Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2017/12/30/murder-by-cop.html
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I noticed that last night. The young man over aged boy who tweeted that he did it was taken into custody per an update this morning.
If he did indeed call that in I hope that he gets removed from society for a long time to come out a better person.
I hope the same for the officer but that one I won’t hold my breath over it.
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INAL but I can tell you the law doesn’t work this way. When you willingly set forth a chain of events that you know can can be dangerous, you’re culpable for what happens as a result. And as an admitted repeat offender they really don’t have a leg to stand on. They better hope they can get a good lawyer.
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This would imply that the police respond to random calls about “hostage situations” with intrusive physical force straight away, rather than any attempt at dialogue with any perps first. Really?
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WTF is wrong with police procedures in the US? Everywhere else, the best outcome for any operation is “no shots were fired, nobody got hurt, (suspects apprehended).” Did someone decide at some point: Fuck it, we’ll just shoot people? How did that happen?
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It seems straight forward: A criminal act resulting in homicide, which was a foreseeable consequence.
I don’t know if the person who gave the fake address could be included as conspiracy member. The Pinkerton Rule seems like a place to start looking. (By those real lawyer people.)
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US cops decided the (non-rich) public was their enemy and gradually went from being peacekeepers to a national gang that murders, rapes and robs the citizens with absolute impunity.
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Once a problem has been shot, the problem goes away! The exceptions prove the rule! Michael Douglas showed such restraint in Fatal Attraction. Everyone else would have just blasted Glenn Close at the first whiff of hassle.
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Gun culture. Police have to assume that any random person could be armed, and could start shooting in response to law enforcement showing up. Hell, defending your home against invaders is one of the biggest arguments used by second amendment proponents.
Their solution: SWAT will storm the house at 3 AM, on full attack mode, to try to catch everyone unaware, and will be extremely aggressive about it, shooting any dogs that might not like this intrusion. Best case you have a mess of a house and a dead dog. And if unlucky, and you react badly to having your house broken into, people end up dead.
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Police deciding to act like violent dicks can only be a small part of the story. Who decided they can get away with it? Especially in this case (not dissimilar to the Daniel Shaver shooting), where there was obviously zero reason to initiate violence. An explanation of why juries acquit in these cases would be more elucidating.
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We have a history of Cowboys, not Knights in shining armor.
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It’s grim to realize, but there’s now an entire generation of males in their twenties and thirties who were never taught an iota of rectitude or consequences and don’t understand the difference between gaming and real life, for whom any heinous act feels like pwning noobs in some repetitive virtual playground.
It should go without saying, but I’m not saying all young males, just the multitudes failed by their parents and the prison-education complex, derelict boys without any good guidance or role models.
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Closing out 2017, it’s been a f’ing doozy.
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Yeah, it’s really not so much police deciding to be violent dicks, but rather police being shaped into an armed-to-the-teeth army of private goons for the rich i.m.o. Which will make whatever happens once a majority of people realise that the elite will never, under any circumstance, stop exploiting them to the fullest of their abilities, even more of a mess. One can only hope that the police army will have the sense to turn against their handlers when that happens, but that’s probably unlikely.
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We can only hope that nailing this guy to the wall doesn’t distract us from the important task of nailing Officer Tacticool to the wall.
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It’s sort of like Jury nullification’s evil twin, with a double helping of “beyond a reasonable doubt” and a sprinkle of lawn-order.
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So there are essentially five potentially culpable entities here:
a. Miruhcle, who provided a false address.
b. Baperizer, who contracted the swatting services of Barriss,
c. Barriss, who did the actual SWATting
d. The PD, which didn’t properly assess the threat, and
e. The officer who fired the fatal shot.
Unfortunately for [a], [b] and [c], the authorities will be very eager to try to focus attention somewhere other than on the responsibility of [d] and [e], so they are going to go down extra-hard.
I can’t say I’m too sorry; these asshats got someone killed for no reason at all. But it’ll be too bad if no one takes this opportunity to ask some hard questions about [d] and [e] and SWAT practices in general.
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There’s no real accountability, prosecutors are often reluctant to hold them accountable, police unions are unwilling to hold them accountable and will unflaggingly defend their predatory behavior, politicians are either afraid of them or are trollies like this homicidal boy and Trump, sociopathically cheering on their rape and pillage of the people, and the wealthy are mostly insulated by their political influence. Everyone else is a sitting duck.
IANAL, but I think there are a few reasons. Jury bias is a strong factor, but probably stronger is prosecutors and the judiciary cooperating to present and bar evidence in such a fashion as to construct a narrative that always casts doubt on the guilt that the unsequestered public, with less fettered access to information, can see clearly.
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Plenty of blame to go around here. A collection of idiots got an innocent man killed. The cops’ explanation doesn’t justify the shooting. The victim was obviously confused about what was happening. The cops’ summary of the encounter:
“Livingston said when the door opened, officers gave Finch commands to put his hands up and walk toward them. He complied for a “very short time” and put his hands back down. He raised them again, and then lowered them for a second time, Livingston said.
“The male then turned towards the officers on the east side of the residence, lowered his hands to the waistband again, then suddenly pulled them back up towards those officers at the east,” he said. “The officers on the north side of the street feared the male pulled a weapon from his waistband, retrieved a gun and was in the process of pointing it at the officers to the east. Fearing for those officers’ safety, the officer on the north side fired one round.”
Read more here: http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article192281169.html#storylink=cpy
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Seems like these days you could track the call and see if it is located at that address??
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