Sharyl Attkisson takes on the Floyd transcript
Here.
Attkisson is one of the few who do. The rest of the media would rather pretend the transcript didn’t exist or spin it against the police, because the content taken as a whole doesn’t jibe with the favored narrative.
She is certainly correct to allude to the case of Rodney King nearly thirty years ago, long before the arrival of smartphones and social media. Nevertheless, not much has changed, with chaos, rioting and upheaval following upon a distorted narrative promulgated, for ideological reasons, by the thoroughly corrupt MSM. The willingness of so many citizens to be motivated towards irrational beliefs and often criminal behavior on the sole evidence of snippets of cellphone video and wild conjectures disseminated virally on Twitter and Facebook (not to mention the complicity of almost everyone who holds real cultural and political power) augurs badly indeed for the future of our beleaguered republic.
It’s very likely the police officers will be acquitted of murder. Prepare for a second round of mayhem. While he died in police custody, it’s very likely the police officers did not cause his death.
He may have been succumbing to the combination of heart condition and the cocktail of drugs in his system.
Hopefully the body cam videos will be released, because without them it’s difficult to follow the conversations and the time when Chauvin placed his knee on Floyd’s body.
I think you had addressed all this in a previous post about the transcript.
There’s probably a big red rubber stamp “CANCELLED” in the near future for Attlkisson.
Only Chauvin is likely to be in any trouble. Two were trainees, including one who tried to intervene to correct him. They have different lawyers, suggesting that they will try and split him off.
Police trainers are very critical of Chauvin’s behavior, at least one I have spoken with saying that he blew by a number of red flags – enough that he will become a “what not to do” video for training. Yet that is not the same thing as saying he is a murderer, or anything more than negligent. Early in my career I had to restrain people who were drugged up or mentally ill and out of control, sometimes in situations where there were innocent bystanders who could be hurt if they were not brought under control. I noticed things immediately that would have gotten you fired immediately even in the bad old days of state hospitals.
Reading the transcript, I am reminded of what happens to my people, the acutely mentally ill, when they encounter police who are not well trained. He may not be guilty, but he’s not innocent. There were a couple of spots right from the start where I shook my head and wondered if this is common in Minneapolis.
Here’s a thought: maybe the MSCM will defend Chauvin like they’re defending Cuomo?
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/matt-margolis/2020/07/27/heres-exactly-how-andrew-cuomo-covered-up-his-deadly-nursing-home-policy-n715550
Imam Ellison’s embarked on a project to lynch Chauvin.
I’m interested to hear Minneapolis PD trainer testimony (both prosecution and defense) re neck restraints. Chauvin didn’t invent that technique on the spot.
What troubles me is the immediate and extraordinarily widespread journalistic and political charge that “Chauvin is a murderer”.
Floyd was in fact a walking dead man, based on autopsy findings, secondary to a life of self-neglect and multi-drug abuse. Stoking a failing heart damaged by both coronary artery disease and its pumping against resistance (high blood pressure) with amphetamines is a poor recipe. I believe autopsy showed an enlarged heart; if so, congestive heart failure was imminent. Of course that is no license to terminate him but he was clearly uncooperative.
Juror selection will be a challenge I do not believe it was possible to avoid the “news”, which was everywhere ad nauseam.
Assistant Village Idiot:
The hold that Chauvin used is not recommended – or sometimes banned – by many if not most police departments. Are the trainers to whom you spoke from Minneapolis, or somewhere else? Minneapolis allowed the hold under certain circumstances which the Floyd case may have fit. Unless the trainers you heard from are from Minneapolis and/or highly familiar with training in that city, what they have to say about this case may not be relevant.
Can you give me more information about that?
Assistant Village Idiot on July 27, 2020 at 4:34 pm said:
“I noticed things immediately that would have gotten you fired immediately even in the bad old days of state hospitals. … [Chauvin] may not be guilty, but he’s not innocent. There were a couple of spots right from the start where I shook my head and wondered if this is common in Minneapolis.”
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Assistant Village Idiot:
After reading the medical examiner’s report, the arrest transcript, and both Neo’s and Atkisson’s posts, I don’t think that Chauvin can be properly charged with murder. I don’t know how the State of Minnesota defines involuntary manslaughter, so maybe that would apply.
Unlike you, I have no training in the right way to deal with people who are over-drugged or severely mentally ill. Given your experience, if you have the time, I’d be very appreciative if you could expand on your comments above. I’d like to know what you think about Chauvin’s wrongdoing, and how it should be addressed by the legal system.
Thanks very much.
(Whoops, Neo wrote a similar request while I was typing)
I’m curious about Chauvin’s previous relationship with Floyd at the nightclub and whether that had anything to do with it.
In any event I remain skeptical that Chauvin’s actions were racist in the sense that he singled out this black man for vicious treatment because he was black.
Anyone who believes that white guys don’t get manhandled by the police is mistaken.
. He may not be guilty, but he’s not innocent.
He is innocent.
You have to give those Antifa guys, exposed by James O’Keefe of Project Veritas, credit for walking their talk when it comes to violence and burning cities.
Here’s a report from a Project Veritas journalist who is midway through the Antifa recruitment process for Portland “Rose City” Antifa.
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The meetings for prospective members were all done very secretly, the journalist explained. And Rose City Antifa did so by holding meetings in businesses outside of their hours of operation. For security, phones are placed in a separate room with fans to ensure no sound is picked up.
One recruiter tells the group in PV’s exclusive footage that the group’s goal “is to get out there and do dangerous things as safely as possible.”
Another, in a separate clip, tells recruits, “Practice things like an eye gouge, it takes very little pressure to injure someone’s eyes.”
https://saraacarter.com/project-veritas-infiltrates-antifa-says-outside-funding-could-be-involved/
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Note that federal officers in Portland have been attacked with laser pointers and at least three may have been blinded.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/portland-riots-federal-officers-blinded-lasers-fireworks-doxed
Not much difference I can tell between Antifa and Nazi brownshirts.
huxley:
He had no previous relationship with Floyd. See this. There is zero evidence that they knew each other.
Which is to say, the current protest/riots sweeping the country are not righteous indignation over the death of the unfortunate Mr. Floyd, but a radical attack which has been spring-loaded for months now.
There is zero evidence that they knew each other.
neo: Clearly I’m not up on the latest, but that’s only the latest twist, not proof that they didn’t know each other and that there is therefore “zero evidence.”
Maybe the witness, David Pinney, has recanted, maybe he’s been pressured to do so. But I wouldn’t call the current situation “zero evidence.”
“Get the fuck on the ground” would get you fired in a lot of places. Those are not the words of a person trying to help you. That immediately puts the other person, however impaired, on the defensive, wondering if he is in danger.
I will go over more later. The police officers I have spoken to at more than a few sentences length are an MP trainer for the Army Reserve and a supervisor/trainer from the NH State Police.
As I noted above, I have also done some of this years ago, including on forensic and high assault psych units. I don’t think I am quick to judge or unsympathetic. I am used to watching (and even doing) interventions that an outsider would think unjustified. I have also done some things in my life that I now wish I had not, because I know better ways to handle situations. Some might even have been prosecutable, even by the older standards I started with in the 1970’s. They certainly would be now.
Also, I have not watched the video, because I have found video to be misleading so often. Admittedly, it’s a lot easier to lie with a 30-second video than one that goes on at length as this one does. But I haven’t even seen it, so I think I can view the transcript with a clearer head than most.
Again I will note that this is not to say that he is a murderer. That’s easy to say, hard to justify.
I have read the autopsy report and note is made that there are no signs of trauma to the tissues around the trachea which does not surprise me since whatever pressure was being applied to the neck was to the side and not the front. We also don’t know how much pressure was being applied by the knee and the portion of his weight being applied by the knee to the neck. The side of the neck is well muscled whereas the front exposure to the trachea has little. As a former trial lawyer, I feel there is good potential to create reasonable doubt.
Assistant Village Idiot:
I have studied the transcript in great detail and done a search for various words, and nowhere does it say that any officer said “Get the fuck on the ground.” Can you point to where you found it?
The f-word is used by Floyd at various times, as well as the woman who was in the car, and also various bystanders. The only time an officer says the word to Floyd, it is during the early period [pages 1, 2, 3 of the transcript, and then when the same section is repeated later] when Floyd is in his car and they are first trying to get him to cooperate, in particular by showing his hands (an extremely important part of reassuring police you are not about to reach for a gun or other weapon). It is clear that some weird stuff is going on with Floyd’s hands where he isn’t showing them, and Officer Lane is getting very disturbed, for reasons one can conclude are related to worrying about what Floyd is up to and whether Lane himself is going to be hurt any moment. Even the woman in the car with Floyd (Shawanda Hill) tries to get Floyd to cooperate. This occurs after Lane already knows that Floyd has tried to pass a bad check, and that the clerk in the store perceives him as erratic and on some drug:
All the f-words from officers – at least, that I’ve found – come from Lane only, and are all during that harried exchange in which it is apparent why Lane is so agitated and so insistent that he curses. He wants Floyd to comply, for the safety of all involved. I assume that the video shows Floyd’s hand action and moving around.
Are you saying that the f-word alone, under those circumstances, would be enough to get an officer fired? Do you think the transcript indicates that, as you wrote “those are not the words of a person trying to help you”? On the contrary, in my opinion – I think it’s clear that Lane is very much trying to help Floyd, Lane, and everyone in that car, from dealing with a situation in which things could rapidly escalate to violence.
You also write: “That immediately puts the other person, however impaired, on the defensive, wondering if he is in danger. ” It is quite clear that Floyd knows he is in danger – danger of going back to prison. Floyd knows what he just did and he knows that prison (with his lengthy record) is likely, and he is desperately trying to figure out a way to not have that oucome occur. Why is he not cooperating with his hands? I have no idea, but it seems quite clear that either Floyd already knows he’s in danger, or he needs to become aware that if he fails to cooperate with the officer’s instructions, he and everyone else around will be in danger.
The f-word here is for emphasis, in a situation that could easily escalate. Since Floyd also uses it at times for emphasis, as do several bystanders, it stands to reason that Floyd would understand Lane’s use of it for emphasis.
Whatever an MP trainer for the Army Reserve and a supervisor/trainer from the NH State Police said about it, it doesn’t seem relevant to me because what’s relevant are the Minneapolis rules and procedures at the time, under which these officers were trained and are operating. Your experience in a mental health setting may not be especially relevant, either, unless you were in the habit of dealing with felons on the street, with lengthy records, who had just committed crimes and might have lethal weapons on their persons for which they might be reaching. I’m not sure what setting a “high assault psych unit” operates in, however.
huxley:
There is zero evidence that they knew each other.
What “evidence” would you say there is? I see none. One person said so and recanted. Others have said they worked at the same club but on different shifts. That is not evidence.
neo: I would say the evidence is yet unclear.
It’s a highly politicized situation in which there is substantial pressure to render Chauvin in absolutely black-and-white, racist terms. So any evidence that would explain Chauvin otherwise threatens the racism narrative.
Have witnesses never falsely recanted?
I would prefer to leave the Pinney claim open a while longer and see how it shakes out rather than rush to a judgment of “zero evidence.”
Would you say there is “zero evidence” that Epstein was murdered? It seems you would.
huxley:
If a witness says something and takes it back, you are welcome to suspect that he recanted under pressure (although this person says that it was simply an error) if you are of that mind. But there is zero evidence of it. Is it a possibility, remote or otherwise? Yes. But there is zero evidence of it.
No one else has said Floyd and Chauvin worked the same shift, either. Au contraire. So again, no evidence.
As for Epstein, the situation is totally different. There have been a number of doctors who say that a person could not – literally could not – commit suicide in the manner Epstein is alleged to have committed suicide. That is expert evidence – not direct evidence that he killed himself, but expert evidence that the facts make it impossible. There is also expert evidence that disagrees, and says it is possible to commit suicide that way. So there is dueling expert evidence in both directions.
As I pointed out before fentanyl is a powerful central nervous system depressor and an overdose can stop your heart or breathing. George Floyd was already complaining that he couldn’t breathe when the police arrived. Difficulty breathing is a symptom of fentanyl overdose. People overdosed on fentanyl may display these symptoms, according to CDC.
Labored or shallow breathing
Small pupils
Cold and clammy skin
Extreme fatigue and sleepiness
Inability to talk or walk normally
Confusion
Fainting, and dizziness.
As for Epstein’ death, hanging kills by either asphyxiation or by severing the spinal cord at C2 or C3, the latter causing total paralysis including paralysis of the respiratory muscles. The big hangman’s knot is placed just so the cervical spine will snap with the drop of the condemned, yielding the paralysis by compressing or severing the spinal cord.
Asphyxiation was considered a hangman’s failure to do the proper job, leaving the asphyxee kicking and dangling. Unworkmanlike!
I have not been able to find sufficient autopsy info, other than “several neck bones were broken, including the hyoid”. Which bones? Unstated except the hyoid, which is a trivial bone; its fracture does not cause death. A broken hyoid is seen with strangulation because of its location in the anterior neck, and it strikes me as unlikely that Epstein could have tolerated the air hunger while still conscious, even if the strangulation were self-induced.
We do not have “expert evidence” here. We have dueling “expert opinions” pro and con.
I personally hold, in my pseudo-expert opinion, that Epstein was not able to commit suicide with a sheet tied to a bed. He lacked the big knot (see above) and for self-asphyxiation would have thrashed about for several minutes in desperate air-hunger.
I believe he was murdered. A simple violent cervical hyperextension posteriorly by an assassin would have done the job quickly and quietly. I doubt Epstein threw himself forward with sufficient force over a very short distance in just the right manner to get the fatal spinal cord lesion.
That the autopsy findings are not more precisely reported in the lay press troubles me. Am I missing something?
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Ray’s points are right on.
Cicero:
In the strictly legal sense – no , we don’t have “evidence” at all, since nothing has been entered as evidence legally. Expert witnesses such as doctors, giving expert opinions, base those opinions on evidence, so the opinion itself ends up being evidence-based testimony. But sometimes elements of their testimony are considered evidence, as well. Here’s the way it goes:
Cicero:
You might want to look at this previous post of mine.
Neo — even assuming Mr. Pinney was not coerced or shamed into recanting, that does not mean the two men didn’t know each other or have a beef with one another. Over a shift assignment? Over a locker? Over hours worked? Over a woman? Over anything? The fact that of all the people in Minneapolis, the cop and the victim happened to work in the same club isn’t worth looking into?
Or, as Glenn Lowery put it, how do we know Chauvin isn’t just a mean son of a bitch?
IMHO, the near-universal assumption that Chauvin’s action can only be explained by racism has a long way to go before it’s proven.
Neo– You are correct that the f-bombs are for emphasis, emphasis that the command is serious and bad things will happen if you fail to comply. It is not in any police How-to manual and Chiefs might take exception under some circumstances. It is well known that hazards to officers come from the hands: they can hold weapons. Hands, empty, on the steering wheel allow the officer to relax a bit. Same goes for the empty hands on the dash board and backs of the seats for rear passengers. A vehicle stop is not intended to be a “fair fight”, so to speak.
Stu, further back. You are right on track for lack of evidence of strangulation as to damage to trachea and thereabouts. And the autopsy also says that there is no damage to the tissues of the sides of the neck and only a minor abrasion on the helix of the left ear (the one in contact with the pavement). There was also no evidence of the microscopic bleeding in the brain and eye that indicates lack of oxygen. Based on all this it is yet to be shown that the knee at the neck actually injured Floyd, let alone killed him. (The autopsy report is on-line,Google for Geo Floyd autopsy; its a pdf or scribd document.)
One of the things Atkisson is saying in her examples is that righteous public outrage is not necessarily evidence in court. But the public frequently doesn’t buy that, hence the unrest following a verdict contradicting righteous public outrage.
I”m sure Ellison would like to get Chauvin charged with a high-degree murder, say first for choice.
I think that, if that fails, and something like a less serious level of manslaughter say, is the convicted charge, people will be hugely upset.
But Ellison, being who he is and with whom he is connected, actually wants a not guilty verdict or some other no-conviction action. Chauvin walks. Then we really see the trouble. I’m guessing that’s Ellison’s wish along with BLM and Antifa and the democratic party.
Agree with Richard, Ellison deliberately overcharged to get an acquittal leading to more riots. That’s the kind of guy he is.
On “zero evidence”: neo is right. Conjecture, “coulda happened”, is not evidence.
Those are not the words of a person trying to help you.
He’s a police officer, not a nurse.
The video was very damaging. Few who saw it, made any attempt to wait for more information. I was one of them. I decided that Chauvin, with his19 years on the force was a cynical cop who had lost all empathy for perps. The transcript revealed my theory to be wrong. Had Chauvin and his fellow cops let Floyd sit up, it was not standard procedure. And, it probably wouldn’t have saved his life. It would, however, have provided a totally different narrative. The narrative that came out of the video was that all white policemen are racists and are killing blacks at will. That narrative triggered a mass hysteria in the country. You all know what followed:
Written by a friend. ” In the most powerful country on the planet its people said goodbye to one of its best sons.
Even presidents are not buried like this. A golden coffin, hundreds of thousands of sobbing mourners and thousands kneeling to apologize to the black population of the country.
The Mayor of Minneapolis clutching the coffin with the body of the worthiest of the worthy citizens of America.
His sobs are interrupted by cries of “SOO…OOOORY.”
Choking on saliva, the ex-wife of the murdered weeps, though the last time she saw him was 6 years ago.
That’s when he left her with her three-month-old daughter. He hadn’t sent alimony to his wife over the years. However, the unhappy widow has been crying for a week that she was left without a breadwinner. Therefore, compassionate Americans collected oodles of money for her. She’s received around $20,000,000 from the world and money continues to flow in.
The University of Massachusetts has established a George Floyd scholarship.
The great Floyd’s rap sheet listed robberies, for drug trafficking, for armed robberies (last time, holding a pregnant woman by the throat and putting a gun barrel to her belly while demanding money). Then he worked a deal with the investigators. Floyd handed over all his accomplices so they reduced his sentence by five years.
Floyd’s autopsy revealed drugs in his blood. This is the national hero of America in the 21st century? But there were followers. The Floyd love affair lives and grows.
Mass robberies and violence, as a sign of respect and grief for George, swept the US and now grow into a worldwide event. The most beautiful areas of our cities, including New York and Los Angeles, plus many others have now been destroyed. Probably never to return to their former elegance. 89 policemen were killed.
A 17-year-old girl was terribly raped, hundreds of police cars were burned, and civilians’ cars, streets, squares, and parks were burned as well.
US presidential candidate Joe Biden also fell to his knees. This didn’t bother hundreds of thousands of admirers of “St. Floyd” as they too dropped to their their knees! I just watched the Democratic leaders of Congress kneel in the halls of Congress for about 9 minutes for the death of a black man named George Floyd.
I have never seen them kneel for a fallen POLICE OFFICER.
I have never seen them kneel for a fallen SOLDIER.
I have never seen them kneel for the thousands of ABORTED babies.
I have never seen them kneel for a MURDERED white man or woman.
I have never seen them kneel for the
THOUSANDS of black on black murder
victims.
I have never seen them kneel for the TENS OF THOUSANDS of elderly people that died in our nursing homes due to the Covid-19.
I have to ask WHY are our Democrat leaders acknowledging the life of George Floyd, as being MORE valuable than the lives of everyone else? In fact, Democrats have put so much value on the life of George Floyd, that they have allowed rioting, looting, arson, murder and mayhem in communities NATIONWIDE.
Stand down orders were given in all liberal cities by liberal mayors and governors. Plus they gave him a folded American Flag. That’s usually for a Military honor. IS THIS OUR NATIONAL LEGACY?”
The progressives/Marxists have put something in motion that has put us on course for a reckoning that no one wants, but is now unavoidable.
.
Richard Saunders:
To say something has not been proven to be impossible is a very different thing from saying that here is a particle of evidence for it. I don’t think there is any way on earth to prove that Chauvin and Floyd – who, after all, were alive on earth at the same time, and who both lived in the same city – absolutely and positively did not know each other in any way is impossible. But there is not a shred of evidence that they did know each other, or even that they ever worked the same shift.
I don’t think it’s all that strange, either, that they worked for the same place for a while. Coincidences like that happen all the time.
And as for whether it is “worth looking into” – it has been looked into. Lots of reporting on that, lots of people have tried to find a deeper connection. Nothing has been found.
I don’t think David Brooks is available to restrain large felonious individuals who happen to be in a state of “excited delirium”.
Nowadays, the word “fuck” is used rather capriciously. I’ll bet A.G. Sulzberger spits out such an oath when he overcooks his quinoa.
Cicero. To differ wrt Epstein. Sometime back, Neo referred to virginia Wolff committing suicide by putting rocks in her pockets and walking into a river. This was to provide an example of an issue with suicide. No matter how badly you want out of here, the body, the reflexes take over at a certain point and you just can’t kill yourself. Unless you can take a step from which there is no recovery no matter what the body thinks but the step can’t trigger the survival/resistance reflexes. You can’t choke yourself. But you can pull a trigger. You can jump, you can make yourself jump, from a great height. Once committed, one way or another–rocks in pockets mean you can’t swim or even come to the surface no matter how you flail–you’re gone. You can jump off a chair with a noose tied to a rafter and if the chair is out of reach there’s no hope no matter how your body makes you struggle.
There is a way to hang yourself, or choke yourself which doesn’t require heights, dangling, and which doesn’t trigger the flailing survival struggle.
That is to affix a medium–rope might be too narrow and hurt–around your neck so that it bears on the carotid arteries. You lean forward with the medium tied to something behind you until substantial weight is on the rope or whatever it might be. If done well, the pressure is on the carotids more than on the throat so the strangle struggle isn’t ignited. Eventually you pass out from lack of oxygen to the brain and collapse further and…you die from lack of oxygen to the brain.
A carotid choke is a move in judo. I’ve been choked out in competition. No trouble at all. Ref shakes you, you get up, bow to your opponent and leave the mat. So the survival struggle doesn’t kick in and ruin your plans.
J.J. Excellent points. If the Floyd subject comes up, I’m sure asking why he got more than a state funeral, more than a dead cop or soldier would…bring a blank look to his fans. But that might be a teachable moment….how did you get led to be so incredibly stupid. Ah, who am I kidding?
I don’t believe it was an ambulance that took George Floyd (or his body) away. And it did not seem that he was gurneyed away by EMTs. I got the impression that all law enforcement at the scene knew Floyd was already dead. Significance? You tell me.
You are correct that the officer (In the transcript I read identified only by number) uses “fuck” in a different command. My error. It is not good police work to ever use it. It’s police who are telling me this, so everyone who is telling me it’s “just for emphasis” might want to take it up with policemen they know. Police trainers tell me that the goal is to defuse the situation to reduce the danger to everyone. They teach this not because they are are pacifists who believe violence is never necessary, but because the defusing techniques work and fewer people get injured. Old-school police interactions just feel right to lots of people, who are just sure they worked great and are justified. They didn’t. They are still common, but that doesn’t mean they are better. Police get in big trouble when it turns out the guy they were trying to intimidate into obedience turns out to be having a diabetic crisis, or a seizure, or a heart attack. Happens all the time.
It is clear right out of the gate that Floyd is not able to cooperate, however much he says he is going to. He is confused, because of drugs, illness, panic, whatever. Just yelling at him louder and more angrily didn’t seem to be working, did it? It is the officers who are supposed to be keeping their tempers. That’s their job. Of course they are concerned with someone who will not cooperate, who might be hiding a gun or other weapon. But that does not mean “Oh, hey, all bets are off, then,” because this is not an unexpected situation in their line of work. You or I might be in a dangerous situation and react badly without being much at fault. Confused, out-of-control people can be frightening, because they are unpredictable. There is no way of knowing whether they are just poor saps or are seriously dangerous and the situation about to deteriorate to a lot of danger.
Richard Aubrey:
Disagree.
I submit a sheet around the neck cannot compress carotids sufficiently without also compressing other structures, and that’s not judo. Carotids are protected by muscle. You say “if done well”; I submit an assassin can do it well, better than someone suicidal!
There remains the matter of multiple but unspecified cervical fractures.
It is clear right out of the gate that Floyd is not able to cooperate,
No, it’s clear that he doesn’t co-operate. It is by no means clear that he’s incapable.
Cicero. I was not referring to Epstein as an innocent suicide, but to a method by which one can…just go to sleep. You lean into it, feel a bit of pressure in the nose, and fade out. After which more weight falls on the carotids. So it is not impossible that somebody in Epstein’s position could do that.
It wouldn’t be a sheet, unless it was rolled to, maybe twice the thickness of your thumb. Small enough, force concentrated enough, to do the job, without biting into the neck and causing the guy to stop.
I am aware of the difficulties with the reports about Epstein.
Among other things, as I say, if an unlikelihood requires the congruence of two or more unlikelihoods, you’re in effect multiplying fractions in trying to calc the likelihood of randomnity. The unlikelihood of the guards goofing off along is one in ten. And that supervision doesn’t come down that night is one in five. So now it’s one in fifty. Times the likelihood that the recording medium goes missing.. Now that’s a toughy. Institutionally, the facility wants that to be as little as possible so they won’t look like real incompetents. So if it’s one in a thousand….now we’re up to one in fifty thousand to congruent the three required unlikelihoods. Nobody’s going to buy one in fifty thousand just happened to the guy whose death would cheer up more rich, connected people than any other in the world. On the other hand, if every other day’s recording goes missing, we only have one in a hundred, which is still unbelievable and leads one to wonder what else goes on that nobody is supposed to know about.
Sucks to be them, since any bump in the checking account is accompanied by a warning. See the Kopechnes.
Assistant Village Idiot:
I’m on record here, when George Floyd died, saying that in my opinion, Chauvin was out of line, especially by using the knee on the back or neck. It’s not that the technique is illegal. I wouldn’t know Minnesota or Minneapolis law. But it’s a violation of many state and municipal agency guidelines to use that technique, even though it is quite effective. Primarily because any choke or hold technique that involves the neck, back or spine can result in death or irreparable physical trauma, even when executed by people who are highly trained. In the end, most agencies are risk averse when it comes to wrongful death lawsuits.
Still, not every agency forbids them. Mine does. And the forensic report reads that the hold, as ugly and ill-advised as it might have been, didn’t kill George Floyd.
With regards to the word ‘fuck. You said:
“It is not good police work to ever use it.”
That’s wrong.
“It’s police who are telling me this, so everyone who is telling me it’s “just for emphasis” might want to take it up with policemen they know. ”
It certainly wasn’t me and I am going to flatly disagree with the people who said that. I suspect any of the men or women who trained me would disagree as well. I spent 8 years as a Field Training Officer myself. I’ve also been a martial arts instructor for 18 years. And a DT instructor (Defensive Tactics) for 7 years with my agency.
There is indeed a place for the word. There is a category of person, regardless of their color or the socio-economic strata they swim in, of a certain cognitive rigidity (not ability) that will often only respond to such language, especially when they have a mind to resist. Sure, it’s not PC to say or admit, especially to people who don’t have to do that job everyday. We spend a lot of time and effort trying to be civilized while immersed in the forces of incivility. We’re taught to say official things and articulate things differently after all. It forces us to wear many hats, many masks, if you will.
Law enforcement places a lot of emphasis on training persuasion, like ‘Verbal Judo’, a course offered by the deceased Dr. George Thompson. It’s a wonderful tool and I use it every day.The George Floyd incident had gone beyond the point where Verbal Judo, or persuasion, is effective. Here’s an ugly fact for you:
Sometimes, when someone is resisting arrest or lawful commands, a good, old-fashioned “Don’t you FUCKING move!”, barked right from the base of the belly, can work wonders. Yes, it’s coarse and crude and ugly. But it can save lives. Many criminals are coarse and crude and ugly and you need to speak their language to be understood. I don’t believe the people you have spoken with are being completely honest with you.
Assistant Village Idiot:
I don’t get what point you’re trying to make.
If it’s that this interaction with Floyd was not a perfect textbook-manual type of interaction that would be taught in training courses, you are probably correct. But that is not at issue. I am certain that, even before Floyd was placed on the ground and Chauvin applied the knee to the neck, Officer Lane’s use of the f-word could and would and even should be criticized as non-ideal.
But – if you’ll excuse the expression – BFD. At the time Lane said it, apparently Floyd was acting very erratically and not following instructions, particularly instructions about where to put his hands, which are ultra-important. People have sometimes been killed because a cop misinterprets what someone is doing with his hands as reaching for a weapon.
Lane doesn’t curse at Floyd after the hand problem, so I am pretty sure that the cursing initially has to do very specifically with the hand problem, and Lane’s fear that Floyd is about to do something violent.
After that, they are quite patient with Floyd for a long, long time. He does not cooperate. Apparently, when he gets into the car, he hurts himself. They have called for EMTs. While they wait, they have to restrain him to prevent problems for both Floyd and themselves. Floyd himself asks to be placed on the ground. They choose a method that apparently was approved by their local police force. It either killed him, or made no difference as he died from one or the other of either a heart attack from heart disease or breathing cessation from a fentanyl OD.
I don’t see how Lane’s cursing is even relevant to the issue, except as a less-than-ideal interaction by an alarmed cop, trying to get a large strong person to cooperate with instructions.
I think it’s worth posting a reminder that this is the same police department that shot and killed Justine Damond roughly three years ago. The shooting was of a nature that no one was able to deny that it was completely unjustified. She was unarmed, in her pajamas, and was in fact the person who had called the cops in the first place.
And yet it took seven months before public pressure finally forced the city to send the facts regarding her death before a grand jury.
There are problems in the Minneapolis PD. And Justine Damond’s death is a strong suggestion that those problems aren’t tied to racist white officers.
I wish to thank Fractal Rabbit for saving me a whole lot of typing. I found that the voice I learned in Drill Sergeant School (1968) served me well later in life. 🙂 Some people take calm and polite to be signs of weakness, and that perceived weakness will be exploited.
The only place the textbook, roll-played scenario exists is in the textbook and in the classroom. Real life is serendipity, and it happens fast. And it can be deadly.
The shooting of Justine Damond is a true tragedy. And it has all the earmarks of being a product of affirmative action. The officer who shot her should not have been wearing a badge.
Thanks again FR. Getting people to escape their preconceived ideas about policing is as hard as getting them to change their voting habits.
WRT Damond: Powerline blog and some other places claim that there is more than a strong hint that the cop, Noor, was from the Somali community and so cut a lot of breaks on the way to being Minneapolis’ first Somali cop. Certainly, they say, he was paraded around by the Top People as an example of civic wonderfulness.
I’ve heard reports of $20 million, and reports of $50 million, settled on the family. The folks claiming to know say that it was to avoid a trial–which would be a bad look anyway–where discovery would show Noor really was passed through his training when obviously he shouldn’t have been. Not only would that have been even worse optics, the settlement would have cleaned out the city.
Powerline blog and some other places claim that there is more than a strong hint that the cop, Noor, was from the Somali community and so cut a lot of breaks on the way to being Minneapolis’ first Somali cop. Certainly, they say, he was paraded around by the Top People as an example of civic wonderfulness.
Waal, how many other people in his class at the academy do you see photographed with the mayor? Betsy Hodges, heckuva job.
And yet it took seven months before public pressure finally forced the city to send the facts regarding her death before a grand jury.
The excuse of the public prosecutor was that the state police slow-walked the investigation and that salient witnesses were not co-operating, among the Ofc. Harrity, who was riding with Noor that night. Just for that, Harrity should have been fired. Freeman was disinclined to convene a grand jury, favoring some alternate procedure available under Minnesota rules of criminal procedure. He had to call a gj and put Harrity under oath before he’d talk.
Noor was also treated rather delicately by the legal establishment compared to Chauvin et al. (He was eventually convicted of 3d degree murder for blowing away a middle-aged woman a propos of nothing). Liberals really should not be allowed discretion over anything of consequence.
Art Deco. Harrity was the driver and Noor reached across him to shoot Damond. I’d be surprised if he didn’t qualify for disability retirement on account of being deaf. A gunshot in more or less closed space is LOUD, and the instant overpressure of the gases coming out of the muzzle is also confined.
Presuming Noor was right handed, that means the gun was probably right in front of Harrity’s face. Or Noor was leaning on him in an effort to get the gun into or even out of the window.
Lots different from being next to the guy on an open range.
Considering everything Noor got him into, Harrity’s reluctance seems odd.
Sometime after that Philando Castile, a black man, was killed by a cop in the Minni suburb of St. Anthony. The guy who shot him…it was a bad shoot and even the NRA was all over it…was hispanic, so that didn’t help The Cause. Have to keep the resources until the Great White Defendant showed up. Dead is dead but it doesn’t matter.
Black cop shooting a white woman…………never happened, nossir. Nope.
The Daily Mail posted the police body cam videos today (8/3/2020) that match the time frame of the transcript.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8576371/Police-bodycam-footage-shows-moment-moment-arrest-George-Floyd-time.html