BLACK VIOLENCE IN AMERICA - HOW MUCH DOES IT COST US? - KENNETH UPSHAW SET HIS GIRLFRIEND ON FIRE WHEN SHE TRIED TO BREAK UP WITH HIM

 

Tennessee Man Charged with Attempted Murder for Allegedly Setting Girlfriend Ablaze

Shelby County Sheriff's Office

NICK GILBERTSON

15 Oct 20210

2:39

A Tennessee man has been charged with attempted second-degree murder for allegedly setting his girlfriend on fire when she tried to break up with him.

Kenneth Upshaw, 38, has been charged with attempted second-degree murder for allegedly dousing his girlfriend in gasoline and setting her ablaze.

Memphis Police met with the victim, Rebecca Briggs, at the Regional Medical Hospital on October 9, according to Fox News. Briggs has second-degree burns on her neck, face, arms, and chest, according to the outlet. It was reportedly difficult for authorities to understand what she said during the interview due to the facial burns she sustained.

The alleged incident occurred on October 8 as Upshaw and his girlfriend Briggs argued when she informed him that she wanted to end their relationship, according to WREG.

Police say that Briggs was standing near Upshaw’s car in a driveway during the argument, according to WREG. Upshaw told her if he could not be with her then no one could, according to police.

Soon thereafter, Upshaw allegedly doused her in gasoline and threw a lit cigarette at her, setting her ablaze, according to WREG.

ABC 24 reports that Briggs said she did not know how the fire was put out, but she was able to escape to her vehicle and drive to a friend’s home. The outlet reports, the next day, she went to Regional Medical Center’s burn unit to receive treatment for her injuries.

Authorities investigated the home where the incident allegedly took place and discovered a 2016 Honda Accord with burns on the back of the vehicle, a melted bumper, and a red gas can, according to Fox News.

WREG reports that Briggs and Upshaw did not live at the residence. The homeowner reportedly said that Upshaw was present at the residence earlier in the day but added that he was unaware of what took place in the driveway. Someone allegedly informed the homeowner that a car was on fire in the driveway. The man said he and a friend put the fire out, according to WREG.

“It was pretty bad. I mean, it burned the whole back end and part of the back driver’s side and started to get where the gas tank is, and I thought it was going to explode,” the man told WREG. 

The outlet reports that Briggs and Upshaw have a child together, and domestic violence has been prevalent in the relationship. Police say Upshaw punched her in the stomach when she was eight months pregnant, which forced her to deliver their baby a month earlier than the due date, according to WREG.  

Fox News reports Upshaw awaits his initial court appearance.

Memphis, Tennessee murder-suicide leaves three postal workers dead

Warren Duzak

13 October 2021

US Postal Service vehicles sit in a parking lot of a facility where authorities said a postal employee fatally shot two workers before dying from a self-inflicted gunshot Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2021 in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/Adrian Sainz)

Two US Postal Service (USPS) workers were killed Tuesday in Memphis, Tennessee after a third postal worker opened fire on them. According to authorities, the shooter then took their own life.

The shooting occurred at the East Lamar Carrier Annex in the predominantly-working class Orange Mound neighborhood in southeast Memphis. The FBI and the US Postal Inspection Service are investigating, along with city authorities and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. At the time of this writing, the identity of the shooter has not been made public.

The victims have been identified as 37-year-old Demetria Dortch and James Wilson, a longtime USPS manager. In comments made to the local Fox News affiliate, Dortch’s father described her as “a hardworking young lady, always has been,” adding, “She was a good mother to all of her kids.”

A family member of Wilson, Roxanne Rogers, spoke to Memphis’ Commercial Appeal, saying, “He was a good man. An outstanding man. He was a humble soul, one of the nicest supervising managers you could ever wish there was.

“He treated nobody different. He treated everybody the same. He had compassion for people. If you had a problem, he’d work it out for you. He was a post office family person.”

The shooting is only the latest in a string of recent shootings in Tennessee. On August 3, a warehouse worker in Nashville wounded three employees before turning the weapon on himself. Then, on September 23, a gunman opened fire in a Collierville Kroger grocery store, located roughly 30 minutes from Memphis, killing two and wounding 14. Days later, a 13-year-old student at a Memphis school was shot and wounded by another student.

While the possible motivations for Tuesday’s slayings remain unknown, it is an undeniable fact that postal workers represent one of the most overworked and underpaid professions in the US, thanks to decades of Democratic- and Republican-led attacks, with the goal of privatizing the world’s largest mail carrier service. Exacerbating the already brutal conditions of these workers is the COVID-19 pandemic, with over 10,000 postal workers infected and at least 83 having lost their lives as of late last year.

A report published on August 31 by the non-profit Center for Public Integrity (CPI) found that hundreds of post offices around the country have withheld pay from hourly workers for years. In a press release detailing the report, the CPI writes, “From 2010 to 2019, at least 250 managers in 60 post offices were caught changing mail carriers’ time cards to show them working fewer hours, resulting in unpaid wages, according to a batch of arbitration award summaries obtained by Public Integrity for cases filed by one of the three major postal unions.”

ProPublica reported last year that the USPS, over the past decade, had fired or pressured to leave 44,000 workers with work-related injuries. In addition, analyzing US Labor Department data, ProPublica found that postal workers, while representing only a fifth of the federal workforce, suffered about half of all federal workplace injuries and illnesses in 2019.

On a national level, there have been a total 35,040 instances of gun violence from all causes this year, according to Gun Violence Archive. Of those, 462 are classified as “murder/suicides incidents.” It is impossible to comprehend such figures outside of an examination of the decay of the capitalist system itself, in particular the enormous rise in social inequality in the United States. The only viable solution to ending the epidemic of gun violence is the socialist transformation of world society, replacing the drive for profit with a system that is organized to meet the needs of humanity.