According to Killedbypolice.net, at least 808 people have been killed by police so
far this year, outpacing last year’s deaths by 20 victims.... and they
ALL GET AWAY WITH IT!
Over forty arrested in St. Louis as demonstrations continue against acquittal of killer cop
By Genevieve Leigh
18 September 2017
Police intensified
their crackdown on protesters in St. Louis, Missouri on Sunday as
demonstrations against police violence continued into the third day.
The protests erupted
Friday afternoon following the announcement that police officer Jason Stockley
was acquitted of first degree murder and armed criminal action in the 2011
killing of 24-year-old Anthony Lamar Smith.
Stockley, who is
white, fired five bullets at point-blank range into Smith, who was
African-American, while the victim was seated in his car after a three-mile
chase. A police car dashcam recorded Stockley telling his partner in advance of
the shooting, “We’re killing this motherfucker, don’t you know.” An FBI
firearms analyst testified at the trial that one shot was discharged from only
six inches away.
After the murder,
video recordings show Stockley going into his police car to get a gun, which he
then planted in the car of the dead victim. Only Stockley’s DNA was found on
the gun.
Considering the
precedent upheld across the board by both Democrats and Republicans of blanket
immunity for killer cops it is hardly a surprise that Stockley was acquitted.
However, the sheer amount of evidence and the blatant murderous character of
the event makes his exoneration particularly egregious.
Demonstrations
erupted immediately following the announcement and attracted as many as one
thousand people at their peak. Protests were held outside of police department
headquarters and numerous marches took place throughout the city Friday
evening. On Saturday, hundreds held demonstrations in West County Center
shopping mall in the city of Des Peres, west of St. Louis, and at Chesterfield
Mall in the suburb of Chesterfield. Saturday’s demonstrations culminated in a
gathering at the home of Democratic mayor, Lyda Krewson, where at least one
window was broken after something was thrown at it.
With the memories of
the massive upheavals which erupted in Ferguson in 2014--only a 20-minute drive
from St. Louis--state and local authorities had anticipated protests over the
exoneration of yet another killer cop. Officials spent the past week preparing
to impose a virtual lockdown on the city. Barricades were erected around police
headquarters and the courthouse, among other sites, and Republican Governor
Eric Greitens activated the National Guard on Thursday ahead of the
announcement.
As early as 6:30 p.m.
on Friday the St. Louis Police Department had determined that the protests were
“no longer considered peaceful,” which they announced in a tweet. They claimed
that demonstrators were ignoring commands to leave the streets, making all of
those in the area subject to arrest.
Reports indicate that
at least thirty-three people were arrested during Friday’s protests and an
additional nine Saturday night through Sunday morning. According to officials,
four of the nine people arrested will face felony destruction of property
charges. Among those arrested were two minors and the other seven ranged in age
from 22 to 37 years old.
The St. Louis Police
Department took to Twitter to justify their actions throughout the weekend.
On Friday they posted
pictures of rocks and water bottles that they claimed had been thrown at
officers throughout the day adding that “officers showed great restraint.”
These photos stand in
sharp contrast to the videos and photos posted by the protesters of hundreds of
police officers dressed in riot gear and armed to the teeth with military-grade
weaponry attacking protesters.
Their “restraint”
included firing pepper-spray balls and tear gas against the overwhelmingly
peaceful demonstrators. In one instance police in riot gear marched over a
woman after she was knocked to the ground. When several people rushed to her
assistance they were also knocked to the ground by police officers armed with
shields and large bats.
Krewson and Geitens
were also active on their Twitter accounts throughout the weekend making veiled
threats to the protesters and offering their full support for the police force.
Greitens publicly
bolstered the law-and-order campaign, tweeting praise of the police actions and
posting videos of himself shaking hands with law enforcement. Bragging in a
Tweet on Saturday, he wrote “some criminals broke windows & thought they’d
get away. They were wrong. Officers caught ‘em, cuffed ‘em, and threw ‘em in Jail.”
The video posted along with the tweet shows five officers hauling away a cuffed
young man who appears to be unconscious.
The brutal murder of
Anthony Lamar Smith and the subsequent violent crackdown on protesters by the
political establishment are, in a very direct way, the product of twenty-five
years of unending US wars abroad, with the same military gear and tactics being
against the working class at home.
The officer
responsible for the killing, Stockley, is a West Point graduate who served with
the Army in the Iraq war. He carried his personal AK-47-style rifle with him as
an officer in St. Louis, and noted in the trial that he felt that his life and
the life of his fellow officers “depended on it”--a perspective likely
ingrained in him throughout his time around the various military institutions.
Greitens, the most
enthusiastic cheerleader of the St. Louis police force through the weekend,
comes out of a long career in the military establishment, having served for
years as a Navy Seal, the most notoriously brutal arm of the United States
military Special Forces.
President Donald
Trump and the Department of Justice under Attorney General Jeff Sessions have
been vehement defenders of killer cops and violent police forces. Speaking for
police officers in August, Trump encouraged them to be “rough” with those they
were arresting. Later that month, he signed an order reinstituting the federal
program that supplies military weapons and equipment to local and state police
forces.
According to Killedbypolice.net, at least 808 people have been killed by
police so far this year, outpacing last year’s deaths by 20 victims.... and
they ALL GET AWAY WITH IT!
"Police in the United States are trained to see
the working class and poor as a hostile enemy.
Anything less than complete submissiveness
is grounds for officers to unleash deadly force
on their victims. In some instances, even the
most casual encounters with police have
proven to be deadly."
Pseudo-left groups push identity politics on seventh day of St. Louis protests
By Genevieve Leigh and George Gallanis reporting from St. Louis
22 September 2017
As police in full riot gear with batons in hand stood by, hundreds of peaceful protesters gathered in downtown St. Louis, Missouri Thursday evening on the seventh day of protests over the acquittal of white police officer Jason Stockley for the 2011 murder of Anthony Lamar Smith, who was African American.
In a marked shift from previous days of protest, Thursday night’s event was dominated by pseudo-left organizations promoting racialist politics. The protest was officially named a “White Allies Only” rally, where white people were asked to come out to support Black Lives Matter.
Nearly four hundred protesters met early in the evening at Kiener Plaza Park in downtown St. Louis for the event. From there, they marched to nearby Busch Stadium where a Billy Joel concert was taking place.
At one point in the protest, organizers of the rally requested that all white protesters move to the front of the protest in order to deter possible police confrontations. According to Black Lives Matter, the purpose of “white allies” is to “amplify and recenter the lives of black people while standing in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter Movement.”
A leading organizer of the rally was a member of Socialist Alternative who repeatedly led the protesters in chanting “white silence is violence.” Multiple posters carried by protesters bore the statements “Black Lives Matter” and “White Silence = White Violence.” The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) fully endorsed the racialist narrative and promoted the event on their local Facebook page. Their flag was carried by a DSA member and was waved above the protesters throughout the night.
Black Lives Matter representatives and Socialist Alternative members gave speeches throughout the protest during which one female speaker told the crowd of protesters, “Police need to be trained better. Had the St. Louis police department received better training, Smith would not be dead.”
For almost two hours, protesters marched near Busch Stadium and eventually returned to where they began at Kiener Plaza Park. The protest dispersed around 9:00 p.m.
Socialist Alternative, the Democratic Socialists of America, Black Lives Matter, and the many other organizations that operate in the orbit of the Democratic Party insist that the issue of police violence is fundamentally a product of racism. The political conclusions which necessarily flow from this lack of analysis can only be a series of empty reforms: that more officers of color be hired into the police force; that police be “better” trained.
Racism has always been an ideological tool of the ruling class. The renewed efforts from pseudo-left groups to remove the issue of racism from its real social, political and historical context are employed to obscure the fundamental class divisions in society and present racism as something pervasive, ineradicable and deeply embedded in the American psyche. Their real aim is to preempt the development of a broader, deeper and politically independent movement of the working class united across all racial, ethnic and national lines.
With three months still left in the year St. Louis police have already fatally shot eight people in 2017, which is high even for the notorious St. Louis police force. Comparatively, there were five people killed by St. Louis police in all of 2016.
All of those killed this year have been poor and working-class
people, many of whom lived in deeply impoverished parts of
city. Two of the eight were white, and the other six were
African American. One of the victims, Robin White, had
mental health issues and at least two others were killed by
police in their own homes. In addition to those who were
killed, police have shot and wounded seven other people so
far this year.
Police in the United States are trained to see
the working class and poor as a hostile enemy.
Anything less than complete submissiveness
is grounds for officers to unleash deadly force
on their victims. In some instances, even the
most casual encounters with police have
proven to be deadly.
The role racism often plays in any given act of brutality is more fundamentally rooted in the irreconcilable conflict between the interests of the ruling elite and those of the working class. This conflict has intensified alongside the explosion in social inequality throughout the US and the world and a quarter-century of unending US imperialism abroad.
The Socialist Equality Party opposes all expressions of racism by exposing its roots in a society grounded in the exploitation of the working class regardless of race, ethnicity, or nationality. Racism can only be fought with a revolutionary program to unite all sections of workers against their common capitalist oppressors. This must become the basis for the development of a mass movement of the working class in defense of democratic and social rights.
Oklahoma City police shoot and kill deaf man
By Matthew Taylor
22 September 2017
Magdiel Sanchez, 35, was sitting on his porch Tuesday night when he was approached by Lieutenant Matthew Lindsey of the Oklahoma City Police Department. Lindsey had received reports that a vehicle driven by Sanchez’s father had been involved in a hit-and-run accident earlier that night and had arrived at that address.
Lindsey claims that Sanchez, who is deaf and does not speak, was holding a two-foot length of metal pipe in his hand. Neighbors later told the media that Sanchez often carries the pipe to protect himself from the many stray dogs in the neighborhood.
A second police officer, Sergeant Christopher Barnes, arrived on the scene shortly after Lindsey. Together the two officers approached Sanchez. As the deaf man approached the officers to communicate with them they shouted at Sanchez to drop the pipe and lay on the ground, an order he obviously did not hear due to his disability.
Nearby neighbors who witnessed the confrontation yelled at the two cops that Sanchez was deaf and could not understand their orders.
At a reported distance of 15 feet, Lindsey shot Sanchez with a Taser, while Barnes opened fire with his gun, hitting Sanchez five to six times, according to witnesses.
Sanchez died on the scene. Lindsey and Barnes are white, Sanchez was Hispanic.
In a press release Wednesday, Captain Bo Matthews of the Oklahoma City Police told the media that the officers could not hear the neighbors shouting that Sanchez was deaf. Sanchez had no criminal record and was not in the vehicle with his father during the alleged hit-and-run, which police acknowledged was not serious and did not involve a pedestrian.
Julio Rayos, a neighbor of Sanchez’s who witnessed the shooting, told the Oklahoman what transpired: “As the police pulled up a couple of neighbors, me and my wife and my daughter were outside screaming at the cops not to shoot, because he was deaf, and they proceeded in doing what they did.
“The guy does movements, he doesn’t speak, he doesn’t hear, mainly it is hand movements. That’s how he communicates. I believe he was frustrated trying to tell them what was going on,” Rayos explained.
“As they got out of the car they drew their weapons. Myself and my daughter were screaming at the officers that he was deaf, that he could not hear anything, and they proceeded on, shooting him.”
Rayos disputed the police claims that they could not hear his neighbors’ pleas, “I believe they did hear me because one of them turned around and looked at me and they also had a neighbor who lived right across the street who was screaming at them. Also, I was approximately 25 to 30 feet away from them.”
Barnes has been put on paid leave but has not been charged with any crime. The killing of Sanchez is the fifth police shooting in Oklahoma City this year.
According to a database maintained by the Washington Post, Sanchez’s death marks the 712th police killing of 2017.
Officer who shot Georgia Tech student had no training in how to handle individuals with mental illness
The Georgia Bureau of investigation acknowledged Wednesday that the campus police officer who fired the fatal shot that killed a white 21-year-old Georgia Tech student, Scout Schultz, had not received any training on how to handle suspects with mental illness.
In a widely-viewed video, Schultz can be seen standing outside a parking garage on the university surrounded by several officers. Schultz, who identified as neither male nor female, has their hands at their sides and can be heard multiple times shouting at the officers, “Shoot me!” Schultz is seen slowly walking back and forth as police order the student to “drop the knife.”
As Schultz turned, Georgia Tech Police officer Tyler Beck, who is also white, opened fire, killing the young student with a single bullet to the heart.
In another video taken from the scene after the shooting, the alleged knife, a Leatherman-style multi-tool, can be seen on the ground. The blade of the tool is not extended, but fully folded into its casing.
The Washington Post reports that the 911 call that led to the killing was placed by Schultz. In the call Schultz told police there was “ a white male, with long blond hair, white T-shirt and blue jeans who is possibly intoxicated, holding a knife and possibly armed with a gun on his hip.”
Three suicide notes were found in the student’s room. Schultz, who had previously attempted suicide by hanging two years ago, had long suffered from anxiety and depression and had undergone counseling.
According to the Washington Post mental illness is a factor in approximately one-quarter of all police shootings. So far, at least 159 people with mental illness have been shot and killed by police in 2017.
Pittsburgh police caught on video
beating restrained man
A video widely-circulated on Facebook shows
police officers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
savagely beating a restrained man.
The officers claim that they were arresting another man on forgery charges at the time, when the man in question, Daniel Adelman, allegedly tried to interfere.
In the video, five police officers are surrounding the two men, who are both on their stomachs lying on the ground. Two police officers can be seen restraining Adelman, who is covering the back of his head with both hands, while a third officer assaults him. The officer punches Adelman eight times, slams his face into the ground three times, and then punches him another seven to eight times before handcuffing him.
Adelman was charged with obstructing the administration of law, resisting arrest and public drunkenness. The 47-year-old man suffered a broken nose, a dislocated shoulder, and a possible concussion.
After being released, Adelman told the media that he witnessed the arrest of the other man, David Jones, outside of a concert and tried to assist the police. “I was smoking a cigarette and I see an officer with a suit on and then I see this other guy and I thought the officer in the suit was in trouble, so I went down there and, you know, and then all hell broke loose.”
The policeman seen striking the blows, Andrew Jacobs, has been placed on desk duty pending an investigation. The other four officers involved in the incident remain on active duty.
According to Killedbypolice.net, at least 808 people have been killed by police so far this year, outpacing last year’s deaths by 20 victims.... and they ALL GET AWAY WITH IT!
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