Yes. So is cutting off someone citing facts or making a point that doesn’t reinforce Carlson’s rant.
Carlson, at this point, is more or less openly trying to foment race war.
This type of logic doesn’t make sense to me. Why in the world would they think that the BLM crowd would riot? That only makes sense if you think (1) black people are so stupid they wouldn’t realize they won or (2) black people are so violent that even a celebration would become a riot.
The people we had to worry about—and who I hope your husband was concerned about—are the Blue Lives Matter folk. They’re so sure this is a horrible injustice, and we’ve seen them choose to get violent before–not the least of which on January 6.
I thought the time spent by the defense discussing drug use by George Floyd was a little odd, and it reminded me of Amy Senser’s case. Senser was convicted of hit and run, killing a man refueling his stalled car. Her attorney kept trying to introduce evidence that were drugs in the victim’s system. I’m not sure how that could affect a hit and run, but it in Floyd’s case it seemed to be more misdirection than anything else. As it happens, Chauvin’s attorney, Eric Nelson, was also Amy Senser’s attorney.
Not black people in particular of course but people riot when their sports team wins a championship. I also think that Trumpers doubt the sincerity of protestors and think that they just want any excuse to steal and break things.
I get that not all, and probably very few, complaints against LEOs are justified. The difference is that with us civilians if even one major complaint sticks we are fired. And in my profession of teaching, one major F-up and you are done forever. Doctors lose their licenses, lawyers get disbarred. Hell, I just read one story on SD of how a bar lost their license (livelihood) because a customer gave a drink to someone underage.
But a cop can walk up to an 8 year old African-American, shoot them in the face and lie about it (and have the thin blue line protect them with more lies) and if caught, at worst they get 2 weeks paid leave OR get fired and go one to work at another law-enforcement agency. That is the problem.
If I had been on that jury, I’d be doing my damndest to try to keep out of the news.
Some of those people who are sure the decision was due to threats are most likely projecting.
Ding ding ding!
Probably the second, in this case.
The Onion, extremely savage on the story:
I want to slap him in his whole stupid fucking face!
God damn, he’s such an arrogant mother fucking fucker. Got me all upset over here.
Grrrrrrrr
Same here. That maniacal laugh is so over-the-top ridiculous. Cops killing black people is so fucking hilarious!
It also didn’t build in the way a normal laugh does, making it seem very much artifice rather than actually finding something funny.
Maybe this is what that sarcastic “lol” I see in so many troll posts sounds like.
I’m honestly waiting for the right-wing pearl-clutching over this, so I can use the standard law-and-order response: “If they didn’t do anything wrong, they have nothing to worry about.”
And I’d love the DOJ to just rake all of the Twin Cities PDs over the coals, get some real reform in here.
For anybody who has never looked at the Report from the DOJ’s investigation of the PD in Ferguson, MO … it’s worth looking at the Report Summary (starts on Page 4 – document Page 1) of the big honking PDF:
I don’t mean to imply even a single parallel with Minneapolis PD, about whom I know nada. But the DOJ’s investigations into such things don’t appear to be – forgive me – whitewashes.
Now, my friends are a bunch of white liberals that range from “moderate Biden voter, corporations can do good” me to “Bernie doesn’t go darn near far enough, first kill all the lawyers and eat the rich.” But everyone I know is ecstatic to see the feds come into the MPD. And it isn’t the politicians or the chief…its the union. Thats one union that my non-picket line crossing friends think needs to be busted.
If you mean that police unions are a major force behind the “Blue Line” that covers for officers’ malfeasance and allows it to proliferate, based on anecdotal evidence I tend to agree. Sometimes unions – which intrinsically are very valuable counters to corporate and governmental abuse – become self-interested, self-perpetuating power structures that operate against the best interests of society. Police unions can be a prime example.
Nelson seemed to me to be singularly unimpressive in this trial. It didn’t help that, either through ignorance or deception, he misrepresented the objective legal criteria that the jury was supposed to use to evaluate the charges. It forced the judge to tell the jury that his instructions, not the suggestions of either counsel, defined the standards they were supposed to apply.
That said, given the overwhelming evidence, I doubt that any lawyer could have done much for Chauvin. Remember that Chauvin himself tried for a plea deal, which was rejected. It would not surprise me that some better lawyers than Nelson refused to take the case.
Wow. You get busy for a day or so, and a few hundred posts show up…
I just don’t think this was a close case. If a prosecutor rejects a plea offer and takes a case to trial, they believe they have the facts needed to convict. And if they don’t make mistakes, they should win.
And they did. Personally, I think the case came down to a combination of several factors:
- Video evidence from multiple angles. The audio was visceral, and seeing what happened made it impossible to deny the basic fact that Chauvin pressed into Floyd’s body until he died.
- Police officers, including those who worked with, trained, and supervised Chauvin, testified against him. That eliminated any reasonable claim that Chauvin was acting within the realm of normal.
- The fact that the jury did not have to find that Chauvin was the sole cause of Floyd’s death. The defense (in my mind, inexplicably) spent time outlining the contributing factors to Floyd’s death, but the jury could accept that things like heart disease or opioids made death easier and still find that Chauvin’s knee was the prevailing cause.
It’d be interesting to hear from the jurors one day. Subtle things like how a lawyer presents a case, or how a witness testifies, can have outsize influence. I bet that the State’s forensic examiner (the bearded guy with the melodic accented voice) was well received. If the jury “trusted” him, then I would imagine that conviction is fairly easy, given that police officers have confirmed that Chauvin acted contrary to procedure.
That utter bullshit statement ought to be a crime in and of itself. Fucking disgusting, Minneapolis PD, simply fucking disgusting.
“To Serve And Protect”
To serve themselves.
To protect murderous cops.
Sick.
When you see a video that features that idiot’s face you should do what I do. Click not.
I don’t think cops getting convicted every time there’s a controversial police shooting should be the goal. There’s no way you’d be able to prove most cases that they did anything but possibly make a poor choice in a split-second decision, and obviously there’s no universe where that would be a good outcome if it were possible.
The goal should be that avenues exist to hold police accountable for abusing their power, and that when these avenues are pursued the police and the justice system at large is willing to pursue justice even if it means “turning against” one of their own. That’s what happened in this case, but there are many cases where it does not.
Another smart decision by the prosecution, in my opinion, was to not overcharge the case. For those who think a first-degree murder conviction would’ve been appropriate, I caution you that the implications of premeditation make conviction exponentially harder. Consider the Casey Anthony case as a prime example of that.
Additionally, I wonder how much of a disservice the defense did to its own cause by raising certain issues that (in my opinion at least) were ridiculous.
For example, claiming that the gathering crowd somehow intimidated Chauvin was simply implausible. Not only did Chauvin have back up that was there specifically for the purpose of controlling the crowd, but the crowd’s complaints were directly related to Chauvin’s use of force. If he wanted them to calm down all had to do is simply get off Floyd’s neck.
For the defense to argue otherwise risked alienating the jury, who might conclude that the defense was desperate and grasping at straws.
Of course, that’s just wild speculation on my part. Unless and until we hear from an actual juror, we’ll obviously never know how deliberations went down.