The George Floyd/Black Lives Matter protests and police conduct

now from a far right wing point of view.......he was exercising his 2nd amendment rights to get his gun to protect himself from an oppressive government?  those damn lefties are going to take all our guns away!

 
Enhance said:
Yeah that's one of the strangest variables about all of this. Without context, walking away from police (who have their weapons drawn) seems like a real bad idea. I realize that a lot of people may feel conditioned to not trust police in these circumstances but I imagine that (statistically speaking) compliance is the safest option.

Shooting seven times also feels excessive (again, without context). The only thing I can think of to justify it would be that Blake was still moving and so the officer kept firing? The fact that it got to that point is still baffling.
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As far as shooting seven times, I think (although there may be others on here who know better than I about this) that if they must fire, officers are trained to keep firing into the center of mass until the threat is neutralized. That is why most police shootings have so many shots fired. So the real question is why it was necessary to shoot in the first place.

The video is so weird. It seemed so casual. There was no real sense of urgency by anyone. And only one cop was following the guy with his gun pointed, it didn't seem like the others perceived this to be such a big threat. And he already had a hand on him. It doesn't make sense.

But I also agree that, generally speaking, if you have guns drawn on you, you are likely to live longer by doing what they say, unjust or not. But the video doesn't show what happened beforehand or what kind of orders were given to the man.

 
I'm a peacock! Glad you knew it was mostly rhetorical.

But really... My hot take is that the system is failing these officers and as a result putting their livelihood and the public's safety in jeopardy. They need to be trained better. We owe them all the physical training and tools to get their job done safely so they and the people they interact with can get back to their families at night. We've had shifts in police policy before (maybe not as painful as this), but once changes are made and we move forward we'll all be better for it.

 
ZRod said:
I'm a peacock! Glad you knew it was mostly rhetorical.

But really... My hot take is that the system is failing these officers and as a result putting their livelihood and the public's safety in jeopardy. They need to be trained better. We owe them all the physical training and tools to get their job done safely so they and the people they interact with can get back to their families at night. We've had shifts in police policy before (maybe not as painful as this), but once changes are made and we move forward we'll all be better for it.
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The last paragraph we should all broadly agree upon. It's exactly what Biden and his campaign are saying we need to do. They're not taking their cues from the people out in the streets rioting and lighting stuff on fire. I'd go so far as to say they could do a better job highlighting that they're NOT supporting those people and that they're not Democrats. Take that attack away from Trump and his cult.

The problem is the latter is basically enabling this cycle in perpetuity by distorting the Democrats' message on this. They're enabling continued bad behavior in policing and preventing systemic change because it wins them "Blue lives matter" votes in the short-term. And it's despicable. Because once again the GOP proves they care more about power and votes than doing what is best for the country.

 
Jacob Blake paralyzed after he was shot by Wisconsin police, family attorney says

Jacob Blake, the 29-year-old Black man who was shot several times by police in Wisconsin, is now paralyzed, family attorney Benjamin Crump said Tuesday. Blake is currently undergoing surgery and is "struggling to sustain his life," Crump added. 

"The medical diagnosis right now is that he is paralyzed and because those bullets severed his spinal cord and shattered some of his vertebrae… it is going to take a miracle for Jacob Blake Jr. to ever walk again," Crump said. "He is currently in surgery as we speak, still struggling to sustain his life and to hopefully become some resemblance of the man he once was."
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https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jacob-blake-family-ben-crump-press-conference-watch-live-stream-today-2020-08-25/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab7e&linkId=98091725

 
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I haven't been following the story too closely the last couple of days, but this somehow slipped my radar. There's a still frame of Blake having a knife in his hand as he walked around the front of the car. (Consider the source, BTW. Not sure how reliable that site or that photo are. It's tough to see in the real video).

The only thing this would explain/justify... maybe... is why cops had their guns out. The DOJ is apparently saying he had a knife on him during the altercation. I still don't necessarily think it answers the de-escalation questions or the being shot in the back seven times piece.

Authorities identify Kenosha cop who shot Jacob Blake, say Blake had knife

Authorities on Wednesday night identified the police officer who shot Jacob Blake, which has led to four days of protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and renewed calls nationwide to end police violence against people of color. The Department of Justice also announced several other details, including that Blake had a knife and that officers first used a stun gun on him.

During the incident, which happened Sunday, officers attempted to arrest Blake, the DOJ said in a statement released Wednesday evening, though it did not indicate why. Officers attempted to stun Blake, "however the taser was not successful in stopping" him, according to the statement. The DOJ identified the officer who shot Blake as Rusten Sheskey, who has been with the Kenosha Police Department for seven years. He fired seven shots, and was the only officer to fire his weapon, the DOJ said.

Blake admitted that he had a knife during the DOJ's investigation, and agents recovered a knife from the driver’s side floorboard of his car, officials said. No other weapons were found.
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knapplc said:
I've seen discussion that this is not a knife, but his keys.
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Interesting. I think that's definitely a possibility given the photo quality. I think the still frame is circumstantial at best. (Forgive the poor analogy, but it's like Big Foot sightings. It seems like the photo 'evidence' is often a lot of blurry, dark photos with poor resolution and some potential matrixing.) That could be what we're seeing in the photo, too.

Police on scene said a knife was found on the floorboard of his car but I haven't seen anything conclusive yet that he had a knife in his hand during the altercation.

 
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Enhance said:
Interesting. I think that's definitely a possibility given the photo quality. I think the still frame is circumstantial at best. (Forgive the poor analogy, but it's like Big Foot sightings. It seems like the photo 'evidence' is often a lot of blurry, dark photos with poor resolution and some potential matrixing.) That could be what we're seeing in the photo, too.

Police on scene said a knife was found on the floorboard of his car but I haven't seen anything conclusive yet that he had a knife in his hand during the altercation.
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If that was a knife, I can see how it would have fallen from his hand to the floorboard as he fell, so sure.

But that video doesn't show anything conclusive, as you said. It's too blurry to see anything. Can't even tell if it's keys or what it is.

 
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Enhance said:
The only thing this would explain/justify... maybe... is why cops had their guns out. The DOJ is apparently saying he had a knife on him during the altercation. I still don't necessarily think it answers the de-escalation questions or the being shot in the back seven times piece.
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That makes even less sense to me, then. A man with a knife can certainly be a threat, and someone trained with a knife can close distance and do a lot of damage very quickly. However, Jacob Blake was walking away, and it was the officer who advanced on him. If he did have a knife, it would make sense that an officer would have a gun trained on him though, but it makes me wonder why the other officers weren't spread out or doing more to contain him if he was perceived to be a threat.

 
Ulty said:
That makes even less sense to me, then. A man with a knife can certainly be a threat, and someone trained with a knife can close distance and do a lot of damage very quickly. However, Jacob Blake was walking away, and it was the officer who advanced on him. If he did have a knife, it would make sense that an officer would have a gun trained on him though, but it makes me wonder why the other officers weren't spread out or doing more to contain him if he was perceived to be a threat.
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I think that's a fair point, too. I can't imagine an officer would close the distance like that officer did when a suspect had a knife in their hands. Seems incredibly stupid on the surface. What's to stop the suspect from turning around and slashing you, if that's the case?

 
Ulty said:
That makes even less sense to me, then. A man with a knife can certainly be a threat, and someone trained with a knife can close distance and do a lot of damage very quickly. However, Jacob Blake was walking away, and it was the officer who advanced on him. If he did have a knife, it would make sense that an officer would have a gun trained on him though, but it makes me wonder why the other officers weren't spread out or doing more to contain him if he was perceived to be a threat.
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Not to mention, there had just been shots fired when Rittenhouse was allowed to walk past police and escape while carrying an AR-15. 

Same city. Same cops. Same week.

 
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