Let's be real. Andrew Brown was shot because he was fleeing not because he posed a threat

[StarfishSaver]

That is blatantly illegal.

[walkingman]

1. No doubt - how can anyone support such a thing? Shameful.

[aeromanKC]

2. The DA practically said as much

The DA said that the officers duty was to bring him in dead or alive. (paraphrased)

[WhiskeyGrinder]

3. Yep. And if cops aren't controlling something, they see it as a threat. Particularly when it comes

to Black people.

[EarlG]

4. He was shot in the back while running away

Just saw the video.

The DA kept making a point during his press conference about how the deputies couldn't let Brown go in that moment -- they were "bound" to arrest him because they had a judicial warrant instructing them to do so. Therefore once he started fleeing they couldn't let him go. What?

Clearly Brown should have submitted to arrest in the first place, but shooting someone in the back while they're running away is not how we do things -- unless the person being shot is clearly an imminent threat to others, like if he's carrying a bomb or something.

In this case the cops put more people in danger than Brown did when they fired 14 shots towards occupied houses. The DA said they found one bullet in a house afterwards.

[StarfishSaver]

6. He claims that if he doesn't stop and submit to arrest, the car becomes a deadly weapon

Last edited Tue May 18, 2021, 05:28 PM - Edit history (1)

Bullshit.

It is illegal to kill a fleeing suspect. Claiming they are fleeing in a car and that makes it a deadly weapon is ridiculous.

This is one of the reasons that, while Happy with the George Floyd verdict, many of us tempered our joy because we knew it was an aberration. What we saw today is the overwhelming norm.

[WarGamer]

24. their "excuse" is the cop standing in front of the car.

[StarfishSaver]

25. Yes. "Excuse" in quotes being the operative term

[WarGamer]

26. Cops have a list of "excuses" aka "justifiers"

[mcar]

46. The short clip clearly shows the cop easily getting out of the way

The claim of bodily harm is laughable.

[Mr.Bill]

54. The DA said the car

was a deadly weapon even when stationary.

[lame54]

9. If he submitted to arrest he still may have been shot...

Based on previous incidents

[EarlG]

12. True

But the cops do have a legal right to arrest people. If you're under arrest, you're under arrest.

What the cops don't have the right to do is murder fleeing people who are not posing a danger to anyone, just because the cops would prefer they don't get away in that moment.

The fact that substantial numbers of Black people get killed AFTER submitting to arrest (or while trying to submit to arrest) is certainly a related problem though.

[lame54]

14. His mindset and decision making in that moment...

Would have been much different than mine

His shoes are not mine and that is the great divide

[Mr.Bill]

55. Or had someone kneel on his neck for nine minutes. n/t

[dsc]

5. Actually in some jurisdictions it is unbelievably not

at least if the person has a gun. PBS is running a fascinating documentary Philly DA which is about the reform minded DA who is up for reelection today. One of the episodes is a police involved shooting and in PA cops can legally shoot a fleeing suspect if the suspect is armed. I live in NC but do not know the law in that regard here.

[StarfishSaver]

7. Of course, there are exceptions

But it is illegal to shoot a fleeing suspect simply because they are fleeing in order to stop them from getting away unless they pose an immediate risk to the officers or others. Driving away in a car doesn't even come close to posing that kind of risk.

[dsc]

8. In Philly it didn't have to immediate

that is my point. They only had to have had a gun at some point not still have it.

[StarfishSaver]

10. Not true. This is not a jurisdiction by jurisdiction issue. It applies nationwide

The US Supreme Court has ruled that it is illegal to shoot a fleeing suspect unless they pose an immediate risk of deadly harm. Running away from the police is not justification for the use of lethal force anywhere in the United States, nor is the fact that an unarmed fleeing suspect may previously have had a gun.

[Blanks]

13. If a suspect fleeing is dangerous because of the danger inherent in driving a vehicle...

Someone needs to look more closely at the cops use of their vehicles. Cops jump in their cars and start dangerously chasing people all the time.

I’d rather they used their radios to catch people who are fleeing than put everyone on the road in danger by chasing someone for a minor traffic violation.

[StarfishSaver]

15. If a suspect in a car is inherently dangerous

Cops would be shooting people ALL the time.

This is pure bullshit.

[Blanks]

18. Yes, it is. eom

[uponit7771]

30. RIGHT !!! The DA laid the case that everyone in a car should get shot when a LEO is around

[FarPoint]

11. That news briefing was not about truth...

It smelled of dung and complete cover-up for LEO.

Stand your ground spew.

[Tndem615]

16. So if the police have surrounded

The car, trying to get him out, and he flees, it’s the cops fault they were standing in front of the car, right?

[gldstwmn]

19. That's not what happened.

[Tndem615]

20. You didn't see the video then

Be that as it may, perhaps we should ban police from having a full 360 coverage of the car. In high speed pursuits, most places mandate leaving the vehicle an”out” to keep from this very thing from happening. I’m betting the feds will mandate this at some point on all police actions.

[uponit7771]

31. The cop didn't stand in front of the car, that's the still the DA showed which was bullshit when the

... video ran seeing the cop was out of the way.

Bottom line, they used the scantest metric to justify danger to themselves.

[gldstwmn]

17. If there's nothing to hide

then show the video.

[Tndem615]

21. They did

[gldstwmn]

22. I meant the whole video

not thirty seconds.

[Tndem615]

23. Well

You saw Mr. Brown attempt to get away from the police, then get killed. That’s pretty much it. I dunno if the police pre raid safety briefing was filmed, or the coroner making the location later was either.

[StarfishSaver]

27. "Trying to get away from the police" is not a valid reason for being shot

[gldstwmn]

28. Thank you.

It was a small town drug raid based on hearsay with an execution at the end. I'm not sure any of that was justified.
Those cops looked like some sort of old school hanging posse.

[Tndem615]

29. What

If that involves running over a police officer?

[uponit7771]

33. avoiding hitting a LEO isn't "running over a police officer" none of that bullshit passed the smell

... test from the still that was shown.

This should go to a jury, let them decide the intent not the DA

[Tndem615]

38. Use of deadly force

Be it a car or a gun is still deadly force.

[StarfishSaver]

47. Driving a car is not "using deadly force" in every circumstance

Police are not justified in shooting anyone they encounter just because they are in a moving car.

If you're going to pop up on DU to defend police officers who shot a suspect in the back of the head, you need to come up with better arguments than this.

[mcar]

48. Show me where any cop in that short clip

was in danger of being run over?

They shot a barrage of bullets into a fleeing vehicle. They were not in danger.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

53. They killed him well after he was clear of the cops.

They shot him in the back of the head while he was fleeing and no one was in danger.

[gldstwmn]

57. Again, that's not what happened.

[gldstwmn]

58. Shooting a fleeing suspect in the back

is illegal according to the Supreme Court. That might be a good fact based lesson for your students.

[Bettie]

59. No police officer was run over

Not one. Not even close.

So, find another excuse since the cop wasn't even close to being harmed.

[StarfishSaver]

61. If a cop thinks someone is about to run him over with a car, he doesn't need to shoot him

Just get out of the damned way.

Simple

[Bettie]

62. Yep..

you'd think that would be obvious...and yet, there's always at least one, in every thread insisting that the dead guy was entirely at fault.

[uponit7771]

32. +1, the fact that people STILL would post that is gob smacking !! Its against the law to shoot...

... people in the back of anything.

[Bettie]

60. The people who post that

are the ones who fly "blue line" flags and who will defend just about any extrajudicial execution of a brown or black person.

[StarfishSaver]

63. Yep.

He should have complied

He should have complied faster

He complied too fast

He shouldn't have run away

He shouldn't have been out that time of night

He threw away the gun too fast

He shouldn't have tried so hard to breathe

He broke the law by selling loose cigarettes so anything that happened to him is his fault

Her ex-boyfriend was a drug dealer

It's wrong to jump to conclusions. So I'm going to keep an open mind and assume the cops were justified unless someone proves to me they weren't.

[Bettie]

64. And yet a white man who drives away with a cop stuck in his car window

and, while driving, hits said cop in the head repeatedly with a hammer is taken in just fine, because he poses no threat to the cop.

FFS...it seems like the worst elements of our society are winning.

[StarfishSaver]

65. If they're winning it's because they're getting a huge assist from people on our side

[uponit7771]

34. "That's pretty much it." ... this is false on its face

[LanternWaste]

42. Moving goalposts does little for your argument.

[Humanist_Activist]

35. Yep, ACAB oh, and that includes the rest of the "Justice" system.

Fucking white supremacist pieces of shit.

[Tndem615]

36. Oooof

What’s that based on?

[StarfishSaver]

37. If you have to ask, you'll probably never understand the answer

Welcome to DU ...

[Tndem615]

39. Educate me brah

That’s why I’m here

[StarfishSaver]

40. You need to be educated on the fact that the justice system is full of white supremacists?

(I'm not a "brah&quot

[Tndem615]

41. I always

Tell my students to base arguments off fact, not emotions, or perceptions. You made a racist statement based off emotions. Our school interacts with government and law enforcement of many levels, and to make the statement that the justice system is “full of white supremacists” only cheapens a much needed discussion on demographic integration of all society.

[StarfishSaver]

44. I did not make the statement you responded to.

You might want to be more precise in your engagements and responses.

[Tndem615]

51. You

Didn’t say law enforcement was full of white supremacists? Full...

[StarfishSaver]

52. I didn't make the statement you originally responded to. But you're right

Last edited Tue May 18, 2021, 09:57 PM - Edit history (3)

I did say that law enforcement is full of white supremacists. The fact that white supremacists and racists are ensconced in police departments across the country and a culture of racial discrimination and abuse has been a reality in law enforcement for decades is a documented fact that I do not need to justify here.

But since you are such a stickler about "basing arguments off fact, not emotions, or perceptions," please explain how saying that law enforcement is full of white supremacists - even if you believe that statement is untrue - is a "racist statement"? What is racist about saying that white supremacists are in law enforcement?

I'll await your explanation. After all, I'm sure you want to be sure you're not making statements based on emotion/perception, not fact that might cheaper a much needed discussion on demographic integration of all society, right?

[Humanist_Activist]

68. Uhm...

https://cpb-us-e1.wpmucdn.com/blogs.uoregon.edu/dist/9/13250/files/2017/11/doc-26-white-supremacist-infiltration-1-110a4e4.pdf

https://theintercept.com/2017/01/31/the-fbi-has-quietly-investigated-white-supremacist-infiltration-of-law-enforcement/

https://theintercept.com/2020/09/29/police-white-supremacist-infiltration-fbi/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/10/fbi-white-supremacists-police-ties-congress

https://abcnews.go.com/US/white-supremacists-seek-affiliation-law-enforcement-goals-internal/story?id=76309051

And this is just when it comes to individual, recent, infiltration of law enforcement by white supremacists. Never mind the systemic issues with law enforcement and courts treating black and white defendants very differently in sentencing and enforcement of laws. For example the Crack/Cocaine sentence disparity, DWB, etc. Its not like this is a secret or even recent, this goes back to the beginning, the first President of the first modern police union still in operation in this country, the Portland Police Association, was a member of the German-American Bund, an OG-Nazi group.

Hell, my own city of St. Louis has two police unions, one official one that represents most the interests of white police officers, and another, unofficial one, that represents the black police officers. Our white officers even get away with damn near beating our black officers to death, because white supremacy is an actual thing.

[TomSlick]

56. I agree. Argument must be based on facts.

However, is it not a fact that far too many police officers do not value black lives? Is it not a fact that police often perceive black people as the enemy or, at least, a threat? Is it not true that local prosecutors are on the "same team" as the local police and often far too willing to justify the killing of black people by the police. Is it not a fact that far too many Americans are willing to give the police the benefit of doubts that do not reasonably exist? Is it not a fact that if Andrew Brown had been a white man, he would likely be alive today?

Now, with which of those statements of fact do you disagree?

[TomSlick]

69. I am disappointed that you did not respond to my post.

I was sincerely interested in your answers to my questions.

[LanternWaste]

43. That's certainly your story, and I'm rather certain you'll stick to it for a while...

"That’s why I’m here..."

[mcar]

49. What does ACAB mean?

Thanks.

[Tndem615]

50. I had to look it up a while back

After seeing it here. It means “All Cops Are Bastards”. It’s a polite way here to show disdain for law enforcement. Like all of them, literally. I’m sure there’s terms for teachers too. I won’t google that.

[Humanist_Activist]

66. Teachers don't regularly shoot black people, there's a reason the song isn't called...

"Fuck the Teacher's Union".

[mcar]

45. My jaw dropped when the DA said

something to the effect of, when the first shot is legit, all the shots are legit.

He also said they were determined to bring him in, when a reporter asked why not let him go and get him later.

Did anyone ask why they sent a SWAT team to deliver a warrant?

[uponit7771]

67. +1, they had a whole what time size force to bring in a non-violent person