Police Officer Threatens to Kill Ferguson Protestors

Lt. Ray Albers, police officer from St. Ann, Missouri who was in Ferguson to help handle the protestors has been suspended. He pointed his gun at protestors and threatened to kill them. When asked his name, his response was “Go Fuck Yourself.” CNN staffers report seeing similar death threats from officers towards protestors that have not been caught on tape. Capt. Ronald S. Johnson confirmed that there had been complaints about officers and “inappropriate behavior” on the part of the officers. He said that he has taken “appropriate action.”

This follows and incident on Sunday in which a police officer told a reporter from Argus radio to “Get the fuck out of here or you’re getting shot with this.” The peacekeeping police forces have threatened members of the media with shooting and in some instances attacked with mace and tear gas for days. Some media members are asked for identification when taking pictures.

The number of civil rights abuses in Ferguson is terrible. Bloggers and other non-mainstream media have been targeted and harassed by police officers on many occasions. While threatening and attacking mainstream reporters is not any more illegal  or disheartening, it is an indication of the lengths police officers will go to prevent the dissemination of information. Leaders of police departments will say that officers threatening the media is unacceptable, but the individual officers are human beings in a position of power and not always thinking of the ramifications of their behavior. In contrast, Harrison William Rund, a Missouri man who threatened to kill police on his Twitter account was arrested and charged with “felony terroristic threats.”

The Equal Protection Clause of the 14th amendment states that no person can be denied “equal protection of the laws.” This means that similarly situated individuals should be treated the same under the law. If death threats are “felony terroristic threats” then the police officers who issue them should be arrested for them, or alternatively the punishment should be removal from positions where the threatener can take action on the threats. That one individual gets one treatment while another individual gets the other is not equal application of the laws.

Those claiming a violation of the Equal Protection clause have to prove an intent to discriminate. In this case, the prosecuting district attorney would have to be proven to have intended to favor police officers over non-police officers when making charging decisions. A defendant must prove that “(1) ‘that he has been deliberately singled out for prosecution on the basis of some invidious criterion’; and (2) that ‘the prosecution would not have been pursued except for the discriminatory design of the prosecuting authorities.'”  In these cases, the “invidious criterion” would be singling people out on the basis of not being a police officer.

Unfortunately it would be difficult to find an individual whom a court would determine has standing. Usually in equal protection cases people argue either that they were discrimatorily prosecuted (the harm) due to their status as a member of the group or that the pattern of discriminatory charging has increased the individual’s likelihood of harm as a member of that group. Anyone accused of, say, making felony terroristic threats could argue that their membership in the “non-police officer” group influenced the charging decision. The public could also file a suit based on the increased likelihood of harm. The determination of standing would hinge on whether the judge thought that those group memberships were valid and that the police officers were “similarly situated.” A counterargument could be made that someone sitting at home making threats on Twitter is in a less stressful situation than a police officer making the same threats in person, so therefore they are not “similarly situated.”

Hopefully those making charging decisions will begin to apply the laws evenly. A help would be a statute that gave individuals standing to sue for judicial consideration the failure to prosecute police who have committed criminal acts and a requirement that their treatment be considered against the treatment of non-police officers in the same locality. While I don’t consider either possibility likely, it is nice to think of a future where police are treated the same as any member of the public, and the police don’t threaten to kill members of the public, especially reporters who are acting on their right to “freedom of the press.”

Another Man Killed by Police Near Ferguson

An unidentified 23 year old man was killed by two cops last night. He had stolen two sodas from a convenience store and may have had a knife. The police officers each shot him several times. The police chief further angered people by saying that officer safety is the number one issue, while questions remain as to whether a fatal shooting was the best approach with a person with a knife at a distance.

The Missouri National Guard is now in place, and the police ordered the media to leave. President Obama had announced in his press conference yesterday: “Let me also be clear that our constitutional rights to speak freely, to assemble, and to report in the press must be vigilantly safeguarded: especially in moments like these. There’s no excuse for excessive force by police or any action that denies people the right to protest peacefully.”

Of the 78 people arrested last night in the Ferguson protests, all but three were arrested for failure to disperse.

Unrest Rising as Police Kill Without Accountability

 

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In Ferguson, Missouri, an autopsy report showed that unarmed Michael Brown, 18 was shot six times. Whether Michael was physically resisting the police is disputed, but the report found that one of the shots had been through the top of his head. That’s not protecting the people nor is it a reasonable action by an officer trying to protect himself; that’s an execution. In a press conference yesterday, President Obama mentioned that a “gulf of mistrust” that exists between the people and the police.

In the same press conference he was asked about the wisdom of increasing militarization of our police forces. His opening on the topic was good: “Well, I think one of the great things about the United States has been our ability to maintain a distinction between our military and domestic law enforcement. That helps preserve our civil liberties. That helps ensure that the military is accountable to civilian direction. And that has to be preserved.” After that, he gave a non-response regarding the wisdom of our militarized police.

The police killing of Michael Brown is being investigated by the FBI, who followed the announcement of the investigation with a disclaimer that the launching of an investigation doesn’t mean that there was any wrongdoing. One witness attests that Michael was shot while running from the police with his hands in the air. Every night since the killing there have been protests by day and riots by night.

Perhaps the outrage in Ferguson will lead to some changes. Daniel Pantaleo, a NYPD officer who choked Eric Garner, 43, to death during questioning regarding possibly selling loose cigarettes, will finally be facing a grand jury. That was announced today, over a month since the incident. Ramsey Orta, who recorded the video of Eric’s death, was arrested, followed by the arrest of his wife Chrissie Ortiz.

In the video the police commissioner said that an investigation would be done into the appropriateness of the police’s actions, before and after stressing that they were in a lawful place engaged in lawful enforcement activities. The Blue Code of Silence was very much apparent here, with the commissioner closing ranks with the killer cops even while promising that an investigation would be conducted.

On August 5, police killed John Crawford, 22, in Beaverton, Ohio. He had been carrying an airsoft rifle (a BB gun) in a Wal-Mart. According to the mother of his children, who had been on the phone with him at the time:  “He said he was at the video games playing videos and he went over there by the toy section where the toy guns were. And the next thing I know, he said ‘It’s not real,’ and the police start shooting and they said ‘Get on the ground,’ but he was already on the ground because they had shot him. And I could hear him just crying and screaming. I feel like they shot him down like he was not even human.”

One of the officers involved in John’s killing was previously cleared of any wrongdoing in a 2010 apartment complex shooting.

Two days after the Ferguson police killed Michael Brown in Missouri, police killed Ezell Ford, 22, in Los Angeles. The police report from the killing doesn’t mention that Ezell was shot in the back. Ezell had been walking along the street when police wanted to stop to talk to him. He didn’t change what he was doing, and they cited “suspicious” hand movements as a reason for their assault. While the police say that Ezell had attacked them after they stopped him, this is disputed by witnesses. Ezell was known in the neighborhood to have a mental illness. Even if Ezell had been assaulting the police, there was no reason to shoot him in the back. Repeatedly.

The huge spate of deaths at the hands of the police in Albuquerque has already been covered here.

The police in Ferguson have asked that the people be reasonable. Michael Brown thought it reasonable to run from the cops with his hands in the air. Eric Garner’s possible offense was selling loose cigarettes. John Crawford was simply walking in Wal-Mart with an impending purchase. Ezell Ford was similarly simply walking. What is reasonable here?  Is it not reasonable to run from an organization with above-the-law murderers on staff? Is it not reasonable to protest these killings? The people in Ferguson are rioting. That’s illegal, but property damage shouldn’t be condemned with more force than the state-sanctioned actors who brutalize the people with senseless murders.

Albuquerque Residents Protest Trigger-Happy Police

Since 2010, Albuquerque police have shot 40 people, 26 fatally. Above is a video of Albuquerque police shooting and killing James Boyd for illegal camping. The surfaced in March and seemed to have triggered the anti-police brutality activism. Recently the police department was ordered to pay over $6 million in a wrongful death suit to Christopher Torres’ family; Torres was schizophrenic and instead of contacting his Crisis Intervention Team, having a family member present, or even just showing him the warrant, well, they killed him.

Saturday a peaceful rally was held at which police chief Gorden Eden was given a mock trial for failing to address the brutality concerns since taking the post four months ago. At this rally, and at others, the police department has been sending undercover police officers to infiltrate and record the crowds. This has concerned not only the citizens of Albuquerque but the New Mexico ACLU. A protest in March was more chaotic with traffic disruptions and the release of tear gas on protestors.

The 2011 Review of Use of Force in the Albuquerque Police Department, put out by the Independent Review Office of the Police Oversight Commission of Albuquerque (it receives complaints about the police and investigates them, and is a part of the city) has some recommendations and suggestions but they are not mandatory; they mostly stress proper training and objective standards on use of force. The Department of Justice, hardly a paragon of restraint themselves, has even found reasonable cause that the Albuquerque police are acting excessively and have launched their own investigation. The Albuquerque Journal editorial board, representing the views of the newspaper, published an editorial criticizing police chief Eden for requiring that officers and staff notify command staff before talking to DoJ investigators, saying that it would change the tenor of the conversation. However, the editorial did point out that it was better than Eden’s former position: forbidding officers and staff from talking to DoJ investigators at all.

Facebook page Albuquerque PD in Crisis has information for those who want to stay involved.