More Riots in STL

[Colonel]

Since the typical people haven't decided to post this here it is.

Officer shoots black 18 year old in Berkley MO, another of the inner ring suburbs of St. Louis, within St. Louis County. The 18 year old raised a 9mm pistol at police who subsequently fired 3 shots and killed him. Later as seen in link one we have riots, bricks thrown at officers and 3 explosive devices set off.

Riots/aftermath

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fatal-cop-shooting-teen-berkeley-missouri-sparks-clashes-n274181

More

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/...cle_d45db16a-7422-5307-b81d-b45dbdc896ba.html

Surveillance Video from Gas Station where incident occured.

http://www.kmov.com/news/just-poste...atal-officer-involved-shooting-286762881.html

More

http://www.ksdk.com/story/news/loca...oot-kill-armed-teenager-in-berkeley/20849209/

 

[Leonel]

See in this case, the guy clearly was armed.

 

[JollyRoger]

I'm sure there is some mentally unstable white lady that wasn't on the scene that the DA will let testify to the grand jury about what went down.

 

[Archbob]

Can't blame the officer here. There was a clear and present danger.

I think some people need to watch this helpful and informative video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QR465HoCWFQ

 

[Evie]

Yeah. Seems like this time the policeman had plenty of justification, plenty of clear evidence for it, and did the best he could out of an ugly situation.

Shame that his actions will probably end up lumped (both as a "statistic" of another dead black guy ; and as proof that police shootings of black are justified by the other) with Ferguson and NYC when it has little to do with either.

 

[Commodore]

And this just proves the irrational mindset of this current protest movement. Even though the cop was 100% justified in this instance, the anti-police protestors are still clamoring about this being an unjustified shooting of a black teen.

Just as there are people who think the cops can do no wrong, there are just as many that think the cops can do no right. This whole issue is just a mess and nobody on either end of the issue is even trying to be objective or find some sort of real solution. I'm personally tired of the whole thing and just wish people would stop screaming about it, no matter what side of the issue they are on.

 

[Kozmos]

And this just proves the irrational mindset of this current protest movement. Even though the cop was 100% justified in this instance, the anti-police protestors are still clamoring about this being an unjustified shooting of a black teen.

Just as there are people who think the cops can do no wrong, there are just as many that think the cops can do no right. This whole issue is just a mess and nobody on either end of the issue is even trying to be objective or find some sort of real solution. I'm personally tired of the whole thing and just wish people would stop screaming about it, no matter what side of the issue they are on.

It's easy for us to sweep this thing under the rug. Most us are not personally affected by this and so we can continue to ignore it. Although the police action looks justified it's still another dead black kid, the product of the system we have created by continually ignoring it. I'm not a fan of mindless hordes screaming and protesting, but the stats from poor neighborhoods, school districts and correctional facilities are really poking us in the eye now.

 

[Evie]

The fundamental problem of the current protest movement is that the've lost trust in the police. And they've lost trust for very good reasons, both their own actions and their repeated denials about there being any problem.

The police ALWAYS present their shootings as justified, and always claim to have evidence. They always hold rank together against the world, and always pretend they do no wrong rather than assuming their responsibility to the people (which is to investigate at length the events and assume shootings to be suspicious by definition, because their first duty should be to the population, not to their fellow policemen).

In short, the police has cried "WOLF!" too many time from the perspective of black people. Doesn't matter that this time there IS a wolf, nobody's trusting their cries anymore.

And it's hard to fault them (just as it's hard to fault the policeman in this case).

 

[useless]

Apparently neither of the cops camera's were on?

You know, i don't think it's unjustified for the black community to be perhaps a tad skeptical of the police and their version of events, especially given the history of law enforcement and how they deal with people of a different race, in america.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

The public is at war with the police. It will take more than a cop shooting a genuine criminal to bring a ceasefire.

 

[Evie]

The security camera at the gas station did shoot the scenario and do appear to show the "victim" (as in the person who was shot, not in a guilt/innocence situation) drawing a gun, in this case.

But yeah. Like I said: police always claim the police did no wrong, always claim shootings are justified. At some point, how can they expect people to believe them?

If you start with the assumption that EVERY police shooting is justified (as police does), people who know some if not many of them to be unjustified aren't going to believe you anymore when you keep making that claim. If you want people to trust in the fairness of the police, then police shootings need to be viewed in the same suspicious light as any other shooting death. Begin with the assumption that any shooting death is murder, and THEN determine if there were circumstances that justified them.

 

[Colonel]

The public is at war with the police. It will take more than a cop shooting a genuine criminal to bring a ceasefire.

Was waiting for this...


And that ladies and gentlemen is the problem! Right there in black and white, the many protestors think they are at "war" with the Police, at "war" with the system, at "war" with the government.

It isn't that there are a few bad cops out there, it isn't that cops disproportionately shoot black people more (which they don't, I have stats if you'd like), its that the populations of some of the communities in America think they are at war with the Police/System etc. Instead of trusting that 99% of the time cops are doing what they are supposed to do. Cops aren't out to find some black kid to shoot, they are out to find criminals and hopefully arrest them.

On another note, these riots have shown a young generation that its ok to attack cops because most of the time they won't end up in jail or dead and if someone else gets shot its a great justification to go loot and pillage the town. This is what is being taught to our youth, this problem will only manifest itself further and cause more wide spread violence all simply because Officers enforced the law and then were required to use deadly force to protect themselves or the community.

 

[Evie]

The problem is that the 1% of Bad Cops are still seen as part of the "force" by the 99% of Good Cops, so whenever the 1% screw up the 99% just join rank with their fellow officers.

Individual policemen largely aren't at war with black communities. The Force, because it tend to react to any criticism or attac on one of their members by joining rank, effectively has been dragged into a war by the 1%.

So long as "the Force" isn't wiling to disown and condemn its own members who form that 1%, the Force is effectively covering them, and thus assuming responsibility for them.

 

[Colonel]

The problem is that the 1% of Bad Cops are still seen as part of the "force" by the 99% of Good Cops, so whenever the 1% screw up the 99% just join rank with their fellow officers.

Individual policemen largely aren't at war with black communities. The Force, because it tend to react to any criticism or attac on one of their members by joining rank, effectively has been dragged into a war by the 1%.

Ignoring the fact that every incident that has been highlighted and caused riots the Officers involved were found to be justified. Not because the Police protected any of these officers but because Grand Juries have found that they are in fact INNOCENT. This is blatantly a one sided war orchestrated by a very vocal minority of the population that thinks the system is keeping them down instead of their own actions.

 

[Evie]

Grand Juries (and judges, and juries in general) tend to blithely accept the word of police more often that they don't. Moreover, even outside that, the justice system has repeatedly demonstrated its own ability to be wrong on criminal cases. Being proclaimed innocent in a court of law doesn't mean you didn't do it (see: Simpson, O.J.), and being proclaimed guilty doesn't mean you did do it.

All the more so when the prosecutor in Missouri had no business on the case at all. That he was there was a grave professional fault on his part, and he handled the case in the most incompetent manner imaginable.

But even assuming that the Ferguson Grand Jury (possible enough) and the New York one (very unlikely) came to the right conclusion, the police still shouldn't assume their own to be innocent until the grand jury says so. That's the core problem here. The police should be a neutral force investigating the case impartially, but they leap to the defense of their own the moment the incident occur.

But even that aside...when did the police ever turn against the rotten 1% rather than holding ranks during cases of police abuse of power?

The police ALWAYS jump to the defense of their own in that kind of situation. And THAT is something 100% of police is guilty of.

 

[useless]

Was waiting for this...


And that ladies and gentlemen is the problem! Right there in black and white, the many protestors think they are at "war" with the Police, at "war" with the system, at "war" with the government.

It isn't that there are a few bad cops out there, it isn't that cops disproportionately shoot black people more (which they don't, I have stats if you'd like), its that the populations of some of the communities in America think they are at war with the Police/System etc. Instead of trusting that 99% of the time cops are doing what they are supposed to do. Cops aren't out to find some black kid to shoot, they are out to find criminals and hopefully arrest them.

On another note, these riots have shown a young generation that its ok to attack cops because most of the time they won't end up in jail or dead and if someone else gets shot its a great justification to go loot and pillage the town. This is what is being taught to our youth, this problem will only manifest itself further and cause more wide spread violence all simply because Officers enforced the law and then were required to use deadly force to protect themselves or the community.

Won't somebody please think about the cops?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Was waiting for this...


And that ladies and gentlemen is the problem! Right there in black and white, the many protestors think they are at "war" with the Police, at "war" with the system, at "war" with the government.

It isn't that there are a few bad cops out there, it isn't that cops disproportionately shoot black people more (which they don't, I have stats if you'd like), its that the populations of some of the communities in America think they are at war with the Police/System etc. Instead of trusting that 99% of the time cops are doing what they are supposed to do. Cops aren't out to find some black kid to shoot, they are out to find criminals and hopefully arrest them.

On another note, these riots have shown a young generation that its ok to attack cops because most of the time they won't end up in jail or dead and if someone else gets shot its a great justification to go loot and pillage the town. This is what is being taught to our youth, this problem will only manifest itself further and cause more wide spread violence all simply because Officers enforced the law and then were required to use deadly force to protect themselves or the community.

Cops should have thought of that before they started it.

 

[KMRblue1027]

The NYPD straight up said they are at war. So how is that the protesters fault that they respond in the same way?

 

[Gary Childress]

It isn't that there are a few bad cops out there, it isn't that cops disproportionately shoot black people more (which they don't, I have stats if you'd like),

I'm interested in seeing the stats you have.

 

[Colonel]

I'm interested in seeing the stats you have.

http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/dataRestriction_inj.html

To a couple of the posts above this one. I of course expect that when an officer uses deadly force that he was justified in it, thats one of the things we pay them for. We expect them to use deadly force only when appropriate, we spend hundreds of millions of dolllars across the nation to ensure they are properly trained in all facets of their job. I expect that if I see on the news that someone was shot by the Police that the Police Officer involved used that training prior to pulling the trigger. When there are cases where they did not, I expect the legal system to handle it as needed.

Now to the stats, if we take a look we can see that whites were indeed killed in higher numbers then blacks but proportionally to their number in the population blacks have a higher percentage rate of death by Police. Continuing with that thought why is that you ask? Blacks have a significantly higher rate of crime then whites or any other race.

Lets take a look at one area of the country for instance. New York City.
Black Population: 23%
White Population: 35%
Crime in the City
Black shooting involved crimes: 80%
White shooting involved crimes: 1.8%

These stats albeit only a single area of the country represent a broader problem because in most urban areas Blacks are 2/3rds more likely to be involved in crime then any other ethnicity.

Why I ask myself would Blacks be shot by Police more often then Whites or any other ethnicity?