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I have been experiencing 'blogger's block' because I didn't want to write up the next item on my blog pile; the content really bothered me. But another news items has made me sufficiently angry that the disturbing one is a piece 'o cake. Well...not really. The disturbing article is from an Aussie paper. The headline: "Victoria Police Execute 15-Year Old Teenager." The synopsis: on a Thursday night, 15-year-old Tyler Cassidy became distraught as teenagers often do. He had more cause than most because his father had recently died of cancer. Taking 2 small kitchen knives with him, Tyler went to a close-by skating park. There was no report of violence; the police were called by his mother simply because she was worried about him; she told them he was in a state of confusion. About 1/2 hour later, three officers shot Tyler to death with no less than 10 bullets. The article warns that the "assassination" is the direct result of recent police training that emphasizes suppressing terrorism rather than protecting citizens -- a training process that is consuming North American police as well. For a less biased account (altho' I agree with the bias expressed), see the Herald Sun's coverage of the funeral. The police claim that Tyler branished a knife and said "I'm going to kill you" and, so, presumably he deserved to be shot to death. The family says "don't believe what you are being told." Perhaps the truth will become evident, perhaps not. In the end, however, it does not matter if the teenager was screaming threats. As the 'biased article explains, 3 grown men have many options to react to a youngster carrying 2 knives, including, but not limited to: * Run away * While backing off take off jacket and wrap around arm * While backing off take off shoes and put on hand * Attempt to calm the distressed teenager by maintaining a non-confrontational posture * Seek to maintain a distance, while waiting for the arrival of a net to be cast upon the target * Throw (chilli) pepper mixed with water into the face of the knife-holding target * countless other options including boomerangs These options were not used -- and probably not considered -- because police are no longer trained to protect. They are trained in military fashion to suppress and to control -- and nothing, nothing is so controlled as a dead body. That is zero-tolerance suppression. Indeed, one of the main reasons civil libertarians argue against conflating the police and the military is because the two serve totally different functions...or, at least, they should. The police should address crimes against person and property, they should defuse situations and protect people; they are public 'servants'. By contrast, the military views the public it confronts as "the enemy" from which it protects itself, often through lefhal force. The military is trained to kill and not to protect, to view the population as 'hostiles' not as equals. And, now, so are the police and all other agents who are part of Homeland Security. So what's the story that angered me? Oscar Grant's family has just sued the SF police for $25 million. Grant was the fellow shot to death in a subway by BART police on New Year's Day. He was unarmed. He was pinned face-down on the ground by one officer (4 were on the scene) when another cop pulled out a gun and shot him in the back. Fortunately, at least three people videoed the incident with cell phones and footage is available on the Internet, where it cannot be suppressed by the police. The fact that Grant was black may also keep the incident from being covered over. Black Voices states, Early New Year's Day in Oakland, Oscar Grant, a 22 year old father, held his hands up and pleaded with the arresting officers not to hurt him because he had a daughter. But once he had been wrestled down to the ground, with one officer's knee in Grant's neck area, a second officer stepped back, took out his gun and shot Oscar Grant the back. And then Oscar Grant was handcuffed. And then Oscar Grant died. | |
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