Tyre Nichols just the Latest

Again America is made Famous by Violence

The horrible death of Tyre Nichols pulls the cover off the true America once again. This is Rodney King 32 years later. The country has a learning problem - a disability at the national level. Too bad there are no therapists for countries. America would need couch time with all of them.

There are very interesting contrasts between these two incidents.

In the King case four white officers beat the crap out of a black man. In the Nichols case five black officers beat the crap out of black man. King survived. Nichols died. King was charged with "felony evading", but later the charge was dropped. Rodney King - Wikipedia. Nichols was alleged the be driving recklessly, unsubstantiated. The King incident was videoed by a third party or we likely would not have seen it. Nichols was videoed by police cameras and others. Otherwise we likely would not have seen it. According to the same Wikipedia article the four officers who beat King were charged with excessive force and 3 got off. The jury was hung on the 4th. Later federal charges were brought for violating King's rights. Two served time. In the Nichols case all 5 officers were quickly charged with second-degree murder and kidnapping plus other serious charges. We will see the outcome. After the King incident there was massive rioting, injury, and death. It took the Army, the Marine Corps, and the California Army Nation Guard to restore order. So far this has not happened with Nichols.

The quick action against the officers this time and the reality that almost everything is now being captured on a camera somewhere is a good thing in my opinion. Not everyone agrees. The bad thing is that police brutality has not improved.

If you talk to many cops they will maintain that many of the young people who are the typical "gang bangers" are people of colour. They justify the need for caution in traffic and other stops on the possible use of guns. Sometimes cops are surprised and killed. What we saw which ultimately killed Tyre was not caution. We saw what many are describing as terrorism - against non-white victims. We saw bullies.

Guns were not a even a factor with King or Nichols. Where was the risk of being shot to these five police officers? They had him on the ground - similar to King; similar to Floyd and other cases. The beating continued. Why? Some of the comments from those bullies tell us why. It was what they do.

Therein lies the biggest problem I see here. Is there something about a career as a police officer that attracts bullies? Let me recognize that the majority of police officers are NOT of this mentality and serve the public for the right reasons. They never fire their gun and never beat up on people in custody. However too many are getting in who do not belong. Are some jurisdictions so desperate that they will pay big bucks for anybody to take the job? Look at it the other way around. If you are a bully by nature, what an occupation! Great pay and all the action you want!

Are these the same genes that cause some men to lose it when rebuffed by a woman, especially sexually? Do they beat the crap out of their wives when she says "No?" Do these genes make men go berserk when someone doesn't stop; tries to flee; mouths off? Are these insults to their cop ego?

This is a big problem for police forces everywhere. The military has a similar problem but following orders and protocol are both drilled into enlisted people as are the negative consequences of disobeying. Perhaps police forces could learn from this. How about police boot camp?

In summary this is a very similar problem to America's second big challenge: how do you keep guns out of the hands of people who should not have them? I don't have any solution but perhaps the next big push in genealogy research should be to identify the bully gene. It's in those spiral molecules somewhere beating up the other genes.

Imagine how many lives would be saved!

#thebrewsterblock

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The Jury in the George Floyd Trial

Floyd Trial Role Play - Pretend You are a Jury Member

We have not seen the defence bring out its own strategy yet to justify the police actions against George Floyd. There might be some surprises. But at present just imagine you being one of those normal people with what you have seen to date going through your mind.

Here are some of the things, without any directions from a judge, which are going through mine.

• Police claim he was big and muscular. They had to control him.
  
• Not one person, store clerks, bystanders, or fellow passengers said they felt threatened
  
• You had him on the ground with hands cuffed behind his back
  
• He had no weapon
• If you really wanted to control him, use leg irons. This would have looked really bad but so did the neck hold and three officers on top
• Not once did the three officers confining him let go to see if the victim tried to get up
• He was agitated and obviously on something. He resisted getting into a squad car.
  
• The man was begging you not to shoot him
• He was pleading with you saying that he was claustrophobic
• He said he has been shot before
• This was a procedure (neck choke) taught during training.
• Most authorities so far have denied that this is taught. 
• Nobody has said it was necessary to persist for over nine minutes
• Even laypeople noticed he had gone completely limp and impassive
• Police should have and could have checked for a pulse.
• Chauvin himself could have gotten off of his neck. There were two others holding him down
• Had he done that the off duty EMT worker offered to check for a pulse
• There were reports of body fluids - urine - having been released from the body. If true that must have been noticed by the officers on the torso and legs.
• If true and if this was a possible sign of death it might have been too late to resuscitate him but again the EMT worker could have tried. Even the ambulance EMT tried this in the vehicle.
• I don't know whether the officers did notice this but I would have expected at least a comment that it had happened, so possibly it was not until the EMT workers arrived.
• It is also remotely possible that the officers did notice it but preferred not to mention it knowing what it represented
• I would be asking myself if this were a white man, would the neck choke have been used?
• If the answer is NO this would clearly be racism
• If the answer is YES then whether black or white or any other colour, the practice is wrong and should be banned or "under control" needs to be defined

As I have said before, OJ all over again. In that case, a man of colour got off when everyone thought him guilty. In this case Chauvin can't hold up his knee to the jury to show that it does not fit!

#thebrewsterblock