All Kinds of Wrong

In my not abundant free time I've been trying to wade through the very poorly written and edited 74pg report by the Cuyuhoga County Prosecutor's Office  (scroll down for the report itself) that they say justifies the Grand Jury's no bill in the murder-by-cop of young Tamir Rice.

I didn't see McGinty's show-and-tell at which he apparently went through the report, but it's just as well. I would have been furious, and that's no good for my blood pressure.

The report is filled with so many typos and so much nonsense and outright falsehood that it takes your breath away. And it took more than a year for the "investigation" and the "process" to unfold, no? Why? As many observers have pointed out, there was more than enough evidence to hold both officers for trial, and it was obvious from the start.

In the case of a cop who kills, it's almost impossible to get a conviction, especially when the DA is acting as defense counsel as McGinty was in this case, but there is often no lack of evidence to charge and try the said cop in court. Of course, that almost never happens.

Yes, McGinty is acting as defense counsel for the police whose actions that awful day when Tamir Rice was shot by Timothy Loehmann at the Cudel Recreation Center were supposed to be evaluated by the Grand Jury with regard to whether or not there was sufficient evidence to charge and try them. That's all.

There was more than enough evidence to charge and try them. It doesn't mean there would necessarily be a conviction -- as I say, almost impossible to get -- but a trial in open court was certainly warranted. Instead, a kind of mock trial in which only the defense was present and only the defense was presented to the GJ by the DA was held behind closed doors. This is not justice, not even its shadow. This was farce.

The defense, yes. There was no prosecution, there was no attempt at presenting evidence for a possible prosecution of officers Loehmann and Garmback. The only evidence presented was a defense of their actions.

And then a defense of the DA's office for not presenting a case for prosecution.

How very circular. How very wrong.

There are many obvious falsehoods in this report, falsehoods upon which the DA rests his defense of the officers in the killing of Tamir Rice. The most glaring is the statement by Officer Loehmann himself, a statement which was apparently presented in whole to the Grand Jury, read by Loehmann to the jurors, a statement which he allowed to present without question or cross examination. By itself, this was a highly unusual and bordered on malfeasance. The statement itself was not new. It had been in the press before, and it had been picked apart because it is riddled with falsehood. But the DA chose to accept Loehmann's statement -- and the statements of other officers -- as true facts. They aren't. And if the goal is justice (it wasn't) the statements of police officers, especially of the killers themselves, have to be open to question. They weren't.

Instead, the DA sought evidence to corroborate, not to dispute, the officers' statements. When he believed he had sufficient evidence to do that, he advised the GJ not to indict.

Because the officers only did what they had to do -- based on the erroneous and incomplete information they had from a 911 caller and dispatch and the fear they felt due to the actions of their deceased victim. The officers had a duty and obligation to neutralize the active shooter threat that they believed Tamir Rice represented. And so they did, with lethal force, which is what they are authorized and empowered to do. The officers committed no crime, according to the DA, because in essence, they couldn't. There were many errors all along the way, he claimed, but the outcome -- a dead boy -- was not one of them. Based on the information they had and the actions of the boy, they had no choice but to kill him to save their own lives and protect the safety of others.

This is all kinds of wrong, but the DA in this case doesn't seem to recognize that.

The first thing to recognize -- which the DA doesn't -- is that there was no credible threat at any time to anyone from Tamir Rice that day. The only threat came from the police to Tamir Rice. Tamir Rice was not armed with a weapon, he had a toy gun. It's been called a BB gun or a "replica gun" (the term of choice used by the DA) but it was an Airsoft gun that could at worst cause slight injury if he had ever fired at anyone. So far as the evidence shows, Tamir never shot a plastic pellet from the gun at any time before or during the 911 call nor did he (nor could he) when the police arrived. He may never have shot a pellet at all. But even if he had, it wouldn't have been known to the officers -- because there was no report of his firing.

Nevertheless, the officers approached Tamir as if he were an active shooter and the situation was that of an active shooter causing multiple injuries and death. Nothing could have been farther from the truth. There was simply no call for treating him as an active shooter to be neutralized on sight. None.

Well, except for this: The report that was transmitted to the officers was that a black male was in the park aiming a gun at people. Bingo. That's all it takes in Ohio to justify police who kill them. It's happened repeatedly in Ohio (elsewhere too, but Ohio stands out because it is an open carry state. Well, for whites.)

All it takes to get a black male shot by police on sight is a 911 caller saying that an armed black male is waving his gun around and pointing it at people.

Bam! Or in Tamir's case, "bam-bam." Loehmann proudly says in his statement that he attempted a "tap-tap" by firing twice, but sadly only hit the boy with one bullet. No doubt he'll try to do better next time.

McGinty defends the "active shooter" approach to Tamir by saying that it was actually required of the officers by protocol, training and the law. They had no choice. Even though there were no reports AT ALL of anyone firing any weapon, because there was the potential that Tamir might become an active shooter, he had to be neutralized according to the protocols of the PD and the law in Ohio. They were not to assess; they were to act. And their act of killing Tamir was required of them due to the gravity of the situation.

This is so far from any sane policy, my head is spinning. It is practically the definition of "murder at will" -- because of fear that something might happen. This is almost the same excuse that was used to justify the killing of John Crawford III at that Walmart near Dayton. But there have been many others. All it takes is somebody calling 911 about a black man with a gun and reports of "pointing it at people." True or false, it doesn't matter. The black man will be a dead man (or boy) shortly.

True or false, it doesn't matter.

McGinty essentially says just that. The police are not to assess anything. They are to act on their split-second decision to neutralize (ie: kill) the reported threat. That is all.

Any delay or assessment of the true situation or any failure to shoot first before the victim can shoot at them is potentially deadly to them or others. Ergo, they are justified at law and by training  when they kill reported  "threats."

It doesn't matter whether the report is true or not. In the case of John Crawford III, the 911 caller made indubitably false claims about the actions of Mr. Crawford, and police acted on those false claims (of loading and aiming an automatic weapon at customers), and they were not held criminally liable.

In the case of Tamir Rice, the 911 caller repeatedly tried to clarify that the gun he saw the boy waving around was "probably fake" and the boy himself was "probably a kid." Didn't matter. That information was never passed on to the responding officers, but even if it had been, it wouldn't have made much difference, because they were psyched for an "active shooter" encounter, and because, according to McGinty's video enhancement expert, Tamir reached for the gun in his waistband.

 Talk about all kinds of wrong. The video is grainy and taken from a distance. It does not "indubitably" show Tamir reaching for the gun. McGinty says it is "indubitable" because his expert says so, but the expert is interpreting his own enhancement, not seeing with any sort of clarity what the boy is actually doing.

In my view, it's just as likely that he is taking his hands out of his pockets and attempting to "show his hands" as the police car skids to a stop. There is no sign -- whatever -- that he actually takes the gun from his waistband (as stated in Loehmann's account). McGinty makes the announcement that Loehmann's account is confirmed by this video enhancement, but that's false. That's not what it shows. But even if it did, it wouldn't constitute an actual threat to the officers or anyone else.

McGinty claims that the Airsoft gun "looks real" -- which it does -- but that's irrelevant if, as I suspect, neither officer ever saw the gun until after Tamir was shot.

And so it goes. The report is one falsehood after another, one irrelevancy after another, one wrong after another.

And cops who kill walk once again, because the DA does not prosecute cops who kill, the DA defends them.

America. 2015.

Legally Right -- Mortally Wrong and Morally Bankrupt. The Injustice Endures

After what seem like endless and quite deliberate delays regarding "investigating" the death of Tamir Rice, Tim McGinty has released two reports which justify the shooting and death of young Tamir on the basis of law and court decisions which essentially protect police officers from criminal liability when they kill ("use deadly force") in performance of their duties.

As long as officers declare themselves to have perceived a threat -- even if there isn't one -- and that perception can be considered "reasonable", they're essentially immune from criminal liability for almost any death or injury they cause in the course of performing their duties.

In the case of Tamir Rice, the reports claim that the officers involved reasonably perceived a mortal threat to themselves when young Rice approached Officer Loemann and reached for his waistband thus justifying the immediate use of lethal force.

The perception of a mortal threat -- even though objectively there wasn't one -- had to do with the dispatch reports of "a black male with a gun" in a park outside a community center.

Here's what's wrong with that analysis:

The perception is based on faulty metrics. The fear the officers felt was due not to any objective threat to themselves or anyone else but due -- entirely in my estimation -- to the fact they were told by dispatch that there was a black male with a gun. A black male with a gun. A BLACK MALE WITH A GUN.

That, all by itself, is considered an existential threat to police and civilians in open carry Ohio.

Not only was Tamir Rice shot and killed -- on sight -- by Ohio police because he was said by a 911 caller to be armed and "brandishing," so was John Crawford III, even though neither of them were actually armed (in the sense of having a weapon with which they could do lethal harm to another) and neither, at the time he was shot and killed, was "brandishing".

All it takes is for someone to say the right words for the executioners to act.

The problem here [8 pg pdf] is police training and Supreme Court rulings that protect the officers who use deadly force even though there may be no objective threat to be neutralized.

Because officers cannot be expected to read the minds of individuals and determine intent, they are instead trained to scrutinized individuals’ behavior for telltale signs. An individual’s actions are often the only signals of their intent. Obviously, if the individual being confronted is reasonably believed to be armed, the officer’s attention to those actions will be intensified. In such a situation, officers are taught to focus on the hands of the individual.3 If the hands move in the direction of a “high-risk area” – an area where a weapon may be concealed, such as inside a jacket, towards the waistband of pants, or under the seat of a car, well trained officers will immediately identify this as a serious threat.

When threat identification is combined with the concept of action versus reaction, an officer’s need to make split-second judgments with respect to the use of force becomes evident. Action versus reaction is simply the recognition that there is a certain amount of time required for every person to recognize a stimulus, formulate a response to that stimulus, and then carry out that response. When applied to deadly force situations, action versus reaction refers to the time it takes for an officer to observe the actions of an individual, such as the movement of an individual’s hands, perceive those actions as threatening, calculate possible responses to the treat, determine what level of force is necessary, and then complete the reaction. The reactions of a well-trained officer may be quick, but they are not instantaneous. The time differential between a threatening action occurring and the ability to respond to that threat always puts law enforcement officers in the position of having to catch-up. The practical effect of action versus reaction in deadly force situations is that officers cannot wait to react until they are absolutely certain of an individual’s malicious intent. If an officer waits to be certain that the individual reaching into a high-risk area is retrieving a weapon, action versus reaction dictates that the weapon could easily be used against the officer before he or she has an opportunity to respond.

This is the root of the problem right here. The passage was written by a former FBI trainer now retired, someone whose wisdom, if you want to call it that, has formed the basis for police training with regard to 'threats' and their 'neutralization' for decades. The principle is that perception rules all, and instant action in the face of a perceived 'threat' -- whether there is really a threat to the officer or someone else -- is drilled into the officer over and over, without regard to either the necessity of using lethal force in the first place or to the consequences of the use of lethal force on the victim.

Naturally, under the circumstances, many, many innocent people and people in one kind of crisis or another and many people who are only tangentially 'threats' will be injured and killed. And their injuries and killings will be justified by the likes of this person, for the simple reason that the law allows and protects it and the officer's perceptions of a threat -- perceptions which have been drilled in over and over again -- are all that is necessary to justify a killing or injury by police.

I've long held that 90% or more of police homicides are unnecessary. If there were a different standard of police conduct and a different way of seeing situations (ie: not all hands to waistbands are reaching for a gun; indeed very few are. And even if they were, why should that be a death sentence to be performed by summary execution on the spot? Whatever happened to "due process?") there would be little or no necessity to use lethal force in the first place. If police were trained to see each situation independently (ie: a hand to waistband doesn't necessarily mean a gun will be pulled from said waistband) and not react to each situation as if a deadly threat were present, the number of police homicides could be cut immediately and substantially. If police were trained to be skeptical of dispatch reports based on 911 calls, the number of police homicides could be cut substantially and very quickly. If police were trained to actually assess a situation before going into it guns blazing, the number of police homicides could be cut substantially. If police commanders and chiefs said to their officers that inappropriate use of firearms will result in discipline up to and including termination, the number of police homicides could be cut substantially.

I could go on. The issue is that police are not expected to value any lives but their own, and even then, their self-valuation may be very low. They need to learn to value human life in general, and specifically to value the lives of those who have previously been determined to be disposable.

That day seems always to be far off, but somehow I know it is coming.

These reports that are being cited to justify the police murder of Tamir Rice are shameful, but they represent the state of police belief and practice as it is.

We must change it.

The Kunduz Hospital Atrocity

The number of killed and wounded at the Kunduz, Afghanistan hospital run by MSF is somewhat uncertain. Dozens are dead or injured, at any rate.

They were killed and wounded during a nighttime attack from above. At least one US AC-130 and possibly one or more helicopter gunships fired on the hospital's main building around 2am, largely destroying the hospital and causing significant death and injury to patients (some of whom are reported to have "burned in their beds") and to staff.

MSF has called the attack a war crime.

The Defense Department has characterized it as an "accident," or perhaps a "tragic" incident justified by reports of Taliban fighters using the site to fire on American and/or Afghan forces operating in the area to retake Kunduz from Taliban insurgents, yadda yadda.

MSF insists that there were no Taliban fighters on the grounds or in the hospital, and there was no firing from the compound before or during the attack.

Of course under the shadowy Rules of Engagement in Afghanistan and other theaters of our many overseas wars, it doesn't matter whether the reports of Taliban fighters using the grounds and hospital as positions from which to fire on American and Afghan forces are true or false. It only matters that there are reports of suspected enemy presence or action from such and such a location to unleash Death From Above. Confirmation is never required as actual confirmation might jeopardize a troop on the ground. Can't have that. Good heavens no.

Force protection is All Important. The deaths of untold numbers of civilians, and the destruction of protected infrastructure such as hospitals, power plants, water treatment and pumping plants, etc, matters far less (actually not at all) compared to the necessity to protect the force.

Such death and destruction is patently a war crime under various treaties, but it's routine in the US pursuit of Empire, and there is no plausible prosecutorial means to hold the Imperial forces liable. Much the same is true of Israel's actions in its attacks on Gaza. Israel routinely attacks and destroys protected sites and infrastructure, killing untold numbers of civilians and other protected individuals, and Israel justifies it through reference to reports of enemy action at or near these sites -- or doesn't bother justifying it at all, it just does it.

"Investigations" by the United States or Israel into these frequently repeated actions are typically farces which exist solely to exonerate those who conducted the operations. In any rational world they would be considered war crimes.

But we are not in a rational world.

We are in a world of illusion and deception, in which literally any presence or action -- or lack of action -- can be interpreted as a "threat" to Imperial forces, and such "threats" can be/will be suppressed with lethal force. There's nothing rational about it. It's all "gut" and "perception," illusion and deception. And above all, it's force protection. From phantoms.

I've compared these incidents with domestic police actions which result in death and destruction. It literally does not matter whether there is an actual threat involved in police use of lethal force. All that matters at law is that there is a perception of a threat -- or simply reports that there is a threat -- for domestic police forces to justify use of lethal force.

False or inaccurate reports are sufficient.

Thus, for example, John Crawford III and Tamir Rice were killed by police on the basis of false/inaccurate reports of 911 callers and dispatchers. It didn't matter what Crawford and Rice were really doing, nor did it matter that they weren't threats of any kind. All that mattered was that they were suspected and reported as potentially threatening.

That is sufficient justification for police use of lethal force in this country, and it is sufficient justification for military action overseas -- such as the constant drone attacks on "suspected militants," the frequent attacks on wedding parties by US forces and their allies, and the recent deadly attack on the Kunduz hospital.

In a rational world, they would be crimes against humanity.

But we are not in a rational world.

[Maybe some links later; busy day today.]