The latest in a series of deaths where a white police officer has killed a black man should never have happened. The police officer at the centre of this particular situation is Michael Slager. There are many cases where the death is in fact justified, and I will use the death of Michael Brown as an example where the actions were justified because Brown had in fact committed a strong armed robbery moments before he was shot and killed. In Brown’s case there is definite evidence that he attempted to take the policeman’s gun and it was only fair that the Grand Jury refused to send his case for trial. Michael Brown was charging at Police Officer Wilson at the time the fatal bullet pierced his brain and killed him. That scenario was not repeated in the Walter Scott case.
First of all, there is a witness. He is also a black man and as a witness he acted to video tape the whole scene. He did not see either police officer attempting CPR on Walter Scott. The young man who is the witness spoke to the two police officers and then he fled to his job because he did not trust them. He feared for his life. Interesting!! Second, the drip feeding has begun with regard to the former police officer Michael Slager, who has in my view been rightfully charged with murder.
Another man has come forward regarding an incident in 2013, that involved Michael Slager using excessive force on yet another black man. In this case the man, Mario Givens was the wrong person. There are witnesses to the whole incident including the woman who filed a complaint against the brother of Mario Givens. She stated that she gave a description of the man who had entered her room and that the brother of Mario is much shorter. Michael Slager ignored her and her friend when he used the taser on Mario Givens.
Now that the Givens case has come to light, with the AP investigating the incident including trying to find out why that case was closed with Slager being exonerated, the truth regarding that incident and the fact that Michael Slager was in the habit of using excessive force against black men will start to shine a light on police operations in North Carolina.
There is no need for the “Black Lives Matter” people to get involved in either case. Justice has been done because Slager is facing a murder charge. However, there is a need for the people of the town to come together and talk about the issues surrounding how both Scott and Givens were treated, and why the police closed the Givens case by exonerating Slager. It seems that the police were turning a blind eye to the use of excessive force.
Each case is different in my opinion. If a criminal is caught in the act of a crime, and that criminal is shot and killed by a police officer then of course the circumstances need to be examined so that anything that was untoward will not be allowed to happen again. If the police department had completed a proper investigation into the Givens case, perhaps Walter Scott would still be alive today. He did not deserve to be shot in the back.
I need to add here that “All lives” matter, not just those of black people. There are black police who also kill black criminals, and there are black police who also gun down white, Asian and Hispanic people.
Whenever there is an incident involving a policeman shooting a person, and that person dying, there needs to be an investigation into the circumstances. The relatives of the dead person might not always be satisfied with the result of such an investigation, but they need to “suck it up princess” and accept that the person was at fault for their own demise, as was the case for Trayvon Martin. Every incident needs to be properly documented and if there has been evidence of excessive force then yes, the police person involved should be charged with a crime.
We are now in the 21st century and it is time to end any of the endemic racism that exists. I am not talking about the absurdity of what is called “Islamphobia” but I am talking about ending the black racism against whites and white racsim against blacks. The civil war ended in the 1860s and it is high time that people adjusted to the fact that there is no longer a slave force. However, I know that it is impossible to have an end to such attitudes when I also hear of how Arabs and others continue to enslave people.
A world at war 