America - The Official Thread

[Dotini]

Shouldn't be the case.

There should be unicorns, fairies and dragons. The reality is, in today's America, white, black, Hispanic and Pacific islanders alike are subject to death at the hands of trigger-happy cops. You are an idiot if you don't keep this in mind EVERY TIME you are on the streets. As a practical matter, your rights exist only in the fairyland of your mind.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Really? He was a thief! That makes him a GRADE A SCUM-BAG. Say it with me! People that rob convenience stores are scum.

You know that, I know that, Officer Wilson knows that. What Officer Wilson didn't know was that Brown had taken cigars from a store. It wasn't that threatening a robbery, the shopkeeper tried to lock Brown in until he gave them back. Still, a robbery it was and the officer didn't know.

@Dotini the officer's skull wasn't broken, that's a misquote from the DA''s statement. In OBFs there is no break, only a fracture. I've had three, the first was from knocking my cheekbone on a loft ladder. I made it all the way through 'Nam only to injure myself there. I only went to the doctor because my eye felt slow the next day. The second and third were rugby/mud/rain related but by then I had a predisposition to the condition.

If the officer's injury was clearly external we'd see looooots of pictures of him, I'm sure. And why not?

I still think Brown was a criminal who deserved to be treated as such. Still, I don't believe that an unarmed man should be subject to deadly force without a thorough and proper investigation after the fact. So far there's a massive amount of judgment by preconception rather than judgement by actual fact. The agenda's so strong that every single fact seems to be being distorted or linked with extra facts from no real source.

 

[Omnis]

Officer Dredd got punched in the face hard enough to have a blowout fracture. Witnesses say his face was swollen like Joe Frazier after the thrilla in Manila.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Officer Dredd got punched in the face hard enough to have a blowout fracture. Witness say his face was swollen like Joe Frazier after the thrilla in Manila.

Do you have a source? And there's not a single picture of him? Given the circumstances and the injury that seems extremely peculiar, rather like the perfect YouTube audio track that nobody noticed for two days.

And I'm not saying he didn't do his job right, I'm saying neither you or I know if he did. It remains possible that this is the extreme of good policing, he did everything he could. Without favour it remains entirely possible that his actions were the extreme of bad policing. The facts will tell us that, there's a lot of hearsay around this and few strong sources.

This is the only photo I know of that shows Wilson after the event. It's impossible to see how he looks of course, but the left side of his head doesn't look red, or damaged.

 

[Danoff]

There should be unicorns, fairies and dragons. The reality is, in today's America, white, black, Hispanic and Pacific islanders alike are subject to death at the hands of trigger-happy cops.

...so let's ignore what needs to be changed and blame the victim?

 

[Omnis]

The police and DA have released that info. I trust them more than a bunch of looters and conspiracy wack jobs.

 

[TenEightyOne]

The police and DA have released that info. I trust them more than a bunch of looters and conspiracy wack jobs.

Yes, absolutely. Did you read the description of an Orbital Blowout Fracture (the main damage is to fat, not bone)? You may well have suffered one and never known, it's a very common minor injury.

Did the police/DA reveal any photo of the officer other than the CT scan image (which shows a small OBF)?

 

[Dotini]

...so let's ignore what needs to be changed and blame the victim?

No, lets acknowledge the facts and stay alive.

 

[Danoff]

No, lets acknowledge the facts and stay alive.

Ok, but I don't think there's really anything to discuss there. Nobody is saying that what this guy did was smart, or that others should do the same.

 

[Omnis]

Yes, absolutely. Did you read the description of an Orbital Blowout Fracture (the main damage is to fat, not bone)? You may well have suffered one and never known, it's a very common minor injury.

Did the police/DA reveal any photo of the officer other than the CT scan image (which shows a small OBF)?

You don't just get an OBF though. I just wonder why this guy wasn't tazed immediately before being shot. Also, where was another officer to help?

It's a bad situation there in Ferguson, but the looters are the real problem and are the reason it's blown up so much.

 

[TenEightyOne]

You don't just get an OBF though. I just wonder why this guy wasn't tazed immediately before being shot. Also, where was another officer to help?

We hear there was a struggle in the car, that seems a pretty safe fact. We know the officer was found to have an OBF. We don't know that Brown caused it. I accept it's likely, but we don't know that's a fact. Certainly if he was punched by Brown I'd expect there to be some photographically impressive bruises within 12-18 hours, and some equally impressive coverage of them.

The point I've been trying to make isn't that different to your own; why wasn't non-lethal force an option? Was it an option that the Officer rightly/wrongly discounted? So many questions.

It's a bad situation there in Ferguson, but the looters are the real problem and are the reason it's blown up so much.

I can't disagree, lots of agitation on either side from people who believe in their agenda and are determined to promote it. A smaller (but not insignificant) number of others just want to line their pockets at other people's expense, whatever the circumstances.

I don't have an agenda, I just like lovely lovely facts that I can line up on my desk and think about. Not a lot of those at the moment.

 

[Not_A_Guest]

With the facts and viewpoints I have now...

The scenario supposedly played out like this from some things that I am reading and hearing.
1. Brown robs the convenience store (note: the officer reportedly was uninformed about who conducted the robbery, but he did know there was a robbery nearby. I personally think this is what occurred).
2. Brown is walking in the middle of the street illegally with a buddy. Cop enters the vicinity, stops him because of said walking.
3. Brown thought cop knew of previous criminal activity and initiated the conflict. Thanks to @EF12345678 for the info.
4. Brown punches cop, resulting in a fracture of some sort. Then charges the cop.
5. Cop fires six rounds (?) into Brown, with two of them hitting the skull.
6. Brown dies as a result.

 

[EF12345678]

3. ??????? I don't know what triggered the conflict between Brown and the cop, please help

Allegedly Brown thought that the cop knew of his past crimes/robbery, so he hit the officer.

 

[Not_A_Guest]

Allegedly Brown thought that the cop knew of his past crimes/robbery, so he hit the officer.

Okay, thanks! Post edited accordingly.

 

[Dotini]

2. Brown is walking down the street, minding his own business. Cop enters the vicinity.

Brown and his friend were not walking down the street minding their own business. According to reporters, they were off the sidewalk, walking down the center of the street, impeding traffic and drawing attention to themselves. This is around the first corner from the convenience store robbery.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Brown and his friend were not walking down the street minding their own business. According to reporters, they were off the sidewalk, walking down the center of the street, impeding traffic and drawing attention to themselves. This is around the first corner from the convenience store robbery.

Yes, we know that the officer interrupted them for walking on some kind of jay that was in the road.

How Brown/Johnson saw that we don't know. We have no testimony as to Johnson's behaviour that I'm aware of. Perhaps he said things to Brown that Wilson believed Brown would act upon?

The Washington Times (a very conservative Church-produced broadsheet) now say Wilson was "badly beaten", another very late piece of information if true.

 

[Not_A_Guest]

Brown and his friend were not walking down the street minding their own business. According to reporters, they were off the sidewalk, walking down the center of the street, impeding traffic and drawing attention to themselves. This is around the first corner from the convenience store robbery.

Okay, thanks! Post will be edited.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Just seen the second St. Louis shooting, two cops on one guy (who only had a knife) pulled guns and put 10 rounds in him from ten feet away. No attempt to apprehend him, straight into kill-mode.

Not how it should be done, in my opinion. No reason they couldn't have tazed him.

To be safe once he was dead they handcuffed him.

 

[Omnis]

Did you even see the video? It was a suicide by cop. You don't aggressively approach police officers when they have their guns drawn on you. The natural thing to do if you don't want to be shot is to immediately double back and raise your arms in surrender.

They shot him 10 times because 2 officers dumped five rounds into him before he hit the floor.

The cops didn't have to taze him. If you're in Ferguson ****ing with the police, you're risking your life and most likely purposely trying to get killed.

 

[Not_A_Guest]

Can somebody give me a video for this other shooting?

 

[EF12345678]

Can somebody give me a video for this other shooting?

Sure, here ya go.

 

[McLaren]

Did you even see the video? It was a suicide by cop. You don't aggressively approach police officers when they have their guns drawn on you. The natural thing to do if you don't want to be shot is to immediately double back and raise your arms in surrender.

They shot him 10 times because 2 officers dumped five rounds into him before he hit the floor.

The cops didn't have to taze him. If you're in Ferguson ****ing with the police, you're risking your life and most likely purposely trying to get killed.

I'm not shocked to see who it is you're replying to. Describing the weapon as "only a knife" & the officers as going into "kill-mode". I got a good laugh reading that and that basically, no one knows how Wilson suffered an OBF; It's just something you get.

Nothing you say has any bearing; like the first protesters, all that matters are the first news reports & everything else released later is either unproven without pictures/video or questionable even then. You & I both know the reason for the "late" revealings is because of something called an on-going investigation to find out what happened & that the Defense is going to play this hearing smart; with hold evidence until its time to be used in court to support the motion that Wilson was legally justified to use deadly force.

 

[phillgt2002]

It's sad that I'm desensitized of this kind of stuff. I've witnessed and heard so many shootings in STL that I'm not even surprised or shocked that it happens. That one time I saw a guy get shot three times on a playground while riding past another school on a bus in elementary school.. Principles called us in and asked us if we needed counseling, I just put on a smug nope face and went back to class to chat with my peers. I guess that's the perk of living in a really ****** city.. a rock solid mind which has developed numb to local violence. I see **** on the local news and I just laugh and scoff at it and generally say 'that's just St. Louis'. Whenever I go to California and mention St. Louis, people usually get excited while I'm just sitting there with a dead straight face wondering why the **** they think it's such a brilliant city. Kind of funny.

And to be completely honest, I don't even care about the Mike Brown shooting anymore, he's just another black male killed by a cop.. I understand the problem in the city, and it's like any other American city. It's totally racially divided. The police force here is so disconnected with the communities they are 'working with'. In order to stop these things from happening, you have to build a sense of trust with the common citizen so that they aren't born and told to fear the police as a black male. When you go past one street in St. Louis whole demographic of the city changes in a fifty mile radius. It's called the Delmar divide and it's where basically the street divides the poor from the college towns and wanna be urban streets like the Central West End where posh, hipster racists go to get their coffee buzz. The city is currently being gentrified with new apartments springing up where old apartments once stood but were torn down, and a Ikea being sprung up on one of the dingiest streets in the area, Vandeventer. It's going to take a long time for this city to be properly integrated, and while the northern parts of the city are predominately black, it's no excuse for such a divide.

Really, the only reason why there are 'racial tensions' in St. Louis is because of some of the morons living out in Chesterfield and Wildwood failing to understand that they're not from the actual city. The only reason why they come into St. Louis is to either A. Leave the damn place via airport or B. To go to the Cardinal games (Chesterfield people and Wildwood people got so pissed when Albert Pujols left the team that they started to say that he should be grateful that the Cardinals took him in because he would be back in his home country if it weren't for them.) Where do I get this **** from? Well, it's spread out throughout my Facebook, and is said by people that I befriended through the years of going to school in the county. These dumb ****s complain about the people looting in Ferguson, and how they're "giving their city a bad reputation" when they aren't even in they aren't even near the city of Saint Louis...

Sorry for the possibly unorganized ranting.. this is just frustrating..

Brown and his friend were not walking down the street minding their own business. According to reporters, they were off the sidewalk, walking down the center of the street, impeding traffic and drawing attention to themselves. This is around the first corner from the convenience store robbery.

And dude, if you were to live around the St. Louis area, you would see this every single day. I highly doubt that the kid was drawing attention to himself, he was probably just walking in the street which is something honestly, I've done before. I only walk in the streets if there is just rain forest like vegetation growing through the sidewalk.

 

[EF12345678]

This article is interesting.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Did you even see the video? It was a suicide by cop. You don't aggressively approach police officers when they have their guns drawn on you.

You do if you're mentally ill. The police are often first responders to the mentally ill in public. The police are there to protect and to serve, after all.

It continues to shock me that, in my opinion, American police can continue to act this way. The man was clearly impaired. Why did both officers draw firerarms? Why didn't one draw taser? Why wasn't it used?

It just seems too much force too immediately.

...to be completely honest, I don't even care about the Mike Brown shooting anymore, he's just another black male killed by a cop.. I...really, the only reason why there are 'racial tensions' in St. Louis is because of some of the morons living out in Chesterfield and Wildwood failing to understand that they're not from the actual city. The only reason why they come into St. Louis is to either A. Leave the damn place via airport or B. To go to the Cardinal games (Chesterfield people and Wildwood people got so pissed when Albert Pujols left the team that they started to say that he should be grateful that the Cardinals took him in because he would be back in his home country if it weren't for them...) ...

Okay.

I'm not shocked to see who it is you're replying to. Describing the weapon as "only a knife" & the officers as going into "kill-mode". I got a good laugh reading that and that basically, no one knows how Wilson suffered an OBF; It's just something you get.

This isn't Brown dude, this is Powell. And he was only carrying a knife, not two guns unlike the police team that killed him.

And you're right, we don't know how Wilson got his OBF. There is a possibility he had it before or even that he suffered it afterwards. When I explained things to you I noted that the greater likelihood is that he sustained it during the incident. We read now that the officer was badly beaten (from an unnamed "top brass" police source). The police have published all kind of evidence but no photo of the badly beaten cop. That's a Day 2 job at the latest and for all the best reasons.

OBF, as you'll have looked it up by now, can be caused by the most minor thing. And yes, I've been very nearly killed by a knife and yes, I've suffered OBF three times.

.

My arm at first therapy after a 12 hour operation to reattach everything. I know what a knife can do and I know it had to be nearer than 8 feet. Don't patronise me, dude, I'm British, not stupid.

 

[Northstar]

You do if you're mentally ill. The police are often first responders to the mentally ill in public. The police are there to protect and to serve, after all.

I must have missed the part where police know everyone's current medical state(as well as how to properly deal with them) off the top of their heads.

 

[TenEightyOne]

I must have missed the part where police know everyone's current medical state(as well as how to properly deal with them) off the top of their heads.

Ah, okay, I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic because, to me, the role of the police is so obvious in caring for the public, however ill.

Here, here, here, here and here.

SBP constitutes about 10% of 600 police fatal-interventions per year. You appear to suggest that police officers aren't trained (or perhaps shouldn't be) to recognise suicide risks or how to properly deal with them. That seems bogus and unlikely. SBPs constitute a real threat to officers, no doubt about it. Officers need to take the SBP down for their own safety, for the safety of the public and for the safety of the SBP. Almost always in that order*. That doesn't mean that there should be an automatic presumption that homicide is the always the primary option.

Are you saying that this is something that's probably unfamiliar to police, or something that they don't need to be aware of?

EDIT: More, this from Aunty.

*I can think of few exceptions, perhaps an SBP with a bomb where hands-on intervention is required by an officer whose withdrawal could lead to greater casualties.

 

[Dotini]

Ah, okay, I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic because, to me, the role of the police is so obvious in caring for the public, however ill.

Here, here, here, here and here.

SBP constitutes about 10% of 600 police fatal-interventions per year. You appear to suggest that police officers aren't trained (or perhaps shouldn't be) to recognise suicide risks or how to properly deal with them. That seems bogus and unlikely. SBPs constitute a real threat to officers, no doubt about it. Officers need to take the SBP down for their own safety, for the safety of the public and for the safety of the SBP. Almost always in that order*. That doesn't mean that there should be an automatic presumption that homicide is the always the primary option.

Are you saying that this is something that's probably unfamiliar to police, or something that they don't need to be aware of?

EDIT: More, this from Aunty.

*I can think of few exceptions, perhaps an SBP with a bomb where hands-on intervention is required by an officer whose withdrawal could lead to greater casualties.

A thoughtful post to which there are few good answers.

Once upon a time in America, the land was dotted with mental health hospitals to which people could could be committed, or admitted at their own or family request. They were in great demand following WWII. But decades ago we dispensed with these institutions. Perhaps our rugged do-it-yourself "system" of public health finds it's easier and less costly to simply shoot the brain damaged.

 

[Omnis]

You do if you're mentally ill. The police are often first responders to the mentally ill in public. The police are there to protect and to serve, after all.

It continues to shock me that, in my opinion, American police can continue to act this way. The man was clearly impaired. Why did both officers draw firerarms? Why didn't one draw taser? Why wasn't it used?

It just seems too much force too immediately.

He never took his hands out of his pockets. They didn't know whether he was mentally ill or not. That doesn't even matter. A police officer is going to protect himself no matter what. You don't accost one when he has his gun drawn on you.

For all the police knew, he could've had a gun trained on them in his pocket, or some kind of explosive device. You're telling me that the mentally ill are not capable of killing anybody? Get real, dude.

In an edge-weapon attack, the standard training is that an assailant can cover 21 feet of space in the time it takes to draw your gun and fire one shot. Unless you hit and sever the brain stem (the apricot), the assailant will not instantly drop dead. Officers are trained to shoot center mass, so they have to shoot until there is no longer a threat. A shot or taze against this guy could still have allowed him to cover the ground and stab one of them. He was AWFULLY close before they opened fire.

I was supposed to apply to St. Louis University. Yeah right. I'm not going anywhere near St. Louis for the next ten years.

 

[Dotini]

I was supposed to apply to St. Louis University. Yeah right. I'm not going anywhere near St. Louis for the next ten years.

Off topic:
To its credit, St. Louis has a beautiful and genteel downtown area. Even more interestingly to me, are the Cahokia Mounds Historic Site and museum about 15 minutes east of St. Louis. In 1250 AD, Cahokia was larger than London in population. The site is dotted with pyramids, mounds and barrows of various sizes, and well worth a visit. Monks Mound is largest pre-Columbian earthwork in North America, and has a base larger than the Great Pyramid of Egypt.