They don’t have good reason. A group of peers from within their own community looked at all of the evidence, an admittedly EXCESSIVE amount of evidence, and decided that there was no case and did not indict the officer. These were not privileged white people flown in from Bel Aire and the Hamptons. These were people from the community in which this happened.
Why do you and others have such a hard time accepting this fact?
Up here in Canada, my impression is that the analysis would go as follows:
The issue of whether excessive force was used would depend on an analysis of all the facts in context. Similar to an allegation of negligence, the issue would be whether the police had used force in accordance with appropriate standards of professionalism; if not, and if harm occurred thereby, there would be a strong inference that the force was “excessive”.
The fact that the police used a hold prohibited by police policy would be very persuasive evidence that the officer in question had failed to abide by accepted standards of professionalism. If a causal link was then drawn between the use of force and harm, there would then be a very strong inference that the force used was excessive.
If at first you don’t succeed, drag the man’s name through the dirt over and over again until you get the verdict you want, eh?
The reactions of the “good folks” of Ferguson is the only reason why non-Ferguson residents are even aware of this issue. Their passion have rubbed off on others. This is how protests work.
Of course not. I just don’t see what that matters.
Without Ferguson being in the news, we very well might not even be talking about Garner right now, so making this all be about cause célèbre betrays shallow thinking. Ferguson has put police brutality on the national news, making it a subject of analysis in way it hasn’t been in decades. Rather than seeing Garner as an isolated incident, more people see it as fitting a larger pattern of police abuse. A pattern that has become intolerable. Again, this is the kind of thing protests aim to do.
Dude, just stop.
Obviously, police regulation alone does not make the chokehold a crime. The fact that it is generally illegal to assault people (including putting a chokehold one somebody) makes it a crime, unless some specific exception makes a particular instance of putting a chokehold on someone not a crime.
In the case before us, the suggested exception (police privilege to use force) does not apply, since the police were specifically instructed not to do that by the police department.
Yes, there is such a bar in New York: CPL § 210.20(4). A court must authorize it on showing of good cause.
What about a 3rd and 4th time, etc.?
Cite that it does not apply? Any citation to a single case that says that the privilege automatically doesn’t apply when the police regulation forbids it?
Because I have never heard of that rule. I’m curious to learn where you found it.
I’m unsure why people seemingly have problems parsing the word ‘or’. Your statement about right wing CTs was what sparked, well, my question about why that needs to be said. In OTHER threads on this subject recently, I’ve seen a lot of people called racists and racism brought up constantly as a counter to someone disagreeing with them. Thus my clever use of the word ‘or’.
If you didn’t believe there was a CT and were just making a general comment, certainly some folks on this board have used that in the past, and again I was asking why we all can’t seemingly discuss any of this stuff without name calling, references to weird CTs or automatically thinking people are being disingenuous when the reality is that none of this is cut and dried and there is room for honest people to have a difference of opinion on this stuff without them being crazy, racists or trolls.
As for the OP, I think that the cops were in the wrong and used improper force for, what I again think was a pretty minor and silly violation, but I think the reality is that they weren’t indited because the court didn’t think they could get a conviction…just like in the other infamous case being talked about on this board lately. Doesn’t mean what the cops did was right or justified, and I think the fact that they are calling for a serious look at procedures and training indicates they know this (or some of them do), but you can’t always get a conviction and if you can’t there is no sense wasting the resources just to appease public outrage, even if that outrage was or is justified (I honestly think it is, in this case…I know I’m pretty outraged by this one, unlike my more ambiguous feelings wrt the Ferguson case).
And if, in fact, the officer’s hold was a blood choke and not a traditional choke, as the union asserts, then your assertion is moot because blood chokes aren’t prohibited.
No, when someone says, “I can’t breathe,” you let him go. I saw the video and it didn’t look like Garner was assaulting the cops. It looked he was raising his hands defensively to push the officers’ hands away, but it didn’t merit being choked down to the ground. I thought the force used was excessive and contributed directly to his death. The officer won’t face criminal charges, but I hope the US DOJ does find for civil rights violations against him.
His assertion is rubbish, yes.
But the shoe also fits on the other foot: even if police department regulations do not forbid the use of a “blood choke,” that does not transform it into a per se legal use of force.
Right?
You contradict yourself.
Conceded. It would appear, however, that the grand jury either felt it was a lawful use of force, or that insufficient evidence existed to prove that it was criminal.
Yes. To my eye, the facts support probable cause, but obviously the grand jury either saw it differently or believed that even though PC existed, there was no way of getting a conviction.
Or they nullified.
Bullshit. Notwithstanding this one and others that you disagree on, you admitted that the Groubert shooting (gas station in South Carolina) was due to misconduct.
I’d settle for a verdict, that is a trial verdict.
We sorely need an independent agency for cases involving the police, I have very little confidence in the criminal justice system’s performence when policemen are accused of crimes, and I’m far from alone. There’s still the issue of the public’s reluctance to indict or convict policemen, but it’d be a great start.
That said, I don’t expect you to agree, given that you are somehow able to watch the Garner video and conclude that nothing criminal occured.
Thank you for the correction.
An excellent time to use that discretion.
How about once more, with a special prosecutor from outside the Staten Island area? Reasonable?
Yes they did – he died. That’s deadly force. There’s nothing deadlier than killing someone.
Hate to double-post, but I missed the edit window.
The hemorrhaging resulting for a prohibited choke hold. Does it matter if Garner died from asphyxiation or bleeding from his arteries? He still died because the cop used excessive force for a misdemeanor crime.
No?
What, exactly, were you describing as “weird CT type stuff,” if not the plainly racist tendencies described?