Lynching in Blue

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As most have likely seen in the dash-cam video released by the Chicago police on Tuesday, the shooting of Laquan McDonald on October 20, 2014, was a police lynching. It should not go unnoticed in this forum.

McDonald was holding a small knife and acting erratically, but he did not make an aggressive move toward Officer Jason Van Dyke. He was at least 15 feet from the officer, and clearly walking away from him, when Van Dyke opened fire.

Van Dyke shot McDonald 16 times in 13 seconds. Fourteen of the sixteen wounds he inflicted on McDonald occurred as the teenager already lay on the street, either mortally wounded or already dead, his back toward Van Dyke.

Shamefully, the "code of silence" immediately set in. Although no other officer fired a shot, they closed ranks to protect Van Dyke, and there is evidence that one or more officers soon deleted tape taken by video cams installed in nearby businesses. The official police reports of the shooting were dramatically at odds with the results of the autopsy. Those police accounts have now been shattered by the release of the dash-cam video that had been withheld for more than a year.

The McDonald video was released one year and a day after the fatal shooting of young Tamir Rice by Cleveland Police. Rice was "armed" with a toy gun, was playing alone in a park, and was given three seconds to respond before he was shot in the abdomen by a police officer.

[youtu_be]http://youtu.be/1Zz03rvyhIk[/youtu_be]
When you side with a man, you stay with him -- Pike Bishop
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Re: Lynching in Blue

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It looks like a bad shoot to me but I don't have all the evidence and neither does anyone else.

The "innocent until proven guilty" concept should also not go unnoticed on this forum. And can we tone down the hyperbolic race-baiting in the post subjects?

Re: Lynching in Blue

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i haven't seen the video. but the police have had it since the incident, and like magic, just hours before the video is released, the officer is charged. they could have charged the officer anytime in the interval, but noooo.
so wrong in so many ways.
i'm retired. what's your excuse?

Re: Lynching in Blue

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begemot wrote:...The "innocent until proven guilty" concept should also not go unnoticed on this forum. And can we tone down the hyperbolic race-baiting in the post subjects?
Officer Van Dyke will have his day in court. His attorney has issued a statement to the effect that the dash-cam video does not show Van Dyke's perspective. That is true, and I did not write anything about his state of mind or the threat he may have perceived.

It is interesting to note that Van Dyke's partner didn't seem to see the same threat. He never fired a shot and told investigators that he had to stop Van Dyke from reloading and continuing to fire.

I am curious about your description of the post subject as hyperbolic race baiting. I did not mention race a single time in my post or in the subject heading. So why do you consider the words "Lynching" and "Blue" laden with racial implications? Is it something in American history that leads to that perception? Is it some trend in recent events? Or both?
When you side with a man, you stay with him -- Pike Bishop
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Re: Lynching in Blue

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The Officer shooting is questionable. Continuing to fire after the suspect is on the ground? That is so wrong. I can't imagine any justification for that.

Huge fuck up, or murder, I hope that officer has been suspended and fired before being charged.

Re: Lynching in Blue

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Paco wrote: McDonald was holding a small knife and acting erratically, but he did not make an aggressive move toward Officer Jason Van Dyke. He was at least 15 feet from the officer, and clearly walking away from him, when Van Dyke opened fire.
He was also over the age of 16, which is the legal age to own a knife of the size he was carrying (in Chicago). Technically, based on the video alone, he wasn't committing a crime per se.
begemot wrote:It looks like a bad shoot to me but I don't have all the evidence and neither does anyone else.
We have sufficient evidence to prove that the police colluded to cover up the series of events that lead to Macdonald's death, e.g. they said the boy lunged at officers after damaging a police car with his knife, which is why he was shot.

Source: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015 ... ons-remain

Also, the judge had enough evidence to deny bail to the officer.

Source: http://chicago.suntimes.com/news-chicag ... d-shooting
The "innocent until proven guilty" concept should also not go unnoticed on this forum. And can we tone down the hyperbolic race-baiting in the post subjects?
I'm not touching the race-baiting presumption :o
BUT technically this wouldn't be a lynching as the "mob" comprised actual officers of the law. It was an execution evidently without due process, which as I mentioned above, is problematic to the Cook County courts.
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Re: Lynching in Blue

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It is a lynching because the police do not have the authority to execute someone without due process of law - indictment, trial by peers, conviction, sentence, appeals, etc., unless they are acting legitimately in self-defense. Anyone who fires 16 times at a person and needs to be stopped from reloading after 14 of those shots hit, is a rabid dog and cannot be said to be acting in self defense. If this guys says he was legitimately afraid of a guy that many feet way, then he is a paranoid nut job and we don't need that type either. I do not care about his "perception" in that case - it has to be reasonable and speaking at least for myself, he was to far away to really be scaring a reasonable man.

This kind of stuff went on for years - it is only with modern cameras, smart phones, etc., has it come to light and the public is horrified by it. Oh - the cop who destroyed the surveillance camera records, indict his butt too for obstruction of justice.

Re: Lynching in Blue

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Where was their, 'less than lethal' option? And why could they not wait for it if they did not have it.

We don't have all the facts yet. But... a person would have to be a lot closer to me, and or rushing me, before I even fired one round, much less a whole magazine. Obviously, all but one of the officers on scene felt the same.
Bud.

"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure"---- Dan Quayle, 1990.

Re: Lynching in Blue

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Chicago's top cop has been fired over this shooting.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel said Tuesday that he had formally asked for the resignation of Superintendent Garry McCarthy, whom he hand-picked to lead the department in 2011.

McCarthy has faced harsh criticism for his handling of the high-profile shooting of Laquan McDonald, a black teenager shot 16 times in 2014 by a white Chicago police officer.
Both the department and the mayor's office had tried to keep the recording from going public. Reporters and lawyers fought for more than a year to get the dashcam footage released, and filed multiple lawsuits to compel the department to do so. The city was finally forced to release the video under court order.

Earlier Tuesday, McCarthy appeared on NBC Chicago for an in-person interview in which he claimed responsibility for the now widely discredited police account after McDonald's 2014 death.

“The initial press release was mistaken, no two ways about it,” McCarthy told NBC. “I guess that’s my fault.”

Hours later, the normally collected mayor appeared nervous throughout the press conference, stammering over his prepared remarks before facing a barrage of questions from reporters, who probed into a suspected political agenda behind McCarthy's ouster.

The embattled mayor, who is facing calls for his own resignation, had scheduled the conference to announce the city's new police accountability task force. But after announcing McCarthy's departure midway through, reporters asked if the news was a sign of Emanuel's leadership becoming a "distraction" as well.

Emanuel said his decision to let McCarthy go was an example of his accountability as mayor, but exempted himself from his own call for "fresh eyes and new leadership."

Various political, religious, legal and activist groups have called for the jobs of Emanuel, McCarthy and Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez in the week since the city released footage of the shooting.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gar ... 9?h53a0pb9

From other incidents such as their undocumented hold areas and other very questionable action there needs to be other firings starting with the mayor.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.-Huxley
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." ~ Louis Brandeis,

Re: Lynching in Blue

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Well I can tell you that I and all the other officers on my patrol team watched the video (morning briefing) last week when it was released and ,based on the video, it doesn't look good. We debated it for awhile and finally concluded that the actions that were taken after the shooting are not good either. Glad I don't work for the Chicago PD.
I type therefore I am

Re: Lynching in Blue

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I haven't read anything really in depth and honest like alternet (haha) but on the news it was apparent that the reason for the cover up was do to the mayors election. If it had been released and the family not hushed up with a 5million pay off rahm would be on the streets.

Re: Lynching in Blue

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Now Hillary is calling for a federal investigation of the shooting and aftermath. While The Mayor is calling a federal investigation as being misguided.
Hillary Clinton is deeply troubled by the shooting of Laquan McDonald and the outstanding questions related to both the shooting and the video," said Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon. He said that while Emanuel's call for a review of the city's police department is an "important step," Clinton supports a full review by the Justice Department.

Clinton's decision, first reported by the Chicago Tribune, puts her at odds with the mayor, a former chief of staff to President Barack Obama and a longtime Clinton ally who said earlier Wednesday that such a review would be "misguided."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hil ... b2818d4690

What is the mayor so worried about? Maybe he has a lot more laundry that is dirty.
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.-Huxley
"We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." ~ Louis Brandeis,

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