And this is the photo. Isn’t the little critter on the right of the picture (not the one on the left) just the cutest thing?
A bipartisan photo op. It occurs to me that this photo should offend no one, except perhaps members of PETA.
[NOTE: Here’s the story behind it.]
This is certainly interesting: two of the surviving Charlie Hebdo cartoonists say they are very very different from Pam Geller and her group, organizers of the free speech event in Texas that was threatened by two gunman. Geller organized the event in explicit support of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists, but these two don’t seem so happy at the association and don’t want people to make a comparison:
Charlie Rose invited two cartoonists for the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, which experienced a deadly attack on its offices earlier this year, to comment on the parallels ”” or lack thereof ”” between the two incidents.
“To be honest, I can imagine the kind of comparison you can make between the Charlie Hebdo attack of January 7 and this event, but there is nothing to do [with one another], there is no comparison, absolutely no comparison,” Jean-Baptiste Thoret said in a clip of a longer interview set to air tonight [the clip is at the link].
While he described the group that put on the event in Texas as part of an “anti-Islamic movement” against the “Islamization of the U.S.,” Thoret said the motives of Charlie Hebdo are “absolutely not the same.” For the magazine, he said it “was a question of criticizing” all religions, not Muslim people “in particular.”
Thoret left out one huge difference: most of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists seem to have been on the left politically, and Geller is on the right (I’m not sure about all her supporters).
There are often huge gulfs between left and right even if they agree on a single issue, and Thoret seems to want to disavow himself of any connection with what he may consider to be the tainted right. To do so he makes what seems to be an absurd statement. I haven’t heard the whole interview, so perhaps he qualifies it in some way, but as it stands it makes no sense that there is “absolutely no comparison.” The two are not the same, of course (and one difference is that the French attacks were horrifically successful and the Texas attacks were thwarted), but there are obvious comparisons that are not at all trivial.
The most important similarity is that each attack was made by Muslim extremists angry at cartoons they believed to be blasphemous and therefore unconscionable. This is actually the reason (and probably the only reason) that both attacks occurred at all.
But Thoret isn’t interested in looking at this through the eyes of the perpetrators. He seems more eager to assure his audience that he and his fellow cartoonists at the magazine were equal-opportunity satirists who did not discriminate against Islam but instead against all religions. You can be pretty certain that this distinction made no difference whatsoever to the perpetrators, but it makes all the difference in the world to the left, which defines Geller as a specialty hater and themselves as hard-nosed realists cynical about all religions, which makes them devoid of the taint of prejudice in their own eyes.
Let’s just say for the sake of argument that Charlie Hebdo spokesmen Thoret and Briand are right in saying that the Texas people represented an “anti-Islamic movement, a very harsh movement.” So what? If you believe in defending free speech, you believe in defending it even for speech with which you disagree, even speech that you consider hateful. But France’s free speech tradition is very weak, as I learned when I covered the al Durah trial (see this for background on the differences between that country and the US in terms of freedom of speech). In this, Thoret and Briand are not just being leftists, they are being rather French as well.
[ADDENDUM: It seems we are not as different from the French as I had thought, at least not any more.
I had a very busy day and was online very little, but now that I’m taking a (quick) look at my computer I see that the internet and the airwaves, as well as the MSM, have been rife with people criticizing Geller for a host of things that they find objectionable about her. This even includes some people who are on the right, or sort of on the right, but I bet it doesn’t include any libertarians.
Ace has an intense rant about the attitude of such people and their lack of devotion to freedom of speech. As I said above, “If you believe in defending free speech, you believe in defending it even for speech with which you disagree, even speech that you consider hateful.” That used to be the basic stance of most Americans; at least, I thought it was. Seems that the times they have a’changed.]
Lately it seems that nearly every transaction any more complex than buying groceries at the local market must be performed at least twice, sometimes three and four times.
A recent mail-order product return, for example. I had bought some jeans that I loved, but when I washed them, following the instructions, they shrank so much that they were unwearable. I decided to get another pair and figured I wouldn’t put them in the dryer at all this time, and so I went back to the store. But they were out of them.
The jeans still existed online—success, or so I thought. I ordered them, but when they arrived they were of a different style. Now, anyone who knows anything about jeans knows that that just won’t do. So I phoned and said I’d send them back and wanted a refund not only for the jeans but for the ten dollar shipping fee I’d paid, because the mistake had been the store’s (which was, by the way, a major nationwide retail chain).
No problem, they said. Thank you so very much, they said. They also said they’d email me a label for the return postage, too.
Great, right? Except for the fact that the label never came. So I had to call back a few days later and wait through their tooth-grinding phone message again. Listening to it was like going on a involuntary treasure hunt, it was that difficult to find a way to access an actual agent rather than a recorded message.
But I prevailed, and after some discussion with a human being, this time the label arrived as an email attachment. I prepared to return the jeans and even managed to get them back in the original shipping bag, although they have to be mailed by way of UPS, which involves a bit of a drive.
But before I managed to accomplish that chore I got a letter (that’s a real letter, a snail mail letter) from the store saying that “your shipment was recently returned to us because it was undeliverable by our carrier.” Now, how had that been generated? Nothing had yet been shipped back by me, and therefore nothing could have been undeliverable and returned. The refund amount listed on the letter was merely the price of the jeans alone minus the ten dollar shipping fee. Another error, which meant I had to call again (third time now), wait through the purposely confusing (are we getting paranoid here?) phone message, not to mention the hold, and talk to another person.
That person told me to disregard the letter. We’ll see whether I’ve heard the last of the matter. My guess is that there may be at least one more call to the store about this in my future.
I wouldn’t be complaining if this type of thing hadn’t become standard operating procedure rather than the exception. Is it super-important in the large scheme of things? No. But it’s the sort of petty annoyance, day after day, that chips away at people’s sense of trust and equanimity, and fosters the idea that something is falling apart, or perhaps has fallen apart.
What is that “something”? I’d say it’s the expectation of competence—caring if the job you do is good or not, and taking responsibility for your actions, both on the personal and corporate level. The entire thing is accompanied by the most galling (and almost Orwellian, under the circumstances) canned read-from-a-manual assurances about how valuable your patronage is and how very very much you are appreciated as a customer, in addition to fulsome praise for every small thing you might do such as give your name and address when asked, which is received with a heartfelt “thank you so much, Miss (fill in the name)”—all of which have the net result of making the call seem even more interminable than it already is (and almost as interminable as this sentence).
In other words, every such transaction now resembles an interaction with a government agency in terms of competence. And every such transaction now resembles an interaction with Uriah Heep in terms of fawning obsequious insincere pronouncements designed to divert you from what’s actually happening and create a false sense of service rendered.
NOTE: It took a while, but I found a tiny clip of Heep in the 1935 Cukor film “David Copperfield,” a favorite of my youth. He’s the guy who’s clasping his hands together:
I love those old black-and-white films.
By the way, in case you’re wondering: no, they would not give me any money back for the price of the original purchase, the jeans that had shrunk in the wash even though I used cold water and moderate heat.]
Anyone who follows the news knows by now that of the six officers who have been charged in Freddie Gray’s death, it is an even split in terms of race: three are white and three are black. The most severe charges are expected to be lodged against the van driver, who is black.
They look like America:
You might ask, so what? And I’d agree. Black or white, the important thing is what they did (or didn’t do).
But I can’t help but reflect that this case might have gone down differently if this information about their races had come out earlier. But although their names were released early on, their races were not. Not only that, but most of the speculation I read prior to learning their races indicated, or at least hinted or guessed, that they were all white. Typical is this article that appeared in the April 22 Atlantic:
Six officers have been suspended with pay and placed on desk duty in the Gray case, and while the Baltimore Police Department didn’t specify their races, the three officers in the clip arresting Gray all appear to be white. One thing that separates this case from, say, Ferguson or North Charleston is the demographics of those in power. It’s true that whites are overrepresented in the Baltimore Police Department compared to the city’s overall population, but black and white officers make up roughly equal proportions of the force. In addition, both Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and Police Commissioner Anthony Batts are African Americans.
Well, it turns out the races of the accused reflect almost perfectly the racial makeup of the police department. So one would imagine racism has nothing to do with this case, right? But I doubt we’ve heard the last of the “racism,” charge; the black officers probably will be excoriated as race traitors. Black police officers often have a difficult time working in black communities for that reason—like the kids who speak with too careful an articulation or who do too well in school, they are often seen as betrayers.
These police officers will almost certainly become the focus of a great deal of hatred. I watched a number of interviews of people in the crowd after it had been announced that the six were being charged, and not only was there a holiday sort of jubilation, but every person I heard interviewed said that he/she was sure the six were guilty. Not just that they thought it, or suspected it, but that they were certain, and it didn’t seem as though any possible evidence imaginable could be presented at the trial that could conceivably exonerate them in their eyes.
It was something like a reverse OJ Simpson phenomenon.
I also wonder what would have happened had Freddie Gray been white, with the same set of fact circumstances otherwise. Would there have been much of an outcry?
Or what if all the officers had been black; would that have defused the protests entirely? Or would it not have mattered?
Or what if all of the officers had been white? Don’t you think that, as in the Ferguson case, we would have heard right from the start, incessantly, in every single headline, that Gray’s death was caused by white officers?
It seems clear that these six officers were charged now in order to placate the mob. Mosby could have waited; more evidence could have been gathered, but she knew what the political ramifications would have been. Instead we have this sort of thing:
In Baltimore, before the racially and economically diverse crowd in City Hall plaza, Black Lawyers for Justice president Malik Shabazz praised Mosby for her decision, and called on the citizens of Baltimore to protect her.
“Every prosecutor should have such backbone,” he said. “Every prosecutor should have such spine.
“We’ve always got the cuffs on us,” he continued, “now the real criminals have the cuffs on them. Make sure no harm comes to this black woman who is prosecuting these police officers, because if any harm comes to this prosecutor while she is prosecuting this case we will hold Baltimore and America thoroughly accountable.”
When the mob gets what it wants, it feels even more powerful. “Justice” should be a response to the mob, according to the mob [emphasis mine]:
…Kweisi Mfume, the former congressman and president of the NAACP, who said the charges are a response to the passion and fury of young Baltimore residents.
If I were a NY firefighter—woman or man—this would make me very, very angry:
The FDNY for the first time in its history will allow someone who failed its crucial physical-fitness test to join the Bravest, The Post has learned.
Rebecca Wax, 33, is set to graduate Tuesday from the Fire Academy without passing the Functional Skills Training test, a grueling obstacle course of job-related tasks performed in full gear with a limited air supply, an insider has revealed.
“They’re going to allow the first person to graduate without passing because this administration has lowered the standard,” said the insider, who is familiar with the training.
Actually, it makes me angry even though I’m not a firefighter:
We’re being asked to go into a fire with someone who isn’t 100 percent qualified,” the source said. “Our job is a team effort. If there’s a weak link in the chain, either civilians or our members can die.”
This is another example of the growing equality-of-outcome madness, which means that any test that has a disparate impact on men vs. woman, or on the races, is by definition unfair and must be scrapped.
It appears that this happened because the department is being pressured by Mayor Di Blasio, and is also afraid of lawsuits:
Under the FDNY’s new hiring policy, probies must earn at least 75 percent on the combined requirements of academics, hands-on skills and physical fitness.
Wax had a high grade-point average on her academics, which officials determined offset her FST deficiency, the insider said.
Last December, Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro told a City Council hearing on the FDNY’s efforts to recruit women that he had changed FST requirements to lower obstacles.
“We still grade the people. You can still fail it if you go beyond the time, but you’re not automatically failed from the program,” he said.
He also indicated he wanted to act before a possible sex-discrimination lawsuit after the city paid $98 million to settle a lawsuit that accused the FDNY of discriminating against minorities.
What about things like, you know, the ability to actually do the physical work in fighting fires? I can’t imagine that a written test could make up for deficits in that arena. But then again, I’m not a social justice warrior.
No surprise that it is a terrorist known to the police, who most likely made a threat a very short while before the shooting:
One of the suspects in the shooting in Garland, Texas, late Sunday has been identified as Elton Simpson, an Arizona man who was previously the subject of a terror investigation, according to a senior FBI official…
Officials believe Simpson is the person who sent out several Twitter messages prior to the attack on Sunday, in the last one using the hashtag #TexasAttack about half an hour before the shooting.
Followers of ISIS had been talking about the event online for weeks, calling for an attack. Simpson and his as-yet-unknown accomplice seem to have only too happy to oblige.
And this is food for thought:
Five years ago he was convicted for lying to federal agents about his plans to travel to Africa, but a judge ruled the government did not adequately prove he was going to join a terror group there.
I’d like to know who convicted him, a judge or a jury, and on what grounds the conviction was overturned. Was there really not enough evidence, or was this an action by a liberal judge determined to bend over backwards to help Simpson? However, even had he served his time, my guess is that he would have been out of prison by now and eager to help the cause.
Note the article doesn’t mention his religion, although we can be fairly certain of what it is. Was he another prison conversion (from a previous offense), as well? That is very very common.
Europe comes to America:
Two armed men were killed after opening fire on a security guard outside an exhibit of artistic depictions of the Muslim prophet Muhammad in suburban Dallas Sunday evening.
The city of Garland said in a statement posted on its Facebook page that the men drove up to the Curtis Culwell Center and began shooting at the security officer. Garland Police Department officers returned fire, killing both gunmen, the statement said.
The wounded officer is okay and was discharged from the hospital. As of now, the gunman are still lying by the car, their bodies and the vehicle being checked robotically for explosives.
The event was organized by blogger and anti-terrorism activist Pam Geller, who has needed to deal with security concerns for a long, long time. Fortunately the precautions paid off; unfortunately they were necessary.
At the moment, nothing is known about the identities of the perpetrators. But it isn’t hard to guess a few things.
[Hat tip: commenter “Alifa.”]
I just received the news that Russian dancer Maya Plisetskaya (whose full name should have been “the great Maya Plisetskaya”) has died at the age of 89 in Germany. Death appears to have come suddenly, of a massive heart attack, although she had seemed in excellent health.
You may not be familiar with the name; after all, it’s hardly a household word. That’s in part because her heyday was a long time ago, and it’s in part because as a politically suspect person (i.e. Jew, free spirit, and daughter of a man who was offed by the Gulag) she was not allowed to leave as often as she, and the dance world, would have preferred.
When I was a child I saw Plisetskaya in person on one of her rare visits, and it was a thrilling experience. That word “thrilling” is often overused, but it is a correct description of what it was like to watch her passionate performances. Most dancers are known for their feet, their extensions, and their long lines. She was known for her steely strength, her fiery personality (to match her red hair), her enormous and powerful jump, and her sinuous, otherworldly arms.
I have written many posts about Plisetskaya (this one is probably the most comprehensive). But I offer the following videos in an effort to capture just a small, small glimpse of two of her quintessential roles. Enjoy.
Pay particular attention to her solo in the last minute or so or of this one:
And this is the role in which I first saw her. I’ve previously described it this way:
There was no one like her. There never will be. RIP, Maya Plisetskaya.my favorite role of hers by far was in an obscure and very funky old warhorse that is rarely, if ever, performed in this country. This was the ballet “Walpurgis Nacht” from the opera “Faust.” It featured revels in which Bacchantes and satyrs cavorted in what was meant, I suppose, to be an orgy (although I didn’t know it at the time).
Plisetskaya as head Bacchante wore a flaming red dress of flowing chiffon to match her flaming red hair. She seemed the very personification of lighthearted fun combined with wild and sensual abandon. Quite a heady mix for the times.
And as luck would have it, by the magic of You Tube, someone has posted part of a grainy old film of Plisetskaya performing this very dance, and so I’m able to reproduce it here and let you see at least a tiny bit of what I’m talking about. Remember that those were simpler times, and we were more easily impressed. Remember also that the film cannot even begin to give you a sense of the rare power and scope of Plisetskaya’s dancing. Remember that this film is in black and white, hardly a showcase for the vivid colors involved, and is a chopped-up excerpt from a longer work.
But, as I said, it’s all we’ve got at this point””and I, for one, was very glad to find it (note especially her leap at :56, her hops on pointe at 1:03, her languid and sensual pose at 1:10, and her hurling herself at her partner at 2:14-2:18):
I saw the Russian dancer Galina Ulanova perform in person when I was very little, not long before her retirement at the age of fifty. She remains unique among all the dancers I’ve ever seen in person or in video.
Ulanova was not especially beautiful. Nor were her body proportions unusual—no swanlike neck, no long slender limbs, no highly arched feet, and although she was thin her ribcage was a trifle thick. And in the style of her times, she had no freakily high, gymnastic extensions. Nothing in her technique stood out: neither her flexibility nor her jump nor anything else. Everything about her body and her physical skills were somehow average—average, that is, for an excellent ballet dancer.
But technique wasn’t what made Ulanova great, for very very great she was. Very. She was a great actress, but her acting was of an unusual delicacy, although she also had that Russian drama and even, at times, schmaltz. But she never crossed the line into caricature, somehow, always remaining exceptionally natural and fluid. When Ulanova danced, you saw a very real person, and you believed her as that person.
For that reason she was not a great Odette, the Swan Queen, although she danced the role. Not for her was the transformation into the inhuman or the semi-human. The human was her domain, and not even princesses or queens. Her greatest roles were Juliet, and the innocent peasant girl Giselle who is betrayed by her lover Albrecht, a nobleman disguised as a peasant for the day. Giselle discovers his perfidy when Hilarion, a peasant lad who is in (unreciprocated) love with her, reveals it in several ways, most vividly by blowing Albrecht’s horn and calling forth a group of other nobles who proceed to bow to Albrecht and among whom he then takes his place.
Giselle, who despite being a peasant is fragile and delicate (this is a Romantic ballet, after all) with a weak heart, proceeds to go mad with grief. She relives the dance she and Albrecht had done earlier that day, originally a dance of joy but now transformed into one of sorrow and pain. It includes the playful daisy game of “he loves me, he loves me not” that has come to take on a terrible irony.
First, let’s look briefly at the dance they do earlier in the day. This clip is from a movie made when Ulanova was 46, practically geriatric in ballet terms. She is dancing the role of a very young girl, happily in love for the first time. Unfortunately, embedding is disabled for the movie clips, but just clink on this link. A good spot to start watching is at 4:21, and you need only watch for a minute to get the flavor of the dance (including the daisy part), although you’re certainly welcome to watch as much as you care to.
Now compare to Giselle’s “mad” scene from the same movie. Click on the link and start watching at minute 1:32, when Hilarion blows the horn that begins the denouement. Ulanova, in Giselle’s traditional Wedgewood-blue bodice, stands with her back to the camera at that point; that is her mother who is embracing and trying to comfort her. As for Albrecht, he’s still got the black vest and the little black shorts on. Back in those days (this was 1956), tights on men were considered too risque for the Russian ballet stage, and so they had to wear those itty-bitty bloomers. The woman in the elegant white dress whose hand he kisses is his real betrothed, who knows nothing of what he’s done to Giselle (who is his fake betrothed; he has proposed to her, too, earlier in the day). And the necklace that Giselle flings off after becoming aware of his betrayal had been given to her earlier in the day by that same women when Giselle had told her that she, too, was engaged to be married (of course, neither woman knew at the time they were engaged to the same lucky guy).
Enjoy. I think you’ll see what I mean about Ulanova.
Here’s the scene beginning a bit later:
One of Ulanova’s greatest achievements was the fact that she was unafraid of looking ungraceful when the dramatic demands of the part called for it. Sometimes she even deliberately came perilously close to awkward. She was not so concerned with always presenting a pretty picture even in grief.
For example, compare to another Russian Giselle, Bessmertnova. She’s a great dancer as well, but not as great to me in this role because she always remains mannered. You are always aware that she’s “dancing”:
Here’s an even more recent Russian dancer (I suggest you start at minute 1:08):
Those performances by fellow Russians are all considered great, but see how much they resemble each other (and many other dancers as well). Ulanova? Absolutely unique.
Speaking of unique—here is Ulanova at 86, coaching, and playing “show, don’t tell”:
Here is one of Ulanova’s most famous moments, Juliet’s run to Friar Laurence’s cell. Running isn’t easy for ballet dancers; they tend to look very mannered. Ulanova is the best runner in the ballet world, IMHO. It’s a long video, and if you want to cut to the chase (as it were) go to minute 4:23 for the run:
Here’s an extremely interesting segment from “This American Life” about how change—political change and change in general—occurs [hat tip: Vanderleun].
I’ve studied change. I’ve observed it. I’ve experienced it. I’ve tried to effect it, but haven’t we all? Therapists, teachers, clergymen, friends, politicians, hairdressers, parents (and even spouses, and not just by divorce but by coercion, persuasion, ultimatum, complaint, reward, and anything else we can think of even though we’re told the effort is probably doomed).
The American Life piece contains a possible blueprint for a political activist plan for the right (commenter “Eric,” are you there?), based on what the left did in California re gay marriage and abortion. Edifying.
[NOTE: Slightly related—what does it mean to be a neocon? In my opinion, Powers is incorrect (neocons are not necessarily for military solutions, and people who are for military solutions are not necessarily neocons). But she is articulating a common use of the word “neocon.” See the category “neocon” on the right sidebar for links to my articles on the subject.]
You may not care about it, but this news makes me happy:
Kate Middleton looks better a few hours after giving birth than 99.9999% of the people in the world at their most gussed-up moments. Of course, it helps to have a staff, but most of us would need more than a staff to even come close.
He’s no slouch, either.
I have been trying to find some very specific information on what the medical report on Freddie Gray actually said. But other than that there was a neck fracture, that he had a head injury that may have been caused by contact with a bolt on a rear door of the van, and that his death was ruled a homicide, there’s not much. And I’m having trouble finding anything even remotely like an official quote from a medical examiner’s report even on those things. The information we have appears to be based on a combination of leaks about the examiner’s report, some early statements by Gray’s family about his condition, and the prosecutor’s statements that do not appear to include quotes from the examiner’s report.
So what did Gray actually die from in the strictly medical sense? A neck injury? Or a head injury supposedly from the bolt? Or a neck injury caused by the same blow that caused the head injury? He was in the hospital for about a week after the incident; was he in a coma? Was life support withdrawn? It would really be helpful to know the details, but we know even fewer of them than we did at this point in the Michael Brown case, and note that much of what we knew or thought we knew back then in the Brown case was wrong and later corrected. Will that also happen in this case?
Prosecutor Mosby has asserted the following in her statement:
—that the medical examiner has determined “that Mr. Gray’s death was a homicide”
—that “Mr. Gray suffered a severe and critical neck injury as a result of being handcuffed, shackled by his feet and unrestrained inside of the BPD wagon.’
—that while in the van during an encounter with the driver and another police officer, Gray “requested help and indicated that he could not breathe.” Gray also asked for a medic, but the officers “officers assessed Mr. Gray’s condition” and did not “render or request medical assistance.” Absent from her statement is any indication of what they observed Gray’s physical condition to be at that point. Other than their reports on it, the medical examiner would have no way to know.
—that “Despite Mr. Gray’s obvious and recognized need for medical assistance” at the point, there was a further delay to pick up another suspect. Again, Mosby does not say what that obvious and recognized need was, other than that Gray requested it (something prisoners often do). While it is certainly possible that Mosty has that information and that it implicates the officers and indicates negligence, she has not described what it is other than Gray’s request.
—later when more police officers are involved, Gray is seen “unresponsive on the floor of the wagon.” At this point medical aid still is not obtained for him. This seems the first time we get a picture of something more than a man complaining: we have an “unresponsive” person who may or may not be unconscious, but it seems to clearly be a medical problem that needed attending (especially if “unresponsive” “unconscious”).
—right after dropping off the other suspect they had picked up, they took a closer look at Gray and found he:
…was no longer breathing at all. A medic was finally called to the scene where upon arrival, the medic determined Mr. Gray was now in cardiac arrest and was critically and severely injured.
Mr. Gray was rushed to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma where he underwent surgery. On April 19, 2015, Mr. Gray succumbed to his injuries and was pronounced dead. The manner of death deemed homicide by the Maryland Medical Examiner is believed to be the result of a fatal injury that occurred while Mr. Gray was unrestrained by a seatbelt in the custody of the Baltimore Police Department wagon.
That is the sum total of the information revealed by Mosby as to Freddie Gray’s cause of death.
New information (to me, anyway) was that he had gone into cardiac arrest in the van. And yet he must have been resuscitated afterward, because he lived another week or so, albeit perhaps on life support. Early reports were that Gray’s family had indicated he was on life support and had suffered a spinal injury, but Mosby does not address those issues, and I have not found any word from an official source about his medical condition at the time.
In what way did Gray’s spinal injury contribute to his cause of death? Did it cause cessation of breathing, which then led to a cardiac arrest? Was there brain damage? Could the cardiac arrest have been from another cause? Was he ever conscious after being found in that state? What did the toxicology report say, since depression of breathing can also be caused by drug ingestion?
Perhaps most importantly of all, how could the medical examiner say at this point that Gray’s death was a homicide, absent a gunshot wound to a vital organ or signs of something like strangulation or a massive head injury caused by a blow to the head delivered by a person? Even if the examiner has correctly determined that Gray’s head wound and/or neck injury was the proximate cause of death, and that the injury was likely to have occurred in the van and even that it was caused by Gray’s head hitting the back of the van, how would the examinier know how that injury came to occur given that, although there was no evidence of a vehicular accident or even the speculated “rough ride,” the injury could have been self-inflicted or the result of an unintentional jolt to the van (a large pothole, for example)? How could a medical examiner be the one making the determination that a failure to belt Gray in was evidence of a homicide, which would seem to be a legal, not a medical, judgment?
Perhaps the medical examiner said there was a suspicion or a possibility of homicide. I would think that could be enough for probable cause, or at least further investigation. But the prosecutor didn’t state it that way, and we don’t know.
In summary, the entire matter seems extremely unclear at this point.