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Hypothetical situation. There is currently a policeman in Charlotte, 180 miles from Charleston, that was charged with murder and fired from the CMPD for shooting an unarmed Black Man. There is no video. The policeman was charge almost immediately.
It remains to be seen whether the system will work in Charlotte. My understanding is that there is dash cam that the police fought tooth and nail not to release. The police union is supporting the murderous cop. There were other cops on the scene. And many cops support his claim of self defense. The cop hasn't been tried yet. So we will see. I will be very surprised if he is convicted of anything.
I stand by my assertion that he's not a bad cop UNTIL proven otherwise by something other than just this shooting. Something happened to this cop to make him think shooting was ok. Now if evidence comes out that he's a "cowboy" or has had multiple incidents in his past then ok, I'll agree with you but until that time it was a bad decision for unknown reasons.
There is a possibility that the cop went too far. But clearly Schlager isn't going to litigate this in the press. His lawyers probably won't let him, so we'll have to wait to hear his side of the story.
In my view, black lives do matter (see thread on that subject). All killings of all people should be taken seriously, even where a black kills a black.
Consider this, for a moment: what if there were no bystander video? The same events transpire, but nobody happens to walk by and start filming. That is a problem that we must solve. This cannot be the bar for holding police accountable for their conduct.
Before I make this point I just want to say that I am in absolutely no way saying that simply running from the police gives them a valid reason or an excuse to shoot anyone.
Now that I have gotten that out of the way, it seems to me that everyone of these cases seems to involve someone either attempting to flee from the police or resisting in some way. The easiest way to start to hold bad police officers accountable for their actions is to in absolutely no way shape or form escalate the situation and potentially turn a situation into one where someone is more likely to make a deadly mistake. Again running from the cops doesn't give them a reason to shoot you but it sure is going to make it more likely to find yourself in a situation where for whatever reason you end up getting shot.
I think (at least hope) that all or at least most police cars across the country are equipped with dash cams which should be recording the scene, by running away you voluntarily give up a key piece of evidence that can hold cops accountable for their actions. When someone runs away from the police, especially into an area where there is no one else around and the situation turns bad they have essentially turned the potential case into a he/she said he/she said, where they may not be alive to tell the story. At that point the only thing left to tell their side of the story is the forensics which may not tell the true story. It is unfortunate but it makes it a hell of a lot easier for a dirty cop to get away with their actions and potentially cost more people their lives later.
A sad but true fact is that there are always going to be bad cops, just like there are always going to be bad lawyers, doctors, judges, politicians, secretaries, and janitors. Bad people will always be in every part of our society. The goal should obviously be to attempt to weed out as many of them as possible, but no amount of training, back ground checks, or whatever other safe guards exist will ever be able to weed them all out.
It remains to be seen whether the system will work in Charlotte. My understanding is that there is dash cam that the police fought tooth and nail not to release. The police union is supporting the murderous cop. There were other cops on the scene. And many cops support his claim of self defense. The cop hasn't been tried yet. So we will see. I will be very surprised if he is convicted of anything.
Your source is incorrect. Like SC, it is against the law for any municipality in NC to sign collective bargaining agreements with any union. i.e. There is no police union for Charlotte. There is a law enforcement association, but it has no power or say in the CMPD.
The two other cops at the scene were Black and at least one of them fired their tazer into the suspect. It should also be noted the Charlotte police chief is Black. You are correct about the video. Nobody has seen it except the defense.
The cop is due his day in court. Unlike what you seem to suggest the USA does not operate kangaroo courts where the suspect is assumed guilty and then facts are picked to to support it. He may very well be innocent of the charges but the fact remains, he WAS indicted, charged, and fired from the police force with no volunteer video. Your commentary "murderous cop" suggests that you have no objectivity in the matter.
1. A judge has been assigned for the Slager trial and all pre-trial motions. In South Carolina, the SC Supreme Court can choose to choose a judge to assign to a case vice it being randomly assigned by the rotation. They chose Judge Clifton Newman, who is not local to the Charleston area.
2. The passenger in the car has his attorney do some interviews on local media. He says they were on the way to a cookout when stopped and he did not know why Scott decided to run. Per the passenger, Scott tried to phone his family right before he got out of the car and ran. The passenger remained in the car. He heard what he described as a taser sound followed by several gunshots. He did not see any of the confrontation.
3. The Black Lives Matter group is having some issues with each other (national vs. local). They came up with new demands (national). Local BLM has asked for citizen review boards with the power of subpoena (that last part not allowable by law). The national BLM group wants the Police Chief Driggers to resign and wants half of the NCPD's budget to go to non-police community activities.
4. SLED has released some information about their investigation. They were denied interviews with Slager immediately following the shooting via Slager's attorney. It was two days before they could interview Slager at his attorney's office. At this point, SLED already had the video and forensics showing the discrepancies between Slager's official report and what the scene showed - as documented in their records and reports. They arrested and charged Slager at the conclusion of this interview. Of note, while Slager refused to speak with SLED after the shooting, his attorney went to every local media outlet almost immediately after the shooting putting Slager's "version" out there. This attorney eventually quit after the release of the video and has since been replaced by local defense attorney (who LOVES big media cases), Andy Savage.
Now my opinions on a few things:
I did some research on this Black Lives Matter group and I'm not thrilled with their "demands" on a larger/national scale. One of the things they ultimately want is to have no police whatsoever and to change to a self-policed type of society. This is both unrealistic and ridiculous on its face. If this is their ultimate goal, I can't imagine why anyone would support them. From their national group's Tumblr page #BLACKLIVESMATTER : Photo
As to the narrative the national media wants to continue to push about Slager wouldn't have been charged if not for the video, I think this is inaccurate. At this point, SLED already knew Slager's account did not remotely match the forensics of the scene. Did the video make SLED's job easier? Yes but the national media is pushing a narrative that doesn't appear to be true - I'm looking at you CNN!
That is laughably wrong. Criminally negligent homicide is when the killing is an accident. This killing was obviously not accidental--it was intentional. That puts it in the murder/manslaughter bucket. South Carolina does not have degrees of murder. Murder is a killing with malice aforethought, defined here by the S.C. Court of Appeals:
"These four possibilities [for malice] are intent to kill, intent to inflict grievous bodily harm, extremely reckless indifference to the value of human life (abandoned and malignant heart), and intent to commit a felony (felony murder rule)."
You've got intent to kill here--he fires 8 .45-caliber pistol shots at a man who is running away. Murder is the proper charge.
Consider this, for a moment: what if there were no bystander video? The same events transpire, but nobody happens to walk by and start filming. That is a problem that we must solve. This cannot be the bar for holding police accountable for their conduct.
I would change the word "police" to the word "people". All people will lie,inflate,massage,contort or omit parts of a story to keep themselves out of serious trouble. It's not just a police thing, a white or black thing, it's a human thing.
So, when it comes to those that are supposed to enforce the rules what do we do? That is the problem that needs to be addressed.
Before I make this point I just want to say that I am in absolutely no way saying that simply running from the police gives them a valid reason or an excuse to shoot anyone.
Now that I have gotten that out of the way, it seems to me that everyone of these cases seems to involve someone either attempting to flee from the police or resisting in some way. The easiest way to start to hold bad police officers accountable for their actions is to in absolutely no way shape or form escalate the situation and potentially turn a situation into one where someone is more likely to make a deadly mistake. Again running from the cops doesn't give them a reason to shoot you but it sure is going to make it more likely to find yourself in a situation where for whatever reason you end up getting shot.
I think (at least hope) that all or at least most police cars across the country are equipped with dash cams which should be recording the scene, by running away you voluntarily give up a key piece of evidence that can hold cops accountable for their actions. When someone runs away from the police, especially into an area where there is no one else around and the situation turns bad they have essentially turned the potential case into a he/she said he/she said, where they may not be alive to tell the story. At that point the only thing left to tell their side of the story is the forensics which may not tell the true story. It is unfortunate but it makes it a hell of a lot easier for a dirty cop to get away with their actions and potentially cost more people their lives later.
A sad but true fact is that there are always going to be bad cops, just like there are always going to be bad lawyers, doctors, judges, politicians, secretaries, and janitors. Bad people will always be in every part of our society. The goal should obviously be to attempt to weed out as many of them as possible, but no amount of training, back ground checks, or whatever other safe guards exist will ever be able to weed them all out.
Two points in response:
1) Maybe the victim ran because he had good reason to fear for his life. Maybe not, and he made a mistake. Unfortunately, he's not alive to tell us why he ran. While I think that running or resisting officers can be a stupid mistake, you are very correct that it is not a valid reason or excuse to shoot. An officer should only shoot when there is reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury to him/herself or others.
2) I do not believe, for a moment, that we should ignore reform because "there will always be bad cops." There are bad cops in every country, yet we know that other countries have a very tiny number of killings by police each year--especially in comparison to the numbers in the United States.
1) Maybe the victim ran because he had good reason to fear for his life. Maybe not, and he made a mistake. Unfortunately, he's not alive to tell us why he ran. While I think that running or resisting officers can be a stupid mistake, you are very correct that it is not a valid reason or excuse to shoot. An officer should only shoot when there is reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury to him/herself or others.
2) I do not believe, for a moment, that we should ignore reform because "there will always be bad cops." There are bad cops in every country, yet we know that other countries have a very tiny number of killings by police each year--especially in comparison to the numbers in the United States.
I don't put much stock in the China figures, but Canada, Germany, and the UK have robust reporting requirements.
To your first point, watching the dash cam footage from the Scott incident in particular unless something major happened that the footage did not show (and that we couldn't hear) I can not see any way that Mr. Scott had any valid reason to feel for his life. I can say that prior to Mr. Scott running that traffic stop was a heck of a lot more pleasant that 2 of the 3 times I have been involved in a traffic stop, although obviously things soon changed. Speaking to your point on a broader spectrum, you may have a valid point although I am not sure how many of these incidents it would apply to. However I don't really see how running is going to make the situation any better. As my dad told me when I was younger you may be able to out run a cop on foot, you may be able to out run him in your car, but you can't out run his radio. By running you just increase the chances that something bad happens.
To your second point, I hope that I did not give you the impression that I was implying that reform should not take place. I may have not been exactly clear in what I was trying to say which was that I think the best way to start reform is to hold the bad police officers accountable. While I am not an attorney I can imagine that it is a heck of a lot easier to create reasonable doubt when there is no video and one side isn't alive to tell their story. Not being able to successfully prosecute bad cops costs more lives, not only is the particular bad cop once again free to walk around (whether he is still employed as a police officer or not) it potentially sets a precedent to make other bad/potentially bad cops think that they can get away with killing other people. Holding cops accountable is the absolute best way in my opinion to achieve reform (or at least start to achieve) at least in my opinion, but this does not mean that we can lower the standard for proving guilt (although I wouldn't argue with you that in come cases good will towards police can actually create an even higher standard for the prosecution to meet).
The other option that I see is to create more rules and regulations to try and prevent these shootings. I would actually argue that doing so could potentially make the situation worse for a few reasons. First creating new procedures that police officers are to adhere to in situations can just increase the amount of information that they are trying to process in a short period of time where they are facing a potentially hostile or escalating situation. Adding more to their plate in the heat of the moment could very well lead to them panicking more often and making more poor decisions. Secondly as we see with everything in government (and in life really) rules and regulations always come with loop holes, no matter how hard those who are crafting the R&Rs try to prevent it. More loop holes=more bad cops not being punished for their actions.
To your first point, watching the dash cam footage from the Scott incident in particular unless something major happened that the footage did not show (and that we couldn't hear) I can not see any way that Mr. Scott had any valid reason to feel for his life. I can say that prior to Mr. Scott running that traffic stop was a heck of a lot more pleasant that 2 of the 3 times I have been involved in a traffic stop, although obviously things soon changed. Speaking to your point on a broader spectrum, you may have a valid point although I am not sure how many of these incidents it would apply to. However I don't really see how running is going to make the situation any better. As my dad told me when I was younger you may be able to out run a cop on foot, you may be able to out run him in your car, but you can't out run his radio. By running you just increase the chances that something bad happens.
To your second point, I hope that I did not give you the impression that I was implying that reform should not take place. I may have not been exactly clear in what I was trying to say which was that I think the best way to start reform is to hold the bad police officers accountable. While I am not an attorney I can imagine that it is a heck of a lot easier to create reasonable doubt when there is no video and one side isn't alive to tell their story. Not being able to successfully prosecute bad cops costs more lives, not only is the particular bad cop once again free to walk around (whether he is still employed as a police officer or not) it potentially sets a precedent to make other bad/potentially bad cops think that they can get away with killing other people. Holding cops accountable is the absolute best way in my opinion to achieve reform (or at least start to achieve) at least in my opinion, but this does not mean that we can lower the standard for proving guilt (although I wouldn't argue with you that in come cases good will towards police can actually create an even higher standard for the prosecution to meet).
The other option that I see is to create more rules and regulations to try and prevent these shootings. I would actually argue that doing so could potentially make the situation worse for a few reasons. First creating new procedures that police officers are to adhere to in situations can just increase the amount of information that they are trying to process in a short period of time where they are facing a potentially hostile or escalating situation. Adding more to their plate in the heat of the moment could very well lead to them panicking more often and making more poor decisions. Secondly as we see with everything in government (and in life really) rules and regulations always come with loop holes, no matter how hard those who are crafting the R&Rs try to prevent it. More loop holes=more bad cops not being punished for their actions.
On reform, I agree with you that holding police accountable for misconduct is at least a major and important way to improve overall policing. There are at least a few ways to do that: 1) bodycams with punishment for not using them (which also have the effect of providing evidence of police conduct in cases that are otherwise based on the officer's word), 2) police disciplinary proceedings with a much lower bar than criminal conviction and with potential for serious career consequences, 3) federal analysis of department performance with rewards and punishment--withholding or providing federal funding for police departments based on their performance on various metrics (e.g., robust reporting of officer use of force, robust police conduct investigation procedures, state-of-the-art use of force guidelines, improvement in use of force statistics, adequate officer performance reviews, etc.).
You know what? I just slowed down the video, as much as I could without special equipment, and if you play around with pausing it within the 1:25 time frame what really happened becomes very ambiguous before you notice the taser lying on the ground. So maybe this should really be a manslaughter case. Just my personal opinion after a closer review.
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