Lawyer: Officer who shot Philando Castile reacted to gun, not race (bulls**t)

[SummerSnow]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2016/07/09/lawyer-minnesota-cop-reacted-gun-not-race/86894752/



Oh I get it, black people aren't ALLOWED to have guns. Even when the gun is licensed.

[bdwker]

1. That is the biggest load of BULLSHIT ever.

[underpants]

2. Two more BS stories - he was wanted for armed robbery and he did NOT have a concealed weapon permit

Snopes

[Evergreen Emerald]

3. The officer was not white.

It is difficult to talk about this without being attacked so please do not jump to attack or call me racist. I am coming from a perspective in which my family and friends are police officers who do not have an ugly bone in their body and who do their best to help people. Here goes.

Given the state of America, with the proliferation of guns, and officers routinely getting killed for pulling people over for a traffic violation, it is see-able that the officer would be startled when someone does not follow their commands. I also think that there must be an internal belief in which race plays a role in their reaction: not that they are consciously thinking that they are shooting the guy cause he is black, but rather they react differently. When it is a person of color they think "the guy is going to kill me". And when it is a white guy who does not follow the commands, they may not always feel that fear.

I don't know what happened in this specific case before the video started or how it escalated.

But, what happens when the officer asks the person to keep his hands on the steering wheel numerous times, and instead of obeying, the driver reaches behind him? Now at that point, the officer fears for his life. Should the officer wait for the gun? By then it is too late--if there was a gun, he's dead. Why would the officer think that he is up to no good? Perhaps because he did not keep his hands where the officer could see them?

So, to solve this problem (and I agree there is a problem) we start with the stop. Many times these horrific deaths start with a traffic stop and escalate. Why is there an escalation? What exactly happens? What is the thought process of both the driver and the officer? How do we stop that escalation? Why does escalation end in death more for people of color? Dehumanizing all of law enforcement is wrong. It does not solve the problem--it sends people to their us-v-them corners.

[mr_liberal]

6. +1. People here jump to conclusions for political reasons and dont wait for all the evidence. nm

[uponit7771]

12. Red herring, doesn't matter even if he was black. The number of blacks shot by black caps are worse

... Ice Cube wrote verses on this in his raps during the 80s and 90s

[Evergreen Emerald]

13. I agree...why is that?

I don't think it is conscious racism for every officer (some, but not every). I don't believe every officer is thinking that he wants to kill the people of color. I believe that there is something more: "this guy with the gun is going to kill me." Or, "this guy with furtive movements is going to kill me." And, that thought occurs to some officers more when the guy is a person of color.

[uponit7771]

14. I agree,. Mother Jones had an article on this (link)

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/11/science-of-racism-prejudice

[840high]

15. Good post. +1

[puffy socks]

18. ...

"and officers routinely getting killed for pulling people over for a traffic violation, it is see-able that the officer would be startled when someone does not follow their commands. "

Officers are not "routinely killed" for pulling over for traffic violations.

Right now the police are saying they believed the car contained an armed robber, yet they stop the car and saunter up to the window asking for id ? No way any officer with a brain would have been anywhere near that window. They would have pulled the car over and barked commands from their own vehicle.
Does that sound like they truly believed he was the robber with a gun? If they did believe that , why such a stupid move? The cop put himself in a risky situation.
.

"But, what happens when the officer asks the person to keep his hands on the steering wheel numerous times, and instead of obeying, the driver reaches behind him? Now at that point, the officer fears for his life. Should the officer wait for the gun?"


This isnt even remotely close to what happened, so why pull out the straw man?

[MillennialDem]

19. Yep, 500 cops in the last 10 years have been murdered on the job. How many during traffic stops? I

have no idea, but it ain't the full 500.

[Wellstone ruled]

4. Lawyer for Yanez is trying to

spin the narrative,the Ramsey County Attorney is a Nam Refugee and understand he is a no nonsense type of guy.

[Igel]

8. There's not a lot of actual objective evidence presented so far.

There's what the officer said on video. There's what the girlfriend said on video.

While a fair number of people have said she was "narrating events," she was giving her summary while the closing credits to the main event rolled, followed by her reaction when she realized that her boyfriend wasn't just shot in the arm. (Seriously. Unless the bullet hit the bone even I, whose gun experience was using a .22 at scout camp in '74 and using a shotgun to disperse a sparrow with extreme prejudice in '83 or so know that skin and meat don't stop a bullet fired at close range.)

And, to be honest, there shouldn't be a lot of evidence presented so far. It'll be investigated by various and sundy. What's left is disbelief because, well, we already know who's guilty and what the punishment has to be. Unlike some in the past, though, we just don't have the balls to grab the guy and implement the punishment ourselves.

[Bluenorthwest]

11. Mr Choi is Korean American....

John J. Choi made history on January 3, 2011, when he was sworn in as the first Korean-American Chief Prosecutor in the nation.
https://www.ramseycounty.us/your-government/leadership/county-attorneys-office/meet-john-j-choi/biography

[Wellstone ruled]

17. Thank you for the correction.

Heard he is a no nonsense person.

[MohRokTah]

5. The lawyer is setting up for a future jury to find reasonable doubt.

The two words every defense attorney wants to instill in every jury, "reasonable doubt".

This is how cops get away with racially motivated first degree murder.

[malaise]

7. There was a shooting in Colorado last year

People called police to tell them a man was walking around with a rifle - the dispatcher told them they couldn't do anything about it - the man then opened fire and killed several people.

He was white

[Igel]

9. And when shooting started, the situation changed.

Same for the black guy with the gun in Dallas. He walked around for quite a while with no problem. No harassment. No arrest.

But when the shooting started, the situation changed.


The problem with imperfect analogies is that analogies are only good to the extent that what's described is analogical. When the two situations veer apart, the analogy stops holding. Spotting that requires analytical clarity. Emotion and advocacy get in the way of that.

[malaise]

10. The only shooting from that car where

Philando Castile was executed was by cop

[Rex]

16. Why? Was Castile in the process of pulling the gun out? No. Not at all.

How fucking pathetic. Castile said he had a gun and a CCP...I hope the cop that shot him rots in prison one day. ROTS.