White couple arrested for pulling gun on black woman

[civvver]

https://www.detroitnews.com/videos/...-being-pulled-mom-teen-lake-orion/5362317002/

Sorry I can't embed the vid because it's on a news site.

Synopsis:

According to accounts, Jillian Wuestenberg, a white woman, bumped into a black teenager who was with her mother, Takelia Hill, outside a chipotle. The mother demanded an apology, which apparently Wuestenberg refused. At that point it looks like Hill's daughter begins filming on her phone. From there on the video you can hear Hill calling Wuestenberg racist and saying you bumped into her you need to apologize over and over, while Wuestenberg looks frustrated and says you're blocking my car.

At that point Wuestenberg gets into the mini van and her husband asks Hill who the f do you think you are? and gets into the drivers side. The next part is a little unclear because Hill's daughter moves the camera away from the action, but it looks like Hill got behind the mini van for some reason, probably to take a photo of the plate, and then the mini van started backing out and stopped abruptly. Hill then accuses Wuestenberg of trying to hit her with the car and Wuestenberg accuses Hill of jumping behind her car on purpose. At that point Wuestenberg pulls a gun on the family and says get the f away from my car. It kind of looks like her husband also had a gun. They then get into the car and leave.

The Wuestenberg couple has been charged with felonious assault.

End of synopsis.

I think this whole video is pretty disgusting behavior from both sides. I agree the Wuestenbergs should be arrested for something. I'm not a law person so I'll just assume the charge is appropriate. But watching the video it seems like Hill is goading them into an altercation. That doesn't excuse what the Wuestenbergs did and as gun owners they should be held to a high standard of when it's ok to use your weapon and that definitely was not ok. They weren't in any sort of danger.

It worries me that as a society we're so divided now and on edge that a little rudeness now turns into a racially motivated altercation. I have no idea from the video if Wuestenberg is racist and refused to apologize cus of Hill's skin color. Maybe she's just rude. If Hill and her daughter were white and did the same thing, minus the calling them racist part, I feel like it would've gone down the same way. Just replace racist with you're white trash and rude, and outcome would've been the same. I can't imagine Wuestenberg felt scared because they were black either, since it's a mom and daughter, like how sometimes white women call the cops on black men cus they feel scared. This seems like a completely different situation.

 

[Synobun]

Why are you trying to "both sides" this?

 

[The_J]

Because it's always good to present the facts in a neutral way and let people form their own opinion, in contrast to feeding them an opinion.
There might also actually be 2 sides.

That said, why the heck do things always seem to escalate so quickly?
One person bumped into another one, and this ended up with one side pulling guns out? Seriously...

 

[Synobun]

It's not neutral, though. Yes, the mother didn't let it go, but the other woman pulled a gun. This is not something you do. The natural conclusion of the mother's escalation is an apology or they just tire themselves out and they go their separate ways. What's the natural conclusion of pulling a gun on someone who hasn't posed a threat? Guns are not a deescalation tool. They are a promise of severe harm and intimidation.

 

[GenMarshall]

Ive watch the entirety of the whole video and I find that both have taken it to extreme levels.

My take on this is due to the racial tension that’s in the air that caused Mrs. Wuestenberg to pull her gun out as deturance and self-defense due to the news stories circling about with innocent drivers getting assaulted by a mob of people. When Mrs. Hill was banging on the rear window/trunk, she had the assumption that she was trying to destroy or break into her van. Some sources say the Wuestenberg had their children with them in the van.

On the part where Mrs. Hill is behind the van, the audience cannot tell what is going on because the camera was facing away from the altercation of the time.

Some people say that Mrs. Hill intentionally jumped to the rear of the van to prevent the driver from leaving the area to go about their business. Others say she was just grabbing the license number on her phone. We don’t know as there’s no witnesses to come forward and can only go with this video and the accounts of both the Hills and the Wuestenbergs.

 

[Birdjaguar]

People who like guns and carry them around often want to justify having them by using them to make public statements.

 

[thecrazyscot]

It's not neutral, though. Yes, the mother didn't let it go, but the other woman pulled a gun. This is not something you do.

This is what a significant portion of Americans do. Our deeply engrained gun culture has cheapened the significance (in all respects) of a gun to absurd levels.

There's no reason to carry one in a car. A car is already an absurdly dangerous weapon.
There's no reason to carry one in public.
There's no reason to carry one at all.

Who do you need to kill?

 

[Farm Boy]

People who like guns and carry them around often want to justify having them by using them to make public statements.

That's sort of like saying Democrats are child rapists. There are some and they do make an awful racket. Other people are just tired of seeing unarmed people killed in their farmhouses, assaulted at work, and shot dead at the gas station. They usually don't like the noise much at all.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Good grief. Was the kid knocked down or hurt by being bumped into? Doesn't sound like it. Some people who bump into other people are rude and don't apologize.

It's second nature here, btw, for most people to apologize if they accidentally bump into someone. But there are times when they're rude and don't; if there's no real harm done other than rudeness, it's not something that tends to get blown up like this incident. Or at least that's been my experience most of the time.

I did get screamed at by a black woman once, for daring to take up space on the sidewalk where she wanted to walk, and my explaining that it's a bus stop, I'm disabled and there's no safe place to wait for my bus except where I was, and if she'd said "excuse me" I'd have done my best to move out of the way... just went nowhere. Scream, screech, rant, swear... so as she and her daughters stomped on down the street, I told her she was setting a lovely example for her kids. I did not choose to take this as a race-based situation (have no idea if she did; I suspect she would have screamed at anyone daring to take up space on her sidewalk, and I've certainly had more incidents of able-bodied people pushing past me or berating me for not jumping out of their way fast enough).

Rude people are going to be rude. The white woman in the video was trying to remain calm, and kept getting screamed at and not being allowed to get a word in edgewise. That said, I don't excuse or condone pulling a gun on anyone. But the mother is not blameless.

@Synsensa: This is a situation where the mother should have just walked away, instead of escalating things to the point where she was screaming and baiting the other woman. It's one of those situations where she could have just explained to her daughter that apologies for bumping into someone are what should always be offered - no matter what races might be involved (I honestly don't like the term 'race' as it implies that we're not all human), and those who don't offer them are rude.

 

[warpus]

Does race even matter here? If one of these people was Chinese and the other Mongolian, would that have affected this conversation any?

 

[Birdjaguar]

That's sort of like saying Democrats are child rapists. There are some and they do make an awful racket. Other people are just tired of seeing unarmed people killed in their farmhouses, assaulted at work, and shot dead at the gas station. They usually don't like the noise much at all.

Perhaps I was over harsh, but if you are carrying two guns around in your car while shopping, and then pull them out to threaten a mother and daughter, I think that the "look I have a gun" attitude is high on ones priority. Incivility is one thing, adding guns to the mix is a whole different game.

 

[Synobun]

@Synsensa: This is a situation where the mother should have just walked away, instead of escalating things to the point where she was screaming and baiting the other woman. It's one of those situations where she could have just explained to her daughter that apologies for bumping into someone are what should always be offered - no matter what races might be involved (I honestly don't like the term 'race' as it implies that we're not all human), and those who don't offer them are rude.

Do you think what the mother did justifies having a gun pulled on her with the threat of being killed?

No? Then it doesn't matter. The one who pulled the gun is to blame. Next you'll tell us she shouldn't have dressed that way.

 

[Farm Boy]

Perhaps I was over harsh, but if you are carrying two guns around in your car while shopping, and then pull them out to threaten a mother and daughter, I think that the "look I have a gun" attitude is high on ones priority. Incivility is one thing, adding guns to the mix is a whole different game.

I doubt I'd pull it unless somebody was beating on the widow, but if they were trapping me aggressively somewhere after I'd tried to leave, you better believe I'd be refreshing my muscle memory on where it is.

 

[El_Machinae]

Was Hill preventing the van from leaving? Clearly a gun isn't the "minimum required force to escape", but once someone blocks you in, you're allowed to extricate yourself.
Not really interested in the discussion of whether 'pulling a gun' is the minimum force, because that's dumb, given the circumstances described. I can think of a thousand situations where pulling a gun would be okay, but this doesn't meet the threshold.

 

[Bamspeedy]

Didnt watch video, but you restrict someone's movement (blocking an exit) you run the risk of false imprisonment charges.

 

[Farm Boy]

Dunno, you tell me and I'll believe you. I'm not watching it. Reverse lights seem a better indicator of intent than a firearm anyhow. Incredibly dangerous too.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Do you think what the mother did justifies having a gun pulled on her with the threat of being killed?

No? Then it doesn't matter. The one who pulled the gun is to blame. Next you'll tell us she shouldn't have dressed that way.

Re-read my post. All of it. At no time did I say that I condone a gun being pulled.

WTF does clothing have to do with this? I didn't even notice what anyone was wearing in the video; I'd have to watch it again to see what you're talking about.

I live in a sufficiently multicultural, multi-lingual, multi-ethnic community that I judge people by their behavior and don't tend to attribute it to race. I've been berated for existing a lot more by white people than people of any other heritage, at least when it's personal and I know about it. My mother was the racist in the family (I've mentioned this before in another thread). Not me.

I stand by my previous post. Yes, an apology should have been offered. It wasn't, but the nonstop barrage of screaming and accusations was not going to help the matter any, especially after the girl (according to the article) stepped behind the vehicle. The reason why doesn't matter; you don't deliberately step behind someone's vehicle when they're trying to back up, because it is dangerous. I'm reasonably sure the couple didn't want to run anyone over, and it's reasonable to say, "Get away from my vehicle."


Putting myself in the shoes of the woman in the vehicle... if I had accidentally bumped into someone, my first automatic response would have been "sorry" because that's just the way my universe works. It's what people are supposed to say.

If the mother had accepted that and moved on, the incident would have been over. It's unfortunate that things escalated so far out of control, when a little ordinary courtesy should have resolved everything.

It's also impossible to know for sure if the woman in the vehicle was at fault for setting this whole thing in motion to begin with, as I don't think the video shows if the bumping incident itself actually happened, and if it was accidental or deliberate.

 

[Synobun]

She pulled a gun.

 

[Narz]

Not watching video, don't need the drama in my life but I'm leaning towards the side of the person being blocked.

Don't block my goddamn car/bicycle/person.

Of course if I bump into someone I'll apologize but jumping in someone's way and getting in their face is asking for assault of some kind

 

[EnglishEdward]

I have had people bump into me (sometimes accidentally and sometimes deliberately) and demand I apologise.
I have accidentally bumped into people and had them politely apologise to me without being prompted.
In my experience, if person A demands person B apologise, that demand may simply inhibit person B from apologising.