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Cops Gone Wild - Killing Elderly Black Cancer Survivors Edition
AngelHedgie
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Registered User regular
I have no words for this:
Yeah, let me repeat what the police chief says at the end:
(sound of head hitting desk. Repeatedly.)
People wonder why fellows like Thanatos have...issues when it comes to the police. Stories like this are the reason why. The police chief thinks he's saying nothing wrong with his above comment. And as long as he doesn't have any repercussions for it, why should he change that belief?
Race may be factor in police shooting of unarmed elderly man
By Howard Witt | Tribune correspondent
March 13, 2009
HOMER, La.—On the last afternoon of his life, Bernard Monroe was hosting a cookout for family and friends in front of his dilapidated home on Adams Street in this small northern Louisiana town.
Throat cancer had robbed the 73-year-old retired electric utility worker of his voice years ago, but family members said Monroe was clearly enjoying the commotion of a dozen of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren cavorting around him in the dusty, grassless yard.
Then the Homer police showed up, two white officers whose arrival caused the participants at the black family gathering to quickly fall silent.
Within moments, Monroe lay dead, shot by one of the officers as his family looked on.
Now the Louisiana State Police, the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department are swarming over this impoverished lumber town of 3,800, drawn by the allegations of numerous witnesses that police killed an unarmed, elderly black man without justification—and then moved a gun to make it look like the man had been holding it.
"We are closely monitoring the events in Homer," said Donald Washington, the U.S. attorney for the Western District of Louisiana. "I understand that a number of allegations are being made that, if true, would be serious enough for us to follow up on very quickly."
Yet the Feb. 20 Homer incident was not an isolated case. Across the nation, in four cases in recent months, white police officers have been accused of unprovoked shootings of African Americans in what civil rights leaders say are illustrations of the potentially deadly consequences of racial profiling by police.
In the mostly white Houston suburb of Bellaire, a 23-year-old black man sitting in his own SUV in the driveway of his parents' home was shot and wounded on New Year's Eve by police who mistakenly believed he had stolen the vehicle. The case is under investigation.
In Oakland, a transit police officer has been charged with murder for allegedly shooting an unarmed black man in the back while he was restrained and lying face down on a train platform on New Year's Day.
In New Orleans, nine police officers are under investigation in the New Year's Day death of a 22-year-old black man who was struck by 14 bullets after an undercover team stopped his car. The police say the man raised a gun and fired at them, but the man's family disputes that.
"All the anecdotal information demonstrates that African Americans are the most frequent victims of zealous, inappropriate police activity that often winds up in a shooting," said Reggie Shuford, a senior attorney with the racial justice program at the American Civil Liberties Union. "It's a shoot first, ask questions later approach to policing."
The evidence is not merely anecdotal. The most recent national analysis from the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics shows that blacks and Hispanics were nearly three times as likely as whites to be searched by police—and blacks were almost four times as likely as whites to be subjected to the use of force.
Psychologists are stepping up research into the implicit, unconscious racial biases that may be driving such statistics and affecting police behavior.
"If in fact police have implicit biases—if they automatically associate blacks with crime—then that would be relevant to an officer in a split-second, shoot-or-don't-shoot situation," said Lorie Fridell, a criminology professor at the University of South Florida who is creating a new anti-bias police training program with funding from the Justice Department. "Is the officer more inclined to believe he sees a gun in the hand of a black person, rather than a cell phone? I think that is possible."
In Monroe's case, friends and family members say they still don't understand why the beloved neighborhood patriarch ended up dead.
Four witnesses told the Tribune that Monroe was sitting outside his home in the late afternoon of Feb. 20, clutching a large sports-drink bottle, when two police officers pulled up and summoned Monroe's son, Shawn, for a conversation.
Shawn Monroe has a long record of arrests and convictions for assault and battery, and even though he was not wanted on any current warrants, he took off running into the house. One of the officers, a new hire named Tim Cox who had been on Homer's police force for only a few weeks, chased after him, reappearing moments later in the doorway.
Meanwhile, the witnesses said, the elder Monroe had started walking toward the front door, carrying only his drink bottle, to try to intervene. When Monroe got to the first step on the front porch, the witnesses said, Cox opened fire, striking him several times as adults and children stood nearby.
"He just shot him through the screen door," said Denise Nicholson, a family friend who said she was standing a few feet from Monroe. "After [Monroe] was on the ground, we kept asking the officer to call an ambulance, but all he did was get on his radio and say, 'Officer in distress.' "
As Monroe lay dying, the witnesses said, the second police officer, who has not been publicly identified, picked up a handgun that Monroe, an avid hunter, always kept in plain sight on the porch for protection. Using a police-issue blue latex glove, the officer grasped the gun by its handle, the witnesses said, and then ordered everyone to back away from the scene. The next thing they said they saw was the gun on the ground next to Monroe's body.
"I saw him pick up the gun off the porch," said Marcus Frazier, another witness. "I said, 'What are you doing?' The cop told me, 'Shut the hell up, you don't know what you're talking about.' "
The Homer police maintain that Monroe was holding a loaded gun when he was shot, but they are not commenting further on the case.
At least one fact surrounding the shooting is not in dispute: It took place amid long-standing tensions between Homer police and the residents of Monroe's crime-plagued black neighborhood.
"People here are afraid of the police," said Terry Willis, vice president of the Homer NAACP branch. "They harass black people, they stop people for no reason and rough them up without charging them with anything."
That is how it should be, responded Russell Mills, Homer's police chief, who noted the high rates of gun and drug arrests in the neighborhood.
"If I see three or four young black men walking down the street, I have to stop them and check their names," said Mills, who is white. "I want them to be afraid every time they see the police that they might get arrested. We're not out there trying to abuse and harass people—we're trying to protect the law-abiding citizens locked behind their doors in fear."
Yeah, let me repeat what the police chief says at the end:
If I see three or four young black men walking down the street, I have to stop them and check their names. I want them to be afraid every time they see the police that they might get arrested. We're not out there trying to abuse and harass people—we're trying to protect the law-abiding citizens locked behind their doors in fear.
(sound of head hitting desk. Repeatedly.)
People wonder why fellows like Thanatos have...issues when it comes to the police. Stories like this are the reason why. The police chief thinks he's saying nothing wrong with his above comment. And as long as he doesn't have any repercussions for it, why should he change that belief?
XBL: Nox Aeternum / PSN: NoxAeternum / NN:NoxAeternum / Steam: noxaeternum
AngelHedgie on
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Back to the topic, Im in the same boat as electricitylikesme. Down here in aust I think our racial oppression is much more low key. None of this shooting un-armed coloured folks. Which is surprising, since I have seen plenty of aborginal folks hassling police men around my neighbourhood of west end, mostly worse for the drink or "chromed" off their faces. These police officers also carry loaded weaponry, but either we have calmer police or much more effective govt. conspiracy hushing all up of the shootings.
hrmm, i have been hearing an abnormal number of cars backfiring though........
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
Of all the silly reasons not to record police activity, this is a top five one.
You can't mistake a camera phone for a gun, and making such a video especially when you feel things are fishy is very important. As it is without graphic visual proof (and even WITH it) police are rarely given more than a slap on the wrist in cases like this.
Of course not. They'd be locked behind their doors in fear like good citizens.
Sir, i don't know why but that made me laugh my ass off.
The laughter keeps away the tears.
MWO: Adamski
can't mistake a camera phone for a gun, but a sports-drink bottle? That's a whole different ball game... o_O
http://lexiconmegatherium.tumblr.com/
But you can mistake a water bottle for a gun?
Hmm, apparently the guy who did the shooting was a rookie, and was chasing after someone who had just fled into the house, so maybe the cop thought that he was fetching a gun? I'm rather more critical of the guy who moved the gun, not to mention that police chief :x
Edit: Beaten
I'll be fine, just give me a minute, a man's got a limit, I can't get a life if my heart's not in it.
Funny, i thought the fact the elderly black man exercised his right to bear arms that the police were able to take said weapon and claim he was threatening with it?
... You are assuming, I guess, that the family would expect the police to act responsibility and with due restraint after just murdering their unarmed, elderly grandfather.
Which is a RETARDED assumption.
Very likely, they were either too scared, or too shocked, or grief-stricken, or all of the above to think of whipping out their phones and starting to collect evidence. I'd like to see you have that kind of presence of mind when your father gets gunned down in front of your eyes, kids and presumably screaming and crying, and he's laying right there bleeding to death.
You're being slightly ridiculous.
PSN: ShogunGunshow
Origin: ShogunGunshow
They could have just planted one instead. This way, when the riot breaks out there is a decent chance that someone will just shoot these fuckers.
No that's when the whole family, children included, attack the cops unarmed and then when the news crews get there to hear about how the cops managed to find a whole house full of armed black people, children included, and had some huge glorious shoot out where the cops managed to come out with a few bruises and scrapes would have been ...intriguing.
If you're a dumbass rookie with shit vision and unable to handle stressful situations and someone's walking towards you and you were dropped on the head as a kid.
I mean, it's more likely than a camera phone. By one billionth of a percent.
Infact I've never even HEARD of a shooting of someone trying to document criminal police action with a camera, let alone a camera phone.
Beaten, sure.
Shot? I dunno.
You're right Than, we should fear ever documenting police doing something wrong, and never take a chance to fight injustice.
My god, what was I thinking?
And to the "why didn't anyone videotape this" or whatever people:
Not everyone has a fucking camera on hand.
This is even ignoring the distress of the situation for those involved.
Let's think about this for a moment, there were a bunch of fucking witnesses at the scene, the chances of a cop spotting the camera, deciding to shoot the person to hide the evidence, and none of the other witnesses seeing it is not that high.
Pretty much everyone has a cell phone, and a good size of them have camera phones.
I'm not talking a fucking SLR rig here.
Really?
Hey, I have a phone too. An iPhone even that I pay $110 monthly.
Know what iPhones don't come with?
A video camera.
So what if they saw? They don't know what their talking about.
Again, they just killed one person with no reason in front of these witnesses, and are planting evidence RIGHT IN FRONT OF THEM to tamper with the crime scene.
Why in God's name do you think they would suddenly realize "OH SHIT THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE HERE" and shamefacedly accept being taped?
PSN: ShogunGunshow
Origin: ShogunGunshow
Okay, seriously...someone kills my grandpa i'm going to be shocked. there's no doubt about that but as soon as i see the fucking cop trying to plant evidence that my grandpa had a loaded weapon i'm going to snap into action and get a picture of it. could i die? sure, that cop may just try to blast me and find another random gun to plant on me but hopefully i'd have enough willpower to send the image on my phone to someone, hell anyone.
then again this also stems from the fact that i would like to at least believe that the police are trustworthy. I know the same stupid rhetoric that gets spouted about how corrupt they are. I've met dirty cops in my lifetime, but i've also met those asshole scumbags that try to get out of their convictions because they throw down the race card, frankly i don't want either to be the case but it gets so goddamned hard to tell what true. so i take all these convictions and reports with a grain of salt and try to give both sides the benefit of the doubt.
I qualified that statement later thanks.
A. Two cops, two heads. They can't fucking look everywhere at once. Even an audio recording of the incident would help, which means not even taking out the damn phone.
B. A cop just murdered your loved one and now it planting evidence, you are DAMN RIGHT I'm gonna do everything I can to get evidence of it.
and yes, the second ammendment is designed to prevent this (tyranny) - in theory. In reality it doesn't work because you cannot legally defend yourself from a police officer. If one walks in and starts murdering your family, you are legally obliged to stand and do nothing.
I'm not advocating that anyone should have done that, certainly not, since it's not something that can happen in reality