[News] Protests Against Police Violence After Death of George Floyd

Discuss police violence, the victims of police violence (including George Floyd and Breonna Taylor), the Black-led protests against said violence, and related topics.

hbi2k wrote:

That's where the military concept of "dishonorable discharge" comes in handy, I think. Not the legal concept, with its implications for pensions and veteran's benefits and such, but the cultural concept.

For such a culture to be even basically functional, there needs to be acknowledgment that certain behaviors are so egregious that they can result in the offending person's expulsion from the in-group. Treason, murder, sexual assault, they get you kicked out of the fraternity. It's not a perfect protection against such behaviors-- military culture has its own problems-- but it's something.

In police culture, the only thing that can get a cop kicked out of the fraternity of cops-- not officially / legally, but culturally-- is "ratting" on another cop. There is no greater morality being served than "us good, them bad."

What if cops who brutalized civilians were expelled from police culture with the same vehemence that cops who report on cops who brutalize civilians currently are?

I swear I remember sometime in the last... 10ish years "civilized" culture mocking/disparaging the "snitches get stitches" mindset in the black/POC/etc communities. I have never heard similar issues on being against ratting someone out for the police/white/etc communities from those same individuals.
No, I do not wonder why, but I am always incredulous on the lack of self-reflection and realization.

Clumber wrote:

It's why the few bad apples analogy simply doesn't work. Amongst recruits, it's probably a reasonable mix of truly bad people and decent individuals, but conformity and loyalty to the group are all designed to protect those bad apples to the point where the entire core becomes rotten.

That is exactly why the analogy DOES work! The phrase is 'a few bad apples spoil the bunch!' If you have 10 bad cops and 1,000 good cops that help hide and protect the bad cops, you have 1,010 bad cops! The whole bunch is spoiled. Throw them out and start again!

The officer already fired in Breonna Taylor case is charged with wanton endangerment.

Stele wrote:

The officer already fired in Breonna Taylor case is charged with wanton endangerment.

No charges for the other two officers.

Prederick wrote:

Once I saw that the DA was speaking at the RNC, this one was a wrap.

Stele wrote:

The officer already fired in Breonna Taylor case is charged with wanton endangerment.

None of the charges are actually related to the murder of Breonna Taylor. They are for shooting randomly into three other apartments.

No Justice.

Better start boarding stuff up before the out of town white folks start setting fires.

Louisville grand jury indicts 1 of 3 officers in fatal Breonna Taylor police shooting

Courier Journal wrote:

A Jefferson County grand jury has indicted one of three Louisville officers in the March 13 fatal police shooting of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor.

But the charges are for putting Taylor's neighbors in danger, not for killing her.

The grand jury's decision Wednesday:

-- Former detective Brett Hankison was indicted on three counts of first-degree wanton endangerment.
-- Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly was not indicted.
-- Detective Myles Cosgrove was not indicted.

A wanton endangerment charge is a class D felony and carries a penalty of one to five years in prison. The charges read by Judge Annie O'Connell on Wednesday said that Hankison "wantonly shot a gun" into adjoining Apartment 3.

...

The judge set a $15,000 cash bond for Hankson. A warrant has been issued for his arrest.

Cameron said the grand jury decided homicide charges are not applicable because the investigation showed that Mattingly and Cosgrove were justified in returning deadly fire after they were fired upon by Kenneth Walker, Taylor's boyfriend, who has said he didn't know police were at the door.

He said there was "nothing conclusive to say" that any of Hankison's bullets hit Taylor.

If only there was some advanced technology that existed that could match bullets to the gun that fired them.

Rat Boy wrote:

Better start boarding stuff up before the out of town white folks start setting fires.

They started boarding windows downtown on Monday, knowing something was coming.

Best headline I have read on this, from Newsweek:

Brett Hankison, Officer Who Shot Breonna Taylor 10 Times, Not Charged in Her Death, Indicted For Shooting into Other Apartments

Just lays it right out there.

Oh, and since I read it, it was changed to:

"Brett Hankison, Officer Involved in Breonna Taylor Shooting, Not Charged in Her Death, Indicted For Shooting into Other Apartments"

Great job, Newsweek editors. ಠ_ಠ

IMAGE(https://i.ibb.co/qFgF0KV/breonna-taylor-daily-show.jpg)

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...and I'm just realizing that the only officer indicted was indicted because his shooting was so reckless that it endangered the lives of Breonna Taylor's neighbors.

Prosecutors were completely OK with the cops recklessly shooting at Taylor meaning the justice system literally said her life didn't matter as much as her neighbors' lives.

OG_slinger wrote:

...and I'm just realizing that the only officer indicted was indicted because his shooting was so reckless that it endangered the lives of Breonna Taylor's neighbors.

Prosecutors were completely OK with the cops recklessly shooting at Taylor meaning the justice system literally said her life didn't matter as much as her neighbors' lives.

Well, of course. Her neighbors might be white. Taylor definitely isn't.

OG_slinger wrote:

Prosecutors were completely OK with the cops recklessly shooting at Taylor meaning the justice system literally said her life didn't matter as much as her neighbors' WALLS.

r013nt0 wrote:
OG_slinger wrote:

Prosecutors were completely OK with the cops recklessly shooting at Taylor meaning the justice system literally said her life didn't matter as much as her white neighbors' WALLS.

The guy was only charged for the bullets that went into the neighboring white apartment; not the upstairs black apartment.

I have typed ‘burn it down’ and then navigated away from the page half a dozen times now. This is not my fight. This is not even my theater, but God. Damn. does it enrage me. I live in Australia and I am honestly and sincerely dreading November. Please take care of yourselves and your people over there, and know that there are others scattered all over the globe who are thinking of you. There is no more schadenfreude, only fear.

Prederick wrote:
Prederick wrote:

Once I saw that the DA was speaking at the RNC, this one was a wrap.

This is me being kneejerk in the moment. But the ways the laws are written, this was always going to be a difficult case.

The long-awaited decision came amid calls for police reform across the U.S. spurred by the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis and other Black Americans by law enforcement. It also happened against the backdrop of a divisive election season that includes a fight over an open Supreme Court seat and repeated comments from President Donald Trump portraying demonstrators as violent mobs.

The outcome came as no surprise to legal experts, who said murder charges would never stand up in court because the officers were fired at first. Police are shielded by laws and longstanding court rulings that give them wide latitude to use deadly force to protect themselves or others. It’s been rare to charge police with crimes in the death of civilians, and winning a conviction is harder.

“You can’t get justice from a tragedy. What we have is a series of events that culminated in the use of self defense” both by Taylor’s boyfriend and the officers, said Jan Waddell, a Louisville defense attorney. “Just because Breonna was in caught the middle of that and she was the victim of a shooting doesn’t mean that either one of those parties engaged in criminal activity,” he said.

The fact that the officers were not only fired upon first but had a warrant allowing them to legally enter the apartment would have provided them with a powerful defense, experts said. That made Taylor’s case less clear cut than other recent killings that have stirred outrage, like that of Floyd, who died in May after a Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into his neck for several minutes.

Prosecutors will likely even face challenges in securing a conviction against Hankison for wanton endangerment, observers said. The FBI is still investigating potential violations of federal law in the case.

This outcome doesn't surprise me.

It infuriates me. It makes me despair. It is generating a cavalcade of rage and depression and everything in between, and I know my emotions utterly pale in comparison to what so many others are experiencing as a result of this.

But it does not surprise me. Which just angers and saddens me even more.

Prederick wrote:

But the ways the laws are written, this was always going to be a difficult case.

There is a deep poison that infects our system at the roots.

So charge them for lying to get the warrant in the first place.

And then since they had no legal right to be there, they're murderers.

Gremlin wrote:
Prederick wrote:

But the ways the laws are written, this was always going to be a difficult case.

There is a deep poison that infects our system at the roots.

True but the best way to fix it is to vote, is to work for change.

A state representative at that.

And LMPD surrounded a Unitarian Church at curfew last night. They spent an hour or more trying to get legal permission to assault the church and arrest the protestors that were there under asylum.

f*cking nuts, they wanted to breach a church.

Finally they left and let the protestors go home.

Stele wrote:

f*cking nuts, they wanted to breach a church.

Is it a black church? Because obviously those don't count.

(extreme sarcasm, if that's not obvious.)

Body cam footage of Breonna Taylor investigations show LMPD breaking policy multiple times.

Hours of body camera footage from Louisville Metro Police Department officers and SWAT team members paint a telling picture of the immediate aftermath of the police raid in which Breonna Taylor was killed.

The footage, which was obtained by VICE News and documents what was seen by officers who responded to the scene after the shooting, has not previously been made public. It shows officers appearing to break multiple department policies and corroborates parts of Taylor’s boyfriend’s testimony. It also raises questions about the integrity not only of the crime scene but of the ensuing investigation into what happened that night

A long read but worth it. Multiple officers involved in the incident were on site, and still entering crime scene. Others broke policy and left without being escorted by the Public Integrity Unit. One involved officer was interviewing neighbors after. Just a complete clusterf*ck.

Stele wrote:

Body cam footage of Breonna Taylor investigations show LMPD breaking policy multiple times.

Hours of body camera footage from Louisville Metro Police Department officers and SWAT team members paint a telling picture of the immediate aftermath of the police raid in which Breonna Taylor was killed.

The footage, which was obtained by VICE News and documents what was seen by officers who responded to the scene after the shooting, has not previously been made public. It shows officers appearing to break multiple department policies and corroborates parts of Taylor’s boyfriend’s testimony. It also raises questions about the integrity not only of the crime scene but of the ensuing investigation into what happened that night

A long read but worth it. Multiple officers involved in the incident were on site, and still entering crime scene. Others broke policy and left without being escorted by the Public Integrity Unit. One involved officer was interviewing neighbors after. Just a complete clusterf*ck.

Also from the reporting, it sure seems like that at least one of the officers present for the actual raid did have a body-camera. Now, I wouldn't be shocked if it was turned off before hand, but that is a direct contradiction to what the alleged investigation stated.

Grand jury member says Kentucky AG used 'jurors as a shield,' seeks to have transcripts released:

A member of the grand jury in the Breonna Taylor case filed a motion in Louisville, Kentucky, on Monday to have the sealed grand jury transcripts and records released "so that the truth may prevail."

The motion, filed in Jefferson County five days after the jury’s decision was announced, also asks that the jurors be allowed to speak on the case as a matter of public interest, according to the petition.

In the petition, an attorney on behalf of the anonymous juror notes that Kentucky Attorney General David Cameron made public statements that “attempted to make it very clear that the grand jury alone made the decision.”

“The citizens of this Commonwealth have demonstrated their lack of faith in the process and proceedings in this matter and the justice system itself,” the filing said. “Using the grand jurors as a shield to deflect accountability and responsibility for these decisions only sows more seeds of doubt in the process while leaving a cold chill down the spines of future grand jurors.”

Something tells me this isn't going very far and that someone's going to speak about it anyway.

Border Patrol Snipers Were Authorized to Use Deadly Force at George Floyd’s Burial

Vice News wrote:

With hundreds of mourners planning to gather in Pearland, Texas, on June 9 for the burial of George Floyd, local and federal authorities braced for “rioting and looting” in the Houston suburb — and they were willing to use deadly force.

As a horse-drawn carriage took Floyd’s body to its final resting place in Pearland’s Houston Memorial Gardens cemetery, planning records show that at least six “sniper teams” were in place on rooftops and authorized to open fire if the situation spiraled out of control. The records, labeled highly confidential, also state that an FBI surveillance aircraft was flown over the burial, and that “overwatch units” were sent to monitor the crowd for violent “agitators.”

Pearland officials also welcomed a large contingent of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents to the city, including dozens of members of the immigration agency’s militarized tactical unit. Known as BORTAC, it’s equipped with military-grade firepower and commando-style uniforms, and deploys to conflict zones “around the world,” according to the agency.

With the burial occurring in the wake of nationwide protests that in some instances turned violent, city records show that law enforcement prepared for the worst-case scenario in Pearland. The records show local and federal officials were ready and willing to open fire, even as the nation was undergoing a reckoning over systemic racism and excessive use of force by police in the aftermath of Floyd’s death.

The mayor of Houston took pains to emphasize the need for a more peaceful approach, announcing during his eulogy at Floyd’s funeral service that he would ban the use of chokeholds in the city. He also noted that Houston police officers are required to issue a verbal warning before shooting at anyone. In contrast, records show law enforcement in Pearland, about 20 miles south of Houston, had broad leeway to use deadly force during the burial proceedings.

The “rules of engagement” outlined in the documents show that CBP’s tactical unit was “geared up ready to deploy” in response to “verbal aggressive language” by protesters, or the throwing of empty water bottles. If the situation escalated to full water bottles or bricks being thrown, agents were authorized to use “less lethal/gas munitions.” If faced with more aggressive behavior that the officers believed could cause them imminent harm, the documents make clear: “deadly force is authorized anytime.”

That aggressive approach stands in stark contrast to the de-escalation tactics adopted by many police departments in the wake of Floyd’s killing, including bans on the use of tear gas, pepper spray, and rubber bullets during protests.

Pearland city officials planned for up to 60,000 mourners; the final attendance numbered in the hundreds. Around 7,000 people visited Floyd’s casket in Houston.

Ben Crump, an attorney for the Floyd family, said the family was not made aware of the presence of sniper units or CBP agents at the burial. He declined to comment further.

The documents, obtained via a public records request filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas and provided to VICE News, include a PowerPoint presentation detailing local and federal law enforcement preparations for Floyd’s burial in Pearland. The presentation and other records show that while Pearland officials were preparing for potential attacks on the burial procession, the primary concern was civil unrest.

One slide in the presentation describes officers being “stationed for a quick response to rioting and looting.” Another says that if “non-peaceful protesting” were to occur during the burial, CBP’s tactical team would “take up positions around Pearland PD to prevent property loss or damage.” National Guard soldiers were on “ready posture as last line of defense.”

...

That plan included 66 members of the CBP’s tactical squad, known as BORTAC. A CBP spokesman said the unit is “trained in highly specialized tactical emergency and response capabilities,” giving the agents the ability to “rapidly deploy to chaotic environments in which they may encounter uncommon or dangerous situations outside the scope of their normal border enforcement duties.”

But BORTAC has repeatedly faced criticism in recent months after being sent to Portland, Oregon, and other cities with large civil rights protests. Critics have claimed the outfit is straying far from its mission to protect the border and serving instead as President Trump’s secret police force. According to CBP, the unit was created in 1984 to quell riots at immigration detention centers, but in the years since it has become CBP’s equivalent to the Navy SEALs.

...

CBP wasn’t the only federal law enforcement agency with a presence at Floyd’s burial. The records say that “the FBI had a fixed wing asset aloft during the event,” an apparent reference to the type of small surveillance aircraft spotted flying over the protests in Minneapolis in the aftermath of Floyd’s death, a development first reported by Motherboard. Such aircraft carry sensitive equipment that can track the movement of people on the ground below, and have been used on counter-narcotics missions and in Iraq and Afghanistan.

On June 9 — the same day the FBI plane was circling above Floyd’s burial service — 35 members of Congress sent a letter to the bureau’s director warning of “the chilling effect of government surveillance” on peaceful protests, and demanding a halt to the practice.

A spokesperson for the FBI did not comment.

The Pearland records indicate that the Texas Department of Public Safety also flew a surveillance aircraft over the burial procession, and “multiple” agencies had drones or “Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems” in the sky monitoring activities below. Some of the drones, according to the memo to Pearland’s city manager, were “used to capture footage of the event for post-operational purposes.”

Despite the fears of unrest, Floyd’s burial in Pearland turned out to be peaceful. One person was briefly detained for assault but released after the victim declined to press charges. A bomb scare at the mausoleum where Floyd was entombed turned out to be a false alarm. Firefighters helped 20 people who suffered from heat stroke or similar illnesses.

DHS needs to be gone.