By “too soon”, take a look at some of the videos linked to in this thread. The one where the kid is in a park and the cops pull up in a car and open fire within a second. Or the guy who was in Walmart holding a toy gun he was going to buy, and he wasn’t pointing it at anyone. Or the unarmed guy who was shot in the middle of a street many yards from the police (and, yes, I know about the 21 foot rule). Or the guy who was shot while on his knees hearing conflicting screamed commands from the cops. Isn’t taking cover and evaluating the situation a reasonable response?
Would Harry Homeowner or Carl in his Car be afforded the same benefit of the doubt that police are? I don’t think so, even though police are supposed to have more training.
As for “too often”, I understand that people don’t always immediately fall down when shot, but are you really supporting 15, 20 or 30 shots being fired in a volley? Is there a better way?
That would be nice.
Better training isn’t just about not pulling the trigger in a dicey situation, it’s about avoiding the dicey situation in the first place. De-escalating conflict rather than escalating it. Avoiding placing yourself into a situation where you have no backup and no support other than your sidearm.
Massive corruption in Baltimore PD. 25 officers discredited and almost 800 convictions to be tossed out. It wasn’t one small unit and “now that that aberration is fixed we’re back on track!”-it was all throughout the department. How many “good cops” looked the other way for this crap to happen?
What makes me sick is the readiness of some on this board, which I’d been led to believe was all about rational skepticism, to jump for conspiracy theories just because they fit into their preconceived notions and prejudices pertaining to certain groups.
I don’t go in for hypotheticals*. What I do go in for is evidence, of which there appears to be an insufficient amount available (at least to you and me) to come to a conclusion, even a non-legally binding opinion.
Just on the surface, I don’t see the motive here, even if I do grant that police really are just a bunch of jack-booted thugs and murders deep down in their hearts. Just how key of a witness was he? Guyger basically confessed on the stand. The only real question for the jury was whether or not she could claim self-defense based on a misunderstanding of fact.
*ETA: and of course it would depend on what we’re betting, too. I’m not even sure what you mean by “10 to 11.” Or did you mean 10 to 1?
Regardless of who did it, the right thing for the Dallas PD to do is to acknowledge upfront that they’re hopelessly conflicted in this case and recuse themselves and turn the case over to an independent authority so that the public can have trust in the outcomes of the process.
“This board” is not homogeneous. It seemed clear to me that Epstein wanted to die. The scandal, if any, is why he wasn’t on suicide watch.
It shows bizarre confusion to think that Joshua Brown was murdered as part of some bid to get the conviction overturned AFTER the verdict. Since we’re in the Pit, let me ask a frank question: Are you fking stupid?** IF Brown’s murder was a consequence of Guyger’s conviction, the motive was revenge or spite.
@ ASL v2.0 — Duh! The cops don’t even yet have a suspect IIUC, let alone a jury verdict. The question is asking you just for a guess. (“You know how to guess, don’t you Steve? You put your mind to work, ponder and blow!”) And …
“10 to 11 and you pick” is what a Las Vegas sports-book quotes, IIUC, when bettors, in the aggregate, think a ball game is an exact 50-50 guess.
The glaring problem with Epstein’s death isn’t necessarily that he was murdered by guards. But the facts certainly indicate tremendous negligence, if not outright corruption, on the part of prison staff in allowing such a high-risk prisoner to be killed or commit suicide.
It’s fair to say that the death is suspicious, but I don’t think we should immediately conclude that the Dallas PD is conflicted. I don’t know what Dallas PD would have to gain by assassinating a witness who testified against an officer whom they also found to have acted wrongfully.
A remote possibility is that a disgruntled family member of Guyger’s did it or paid someone to – but again, this is a remote possibility, and extremely unlikely.
More likely? He was either at the wrong place at the wrong time in a case of mistaken identity, or he pissed someone off who had no relationship to this case.
He wasn’t in the wrong place at the wrong time. This isn’t a case of being caught in crossfire, he was singled out and executed. It could be mistaken identity. He could have some other enemy. It could be someone who wanted to send a message not to testify against the police. Or it could be someone else who was pissed about his role in Guyger’s prosecution.
Or Merritt could be lying. I suppose we will find out eventually.
I do think the police department would be wise to ask the feds to investigate, to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest.
The woman who recorded Amber Guyger outside of Botham Jean’s apartment after the shooting has been fired from her job after repeated threats and harassment at her place of work.
“I did get a few threats from people saying they weren’t gonna leave any witnesses behind, telling me I need to watch my back, things like that,” she said.
It also crossed my mind that this might be a hate-fueled right wing extremist, a lone nutter obsessed with the case, an ultra-vigilante police officer (current or former) – those seem like possible scenarios. But we just don’t have much information to work with right now.
More often than not murderers are acquainted with their victims, so in terms of averages, someone who had met him in person at least once (and perhaps more than that) seems like a good place to start.
The most legitimate-looking news article I could find on this is from the Dallas Morning News (which covered much of the investigation and subsequent trial as the major newspaper for the Dallas area):
It’s not clear if or why she was terminated. What is clear is her gofundme campaign was successful. Good for her, I guess.
What do the conspiracy-minded individuals on this forum make of that?
ETA: And to be clear, this happened in January, not coincidental with the decent shooting death of Joshua Brown