Gene be prepared for a long answer that meanders into Ferguson.
This is an easy one. There is a 14 minute vid out there that shows the entire thing. First of all this is a ticketable offense. Write him a ticket and move on. In fairness there is obviously a history here and I suspect we will learn more about that. The cops and this dude knew each other, and I presume it isn't from Christmass parties.
It's hard to beleive this couldn't have been deescalated by cops without an attitude or the need to puff out their chest and be the absolute everything bad ass and the cigarette dude totally subserviant. It goes back to the it's not always good enough to be right. Sometimes the cost of being right is too great and it's ok to back off a bit. I learned this from my dad and it was strengthened during a high profile public relations battle I was in the middle of (and many smaller ones since).
Since a choke hold is forbidden in New York maybe one should not have been used. That is a pretty simple fix.
As for the DA, the saying that a DA could convict a ham sammich if they want to is over used but true. I saw several former prosecuters speaking last night and to a T every one of them said they had always gotten an indictment when they wanted one and never had they failed to do so. This DA didn't want an indictment or he would have gotten one.
An indictment does nothing more than send it to trial. Why not send it to trial? Maybe the DA knows of a valid reason not to do so. Maybe he is protecting the police. Perception of conflict of interest is often just as bad as a real conflict of interest. I spend much of my professional life mitigating percieved conflict of interest. This is a clear case where that should be done.
A broken clock is right twice a day. I hate to say it because 99.87% of what comes out of his mouth is garbage to be discounted, if not a sign to do the opposite, but Al Shapton is on the right track about one thing. In many cases prosecuting DAs and Police are too close to each other and a percieved conflict of interest, if not a real conflict of interest, exists.
The perception is cops are above the law and their buddy will get them off. It's not what you know it's who you know. The folks in the middle of all this probably beleive/know this is not true. But it is very obvioulsy the perception of many. If it's true we need to fix it, if it is not we need to change the perception. It is a problem whether we beleive it to be true or not.
Maybe we need to find a way that a third party having no ties to the DA or the local cops develop and present the case. For perception if nothing else. Where Al is wrong is I don't think it should be federal and the federal govt needs to get out other than monitoring and making sure localities don't systematically screw folks.
I don't think we need to revamp the entire grand jury process because I think whenever you change laws in the emotion of the moment bad things happen. It's best to slow down. And I think that is one good thing about balance of power and grid lock. This system has been in place since the 1700s and we don't need to rush to change everything based on a few bad results (debateable anyway).
I'm also bothered by the folks that know what the end result should be before the grand jury (although it could be argued in Ferguson and here the grand jury process could have been skipped and gone straight to indictment and in both cases the normal process wasn't followed and was pushed aside in order to present more evidence than usual (presumably to make sure the grand jury has all the evidence but it could be argued it is used to lead them away from an indictment).
I worry about the witch hunt or mob mentality. We should not rush to change anything based on that. And the cops deserve MORE than a fair shot at this. I do beleive they deserve a bit more leeway than the average joe based on their job, need to make split decisions, the fact that they are potentially in harms way every day and we have to assume their posative intent or we should be weeding them out on the front end.
That said with authority comes responsibility and I'm for comming down harder on someone who abuses their authority than someone that has none. That's why the comparisons of a cop of any color abusing power and killing a person of any color to a non cop of any color killing a non cop of any color is silly and irrelevant. It's doing it under the authority of the state that changes the equaiton for me. I think most good cops that don't buy in to their own form of omerta feel similar in that they want all cops to be above reproach and have integrity. it does nothing but help them. I know I hate it when someone in my profession is a turd bag and as a result folks assume I am. (and the catch 22 is if you out them it becomes public thus folks still assume you are a turd bag)
Notice the first thought of color came up in the last paragraph. It's not about color at all to me, but I can see how to some folks it is. It's about community. Ferguson as a community has a relationship problem between the police and the citizens. Not all citizens, but anough to make it a powder keg. What is happening there has been inevitable and in my mind the Brown case is just a flash point to the extent that the details or merits of the specific case don't matter at this point. We try to stake out our ground as to who was right and who was wrong and miss the bigger picture.
The details are very important to Wilson and to the Brown family, but to us we really shouldn't be rooting for either side. I don't know what happened and tend to give the benefit of the doubt to Wilson. There is no video, but as we have seen even when there is the scale is tipped in the cops favor (I could argue it should be, others will say the fix is in). Nobody should be looting or burning things. Why **** in your mess kit? In true fence post fashion I think neither side and neither party has completely clean hands. By staking out ground so clearly and entrenching we insist on a win-lose and in the end get a lose-lose. Until this cycle is broken there will be no resolution. Anyone who has ever negotiated anything of substance requiring an ongoing relaitonship knows this.
This is very clear if you consider anytihng short of wilson going to jail would be a lose for the other side. An indictment would not have been enough. That's not fair because what if, just what if, he did nothing wrong. I think most (with exceptions) on this side are good folks that are acting on emotion\reaction). Something has also been going on in that community that give them a sour view of the police and authority.
The flip side is there is a very vocal group that immediately insist Brown was a thug and its a good thing he's gone. I honestly think this is also emotion/reaction largely to the other side. They want to protect Wilson even though what if, just what if he did something wrong. They will hide behind the "facts" as they see it as long as their facts win out and there is no consideration that the local process might actually be flawed. They jump immediately to the cops must be right and this thug must be wrong. It's a game. If the cop is indicted or found guilty the mob mentality won and the facts were ignored If he isn't isn't indicted, "See the facts are on our side".
lose-lose.
I'm glad Wilson wasn't indicted because I suspect had he gone to trial he would have been aquitted and the band aid pull was fast rather than slow. It's always dangerous to presume intent, but I like to think the DA knew there was no case and that is why he had his assistants lead the grand jury to a non-indictment. He could have just refused to indict but that would have put heat on him. He used the process as a buffer. Maybe he should have let the Governor appoint a impartial Special Prosecuter but then he would have had no control of the outcome. I do beleive he would have gotten an indictment if he so chose and in that regard I can understand the percption of the fix, no justice, conflict of interest brigade (especially given the botched presentation of Missouri Law regarding Police authority to shoot a suspect while they run away).
The case in NYC is more troubleing to me. There was video. I accept that there is more to the story than the video, but the video is pretty compelling. So compelling that the perception of a possible conflict of interest becomes more glaring to me. It smells funny. Maybe it's just a funky cheese that taste good, maybe it's rotten.
The part I can not reconcile is the difference in the communities in terms of their reaction. I'm still processing that one. The initial reaction by the police and the protesters in ferguson to me is very telling. There is a problem there on both sides. To claim it is completely one side or the other is to not really be interested in a solution to a problem much larger than this case.
teedubbya wrote:
