![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Quite Possibly
Aug. 21st, 2014 09:24 pm"I'll tell you what will happen. They'll have a trial. The white jurors will see it one way, and the black jurors another."
—Geraldo Rivera on Michael Brown shooting
Though I hate agreeing with Geraldo, he's fundamentally correct. Here's the core of the problem: very few people have complete information on what happened, we certainly don't. In some cases grand jurors have the ability to ask for specific information, that may or may not be the case here. I recently found out that after Brown had been shot that a nurse who wanted to attempt CPR on him was denied by the police. That's a pretty serious allegation.
One thing that we do know is that the Ferguson Chief of Police deliberately tried to muddy the waters by releasing the liquor store robbery footage on the same day as a portion of the autopsy report was released.
Sadly, it wouldn't surprise me if the officer does not get indicted by the grand jury. They will look at the appropriate laws, police rules and regulations, the training the officer took, etc. In the end, he might walk. Which will bring in the question of whether the Feds can indict him for violating Michael Brown's civil rights, such as was done in the Rodney King beating.
I'm very curious about the 'suicide by cop' that happened a few days ago four miles from where Brown was killed. A person with a knife is dangerous, if they have a knife out and are within 10' of you and your gun hasn't already been drawn, you're going to get cut before you clear leather. So the officers might have been totally within their rights and policy to shoot him.But one of the officers was still in the patrol car in the passenger seat when he stated shooting, apparently the dead man was leaning in to the car window. If he was that close to the police, why didn't they back up the car to get some distance to give them some room to move tactically? Doesn't make sense. If they'd had some space, they might have been able to use tasers, assuming they'd been issued them. Have one cop with a gun, one with a taser.
But almost any police shooting is a pretty chaotic situation. I have my doubts that the shooting of Michael Brown was a justified shoot, but I don't have the evidence.
ETA: the Thursday night Rachel Maddow Show showed footage recorded by a bystander in the suicide by cop incident (available online). My wife showed it to me. The police said that he had the knife in an overhand position and attacked them. He didn't. The police pulled up in an SUV, the one on the passenger side stayed near the door like he could get behind it for cover. The driver moved further left to flank the suspect. The suspect looked behind him twice, my wife thinks he was checking to make sure there were no bystanders behind him.
And then he was dead. Each officer fired six shots, at least nine hit and were fired in something like three seconds according to the news report. And yes, having been a firearms enthusiast, that's totally doable. And then they rolled the body over and handcuffed it. (Maddow did not show the actual shooting as that is NBC policy)
Apparently the two officers had tasers. They had plenty of time to have used them, which they could do fairly safely by having one officer pull the taser and attempt to subdue the suspect while the other keeps his gun trained. But they didn't, and now he's dead. Just over 30 seconds elapsed between the arrival of the police unit and the death of the man.
*sigh*
I think paraphrasing John Donne here would be appropriate:
"I am a part of mankind, therefore any man's death diminishes me.
So send not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee."
—Geraldo Rivera on Michael Brown shooting
Though I hate agreeing with Geraldo, he's fundamentally correct. Here's the core of the problem: very few people have complete information on what happened, we certainly don't. In some cases grand jurors have the ability to ask for specific information, that may or may not be the case here. I recently found out that after Brown had been shot that a nurse who wanted to attempt CPR on him was denied by the police. That's a pretty serious allegation.
One thing that we do know is that the Ferguson Chief of Police deliberately tried to muddy the waters by releasing the liquor store robbery footage on the same day as a portion of the autopsy report was released.
Sadly, it wouldn't surprise me if the officer does not get indicted by the grand jury. They will look at the appropriate laws, police rules and regulations, the training the officer took, etc. In the end, he might walk. Which will bring in the question of whether the Feds can indict him for violating Michael Brown's civil rights, such as was done in the Rodney King beating.
I'm very curious about the 'suicide by cop' that happened a few days ago four miles from where Brown was killed. A person with a knife is dangerous, if they have a knife out and are within 10' of you and your gun hasn't already been drawn, you're going to get cut before you clear leather. So the officers might have been totally within their rights and policy to shoot him.
But almost any police shooting is a pretty chaotic situation. I have my doubts that the shooting of Michael Brown was a justified shoot, but I don't have the evidence.
ETA: the Thursday night Rachel Maddow Show showed footage recorded by a bystander in the suicide by cop incident (available online). My wife showed it to me. The police said that he had the knife in an overhand position and attacked them. He didn't. The police pulled up in an SUV, the one on the passenger side stayed near the door like he could get behind it for cover. The driver moved further left to flank the suspect. The suspect looked behind him twice, my wife thinks he was checking to make sure there were no bystanders behind him.
And then he was dead. Each officer fired six shots, at least nine hit and were fired in something like three seconds according to the news report. And yes, having been a firearms enthusiast, that's totally doable. And then they rolled the body over and handcuffed it. (Maddow did not show the actual shooting as that is NBC policy)
Apparently the two officers had tasers. They had plenty of time to have used them, which they could do fairly safely by having one officer pull the taser and attempt to subdue the suspect while the other keeps his gun trained. But they didn't, and now he's dead. Just over 30 seconds elapsed between the arrival of the police unit and the death of the man.
*sigh*
I think paraphrasing John Donne here would be appropriate:
"I am a part of mankind, therefore any man's death diminishes me.
So send not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee."
