MN - Philando Castile, 32, shot by police officer, 6 July 2016 #1

[FrostOwl]

I wonder if people in France or England or Norway, for instance, teach their children this. How about New Zealand or Australia?

I know the answer. No, they do not. So why do Americans accept this kind of life?

As for Norway, the police doesn't usually carry weapons when on duty, if they should need weapons they have to get a permission from their boss. There are about 3 police shootings/year in Norway, usually non-fatal. Sweden is the Nordic country with most police shootings, about 30 a year, and since 2010 there have been 10 fatalities, 4 of them in 2013. The last killing of a police officer was in 2007, and since 1900 30 police officer have been killed during duty, all except one have been solved.

 

[scapa]

This case is one that I don't understand at all. With most other police shootings, I can see how things escalated, I can see there being fear...but this seems like a scared jumpy cop, however, I will try and wait until all the information is out so I can formulate my own thoughts on the truth, because we all know how many versions of the truth there are with even an innocuous situation.

Agree. This seems like an absolutely standard traffic stop/warning, with girlfriend and kid in the car FGS. How it went from a request for license/reg to a lethal shooting in such a short span is astonishing, and frightening.

EDIT: The victim seems to have been a genuinely good and deeply loved man. So much the sadder.

 

[SugarQueen]

I wonder if people in France or England or Norway, for instance, teach their children this. How about New Zealand or Australia?

I know the answer. No, they do not. So why do Americans accept this kind of life?

For me it's no different than teaching him to respect his teacher, or anyone else in a position of authority.

ETA: just to clarify, I am NOT teaching him that someone in authority is always right. I'm just trying to teach him to look at it from the other persons point of view, get thru the immediate situation, then deal with any issues.

 

[oh_gal]

RSBM

The mainstream media is reporting them more, in part due to cell phone videos.

CNN: We're not seeing more police shootings, just more news coverage

The headlines make it feel as if the country is experiencing an unprecedented wave of police violence, but experts say that isn't the case. We're just seeing more mainstream media coverage, and for a variety of reasons.

Let's be clear: That's just each expert's sense of things. We rely on hunches because real numbers don't exist, likely because no one thought it important to keep a tally until recently.

Chat with a publisher or editor at one of the country's African-American newspapers, and she or he can tell you they've been covering these cases for a long time.

... "This is the African-American experience, and for some reason non-African-Americans don't believe it."

They're starting to believe it, thanks to cell phones, said Cedric Alexander, the DeKalb County, Georgia, deputy COO of public safety and president of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives.

"Black and brown people have been making these complaints for years, but they fell on deaf ears because no one wanted to believe some officers would act that way," he said.​

I imagine you're right. I remember a thread on here a while back asking the question "were we safer 50 years ago?", or something like that. While it seems like crime is on the rise, maybe it's just that you never heard about things happening 100 years ago.

However --

Look at newsreels from 50, 75 years ago. When Kennedy was assassinated, or when the Hindenburg blew up....there was such raw, real emotion in the newscasters face/voice. People just generally seemed to care more, and care about each other. Why did Victory gardens pop up? To feed those who couldn't have their own garden. Nowadays, people just walk on by, quickly, because they're afraid they may be asked to help in some way.

 

[KaaBoom]

I'm not sure that's an accurate statement. If it were, you would expect those links that were posted above to show an inordinate number of African American people vs. non-African American people being killed by police. But it doesn't appear that way to me. However, there are over 600, and I haven't counted them all. But in January, there were 92 total deaths...19 are listed as "Black", 55 were "White".

Regardless of race, these incidents seem to be occurring more and more often.

African-Americans make up just 12% of the population. 566 people have been killed by police so far this year. 136 of them were black. Thats 24%. So blacks are 2 times more likely to be killed by police then other members of society.

 

[bluesneakers]

Two years after Ferguson, fatal shootings by police are up

As the use of deadly force by police once again roils the nation, the number of fatal shootings by officers has increased from 465 in the first six months of last year to 491 for the same period this year, according to an ongoing two-year study by The Washington Post. This year has also seen more officers shot and killed in the line of duty and more officers prosecuted for questionable shootings.

...

A Post database that tracks fatal shootings by police shows a 6 percent increase in the number of such deaths during the first six months of 2016 compared with the same period last year. Details of the fatal encounters so far this year remain strikingly similar to shootings in all of 2015: Blacks continued to be shot at 2.5 times the rate of whites. About half of those killed were white and about half were minorities. Fewer than 10 percent of all those killed were unarmed. One-quarter were mentally ill.

But there are notable differences: More of the shootings were captured on video, from 76 to 105 in the first half of each year. And the number of fatal shootings of black women, such as Nelson-Williams, has risen. Nearly the same number of black women have been killed so far this year as in all of 2015 - eight compared with 10.

 

[Jen Darme]

Difficult for me to believe the cop just shot w/o provocation. I sure hope we ultimately see the cop was wearing a camera and we get the full story. I would like to see the 60 seconds prior to shooting. Audio would probably suffice. I hope this wasnt a trigger happy cop. A biased opinion from a white male...but....if I were a black parent, I would be teaching my children what to do and what not to do when pulled over by cops. I want to hold firm on my thoughts that if you are respectful and compliant nobody gets hurt.

Based on my experience, how to deal with the police starts very young outside mainstream white culture. Children are not oblivious to what has happened to their family members, neighbors, classmates, and the people they learn about via the media.

Pick an era, from the founding of this country through convict lease, peonage, and Jim Crow to the present. Respect and compliance has never been a guarantee of safety for many Americans.

The Atlantic: Letter to My Son by Ta-Nehisi Coates

The birth of a better world is not ultimately up to you, though I know, each day, there are grown men and women who tell you otherwise. I am not a cynic. I love you, and I love the world, and I love it more with every new inch I discover. But you are a black boy, and you must be responsible for your body in a way that other boys cannot know. Indeed, you must be responsible for the worst actions of other black bodies, which, somehow, will always be assigned to you. And you must be responsible for the bodies of the powerful—the policeman who cracks you with a nightstick will quickly find his excuse in your furtive movements.

<snip>

But you are human and you will make mistakes. You will misjudge. You will yell. You will drink too much. You will hang out with people whom you shouldn’t. Not all of us can always be Jackie Robinson—not even Jackie Robinson was always Jackie Robinson. But the price of error is higher for you than it is for your countrymen, and so that America might justify itself, the story of a black body’s destruction must always begin with his or her error, real or imagined...​

 

[DexterMorgan]

At around 6:50, she said the officer told him not to move, but instead he started to put his hands up and the officer shot him when he moved to do that.

[video=youtube;rDRSDvZxkPA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDRSDvZxkPA[/video]

Dang.

Thats pretty graphic.

Wtf.

The girlfriend couldn't even hug her boyfriend since the cop was still standing there by the window and ready to shoot.

Wth. The cop stood there like he was waiting for death to take place before realizing that there was no threat. Jmo.

Now I applaud that the woman was brave enough to live stream things as proof.

But shux. Where the heck was the hugs and kisses and you will be OK.

Dang. She had No tears. Just straight lois lane reporting.

Now I do feel bad for the guy. But I also feel that her real time reporting during the dying of a loved one; says that she did it more for dollar signs and not out of why is this happening to my loved one. Jmo.

 

[Jen Darme]

I imagine you're right. I remember a thread on here a while back asking the question "were we safer 50 years ago?", or something like that. While it seems like crime is on the rise, maybe it's just that you never heard about things happening 100 years ago.

However --

Look at newsreels from 50, 75 years ago. When Kennedy was assassinated, or when the Hindenburg blew up....there was such raw, real emotion in the newscasters face/voice. People just generally seemed to care more, and care about each other. Why did Victory gardens pop up? To feed those who couldn't have their own garden. Nowadays, people just walk on by, quickly, because they're afraid they may be asked to help in some way.

Life has changed in many ways but I think the degree of people helping people in a community still depends mainly on whether there's an atmosphere of entitlement and/or blame (separateness) or understanding (inclusiveness). The first response when bad things happen to others is often to consider why it hasn't and wouldn't happen to oneself, creating emotional distance, directly or indirectly casting blame, and making it more difficult to see bigger problems in society as a whole.

 

[Gardenista]

Dang.

Thats pretty graphic.

Wtf.

The girlfriend couldn't even hug her boyfriend since the cop was still standing there by the window and ready to shoot.

Wth. The cop stood there like he was waiting for death to take place before realizing that there was no threat. Jmo.

Now I applaud that the woman was brave enough to live stream things as proof.

But shux. Where the heck was the hugs and kisses and you will be OK.

Dang. She had No tears. Just straight lois lane reporting.

Now I do feel bad for the guy. But I also feel that her real time reporting during the dying of a loved one; says that she did it more for dollar signs and not out of why is this happening to my loved one. Jmo.

Agree, but she was probably afraid she could be shot too if she moved when he told her not to.

But there won't be any $$$ since she admitted he moved after he was told not to. The cop is lucky she did the video

 

[Tillicum]

Dang.

Thats pretty graphic.

Wtf.

The girlfriend couldn't even hug her boyfriend since the cop was still standing there by the window and ready to shoot.

Wth. The cop stood there like he was waiting for death to take place before realizing that there was no threat. Jmo.

Now I applaud that the woman was brave enough to live stream things as proof.

But shux. Where the heck was the hugs and kisses and you will be OK.

Dang. She had No tears. Just straight lois lane reporting.

Now I do feel bad for the guy. But I also feel that her real time reporting during the dying of a loved one; says that she did it more for dollar signs and not out of why is this happening to my loved one. Jmo.

Thank you. I was wondering if I was the only one who noticed. Obviously she couldn't hug him and hold him but what about words of compassion in his last moments? Instead she's posting live on facebook saying he killed him, while her boyfriend is still alive and conscious.

 

[Sillybilly]

Please stick to discussing THIS case and this case only. Off-topic posts have been and will be removed and, as usual, generalized bashing of law enforcement is not allowed.

 

[DexterMorgan]

Life has changed in many ways but I think the degree of people helping people in a community still depends mainly on whether there's an atmosphere of entitlement and/or blame (separateness) or understanding (inclusiveness). The first response when bad things happen to others is often to consider why it hasn't and wouldn't happen to oneself, creating emotional distance, directly or indirectly casting blame, and making it more difficult to see bigger problems in society as a whole.

Imo. One of the big problems in urban communities in Detroit or Chicago or D.C or wherever is that a lot of folks since the 80s has received big government assistance to help support their big families.
They get free food, money, schooling, low cost to free apartments or houses and free medical with a host of other benefits.

But most folks aren't forced to make sure that their kids meet a certain standard as far as not being caught up in certain things while the family is being supported by us tax payers. Jmo.

So now we have 1 million drop outs from schools that were raised on our dollars while no one is held responsible except for us tax payers when prison time comes around. Jmo.

So you can now have 20 kids that are all supported by our dollars,

Plus we now have kids that dare cops to shoot them with the hopes of surviving and getting paid millions. Jmo.

Now I see why China didnt want people having too many kids that they couldn't afford. Jmo.

But sorry for the off topic rant which doesn't have anything to do with this case. Jmo.

 

[barcode]

Thank you. I was wondering if I was the only one who noticed. Obviously she couldn't hug him and hold him but what about words of compassion in his last moments? Instead she's posting live on facebook saying he killed him, while her boyfriend is still alive and conscious.

I too find her misdemeanor somewhat offbeat, out of place. She is in other videos in sighting Trayvon Martin, Sandra Bland, would be nice to see how this all went down.

 

[bluesneakers]

Dang.

Thats pretty graphic.

Wtf.

The girlfriend couldn't even hug her boyfriend since the cop was still standing there by the window and ready to shoot.

Wth. The cop stood there like he was waiting for death to take place before realizing that there was no threat. Jmo.

Now I applaud that the woman was brave enough to live stream things as proof.

But shux. Where the heck was the hugs and kisses and you will be OK.

Dang. She had No tears. Just straight lois lane reporting.

Now I do feel bad for the guy. But I also feel that her real time reporting during the dying of a loved one; says that she did it more for dollar signs and not out of why is this happening to my loved one. Jmo.

That's a terrible thing to say. I hope you're wrong. Maybe she understood what she was witnessing and wanted to know others would witness and maybe his death wouldn't be in vain, or maybe by doing this she was able to keep from freaking out. I do that when faced with big bad situations and people assume I'm cold or heartless, but it's the only way I can deal with big emotional moments.

 

[Elley Mae]

Dang.

Thats pretty graphic.

Wtf.

The girlfriend couldn't even hug her boyfriend since the cop was still standing there by the window and ready to shoot.

Wth. The cop stood there like he was waiting for death to take place before realizing that there was no threat. Jmo.

Now I applaud that the woman was brave enough to live stream things as proof.

But shux. Where the heck was the hugs and kisses and you will be OK.

Dang. She had No tears. Just straight lois lane reporting.

Now I do feel bad for the guy. But I also feel that her real time reporting during the dying of a loved one; says that she did it more for dollar signs and not out of why is this happening to my loved one. Jmo.

I have to say that JMO, she thought he was shot in the arm, at 00:26 seconds. [video=youtube;DKWWU8rBsfA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKWWU8rBsfA[/video] she says that. Not sure that she realized the seriousness of the wounds. jmo idk

 

[DexterMorgan]

That's a terrible thing to say. I hope you're wrong. Maybe she understood what she was witnessing and wanted to know others would witness and maybe his death wouldn't be in vain, or maybe by doing this she was able to keep from freaking out. I do that when faced with big bad situations and people assume I'm cold or heartless, but it's the only way I can deal with big emotional moments.

Okay. I'm sorry Blues. My day off with a slight Irish coffee this morning.

Please forgive me.

Because I can't afford a vacation. Lol.

Thanks my Friend.

 

[Tillicum]

I have to say that JMO, she thought he was shot in the arm, at 00:26 seconds. [video=youtube;DKWWU8rBsfA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKWWU8rBsfA[/video] she says that. Not sure that she realized the seriousness of the wounds. jmo idk

At 00.09 she says he killed my boyfriend?

 

[bluesneakers]

Okay. I'm sorry Blues. My day off with a slight Irish coffee this morning.

Please forgive me.

Because I can't afford a vacation. Lol.

Thanks my Friend.

I can't afford one either.

But I would love some of that coffee please and thank you.

 

[DexterMorgan]

At 00.09 she says he killed my boyfriend?

Agree. That doesn't sound like she thought only a arm shot.

So he made have heard that he was dead before he actually died. Jmo.

Her Facebook reporting of him already dead could be the last thing that he heard. Jmo.

Idk.

But the entire situation is totally awful and I hope that justice is served against the police.