Eric Garner

Knowing your personality and way to handle the arrested without mercy, if you get into life of dead trouble nobody will help you either.

“Hands Up, Don’t Shoot!” and “I Can’t Breathe!”


Crossposted from Tikkun Daily by Warren Blumenfeld

A grand jury in St. Louis county Missouri, on November 24, 2014, failed to indict police officer Darren Wilson for the shooting death of unarmed black man, Michael Brown, Jr. in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9, 2014.

Now a grand jury has decided not to indict Staten Island police officer, Daniel Pantaleo, in the July 17, 2014 chokehold death of Eric Garner, a black man who was selling loose cigarettes in violation of New York law.

After my initial outrage and disgust after hearing both these decisions, I am left with so many unanswered questions that I don't know where to begin, but begin I will.

Darren Wilson Case

There is sufficient reason to doubt Darren Wilson's assertion that he was in fear for his life in the presence of Michael Brown, Jr., but for the sake of argument, if Wilson was, in fact, in fear for his life, tell us why he felt compelled to aim approximately twenty bullets at Michael Brown, Jr. hitting him six times with two to the head? Why didn't he aim to slow Brown down, to injure him rather than to kill?

Why did Robert McCulloch, the St. Louis Country prosecutor not recuse himself from the case due to a conflict of interest since his own father, a police officer, was killed by a black man?

Why was the grand jury composed of only three black people compared with nine white people? Yes, I understand that demographically, white people comprise approximately 70 percent of St. Louis country, and they represent Darren Wilson's peers, but what about a grand jury composed more equally of Michael Brown, Jr.'s peers? Did his rights to a "jury of his peers" terminate with his killing?

Why does Ferguson, Missouri have a police force that includes only three black officers and the overwhelming majority composed of white officers in a town of 70 percent black residents?

Why did McCulloch decide to announce the grand jury decision not to indict at 8:00 p.m. after dark? What was his intent? And why did the city of Ferguson concentrate police officers and the National Guard primarily downtown rather than also in the neighborhoods to protect black-owned business from vandalism and destruction?

When a young man is killed over box of smokes, where a smoke screen seems to cover the many still unanswered questions, when a grand jury acquitted an officers on charges in secret proceedings, how can healing begin when the heart is ripped from a community? And how can justice be served when so many questions linger?

Daniel Pantaleo Case

In our nation, as we see the decriminalization of marijuana in state after state, as the federal government has increasingly lowered the penalties for accumulating small amounts of pot, why does New York State maintain a law criminalizing the sale of loose cigarettes? Didn't Eric Garner and others who do so simply conform to a basic tenet of Capitalism by selling legal merchandise at a profit? Take for example the restaurant industry, which buys large quantities of food stuffs, and sells smaller amounts at a profit. Should we pass laws against the food industry as well?

Why did it take a gaggle of officers to confront Eric Garner for simply selling cigarettes? Don't Staten Island officers have more important work to perform? Was Garner's so-called "crime" so serious that the force needed to divert such a large segment of its human resources to confront Garner?

How many more times in addition to 11 would it have taken Eric Garner to utter that he couldn't breathe for Pantaleo to ease his grip on Garner's neck and chest?

With all the increased calls for police officers to wear body cams while on duty to record their interactions with the public, will juries actually consider what they see on video screens in court rooms? This grand jury had the change to witness the actually events in the Pantaleo case, which was clearly recorded by an eye witness, and still, it refused to indict?

Pantaleo argued in front of the grand jury that he "had not intended" to kill Eric Garner. When will we as a nation understand that the burden of proof in many court cases must rest on the impactof an action and not merely on the intentof the person committing the action?

Since prosecutors work closely with police departments, and they depend on police evidence for details in the vast majority of their cases, does it really make sense for prosecutors to lead efforts in investigating the very officers with whom they count on in their work? Is this system itself not a conflict of interest?

Tiered (Teared) System of Justice

"[African Americans are] born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world - a world which yields [them] no true self-consciousness, but only lets [them] see [themselves] through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity." W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, 1903.

For DuBois, this "veil" concept can be taken three ways. First, it suggests the literal darker skin of black people, a physical delineation of separation from whiteness.Secondly, the veil suggests white people's deficiency or inability in seeing African Americans as "true" U.S.-Americans.And lastly, the veil refers to black peoples' difficulty under a racist system to see themselves apart from how white U.S.-Americans define and characterize them.

The veil hanging over African Americans, though, operates like a one-way mirror. They can easily see outward onto white America, and in this way, they develop a "double consciousness." Though not in the truest sense "bicultural," they acquire a realization of "otherness." For emotional and often physical survival, they must learn how to operate in two societies, one black and one white. White people have no such veil wrapped around them, and the mirror makes it difficult for them to perceive the realities of African Americans.

This relative inability of white people to see through the veil was reflected in a Pew Research Study of 1000 people conducted between August 14-17, 2014. It found profound racial divisions between African American and white people on attitudes surrounding the police killing of Michael Brown Jr.

Among the study's finding, fully 80 percent of African Americans compared to 39 percent of white people stated that the fatal shooting "raises important issues about race." Conversely, 47 percent of white people versus 18 percent of African Americans believe that "race is getting more attention than it deserves." In addition, 65 percent of African American and only 33 percent of white people believe the police response went "too far" in the aftermath of the incident.

Blauner wrote earlier of a United States in which there exists "two languages of race," one spoken by black people (and by implication, other people of color), the other by white people. By "language," he refers to a system of meaning attached to social reality, in this instance a "racial language" reflecting a view of the world. This echoes the conclusions of the Kerner Commission report released in 1968 in its study of urban unrest. It stated, in part, that the United States was moving toward two separate societies: one white and one black (though the report left it uncertain where other communities of color fit into this equation).

Can we as a society cut through the vail and begin to know and understand those different from ourselves, to have the ability to walk in the shoes of another, to break down these "us" versus "them" notions that separate? First, we as white people must dismantle the denial systems that prevent many of us grasping our social privileges and the realities of "race" in U.S.-America.

Dr. Warren J. Blumenfeld is author of Warren's Words: Smart Commentary on Social Justice (Purple Press); editor of Homophobia: How We All Pay the Price (Beacon Press), co-author of Looking at Gay and Lesbian Life (Beacon Press); and co-editor of Readings for Diversity and Social Justice (Routledge) and Investigating Christian Privilege and Religious Oppression in the United States (Sense).

To read more pieces like this, sign up for Tikkun Daily’s free newsletter, sign up for Tikkun Magazine emails or visit us online. You can also like Tikkun on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

Priors are not admissible in a trial 90% of the time. Thats a fact. Get the **** over it, asshole. You just got to be a dirty thieving, apple stealing, donut polishing, ******* cop. Suck your service automatic.

“Hands Up, Don’t Shoot!” and “I Can’t Breathe!

Crossposted from Tikkun Daily by Warren Blumenfeld

A grand jury in St. Louis county Missouri, on November 24, 2014, failed to indict police officer Darren Wilson for the shooting death of unarmed black man, Michael Brown, Jr. in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9, 2014.

Now a grand jury has decided not to indict Staten Island police officer, Daniel Pantaleo, in the July 17, 2014 chokehold death of Eric Garner, a black man who was selling loose cigarettes in violation of New York law.

After my initial outrage and disgust after hearing both these decisions, I am left with so many unanswered questions that I don't know where to begin, but begin I will.

Darren Wilson Case

There is sufficient reason to doubt Darren Wilson's assertion that he was in fear for his life in the presence of Michael Brown, Jr., but for the sake of argument, if Wilson was, in fact, in fear for his life, tell us why he felt compelled to aim approximately twenty bullets at Michael Brown, Jr. hitting him six times with two to the head? Why didn't he aim to slow Brown down, to injure him rather than to kill?

Why did Robert McCulloch, the St. Louis Country prosecutor not recuse himself from the case due to a conflict of interest since his own father, a police officer, was killed by a black man?

Why was the grand jury composed of only three black people compared with nine white people? Yes, I understand that demographically, white people comprise approximately 70 percent of St. Louis country, and they represent Darren Wilson's peers, but what about a grand jury composed more equally of Michael Brown, Jr.'s peers? Did his rights to a "jury of his peers" terminate with his killing?

Why does Ferguson, Missouri have a police force that includes only three black officers and the overwhelming majority composed of white officers in a town of 70 percent black residents?

Why did McCulloch decide to announce the grand jury decision not to indict at 8:00 p.m. after dark? What was his intent? And why did the city of Ferguson concentrate police officers and the National Guard primarily downtown rather than also in the neighborhoods to protect black-owned business from vandalism and destruction?

When a young man is killed over box of smokes, where a smoke screen seems to cover the many still unanswered questions, when a grand jury acquitted an officers on charges in secret proceedings, how can healing begin when the heart is ripped from a community? And how can justice be served when so many questions linger?

Daniel Pantaleo Case

In our nation, as we see the decriminalization of marijuana in state after state, as the federal government has increasingly lowered the penalties for accumulating small amounts of pot, why does New York State maintain a law criminalizing the sale of loose cigarettes? Didn't Eric Garner and others who do so simply conform to a basic tenet of Capitalism by selling legal merchandise at a profit? Take for example the restaurant industry, which buys large quantities of food stuffs, and sells smaller amounts at a profit. Should we pass laws against the food industry as well?

Why did it take a gaggle of officers to confront Eric Garner for simply selling cigarettes? Don't Staten Island officers have more important work to perform? Was Garner's so-called "crime" so serious that the force needed to divert such a large segment of its human resources to confront Garner?

How many more times in addition to 11 would it have taken Eric Garner to utter that he couldn't breathe for Pantaleo to ease his grip on Garner's neck and chest?

With all the increased calls for police officers to wear body cams while on duty to record their interactions with the public, will juries actually consider what they see on video screens in court rooms? This grand jury had the change to witness the actually events in the Pantaleo case, which was clearly recorded by an eye witness, and still, it refused to indict?

Pantaleo argued in front of the grand jury that he "had not intended" to kill Eric Garner. When will we as a nation understand that the burden of proof in many court cases must rest on the impactof an action and not merely on the intentof the person committing the action?

Since prosecutors work closely with police departments, and they depend on police evidence for details in the vast majority of their cases, does it really make sense for prosecutors to lead efforts in investigating the very officers with whom they count on in their work? Is this system itself not a conflict of interest?

Tiered (Teared) System of Justice

"[African Americans are] born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in this American world - a world which yields [them] no true self-consciousness, but only lets [them] see [themselves] through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity." W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, 1903.

For DuBois, this "veil" concept can be taken three ways. First, it suggests the literal darker skin of black people, a physical delineation of separation from whiteness.Secondly, the veil suggests white people's deficiency or inability in seeing African Americans as "true" U.S.-Americans.And lastly, the veil refers to black peoples' difficulty under a racist system to see themselves apart from how white U.S.-Americans define and characterize them.

The veil hanging over African Americans, though, operates like a one-way mirror. They can easily see outward onto white America, and in this way, they develop a "double consciousness." Though not in the truest sense "bicultural," they acquire a realization of "otherness." For emotional and often physical survival, they must learn how to operate in two societies, one black and one white. White people have no such veil wrapped around them, and the mirror makes it difficult for them to perceive the realities of African Americans.

This relative inability of white people to see through the veil was reflected in a Pew Research Study of 1000 people conducted between August 14-17, 2014. It found profound racial divisions between African American and white people on attitudes surrounding the police killing of Michael Brown Jr.

Among the study's finding, fully 80 percent of African Americans compared to 39 percent of white people stated that the fatal shooting "raises important issues about race." Conversely, 47 percent of white people versus 18 percent of African Americans believe that "race is getting more attention than it deserves." In addition, 65 percent of African American and only 33 percent of white people believe the police response went "too far" in the aftermath of the incident.

Blauner wrote earlier of a United States in which there exists "two languages of race," one spoken by black people (and by implication, other people of color), the other by white people. By "language," he refers to a system of meaning attached to social reality, in this instance a "racial language" reflecting a view of the world. This echoes the conclusions of the Kerner Commission report released in 1968 in its study of urban unrest. It stated, in part, that the United States was moving toward two separate societies: one white and one black (though the report left it uncertain where other communities of color fit into this equation).

Can we as a society cut through the vail and begin to know and understand those different from ourselves, to have the ability to walk in the shoes of another, to break down these "us" versus "them" notions that separate? First, we as white people must dismantle the denial systems that prevent many of us grasping our social privileges and the realities of "race" in U.S.-America.

Dr. Warren J. Blumenfeld is author of Warren's Words: Smart Commentary on Social Justice (Purple Press); editor of Homophobia: How We All Pay the Price (Beacon Press), co-author of Looking at Gay and Lesbian Life (Beacon Press); and co-editor of Readings for Diversity and Social Justice (Routledge) and Investigating Christian Privilege and Religious Oppression in the United States (Sense).

To read more pieces like this, sign up for Tikkun Daily’s free newsletter, sign up for Tikkun Magazine emails or visit us online. You can also like Tikkun on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

Can someone help translate this...I dont speak jibberish; thank you.

I WROTE: Well either your "lawyer" is as big a boob as you or he dosent thing you are smart enought to be given a full explanation of the law.

Evidence of other unrelated crimes can be admissible under certain circumstances. A prior conviction could be considered relevant if the way the previous crime was committed is consistent with the way the current crime is committed. This would show a pattern of behavior and could be admissible evidence.

A crime of dishonesty can be used to impeach the defendants testimony.

I could cite further instances but they would be lost on you because you are a BOOB.



LOL!

Hey BOOB...Dont get mad at me...Im not the one who cant get it right. You made the inacurate statement...I just corrected your dumb ass. Did you also yell at your teachers when they showed you were wrong?
Looks like it's YOU that need to get over it! Ha-Ha-Ha.
BTW BOOB where did you get this "90%" number...out of your ass? LOL...and, suck on my auto??? Hey Boob what do YOU suck on LOL.

MERRY XMAS ASSHOLE!

Just bollocks.

Which I gather you speak fluently.

Oh, I can translate it for you:

Du hurensohn, elender mistkerl, ein ieichtgIäubiger, du bist ein großer sohn deiner.

Hope you'll never been in the same trouble like Garner, because great possibilities are that nobody will help you either.

I will "pray" for you my dear giujohn.

Lol... your German is as bad as your English (3 years in Germany as an MP, thank you)

OH and BTW...dont bother...I'm an ATHEIST... ein nichtgLäubiger...I have no idea what this jibberish is: ieichtgIäubiger

HE still believes in you.

Not possible..."he" doesnt exsist.

Which is why I know that's all you talk.

Don't be so modest, you speak gibberish exclusively and expertly.

How could I be angry with you? You speak with such authority out of your ass, it just makes me laugh. Its like watching children play cops and robbers.

I though he spoke gibberish, which is it,you asshole?

******* candy-assed lazy mother ******* MP. You asshole! I knew you thought you were a cop! You despicable jackass. goojohn the peace officer. What a disgusting trail of slime you must have cut as a cop.

With all honesty: how many times did you pull your piece to return fire?

Bet you don't answer.

With all honesty what did you get busted for? Did you resist arrest and some female cop beat you down? Co'mon you can tell us, we wont laugh, I promise.

Never been 'busted', Officer Fife, I always held a real job.

Noticed you dodged the question one more time. Bite me.

'Racial' Cop Stories That Didn't Make the Cut
By Larry Elder - December 18, 2014

In 2012, according to the CDC, 140 blacks were killed by police. That same year 386 whites were killed by police. Over the 13-year period from 1999 to 2011, the CDC reports that 2,151 whites were killed by cops -- and 1,130 blacks were killed by cops.

Police shootings, nationwide, are down dramatically from what they were 20 or 30 years ago. The CDC reported that in 1968, shootings by law enforcement -- called "legal intervention" by the CDC -- was the cause of death for 8.6 out of every million blacks. For whites the rate was was .9 deaths per million.

By 2011, law enforcement shootings caused 2.74 deaths for every million blacks, and 1.28 deaths for every million whites. While the death-by-cop rate for whites has held pretty steady over these last 45 years, hovering just above or below the one-in-a-million level, the rate for blacks has fallen. In 1981, black deaths by cop stood at four in a million, but since 2000 has remained just above or below two in a million.

So what's driving this notion that there is now an "epidemic" of white cops shooting blacks when in the last several decades the numbers of blacks killed by cops are down nearly 75 percent?

Where's the evidence suggesting race had anything to do with the death of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland, who was pointing a pellet gun at bystanders before being shot and killed by police?

What's the racial nexus to the death of Eric Gardner, the large, obese man who died after being taken down by several NYPD cops?

While the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case became another racial thermometer of America, the jury found Zimmerman not guilty, and several jurors later said that during jury deliberations "race never came up."

The Ferguson, Missouri, shooting of Michael Brown by officer Darren Wilson is yet another case where there is absolutely no evidence that whatever happened occurred because of Michael Brown's race. Did officer Wilson display racial animus? Does anyone know if this officer Wilson had some racist background? With the desire by media for a scalp, such information would have long ago been made public by somebody.

This white-cop-out-to-get-black-civilian narrative advances the interest of many. The media loves what Tom Wolfe called the "Great White Defendant" -- a bad white guy everybody can agree to dislike. For the Democrats, it furthers their assertion that race remains a major problem in America, that Republicans/tea partiers/black conservatives are out to get them, and you must vote for us. For "activists" like the Revs. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, and local wannabes, it gives them continued relevance.

That this "epidemic" is imaginary can be demonstrated by the recent stories that never became national news.

In Mobile, Alabama, a black cop shot and killed an unarmed white teenager. As with Michael Brown, the Alabama teen was later found to have been under the influence of marijuana at the time of the shooting. The teen had also recently taken a hallucinogen, and was so stoned he thought he was on fire -- and literally took his clothes off. Nude -- and obviously unarmed -- he was still later shot by the cop. Despite public pressure, a Mobile grand jury decided not to indict the black police officer, believing he acted in self-defense. Not national news.

In Salt Lake City, Utah, just two days after Brown was shot and killed in Ferguson, a "not white" cop shot and killed an unarmed 20-year-old man whose race has been described as Hispanic. The family of the dead man believes that the cop is a murderer. Not national news.

In Pennsylvania, a state trooper named Kelly Cruz was accused in 2009 of stomping on the head of a handcuffed suspect laying on the ground, resulting in facial fractures, a broken nose and damaged teeth. The trooper, at the time, was attached to a local drug task force and was part of a raid on a suspected meth lab. One of the men inside escaped during the raid, and the victim -- who, according to another officer, was seen running from the scene and found five houses away -- was thought to be the meth lab escapee. Turns out the victim was not a meth lab escapee. The local grand jury decided not to indict the trooper. The feds, however, filed civil rights charges against the cop. He was found not guilty by the federal jury.

It is rare for a cop to shoot and kill any civilian. Excluding practice on the gun range, 95 percent of officers never discharge their firearm while in the line of duty, including those who work for big-city departments. The first time -- and only time -- officer Darren Wilson used his firearm while on duty was in the Michael Brown case. The facts do not support the narrative that there is an epidemic of white cops shooting unarmed blacks.

We are being manipulated.

FACT: IN 2012 THERE WERE 123 BLACKS SHOT IN THE U.S. BY POLICE
FACT: IN 2012 THERE WERE 326 WHITES SHOT INTHE U.S.BY POLICE
FACT: THERE ARE MORE THAN 43 MILLION BLACKS IN THE U.S.
FACT: THERE ARE ONE MILLION POLICE OFFCIERS IN THE U.S.

SO MUCH FOR THE SUPPOSED "EPIDEMIC" OF POLICE KILLING BLACKS IN THE U.S.