It's not about victory, it's about justice...

The trial of Dominique Perez and Keith Sandy, acknowledged killers of homeless, schizophrenic camper James Boyd in the Sandia Mountain Foothills of Albuquerque, ended in a hung jury yesterday. Whether they will be retried depends on the wishes and interests of the incoming DA who won't be installed until January.

Their mug shots -- Keith Sandy,  L, Dominique Perez, R

Charming duo, aren't they? Actually they were, I won't lie about it. When they took the stand in their own defense, they came across as a couple of choirboys, no pun intended, who would never hurt a fly in anger or intentional malice. They were (wait for it)

JUST DOING THEIR JOBS



when they shot and killed James Boyd that chilly afternoon March 16, 2014, setting off a roiling series of protests and demands for police reform in Albuquerque, including an end to the killing spree APD had been on for years. I played a very minor supporting role in the efforts to bring some kind of accountability to the police department and an end to the killing, and I reported some of it here. My involvement in these efforts over the years, in both Albuquerque and Sacramento has caused some strain in my household because Ms Ché, a retired court official and the granddaughter of a sheriff's deputy, strongly supports the police; I, on the other hand, am the son and grandson of attorneys, and my uncle was charged with murder in the death of his wife -- in a highly political trial that ended first in a hung jury, then in acquittal.

So we have a disagreement about these things, Ms. Ché and I. While she respects my point of view and has actually been very supportive in my efforts, she rather vehemently disagrees with me. To her credit, she does not denounce those I've worked with to bring accountability and an end to police violence. But she does see these incidents through the prism of her own experience in court, and through the eyes of the police officers she's worked with and come to know very well. I've known some of her police pals, and for the most part have found them to be fine, upstanding gentlemen -- who wouldn't hurt a fly out of anger or intentional malice. If they ever engaged in violent policing or use of lethal force (so far as I know, none of them did), they would only be doing their jobs.

And this is the problem of violent policing in a nutshell. When it happens -- and statistics suggest it happens much less often than it once did -- it is almost always regarded by departments, officials, and the public as "just doing their jobs." In other words, it is what officers are expected and required to do under the circumstances.

Prosecutor Randi McGinn asked after the mistrial was declared yesterday whether this was the kind of policing the people of Albuquerque wanted, whether "shoot first" anticipating that someone might be a threat was the right and proper way to approach people like Boyd who was clearly in another world but who was not objectively a threat to officers, or should there be another way for police as representatives of the community, to approach people like Boyd.

In a way, she's back in the past, because the APD policies in these matters have changed radically since the Boyd shooting. In fact, the whole approach to his minor offense of camping in the mountains and his insistence on self defense with folding knives would be significantly different by APD and support staff than it was on the day he was killed.

Crisis intervention would be allowed to continue until there was a successful resolution. The ROP (Repeat Offender Project) team that Keith Sandy was part of has been disbanded. If SWAT (Perez was a SWAT officer) had been called at all (not necessarily) they would not have been obvious nor would they necessarily have been setting snipers ready to kill at a moment's notice. The K-9 officer whose actions helped precipitate the killing might not have been there at all.

And so on. Rather than setting up to kill this man, APD would be doing everything possible to preserve his life. That would be their jobs.

That is a radical change, and that is part of the change we were after.

Three of the jurors believed Sandy and Perez were guilty of 2nd degree murder, 9 voted to acquit. 

The jury told the judge that they were hopelessly deadlocked, and the judge declared a mistrial. 

The matter goes back to the DA's office. Randi McGinn, the prosecutor, was a special appointee, not the DA. The DA, Kari Brandenburg, recused herself when she was accused of conflicts in this case, and she appointed McGinn to conduct the prosecution. Brandenburg chose not to run again for DA this year so she will be replaced by Raul Torrez in January. Whether he will attempt to retry these ex-officers is anyone's guess, but I suspect he won't, partly based on the fact that APD has undertaken significant reforms since Boyd's killing, and they are currently under a DoJ consent decree to address their issues of unconstitutional policing and other failings -- including one of the worst killing sprees of any police department in the country (based on population.)

McGinn said it's up to the community to decide whether they want police training to emphasize "anticipatory" killing (ie: neutralizing a potential threat) or focus more on preserving the life of even a suspect like Boyd. I think that conversation has already been had. It's not subject to a vote. The community came out strongly in favor of doing everything possible to preserve a life, including that of Mr. Boyd. Thus policies that led to Boyd's death -- and the deaths of many others prior to and briefly after Boyd's killing -- have been changed significantly. Albuquerque Police Department now kills very few individuals -- three this year so far, compared to more than a dozen per year in the past -- and they deploy crisis intervention much more often than in the past.

The problem of police killing in Albuquerque and the rest of New Mexico has not gone away, however. While APD doesn't kill the way it used to, other agencies, particularly US Marshal, Bernalillo County Sheriffs, and New Mexico State Police continue to kill in a pattern that follows prior "force protection" models rather than "sanctity of life" models. They never had as high a rate of killing as APD, so it didn't seem like they were as trigger happy as they are. But now that APD has taken a very different approach to these matters, the other law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction in Albuquerque who haven't changed their approach seem to be much more violent and lethal -- though their actual rate of killing is probably not any higher than it was before APD changed its ways. 

It's a never ending challenge to maintain both accountability by police forces and to reduce their use of violence and lethal force. Police unions resist strenuously any effort that would interfere with officers' use of force or require accountability by police. In some cases -- Seattle and Oakland come to mind -- they refuse to abide by rules of conduct they don't agree with. This is in effect a mutinous action that should lead to discipline or dismissal, but until recently, it hasn't. APD vocally resisted reforms, but in the end accommodated them fairly well for which they are to be congratulated. 

I've pointed out the drop in killing by APD in several internet fora, only to be met by skepticism because it hasn't been reported in major online  media. True enough. It hasn't even been reported locally. But it's true, as any review of the data (as collated by Killed by Police and the Guardian) will demonstrate. But that's work, and few want to bother with it if they don't have to.

Meanwhile, the trial of Sandy and Perez did not end with an acquittal, which is what I thought it would. There may or may not be a new trial, but if there isn't one, it will not mean that these men were acquitted of murder, only that the charges were dismissed.

I can only hope that the reforms instituted by APD will continue in force and that violent policing will be curbed nationwide.

But it's a long and exhausting struggle. I'm old and ill, and I'm not at all sure how much more I can do. Time for the young to step up...

The Anti-Putin Racket

I've been curious about this for quite a long time.

Russia and the United States have a long and complex history with one another, on the one hand putative enemies due to differing value systems, on the other friendly rivals, and on yet another level, close allies to overcome existential political, economic, social, or power threats.

When I was a child, of course, I was indoctrinated with all the anti-Communist/anti-Soviet propaganda everyone else was. We lived through endless iterations of the looming nuclear annihilation game, the repetitive duck and cover drills, the frequent measurements between our happy homes and likely targets for ICBMs and long range bombers. Of course, the enemy du jour was Joe Stalin and after he died, it was still Stalin until the Kremlin sorted out its power structure and Nikita Khrushchev got to the top of the heap.

That was a bit disorienting because we'd been taught to believe Stalin was the Devil, and Khrushchev just didn't seem to be all that threatening. More like a somewhat crazed uncle.

And the stories we were told about the appalling conditions in the Soviet Union either lacked context or were outright false. For some reason, I don't recall how it happened, I became aware of the falsehood of the anti-Soviet propaganda we young were indoctrinated with very early on. I'd like to think it was through anti-anti-Soviet propaganda organs like "Soviet Life" which was distributed fairly widely in the late Fifties, but I can't recall seeing it before my eyes were opened to the fact that we were being fed fabrications and lies.

I may have learned of the propaganda and lies through a teacher instead. Mr. Beeson was my fifth grade teacher, and I recall he was being "investigated" for God knows what, but I think it was for "Communist Sympathies" among other things. He was gone from the classroom for several days, perhaps weeks, and when he came back, he was very subdued. But I think he was the one who clued us to the fact that propaganda of any kind wasn't "fact," it was meant to sway our minds and build up loyalty and patriotism toward our own country and animosity and hatred toward -- THEM. It was perhaps my first lesson in critical thinking.

I see many echoes of that indoctrination in the New Hitler/Boogeyman, anti-Putin, anti-Russian propaganda we're being flooded with these days. Putin-The-Devil is everywhere, inescapable, and yet I see very little that even makes sense, let alone has any sort of evidence to back it up or factual basis whatever.

But even if there were concrete facts to back the propaganda -- there aren't -- the correct approach is skeptical disinterest, a "so what?" rather than the increasingly shrill and belligerent demands and ultimatums.

What's really going on here, in other words?

The Official CT (if you can call it that) is being driven by the same internal government faction that drove the drumbeats that led to the Iraq invasion and the subsequent catastrophe, and the demonization of Putin, the Otherization of Russia and its people, is right out of the neocon playbook which has been known for almost 20 years (Project for the New American Century, etc.) The point being to establish the USofA as the unrivaled global hegemon by destroying or absorbing any and all rivals.

Including the Russian Federation (aka "New Soviet Empire") and China. The destruction of the Middle East and Arab North Africa fit right in to the Plan as it was announced years and years ago.

It's an Anglo-American-Israeli plot to Rule the World for ever and ever, rAmen.

These people are relentless, they don't give up, and they will have their way by hook or by crook. Hillary is fully on board with their evil plans, according to the common CT understanding, whereas Trump, for all his many faults, is not.

OK.

I don't buy that Trump is not on board, but that's a side issue.

The issue for me is that this faction within the government (and those who own said government) is playing with fire, and it seems to have a Bourbon level inability to learn from mistakes or even to acknowledge them. Iraq was a great success according to them; the ruin of Syria is going according to plan; the rise of rebel jihadist groups and their terrorist accompaniment is useful to keep domestic populations in line and uncomplaining; the flattening of Yemen is necessary for the Saudi regional hegemony and to teach a lesson to anyone who would challenge the mighty-might of the Empire;
periodic Gaza flattening likewise.

India and Pakistan going at it is part and parcel of the Imperial Project; the chaos in much of Africa is meant to be. The economic turmoil in China is a precursor of Imperial Will to Power. It's all been gamed out, and the Hegemonic Axis of Anglo-American-Israeli power always comes out the winner.

Except when it doesn't. Which apparently the military has found is the case in any direct conflict with a fully engaged major or minor power. In other words, the Imperial Axis can't win against, say, Iran or Russia, or even a determined group of rebels unconnected with a nation-state. Thus the current efforts at subversion and undermining such states and rebel groups, much like the Color Revolutions of the 80s and 90s or the more recent Arab Spring/Maidan uprisings.

It's all part of the Imperial Project.

It's disturbing to say the least.

There is much hoo-hah over the likelihood of a nuclear exchange with Russia should The Hag assume the Mantle of the Presidency. I don't think it will happen. More likely in my view is a "non-aggression pact" between the two supposed Super Powers. In other words, some imitation of what has long been going on between US and Russian/Soviet rivals. Russia will bluster but back down in the end, and the US will step back from the brink. Nevertheless, it's a dangerous and a fool's game that shouldn't be played at all. Easy for me to say, right?

Of course, Russia is no longer a "super-power" and is unlikely to use its stockpile of nuclear weapons except in defensive extremity. Despite the propaganda barrage, things haven't deteriorated that far. Not yet, anyway.

And too, it's all a racket, meant to enhance the power and authority of a certain bloodthirsty faction among Our Rulers -- and theirs (the Russian ruling elite)  as well, it would seem. For profit. For gain. For ultimate glory.

It's sick.

But it's built in to the way our government and its owners believe and act. There is little or nothing one can do about it from outside. Not much the other factions can or will do from inside.

We're fucked no matter which way we turn, much as was the case during the previous anti-Soviet  churn.

Bah.

The Second Contact Between Hillary and Trump

Always one for a good time, I had the second "debate" between the Presidential contestants on last night while I busied myself with other things.

My, wasn't it nasty, though.

Jeebus.

They seem to have picked up energy from the VP set-to, or something, and the accusations flew fast and furious. Trouble is, we've heard them all before and they no longer resonate. Yes, he's a misogynist and liar; yes, she skirts the edges of legality and may cross over from time to time; yes, Bill is a serial philanderer (or was, anyway).

I didn't know about Trump's press availability with The Women Who Accuse Bill (and One More) just before the "debate"" until after the event. How interesting. Yah, it was a good deflection from his own "locker room banter," but ultimately, it's a nonstarter. Everyone knows -- too much -- about Big Dog's randiness and they long ago made of it what they would. Nobody's mind will be changed by trotting out The Women again. On the other hand, we're just getting used to the notion of Trump the Serial Assaulter (though why it should have been a mystery until now is anyone's guess.) His peccadilloes will play for a while until people get bored with them.

Ultimately, though, they don't stain Hillary. She's  blameless -- well, more or less -- in all of this, so the point of bringing up Bill's indiscretions (or the Other Accuser that I'm still somewhat mystified by) is more of a distraction than a Thing. Hunh?

I didn't watch much of it, but I heard plenty. All the same accusations we've been hearing on and on, about taxes, emails, Russia, Muslims, yadda yadda, almost all of it completely meaningless.

Mention was made of the Wikileaks release of partial transcripts from the high-paying Clinton speeches to People Who Matter. The issue that's been glommed onto is Hillary's "public" vs "private" positions. OK, so?

Or rather it would have been a meh if it weren't for Hillary's hooey about the Ruskis hacking; what the FFF? Another tailspin into the gutter.

The point of course is that she didn't even try to deny she said what she's reported to have said, doesn't discount the truth of what's been released, but she blames it on the Russians, which is stone stupid.

But then Our Rulers never were known for their smarts, I think.

Meanwhile, I looked over some of the Wikileaks leaks of what she said to the High and the Mighty, and my initial impression is that she was trying -- probably unsuccessfully -- to inject some concept of social consciousness into the realm of Those Who Must Be Obeyed.

In other words, if she had a brain -- or her people were actually thinking things through -- they would realize these leaks are better for her than opponents make them out to be.

But then, who ever said they could figure things out without a focus group?

Her baroque and legalistic excuses for the Email Thing are wearing thin, but Trump's continued yapping about it doesn't help his cause in the least. Saying she should be in jail because of it, while red meat to his fans, is one of many disqualifications for high office Trump has exposed throughout this mess of a campaign. I'm sure that a tit for tat could be used -- no, YOU should go to jail! -- but it's just stupid. If Trump were running a  serious-revolutionary campaign and he didn't have so many vulnerabilities and skeletons in his own closet, I'd say go for it, jail them all and hang the rest of them, but that's not what he's doing. He's trying to finagle a neo-Republican ascendancy with Himself in the driver's seat. It's not revolutionary, it's just more of the same bullshit, with an extra dose of cruelty.

So in the end, I'm more convinced than ever that he's a ringer, meant to lose and to split the R Party in the process. Revenge, let's say, for the impeachment. Yes, of course, Our Rulers are just that obsessed with Get Back. This tells me that when Trump loses, he will be rewarded handsomely. Oh, very handsomely indeed.

It's all as phony as a three dollar bill.

Yep.

So I'm thinking that when they gamed this thing out, they discovered that Hillary couldn't win the White House unless the R candidate were someone like... Trump, who I'm given to believe has been a family friend of the Clintons for years, and perhaps was.... induced to run with the proviso that he lose and throw a monkey wrench into the R Party to boot.

Signs are sure pointing that way.

I think I'll skip the next one.

Historic Political Realignment?

The backstory of what is going on with the Trump campaign must be absolutely fascinating for political junkies of all stripes. This year's elections will be fodder for political scholars for decades to come. Nothing like this has happened in our lifetimes, perhaps ever. We're in a political never-never land. A circus. A goon-clown show. A WTF moment every day. Hunh? You've got to be kidding!

Something's happening here, but we don't know what it is.

Time to dredge up the Buffalo Springfield for the umpteenth time...



Yep, here we go again. We're living in Interesting Times.

I read in some newsfeed that Trump was lustily cheered yesterday when he made an appearance at the front entrance to the Trump Tower. He is mighty-mighty and his loins are heavy with seed. I mean come on... And his partisans have flooded the Intertubes to tell us all how mighty-mighty he is and how heavy his loins must be. This is the Man who ought to be King! Yay!

Something similar followed on revelations of Bill Clinton's infidelities, so I'm not at all surprised at Trump's partisans standing with him today. Of course they will; they must. They do not see the randiness of Boss Men as a fault. They see it as an Attribute. A Good and Necessary Thing. It is one of the ways to separate the Strong from the Weak.

But the Trump campaign, such as it is, appears to be falling apart. Rs of all stripes are "distancing" themselves from the candidate for his indiscretions, not his actions. They've never had a problem with his actions, nor in fact, so far as I can find out, have the members of his class, the Billionaire and Would-be Billionaire Boys Club, ever had a moment's problem with Trump's personal or business behavior.

Why should they? It's standard for men of his status.

Standard.

Maybe he's a bit cruder and ruder than many of those in his class, but what he does -- never mind what he says -- is what nearly all of them do. They are no friend to the weak or downtrodden. They have little use for women except for what they can get from them. They are exploiters and oppressors. It is their emblem of Strength.

The pro-forma denunciations we're hearing are just that -- pro-forma. They don't mean anything but they are meant to bamboozle the weak-minded, to shift the story from one of outrage over what he said (never mind what he does) to one of Puritanical holiness on behalf of everyone else of his status. Bollocks and Bullshit. They're all like this. All of them. Every one. Well, nearly...

I've said many times that Trump is a particularly boisterous representative of his class; he is no aberration, he is an avatar of who they all are. For whatever reason, that insight has gained no traction, in part, I think, because most people simply don't want to believe the worst about Our Betters. They can't be that bad. Well, they are.

Many others see Trump's badness for what it is and celebrate it. Whoop dee doo, we're goin' to the Rodeo now! He liberates the badness in others. That kind of liberation, the removal of any requirement for restraint, leads to violence of course, but more than that, it redirects social energies.

He's been called a fascist, and in a classic sense he is. But our governance has been inwardly fascist for a long time, and every now and then it is outwardly and openly fascist as well. He is not, therefore, aberrant. He fits right in. Where he diverges from the right and proper way of doing things is in his demagoguery, his populist cant and rhetoric. No, no, no, no, no. This is not the way things are supposed to be done. A leader doesn't whip up populist sentiment -- you never know where it will go after all -- one suppresses the urges of the Rabble, and convinces them that their Betters know better, and in the end, the right and proper Leader governs contrary to the interests of the Public and disregards the People's Will. That's how it's done.

Trump violates these principles over and over again, and that -- to the oligarchs and kleptocrats who rule us -- is unacceptable.

However...

Trump's campaign may indeed fall to pieces, and Herself may indeed be installed in the White House come January, partly because she is more acceptable to the oligarchs and kleptocrats, but also because her world-view is more in line with the conventions of the neoLibCons who have been so right about everything over the post-modern course of history (save me), and she has made clear she will follow their lead over the cliff if so ordered.

But... Trump has shown there is a future in his way of whipping up sentiment. There is no ultimate need to mask it. Our Betters can be just as bad as they want to be without the necessity of Bernays-ian bamboozlement and enough of the Rabble will go along with them, cheering them on, that the Others, sticks in the mud, won't matter. The mild form of populism, represented by St. Bernie (bow down) is simply too weak, you see, for consideration.

That's the lesson of Trump. A billionaire being openly bad is hailed a hero by enough of the Rabble to be electable. Ah ha! The light bulbs are going off all through the political class, make no mistake.

I've said he's a gangster and a con-man -- which he doesn't even try to hide, btw -- and I've been shocked that so many people want that kind of rule, but I can see how frustrated many people are with the status quo. Of course.

Millions upon millions of Americans have been forced into poverty by the economic unpleasantness of the last decade. No one who should be held responsible for it has suffered in the least let alone been brought to justice. In fact, they've been rewarded over and over again, while Rabble continues to be oppressed and looted. The status quo, represented by Herself, Ms. "No You Can't", will ensure that the way things are will continue without let up. And indeed, will ensure that conditions will worsen for the Little People indefinitely.

That's the post-modern, neoLibCon way. There is no alternative.

I'm not so worried about her warmongering. I see most of it as pretense. The implicit threat against real and imagined foes runs throughout the ruling class -- Trump and his familiar Pence express it just as strongly though against slightly different targets -- and it is part and parcel of their approach to global domination.

Hillary ("The Hag") is probably less likely to act on her warmongering than her opponents want you to believe, in part because the Obama Wars have been such complete clusterfucks, following as they do the regime-change pattern set under the Bush-Cheney regime, than which no clusterfucks have been greater. While it seems that neoLibCons are incapable of learning (they're worse than the Bourbons in that regard) as the misrule and anarchic "liberations" pile up, they've eased off adding more bungling and disregard to their litany of horrors. What they've done doesn't work for long-term imperialist gain in any case. The Hegemon suffers too much to keep doing the same things over and over. On the other hand, you never know...

What she's doing though, is perhaps more important in the long run. She's consolidating political power and the parties under her (or rather her owners') purview. The Republican Party elite is being absorbed by the borg of the Dems. I've never seen anything like it in the open, though it's been obvious as sin that the Democratic Party is for all intents and purposes a Rockefeller Republican Party in every way but name. This transformation has been going on since Clinton I. Perhaps it started under Carter but was temporarily aborted by Reagan's intervention. At any rate, the Dems are nothing at all like a leftist party. They are a "less evil" rightist party, whereas the Rs, to escape, have become the "most evil" rightist party. There is no genuine Left in American politics.

But Hillary is going much farther than I've seen any politician in my lifetime toward bringing in the opposition (supposed) under her wing. And it's working spectacularly. Her ostensible Republican support is essentially greater than her nominal Democratic support. At least it's more powerful.

She's in the process of transforming the Democratic Party into a consolidated Democratic Republican Party (of Unity?) that can be something like a permanent ruling party, serving the interests of Oligarchy against the popular will.

It is a historic political realignment.

Of course all the attention on Trump and his follies obscures it.

Of course.

Le sigh.

Curbing Violent Policing... Why and How

Violent policing is routine in this country and in many other crisis-ridden societies. It's not a new standard by any means, even though Americans tend to look at the current state of police conduct as something new and unprecedented.

According to statistics I've seen, though, policing now is less violent and deadly than at almost any time in our past. We see it as unprecedentedly violent in part because there is far more visual evidence of police violence than ever before. The ubiquity of video of police conduct means they can't hide behind their traditional curtain of lies, though they still try and they will lie outright even in the face of contradictory video evidence. It is their way, and efforts at police reform doesn't change that.

Though this arguably a less violent policing era, there is still too much violence inherent in the culture of policing, and there is far too much brutality and death at the hands of police. It is not a law of nature that police behave the way they do. There is no law of nature that requires them to kill on impulse. There is no law of nature that requires the public to obey police orders immediately or face a bloody beating or die.

Obedience will not necessarily save you in any case.

The problem is that police are given too much authority to use force and very little concept of their responsibility for the sanctity of life. They are filled with negative notions about the "scum" and "trash" they have to deal with, but they have few or no concepts which will lift people up. They do not value the lives of those they come in contact with, every one of whom they consider a potential existential threat. If their contacts are black, brown, mentally ill, homeless or disabled, they too often respond with an utter lack of insight, compassion or empathy. Thus the dead and wounded pile up, even though in absolute terms, the number seems to be quite low compared to previous eras.

The point I've made many times is that realistically, the police don't have to use lethal or even less lethal force more than a tenth of the number of times they do. I use statistics from cities like New York and Oakland and others where police killings have been reduced by up to 90% simply by changing the rules for use of force and enforcing those changes on officers in the field.

In these and other cities, the goal was set to reduce the killing and to curb police violence -- and it was done. It's not rocket science, and it is not an insoluble problem. It doesn't require endless conferences, task forces, public meetings and a "national conversation" to accomplish.

It requires orders from the top that the killing stop. It requires clear and enforceable rules for the use of any kind of force during encounters with the public. And it requires violations to be punished.

To endure, it also requires changes to police culture, particularly the "us against them" belief system, and the "comply or die" behavior.

The reason for doing this is simple: violent policing is modeled by society in general, forming a basis for dealing with almost any problem. Beat the shit out of somebody or shoot them dead. Threaten. Belittle. Demean. Dominate. Demand submission. Immediate compliance or face the consequences. Victim blaming. One could go on and on describing the destructive results of violent policing on society as a whole.  Other destructive results include the kind of blowback we've seen, where snipers target police. It's a wonder it doesn't happen more often. But it's the kind of blowback violent policing is bound to produce. Reduce violence by police and there will be a parallel reduction in violence against police. Again, it's not rocket science. It's common sense.

The "national conversation" has been going on for years, seemingly with little to show for it apart from the widespread recognition that policing has an inherent racial bias. Black and brown men especially are targeted by police as Bad Dudes, regardless of their actual threat. They are seen as dangerous simply by their presence. This is due in part to training and conditioning which assumes that black and brown men are the primary perpetrators of crime and will be the most commonly encountered threats to officer and public safety.

This assumption is partly due to a misuse of crime statistics, partly due to institutional racism (as in the origins of police departments as slave patrols, posses and militias to hunt down and 'bring to justice' disobedient Others) and partly due to a cultural belief within policing that sees police as anti-crime troops sent to occupy Tiger Town. Of course to justify their occupation, crime of some sort must flourish. How ironic, then, that as crime rates have plummeted from historic highs a few decades ago to historic lows today, police budgets and the number of police have increased exponentially, while the number of dead at police hands continues at an average of three a day, every day -- a good third of whom present no objective threat to police or anyone else, and almost all of the rest could have been dealt with without use of lethal force.

Of course I've mentioned two police consultants who go around the country training and convincing police officers and their supervisors that killing is their highest accomplishment, and aggressive and violent policing is the correct means of dealing with "today's" potential threats from terrorists and active shooters and such, which means that every encounter should be approached as if the subject were a terrorist or active shooter because potentially they might be. You never know.

"Better to be safe than sorry."

Shoot first, worry about the consequences afterwards, and don't worry about the subjects they kill at all. Their departments will inevitably smear and blame the victim. Inevitably.

This is too often just what happens.

I am reluctant to blame the officers for this state of affairs because they aren't the ones who come up with the policies which lead to so much death and destruction. They carry out their orders. If they don't, they can be disciplined or fired, such as what happened to the young officer in Weirton, WV, who didn't kill a suicidal man, and who was fired for not doing so -- thus "endangering" other officers. [In the linked story, the tradition of lying about events is honored by the police department and the city manager...]

The problem is not so much officers in the field though they are the ones committing most of the violence; the problem is at the top where policies are made and expectations are set.

The "top" includes police chiefs and sheriffs as well as city managers (who have authority over most police departments) and county managers (who are in authority over even elected sheriffs departments) and local elected officials (who have theoretical authority but little practical authority over policing policies).

Policing power actually flows from local elites and moneyed interests through layers of government. Police essentially serve as guards and guarantors of those elites and moneyed interests.

Policing policies and practices will change when the it is in the interests of those elites to change them.

Economic pressure is the surest way to force change on a resistant elite.

There are growing calls for economic boycotts and other forms of economic pressure where violent policing practices continue to be fostered and implemented. On the other hand, we're seeing the demise of the Warrior Cop in city after city where maintaining those principles of policing is proving to be counterproductive.

We're close to the tipping point where police departments can no longer be celebrated for acting like occupying troops in communities of color, but it will be a long slog to transform them into positive elements in a complex social, economic and political matrix. It's under way but inertia is so hard to overcome.

Killer Cop Trial in ABQ Goes To The Jury

I've been periodically watching the trial of Dominique Perez and Keith Sandy on the Livestream for the past two weeks or so. These are the APD officers who shot and killed James Boyd in the Sandia foothills on March 16, 2014, triggering an outpouring of public rage against the constant killing APD had long been engaged in. The protests were large and sustained, and while there was a spate of killings by police in Albuquerque following the Boyd execution in the mountain foothills, eventually the DoJ came down hard on APD for their infamous 'pattern and practice' of 'unconstitutional policing.'

It took a while, but things have changed, and we haven't seen another killing (by APD) like Boyd's execution for a couple of years now, and the rate of killings by APD has been drastically cut. That isn't to say that people aren't still killed by law enforcement in Albuquerque. The rate is still rather high -- though not as high as it once was -- because other agencies such as US Marshals are doing most of he killing these days. For whatever reason, they appear to immune to accountability, but that's another issue for another time.

Perez and Sandy were originally charged with Murder 1 by discredited Bernalillo County DA Kari Brandenburg in January 2015. This was the first time she had ever charged any police officer in the death of a civilian -- after 16 years in office and dozens and dozens of police killings many of which were judged to be "unconstitutional."

But the combination of massive protests, a growing national reputation for a police department out of control, the economic impact of people staying away from Albuquerque and New Mexico because of the poor reputation of the police force, and the scathing DoJ report on the manifest failures of the Albuquerque Police Department spurred her into action, action for which she has been decried by some, praised by others.

In the end, she withdrew from the prosecution under pressure, appointing another attorney as special prosecutor, Randi McGinn. McGinn has a reputation for going hard against police misconduct, but watching her performance at this trial, I have to wonder about her level of competence. She seemed poorly prepared, disorganized, and at a loss when a blizzard of objections by the defense were sustained by the judge. According to what the judge said during arguments over jury instructions, McGinn was trying to apply a civil case standard to this criminal trial, and it didn't work. That was an interesting comment, though I'm not sure the judge was correct. It looked to me like McGinn wasn't thoroughly prepared and she had only very modest backup. In other words, it was a sketchy prosecution from the get-go. 

On the other hand, the defense was thoroughly prepared and appeared to be very competent and in charge. It sounds sexist to say since both lead defense attorneys were men, but they had a very competent and prepared woman on their team whose skill at examining and cross examining witnesses was excellent. Nevertheless, the male lead defense attorneys were loud and belligerent, and their constant objections essentially forced the trial to favor the defense. The prosecution hardly objected at all, and most of their objections were overruled.

So. Ultimately the two killers (no one denied they killed Boyd) testified in their own defense and both came across as reasonably decent men who were "just doing their job." Which was of course to kill.

Perez was a Marine who'd served two tours in Iraq. He'd been badly injured in an IED explosion during his second tour, and when he got out of the Marines he decided to try for a position with the Albuquerque Police Department SWAT team. He was hired and had been with SWAT for a number of years when the "Boyd incident" happened in 2014.

Sandy had a more checkered past. He was fired from the State Police for double dipping which was considered dishonesty. He applied to APD as a 'lateral' transfer, and because APD had lowered its standards, he was promptly hired and put on the ROP team. ROP -- Repeat Offender Project -- has been disbanded due to intense criticism by the DoJ in their report on APD, but at the time of Boyd's killing, it was notorious as essentially a death squad. But then, given the rate of homicide by APD in those days, the whole department was seen by many as a death squad.

SWAT was more prestigious and advanced, and they had a wider range of options when confronting the Bad Guys, but they were no slouch when it came to killing. On the other hand, ROP was more informal and testosterone poisoned, and their whole reason for being appeared to pivot on their use of firearms no matter what. The dead piled up.

In Boyd's case, both Sandy and Perez were on the mountain as "lethal cover" for other officers -- or so they said -- who were preparing to arrest Boyd and take him into custody using force. It appears that Perez was assigned to the mountain by his SWAT supervisor whereas Sandy assigned himself, though that's not entirely clear. He was in communication with his supervisors, but I didn't hear whether they told him to go to the mountain or he decided to go on his own and informed his supervisors while he was en route. There was already another sniper on the mountain ready to take out Boyd if and when the order came.

Boyd was confronted by open space officers on the morning of March 16, 2014, due to a complaint lodged by a nearby homeowner. According to his somewhat strange testimony, Boyd had been camping on the hillside for a month, and this homeowner was increasingly alarmed because he was... there. This homeowner's garage became the assembly point for the dozens of officers who eventually made it to the mountain to observe and attempt to get Boyd to come down. The open space officers were unsuccessful in getting Boyd off the mountain, and I believe that when they confronted Boyd, he used his two knives to defend himself. He pulled them out, at any rate, and the officers withdrew. 

They recognized, however, that Boyd was not in his right mind, and a CIT officer was called to the scene to negotiate with Boyd and to attempt to bring him down from the mountain. Other officers were called to the scene as back up. The crisis officer was making slow progress with Boyd when he was called off by SWAT(?) officers arriving on scene. They had their own negotiator, though it's not entirely clear that he engaged in any negotiations with Mr. Boyd. There were other instances I'm aware of where SWAT "negotiations" consisted entirely of shouted orders and commands, leading to the death by sniper fire of the suspect/subject.

The crisis officer who was pulled off the mountain testified that he had negotiated hundreds of times with mentally ill and otherwise in-crisis individuals, and every one of those cases was resolved "successfully" -- meaning that none of them led to the death of the subject.

Boyd was 38 and was diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. He'd been in and out of mental health care facilities, homeless shelters, jail and prison for much of his life. He'd been convicted of aggravated assault on police officers -- but the circumstances weren't exactly cut and dried. Apparently his sojourn on the mountain in his own camp was precipitated by an incident at the last homeless shelter where he'd been staying. He got into some kind of altercation with another resident, and it led to his ejection from the facility. Camping alone on the mountainside was his choice apparently, and for the month he'd been there, he had not gotten into any reported trouble. But the nearby homeowner could see his camp and for whatever reason, he was becoming increasingly alarmed. Eventually, he called the city's non-emergency number for someone to go out and check on Boyd. That call led to Boyd's death. I doubt that was the intent of the caller, but you never know.

Boyd was reluctant to leave his camp, in part, apparently, because it was a successful home-place for him in contrast to all the other places where been and wound up in conflict with others. Nothing like that was happening to him in this campsite. He was clearly delusional in his conversations with the police officers who came to get him off the mountain, but he was also quite clear that he didn't want to leave his camp and that he was afraid of the police -- because, he said, they were there to kill him.

Initially they weren't, but as the day wore on, and more and more officers arrived armed to the teeth, it became more and more obvious that's exactly what they were there for, at least to Boyd. When officers started pointing their guns at Boyd, he pulled out his knives in self-defense. This back and forth went on for hours. Eventually, it appears that officers decided to affect Boyd's arrest before it got dark.

To do this they formulated a plan of action that apparently wasn't communicated to all the officers on the mountain (there were 19, I heard, when Boyd was shot, 43 had been involved throughout the day). Keith Sandy was apparently the chief planner and he would be the one to implement the final act.

 The plan was to disorient Boyd with a flash-bang, then loose a dog on him and fire a taser shotgun to disable him. He would then be taken into custody. The plan went wrong. Sandy tossed the flash-bang which landed some distance from Boyd. He didn't appear to react. The taser shotgun had no perceptible effect and may have missed Boyd altogether. The dog was loosed, but when it got close to Boyd, he pulled out his knives. The dog turned back, and as its handler went after the dog, Sandy fired at Boyd with his rifle. Two shots struck Boyd in his arms gravely wounding him. As Boyd began to fall, Perez then fired at Boyd, striking him in the back. Boyd fell to the ground paralyzed and bleeding. Officers approached shouting at him to "drop the knives!" He said he couldn't move. The dog was loosed on him again and he was mauled. He was shot with beanbag rounds. Orders continued to be shouted at him and he continued to say he couldn't move.

Eventually, brave officers approached his body and kicked the knives out of his hands. In time, paramedics were called up from their staging area at the foot of the mountain. Boyd was given first aid and transported to the hospital where one of his arms was amputated in an effort to save his life, but his other wounds were so severe, and he'd lost so much blood, it was essentially too late and he died the next day.

The prosecution claimed that Boyd was not an imminent threat to officers when he was shot, nor was he an imminent threat at any time during the confrontation. He was a potential threat, in that he was armed with knives and he said he would use them. But he was never close enough to officers to carry out that threat, and he never moved toward officers as if to attack them, even after he had been subjected to the flash-bang grenade, the dog, and the taser shotgun. He was actually in the process of surrendering when he was attacked by officers. The officers advanced on him, he didn't advance on them, and thus the officers were solely responsible for putting themselves in danger. Boyd had done nothing to endanger the officers.

Thus, murder.

Unfortunately, the final argument -- that the officers had caused their own danger -- was the one disallowed by the court. That, the judge said, was a civil case argument, inappropriate in a criminal trial. What effect that will have on the jury, I don't know. My sense all along, however, has been that there was little likelihood of conviction. "Just doing their job" has long been an adequate defense in court for police officers.

We'll see...

Doing What Needs to Be Done to Reduce Violent Policing

Americans have become accustomed to the rat-a-tat-tat of police shootings and to the stories of other means police use to "control" suspects -- sometimes unto death. Americans are also accustomed to the protest that frequently arises from this or that act of violent policing.

Efforts to control or reduce violent policing have been under way for many years in many communities, and they've been met with resistance from line officers and their unions, from police chiefs and sheriffs, and often from the justice system itself (DAs and courts) which will typically defend and exonerate officers no matter what they do or how egregious their violence toward the public.

And yet progress has been made, slow and painful as it may be.

Ways to reduce police violence and use of lethal force are well-known and understood. Some of those ways and means have been widely adopted, but we still see almost daily examples of men and women in crisis, particularly if they are black or brown, violently abused by police or summarily executed by officers who ritualistically cite "fearing for my life and the safety of others" to justify and excuse what they have done.

Simply being in psychological or emotional crisis and being black or brown can be sufficient to trigger the deadly fear response in officers, and almost always that fear is sufficient to officially justify use of whatever force the officer deems necessary.

There can be no second guessing of the officer's split-second decision to use lethal force or any other force necessary to control the subject.

We see it over and over again, practically daily, and many Americans are fine with it. Since they believe that police violence would never be directed at them why should they worry or be concerned about police violence directed at others?

Often this means that white-folks don't care if police are violent or deadly toward disobedient or otherwise recalcitrant black and brown individuals. It's what they deserve. If only they would obey, nothing bad would happen to them. And yet we see over and over again, that's not necessarily true at all. Obedience will not necessarily protect an individual who's been targeted by police for execution. People are shot and killed or tasered and killed while in the process of obeying police commands. It's simply a fact. There are too many examples documented to continue to believe that "obedience = safety."

It doesn't.

The problem is not so much the disobedience of individuals as it is that police officers are trained and conditioned to experience the disobedience of some individuals (particularly black and brown men) as existential threats to their lives and others' safety. Obedience can be interpreted by officers in exactly the same way because of their training and conditioning. When they determine that an individual is a subject or suspect, everything that individual does or doesn't do is subject to being interpreted as a threat.

Police are trained and conditioned to neutralize threats when they perceive them, and the only standard is the officer's perception at the moment he or she chooses to use force, lethal or otherwise. There is a "reasonable" standard, but it is limited to what another officer in the same situation would perceive and do. When they are all trained and conditioned in the same way, they are likely to perceive threats and act on them in the same way. Consequently the reasonableness standard for use of force based on officer perception is no protection for individuals subjected to use of force.

This is due largely to court decisions and police department policies which deny civilians ('subjects') the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, or indeed any rights at all that an officer is bound to respect, when the officer perceives a threat from the individual.

How do we get past that? In so many cases recently -- but we can cite similar cases going back many years -- the use of lethal force against individuals who do not present an objective threat is practically routine.

One case I've featured is that of Joseph Mann in Sacramento. He was shot and killed in July by two jacked up officers who raced to the scene apparently specifically to "neutralize" the subject. The problem with their action -- which included trying to run him over with their vehicle and then gunning him down when that proved unsuccessful -- was that Mann was not an objective threat to anyone, not the officers on scene, certainly not to the officers who killed him, and not to bystanders or pedestrians in the vicinity. He was not perceived to be a threat by other officers on the scene, at least not to the extent that he needed to be "neutralized" -- euphemism for killing.

His threat matrix was that he was armed with a small knife, he was disobedient, and attempted to elude police. He was falsely accused of many overt threats toward police during the five minutes or so he was being pursued by them, but apart from tossing a mug or thermos at a pursuing police car,  he never demonstrated an actual threat toward police or anyone else.

And until the two officers who killed him arrived on the scene, the other officers were trying to defuse the situation, de-escalate the confrontation, and bring Mr. Mann into custody non-violently.

They had really only begun their efforts when the two killers arrived.

De-escalation in cases of mental or emotional crisis includes such things as:

Calm the situation, by using the following tactics:

 Request backup.

 Move slowly.

 When possible, eliminate emergency lights and sirens and disperse any crowd that may have gathered.



 Assume a quiet nonthreatening manner when approaching and conversing with the individual.



 If possible, avoid physical contact if no violence or destructive acts have taken place.



 If possible, explain intended actions before taking action.

 Take time to assess the situation.

 Provide reassurance that officers are there to help.

 Give the person time to calm down. Communicate with the person:

 Keep sentences short.



 Talk with the individual in an attempt to determine what is bothering that person.

 Acknowledge the person's feelings



 Ask if the person is hearing voices and, if so, what they are saying.

 Avoid topics that may agitate the person.

 Allow time for the person to consider questions and be prepared to repeat them.

Additionally, POST trains police officers to “not threaten the individual with arrest or in any other manner,” explaining that “threats may create additional fright, stress, or potential aggression.”

This is all well-known and understood and is standard training for officers in their interaction with individuals showing signs of crisis or mental illness. There is no mystery about it. And yet over and over again, police use lethal force rather than these de-escalation tactics. They do so because they know they can -- and can get away with it -- on the one hand, and because they are conditioned to see the subject (no longer a human being) as an existential threat, no matter the objective reality. On the other hand, officers who are allowed to use crisis intervention and de-escalation techniques, as well as mental health professionals who use these techniques, are almost always able to defuse situations involving mentally ill or in-crisis individuals without resort to violence.

In other words, fear, conditioning, and the expectations of threat -- not the actuality of it -- drive most officers' inappropriate use of force.

It's an induced form of cowardice that's masquerading as courage.

Other officers on the scene of Mann's killing were frustrated by Mann's failure to obey and his attempts to elude them, but they did not appear to be in fear. They were protected by their vehicles, for one thing, and they were always at a safe distance from Mr. Mann. They had no cause to fear for their lives, and as for the safety of others the situation appeared to be non-threatening as well. There were a few other people on the street, some of whom got quite close to Mr. Mann, and he is not seen to threaten them in any way. He may not even have been aware of them.

911 reports, while apparently false about his possession of a gun, and they did not claim that Mann was threatening anyone with his knife. They said he was tossing it in the air and catching it, and the only claim was that he was acting strangely, was probably mentally ill, and callers said they were concerned because of the presence of children in the area.

They also reported that Joseph Mann was black.

Which may have been the determining factor in his death.

What I want to know is whether someone in the department ordered the killers to do their job and kill Joseph Mann. Given the way they raced to the scene with the intent to administer great bodily harm to him and when they were unsuccessful, they killed him, I have a strong suspicion that they were ordered to do what they did, regardless of anything else. It happens more often than we know, and there are very few mitigations to protect the public. There are other means to reduce violence and death by police apart from simply abiding by policies already in place. I'll try to get to some of those in another post.

VP Follies

I actually sat through the entire VP "debate" last night. I didn't watch or listen to it all, but it was on the TeeVee and I was in the same room concentrating on other things, particularly concrete things that can be done to reduce police violence and killing (seems there are all kinds of ready-made fix-its available, they just need to be implemented more broadly. This ain't rocket science. What needs to be done is well-thought out and well understood. The resistance is strong but can be overcome... topic for another post.)

As for Kaine and Pence. Jeebus.

Look, I get that the program of both campaigns is to appeal to a "conservative" -- ie: traditional Republican -- base, and that both these men have some cred in doing so, Pence from the religious and self-righteous right, Kaine from a similar (though, ick, Catlick) religious and proudly righteous "left." It's not a real left, let's face it, but we don't have one of those in politics.

What I noticed more than anything was the similarities of these two, practically Tweedle-y they were. It wasn't surprising, but it was edifying. They are performing similar roles for their candidates -- make them palatable to a market segment they otherwise might lose. Ie: randical chritianists, moderate Republicans, dubious neoC,ons, yadda yadda.

They both strongly favor neoLibCon policies, which can be endearing to the Establishment but truly to no one else. Kaine is stronger on the Liberal Identity Politics front, but Pence is no slouch with the Rightist Identity triggers. They both know this game inside out, but they are like sideline coaches rather than players themselves.

I've read a lot of trash talk about Pence and how horrifying his reign as governor of Indiana was, but what I remember him for is radical christianism in Congress. Kaine strikes me as a less polarizing figure both as governor of Virginia and in the Senate. In other words, he plays better with others and can "get things done." Pence on the other hand has a record of hurting people in a kind of religious ecstasy -- the very thing I think we shouldn't want so close to the Big Chair -- or really in public office at all, though that can't be prevented under our system. I'm thinking of Cheney as an equivalent on a secular plane. But maybe GHWBush is the closer equivalent, he being the CIA head and said to be quite the eminence grise behind the throne during the Reagan regime. In other words, especially as his mind deteriorated, Reagan wasn't really in charge, Bush the Old, apparently with help from Nancy, was.

Be that as it may, the upshot of the yap-fest last night, at least for me, is that you're gonna get the same neoLibCon shit from either of the candidates, one with a slightly less cutting edge, and you better like it because there is no alternative. Suck-ers!

Kaine's yippy-dog act was to demonstrate that he is quite able to go on the offense; he's not a passive wall-flower, oh no.

And that's all I'll have to say about that.

So the Question is Why? Why Does This Keep Happening?

Victim blamers are a significant portion of those who post on the intertubes, as are compliance fetishists. I noticed this many years ago, somewhat to my shock, since supposedly the intertubes were a bastion for free-thinkers, liberationists and outright libertarians, generally "left-leaning" whatever that meant.

But so many of those who posted on message boards and internet fora were deeply imbued with an authoritarian spirit, no matter what they professed to be their politics, and they practically worshipped at the feet of police and military (thus the pejorative, "bootlicker.")  We've all heard of "Comply or Die" as the underground motto of the police. It was clear that many of those who posted to the internet were dedicated followers of just that belief.

Of course these things are skewed because the internet is attractive to certain kinds of people, not so much to others. How representative the internet is of the general population is hard to know. It seems to be quite a cesspool at times and I'd rather not believe that it is representative of much more than a tiny segment of the population. But what do I know?

Meanwhile the killing by police continues seemingly unabated. WTF? Other murders also continue seemingly without let up, no matter the violence of the police -- or perhaps partly because of it. That's a separate but related topic. It's related in part because police are modeling violent reaction to disrespect and disobedience which has a ripple-effect in society, particularly in affected communities. But it is a separate topic I might be able to get to in another post.

Scholars have pointed out that the number and rate of police killings  (and killings of police) is WAY down compared to earlier times, as are murders in general. Despite appearances, this is actually a far less violent era all around than -- say -- the idyllic '50s I grew up in. I'm aware of that from personal experience. I was shot twice when I was a kid, and many other kids I knew went through worse. My mother was practically raped by a neighbor. There was much more general violence of all kinds in society and in US enterprises overseas -- where wars, overt and covert, were a constant. While I use the '50s as a nostalgic touchstone, I don't romanticize the era. It could be and often was rough. Just to note, we lived in relatively quiet, in some cases new suburban neighborhoods that were considered then and are considered now to be typical lower-middle class to middle-middle class, not in poor or notorious neighborhoods at all.

Crime was not so much an issue in part because not so many acts and activities were criminalized, and there wasn't such an intense need to punish rather than rehabilitate those who violated the law. Filling the prisons was not considered necessary or wise. On the other hand, mental health facilities were prevalent and often full to bursting. While we decry the absence of mental health care facilities in today's society -- and the substitution of punishment and imprisonment and summary execution for what's missing -- we may not understand how the mental health care system was formerly used -- abused? -- as a kind of warehouse for those who didn't "fit in" to society, as well as warehousing all kinds of genuinely mentally ill and mentally challenged individuals. The system was not exactly a prison system, but very often the inmates could not leave the asylum. Many were there for life. And in the '50s that meant that millions were being held indefinitely or for life, many more millions were cycling in and out of the system.

That system held about twice the number of today's vast prison system, 4 million as opposed to 2 million. It is often claimed that half or more of those in prison today are mentally ill, and that American prisons and jails are used as substitutes for mental health facilities (absent "care") far more than they are used to house criminals.

That's one reason why I think we see so much violence in policing -- even though it's less objectively violent than it once was, just as society as a whole is less violent. The problem is that the typical police -- and "corrections" -- response to disobedience, misbehavior, and signs of mental illness is punishment/violence. There is no alternative except death.

They'll either beat you bloody, electrocute you,  or they'll kill you. They have no other viable options for control. They do not have or use de-escalation tactics, they do not know any way except through dominance to approach someone in the midst of a mental/emotional crisis, and they are conditioned not to have empathy or compassion for those in crisis -- particularly if they disobey "lawful orders."

Lack of obedience together with "furtive movements" -- the infamous "reaching for his waistband" -- is interpreted as an existential threat to be neutralized, and that generally means killing the subject (not at that point a human being, only a subject.)

Police are trained and conditioned to react to visual/verbal cues, react almost robotically, no matter the objective reality of the situation. When they detect particular cues, they will kill. If they don't they might be fired from their jobs or otherwise disciplined. That's the reality of the field of policing. Let's not fool ourselves.

Internet apologists will say that all the individual has to do is "obey" and nothing bad will happen to them, forgetting (conveniently) that people in crisis or otherwise disabled cannot necessarily obey promptly or at all, and that even people with their wits about them cannot promptly or properly obey contradictory shouted "commands."

If police are determined to kill you, they will, no matter what you do or don't do, and they will generally get away with it.

Disobedience is a cue to take more domineering or violent action, but obedience will not necessarily save you, as so many individuals find out.

But why do police so often only have domineering or violent -- or deadly -- options, when there are so many more effective an positive alternatives available, alternatives that are based on a respect for the sanctity of human life.

It has to do with how they are expected to see their role in civic life post-Columbine and post-9/11.

This is due essentially to the ravings of two consultants and their teams who go around to police departments all over the country lecturing and training on concepts of use of force and killing.

These men, (Dr.) Bill Lewinski, and (Lt. Col.) Dave Grossman, are probably more responsible for the current state of violent policing than any other two individuals in the country. And they're proud of it.

They make no apologies whatever for the death dealing and violence that goes on every day in police work. They celebrate it, and they defend and celebrate the killers. No matter who they kill or under what circumstances. They are reaching their highest level of accomplishment when they kill -- according to Grossman. And they are serving the public by killing according to Lewinski. Every killing by police is defensible, necessary and ultimately for the good of all. They are removing threats, wolves as Grossman calls them, who would otherwise be preying on the sheep (ie: you 'n' me) . Every kill is a good kill, without exception. After all, a sheepdog would never kill without reason or necessity, no? Even when, sometimes, a sheep is caught up in the crossfire or targeted. No one who is killed by police is truly innocent in any case. All are worthy of death for one reason or other, without exception. They are criminals and threats, now or in the past, and society has no place for the likes of them. None.

This is what Grossman and Lewinski teach. It's what they believe. And it is a belief shared by enormous numbers of cops and chiefs of police and sheriffs and public officials throughout the land. It is the interior culture of policing, indeed, the interior culture of rule. More importantly, it is a belief shared by elites, Our Betters as it were, almost universally.

You and I, the Rabble, have no right to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness, no rights at all that police are bound to respect, once you or I are targeted for liquidation. And when they decide to kill, there is essentially nothing we can do to stop them from carrying out their bounden duty.

Many of the examples of police killings we've seen recently demonstrate that belief as clearly as possible. Some are outright murder/summary executions, others are a little more complex, involving stages of force but inevitably leading straight to the morgue. "There is no alternative" once police have decided to kill their quarry. And that's a truism. Once the decision is made, they will kill, guaranteed.

We hear a lot about "split second decisions" but it is rarely that way at all. Police will go into a contact/confrontation having already decided to kill, or sometimes they are designated to do just that. Police departments all over the country employ snipers and shooters whose job it is to kill. When they are deployed, that's what they do. It is not a "split-second" thing at all; their deployment is itself the "decision" to use lethal force.

In other cases, beat cops or special purpose cops -- who are not necessarily or ordinarily assigned to kill -- take it upon themselves to "neutralize the threat" (ie: kill) based on what they are told via dispatch or their supervisors. That is not a "split-second" decision at all; it is a built in requirement of their dispatch to the scene. (Cf: John Crawford III, Tamir Rice and others, killed on sight without the least consideration of the facts but based solely on reports which are often inaccurate or downright false, sometimes purposely so.)

We could go on and on listing other incidents -- recent and historic -- where police kill and get away with it when there is no objective threat to them or anyone else. That's not the point of this post, however. Instead I'm not looking so much at what happens as why it happens, and why it is so difficult to change the pattern of police killings.

Inherent bias and racism is a fundamental and apparently intractable part of the problem of policing in general as well as police killings. The proportion of black and brown men killed by police is way out of proportion to their population, and it is due largely to training and conditioning which assumes a threat from these populations -- and to inherent cultural bias and racism that is fostered in society and particularly within police culture. There is no greater threat to police and society in general than raging and armed white men, but police typically approach them with deference. Black and brown men on the other hand are seen a inherent and existential threats by their nature. They are approached aggressively and often lethally with no recourse for the victim at all. This is racism and cultural bias, but it is also something else: it is a demonstration of Othering, something that is very deep seated in American culture and society.

Black and brown men, especially, are not seen by police as full "members" of society, and they are typically seen as inherently threatening to the "good order" of that society, no matter what they do or don't do.

There are other categories of the population who are "Othered" in the same way, and they are often treated as badly or worse by police, but it is the constant killing of black and brown men by police that gets the majority of the attention. That's not inappropriate at all, though I sometimes see complaints that this or that white victim of police is not being highlighted or featured by the media, and it's so "unfair!!!!" No it isn't, and no these incidents are not ignored. The problem is the proportion of police killings is vastly greater among black and brown victims, and no, it is not because they are all criminals nor does it have anything directly to do with crime in their communities. It generally has absolutely nothing to do with previous accusations or convictions -- often cited in excusing the killing of a black or brown victim -- because police typically don't know anything about that when they kill, and even if they did, it should have no bearing on their current encounter.

I was going to post some videos of Lewinski and Grossman raving about the "science" of their kill--think, but it's really sickening to me. But if you're interested just google up Dave Grossman and Bill Lewinski and you'll find plenty of information and probably hundreds of videos between them. Their poison theories and "science" is a major driving factor in police killings. Changing the situation requires discrediting their bizarre and crazy theories and beliefs, but it also requires putting in place viable alternatives.

That's a subject for another post.

Cops Who Shouldn't Be On The Street

While I'm all but certain that Keith Sandy and Dominique Perez (executioners of James Boyd in Albuquerque in March of 2014) will be acquitted of murder, it's unlikely either one will go back to policing. The behavior of Albuquerque police has changed for the better since that killing, and neither one of them would be given the kinds of assignments they had on chilly hillside in March. For one thing, crisis intervention would be allowed to continue without the necessity of cover (as those engaged in negotiations would be a safe distance away from their subject), SWAT or other heavily armed response teams would not be visible, perhaps not even on site, and threats of bodily harm, expressed or implied, would not be made to Mr. Boyd.

Meanwhile, we have seen situations all over the country in which black men in crisis have been gunned down by trigger happy police who seem eager to bag them a trophy. It's insane. In some of these cases, the cops are clearly crazier than the men they kill.

One of those incidents happened in Sacramento in July when two crazed cops shot and killed Joseph Mann on Del Paso Boulevard in front of witnesses and cameras. As I reported previously, the Sacramento Police Department issued a narrative filled with lies and fabrications on the day of the killing, and it has only been through persistent pressure by Mann's family and the Sacramento Bee that something closer to the truth has come out. SPD was determined to withhold video of the incident, for example, in order to "protect" the "investigation," but as long as video was unavailable to the public, the SPD was free to spin the incident narrative to their advantage.

Their (false) story was that an erratic, disobedient Negro armed with a gun and a knife was reported by residents of North Sacramento who were scared. SPD said that this crazy Negro refused orders to drop his weapons and charged officers with his knife. One officer was injured in pursuit of him. This officer had to be hospitalized. Mann was pursued on foot by two other officers and was shot and killed when he lunged at them with his knife.

Almost none of this story was true.

A citizen video, taken by a witness, was released by Mann's family's attorney in August. It did not show the shooting itself, and some of it was shaky and difficult to decipher because it was taken at a distance, but it strongly indicated that the SPD narrative was false. Throughout this video, Mann attempts to get away from cops, he does not lunge at them or charge them. He does not obey them nor does he threaten anyone. Police issue "commands" via loudspeaker. A number of police vehicles arrive on the scene and they attempt to corral Mr. Mann as he attempts to elude them. They do not get out of their vehicles, nor do they pursue him on foot until just before he is killed. Officers on foot are seen to come from somewhere unknown, rushing up to Mann, and shots are heard. The camera pans away as the witness appears to duck; the next visual is the body of Mann lying on the sidewalk quite a distance from the witness and police rushing up to the victim.

It's not entirely clear from this video what happened, but it is clear enough that the police were not entirely truthful in their account of the incident.

The family demanded to see dashcam and any other video in police possession, but SPD adamantly refused and continued to stick with their largely false narrative of events.

Then the Sacramento Bee obtained and released surveillance footage that much more clearly showed the shooting itself. (This footage was released before the family saw it, and they were somewhat annoyed.)  This video footage showed Mann running down a sidewalk on Del Paso Boulevard, stopping as police cars come ever closer, then trying to get away again, stopping again as two officers on foot approach. Mann raises his arm but does not "lunge" at officers -- who are approximately 30 feet away -- as they open fire. Mann falls to the sidewalk, and officers approach his body, one apparently kicking him.

Shortly after release of this video, SPD released three dashcam videos which showed different parts of the incident from different viewpoints. None of the dashcam videos clearly showed the shooting itself, but taken together, they showed a fairly comprehensive overview of the situation and the scene. They demonstrated the falsity of the police narrative and when combined with surveillance video and witness video, they confirmed that the police had simply lied about what happened, and in a perverse twist, they continued to lie, citing one dashcam video in particular as evidence that Mann "charged at" officers.

In fact, it showed the opposite of what police claimed it did. On initial release, there was no sound with this video, so the conversation between the officers in the car was not heard. Nevertheless, it appeared the car was rushing to the scene traveling west on Del Paso Blvd at high speed. When it arrives near Mr. Mann, the police narrative was that Mann "charged" the car, but it looks like the car is actually 'charging' him, and he's trying to avoid getting hit. As he passes by the car, the driver turns the car around and continues pursuit on Del Paso Blvd, stopping when it reaches the median. Mann crosses the street, and shortly two officers appear on foot following him. Within seconds, shots ring out (so there was sound after all!) and other officers rush up to the obscured scene.

Two days ago, the Sacramento Bee re-released this dashcam video with officer conversation in the car -- which had been muted in the original release by SPD. This conversation clearly indicates that these officers rushing to the scene intended to hit Mr. Mann with the car, and when they were unsuccessful, they were the ones who rushed up to him as he stopped on that sidewalk and they were the ones who shot him dead from almost thirty feet away.

Here's the story as it appears in Newsweek.

Here's the original story as it appeared in the Sacramento Bee.

And here's the video with sound:

This is actually quite shocking because it demonstrates intent. These officers are intent on gravely injuring Mr. Mann by striking him with their vehicle at high speed, and when they are unsuccessful, they exit the vehicle and rush to within thirty feet of him and shoot him dead. This is obviously intentional homicide, voluntary manslaughter at the least, murder 1, more likely.

There can be no "fearing for my life and the safety of others" defense, though I'm sure it will continue to be offered. There was no threat to these officers at all; they were the ones threatening great bodily harm, not Mr. Mann. In fact they attempted twice to run over Mr. Mann, and when they were unsuccessful, they ran from their car and shot him. They shot him from a distance where they were not objectively in any danger from Mr. Mann who, in any case, did not threaten them. Nor were any other officers in any objective danger from Mr. Mann at that time, as they were all still in their vehicles.

There were a few people on the street, and some observers have tried to make the case that Mr. Mann was a danger to them. That argument is weak due to the fact that Mr. Mann is never seen threatening anyone on the street, and further, the initial calls to 911, while falsely claiming Mr. Mann has a knife and a gun, do not in any way indicate that Mr. Mann is threatening people. They say he is throwing his knife in the air and catching it, and claim falsely that he is taking out his gun and putting it back in his waistband. That is all.

At no time in any of the videos is Mr. Mann able to be an objective threat to officers in their vehicles, nor is he seen to charge or lunge at officers with his knife (the only weapon he actually has.) At no time is Mr. Mann seen to threaten bystanders or pedestrians. The only things Mr. Mann is seen to do is try to elude police (not very well as he stays on sidewalks and streets) and he appears to tell them to go away/leave him alone. At one point he throws what was later said to be a mug or a thermos at a pursuing police car. That is literally all he is seen to do that might be interpreted as a "threat" to anyone.

Until the two cops who kill him arrive, the other officers are safe in their vehicles and are relatively patiently trying to corral Mr. Mann with their vehicles in an effort to contain him prior to disarming him. He is able to get away, but not very effectively. He never actually threatens police or bystanders.

Police officers in their vehicles have him almost contained when the other officers on foot rush up and kill him.

Under the circumstances -- and given all the other police killings of black men recently -- these officers should be held to account; they should be arrested and charged with murder an the lesser included voluntary manslaughter, and they should be put on trial.

I don't know whether they would be convicted, but the death of Joseph Mann should not be allowed to fade into the background noise of police killings. This one, perhaps more than the others (except for the execution of Terence Crutcher in Oklahoma), should be seen for what it was, an intentional and egregious killing, a murder in a word, of a man in crisis, without so much as a moment's hesitation.

Let's see what happens...

Another Video, Another One Dead, and Changing the Dynamic

Practically every day lately we hear of another black man killed by police, another video disproving police claims, another city in uproar, another call for calm and peaceful protest while the power structure gets to the bottom of another tragic incident.

Again and again and again and again. This is America the Exceptional. And indeed, no other developed country has the American level of police violence and murder, nor does any other country have the American level of incarceration. These are two signs among many that the vaunted American Way isn't working all that well.

There was another police killing in Pasadena yesterday. A black man in crisis had himself called 911 for help. Right there, of course, was a mistake. By now it should be clear to nearly every one that calling 911 for help with a black loved one or one's black self is calling for an almost automatic death sentence. They'll be helped all right, right into the morgue.

That's the American Way, and if people haven't figured that out yet, I wonder what they have been paying attention to instead. These incidents are not aberrations. They're routine.

No, not every person in crisis winds up dead. But a black man acting erratically is liable to.

I watched the video that El Cajon police released yesterday of the execution of Alfred Olango, and very little but the broadest outline of what happened was visible in what was shown initially.

Contrary to one news report of what the videos show, Mr. Olango is not in the street, he is in a parking lot off of one of the main streets. He is pacing and is being followed by a police officer. It's not clear whether the officer has his gun drawn. His left hand is down at his side and his right had is gesticulating.

Mr. Olango appears to have one hand in his pocket, but again that's not clear from the washed out and indistinct video that was released (a video of the broadcast of the video that was projected on a screen.)  As the officer approaches closer and closer to Mr. Olango, they mirror one another's actions. They step right, they step left, and the officer gets closer and closer. Another police car drives up from the side. When the first officer is perhaps four feet from Mr. Olango, the second officer gets out of his car and approaches. In the initial video release, one cannot see Mr. Olango raise his arms and assume a "shooting stance." In fact, the still that was previously released by the police that shows him in that stance might have shown something that lasted only one frame -- in which case, it would not have registered on the consciousness of the officers.

At any rate, in one of the released videos, Mr. Olango falls to the ground. In the other -- the one from which the still is allegedly taken -- four shots are heard, Olango falls to the ground and a woman screams.

In both videos, a woman who I assume is the same one who said she was Mr. Olango's sister and who had called three times for help is seen at the left, following the officer with the gun, getting quite close in fact, and after the shooting she is seen running away. I assume she is the one who is heard screaming on the cell-phone video, but there are reports that it was actually the woman who took the cell-phone video who did so.

At any rate, later clearer and more contrasty versions were published, and it appears that the first officer does have his gun drawn in his left hand during the whole -- very brief, mind you -- encounter. Mr. Olango is backing away from him the whole time. At no time is he seen to make any threatening motion toward the officer. When the second officer arrives, he seems to be momentarily disoriented, but the "shooting stance" visible in the still frame the police released is not visible in either of the videos that were released. If it happened at all -- and I'm assuming it did -- it was extremely quick, and I would argue it was not intentional.

See for yourownself:



Why is this important? Police have been justifying the latest rash of street executions on the threat (quote-unquote) posed by the crazy or otherwise disobedient black victim. But as we see in video after video, the threat is largely or completely imaginary. The black man may be disobedient, and he may actually have some kind of weapon in his hand -- or maybe not -- but at no time (repeat) at no time does the victim pose an actual threat to the officer. According to convention and law, however, that doesn't matter. All that matters is that the officer perceives a threat.  As those of us who have been following these matters learned long ago, that perception is almost a given whenever an officer is in confrontation with a crazy, disobedient black man -- or in some tragic cases, in confrontation with any black man at all.

In other words, according to some police conventions, any black male is a potential existential threat, and must be regarded as a threat until and unless proven otherwise. In some cases, there is literally nothing that a black man can do to disprove the threat he represents in the eyes of the police: comply or don't comply, it doesn't matter. Be armed or unarmed, it doesn't matter. Be polite or hostile, it doesn't matter. Sometimes the police don't even give a black male the opportunity to respond before firing away. By now, there is no mystery or surprise about these things. It's obvious as sin. Police see an existential threat to their own lives and the safety of others when they see a black male. (To go Godwin for a moment, this was much the same situation in Nazi Germany when Jews and other despised minorities were encountered by police; sometimes they would be killed on the spot, and it was always because of fear for lives and safety. The very presence of a Jew or other despised minority could trigger the killer-cop to act violently or lethally. And this was happening well before the Final Solution was implemented. Much the same happens in Israel and Occupied Palestine today whenever Israeli police or military are in confrontation with Arabs or Palestinians. Summary execution is routine -- and the excuse is that the Arab or Palestinian male (especially) is inherently an existential threat.)

These actions may or may not be due the inherent racism of the individual officer, but it is certainly an induced racism that comes from intense training and conditioning. (Black officers suffer from the same training and conditioning, and they can kill black victims just as easily and with almost as little empathy or compassion for their victims as white or Hispanic officers will.)

Of course these killings have been going on in this country forever, and from time to time execution squads have been organized to go around assassinating particularly troublesome black men. It's part of the hidden history of the USofA. Let's not forget the lynching era, either.

Some of the black people I correspond with see the current spate of police killings as an evolution if you will of lynch law. Nowadays police take it upon themselves to execute blacks rather than await the mob. But the rationale is essentially the same as if a mob had done it.

There are two important factors: it doesn't matter if the victim is guilty or innocent of a crime (as that's never adjudicated); and the victims are essentially randomly and arbitrarily chosen though the rate of killing is fairly constant. To be clear, black victims are not the only victims of this New Lynch Law, but they are victims far out of proportion to their population percentage as was true back in the day as well.

A common thread found in the recent spate of street executions is mental illness, disability, or psychological/emotional crisis of some sort. In each case, disobedience is a trigger factor for the ultimate execution, but it's not the only factor. Being black and male is just as strong a trigger factor if not stronger.

It's as if police believe it is their "job" to execute crazy Negroes on sight. Well, maybe it is.

Here's the thing. Police officers are not operating independently in a vacuum. They are part of a system and culture of policing that takes orders from commanders (police chiefs, sheriffs, etc.) who in turn are taking cues and orders from... whom?

I find I have to make this point over and over again because so many people either don't understand how police departments operate or they are being deliberately obtuse. Police departments, like the military, are hierarchies. Officers receive orders from their supervisors who in turn receive orders from their commanders. Officers must then carry out their orders. If they carry them out they are rewarded. If they don't they are disciplined. In some cases, they will be dismissed. That's a very simple outline, but that's how it works. Officers on the street are not independent (ie: "rogue") agents, at least not usually. The "bad apple" argument depends on these "rogues" running wild, but that's not how police departments operate.

No, they have chains of authority, orders, and a cultural/historical perspective. Many people have pointed out that modern police forces are in many cases (all?) descended from slave catchers and semi-private militias sent out to bring "Law'n'Order" to the frontier and keep the Negroes (and Indians and Mexicans and Asians) in their place.

Organizationally, police forces are semi-military -- like the militias of yore -- but they are highly bureaucratized, too. In a sense, like public education, they're being administered to death. In other words, the seeds of their own institutional collapse have long been planted.

The recent killing spree is not really new; what's new is the sight of all these killings via video -- some of it from the police cameras, some of it from citizens, some of it from pervasive surveillance cameras. People may or may not have known it was going on before the advent of universal cameras, but in fact there has never been peace between civilians who are designated "Others" and police.

Despite the frequency of police killings -- average three a day -- statistically, there are far fewer now than in eras past, just as far fewer police are killed by civilians than in the past. We are actually living in a relatively bloodless period, though it doesn't seem like it. Because we didn't see so many police killings on our teevees back in the day, it didn't seem like there were so many, but there were.

Police killings are almost always justified by two things: fear, and the actions (or failures to act) of the victims.

"Comply or Die" is not just a catchphrase, it is the operational theory of much of modern policing. In other words, in confrontation with police, the civilian has no rights which officers are bound to respect. Obedience and compliance are the only acceptable responses to police command, and often they are not enough. Swift and sure punishment can be applied at the discretion of the officer whether or not the civilian complies and obeys. This punishment can include the use of lethal force but it doesn't have to. Whereas 1,200 or so are killed by police every year, tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands are injured, sometimes gravely, by police in the performance of their duties. They are not counted yet, so we really have no way of knowing how frequently people are injured as opposed to killed by police.

Understanding how police departments operate and knowing the principles by which they operate is part of the key to changing them for the better.

Proviso: some police departments are not reformable (Chicago comes to mind but there are many more just as bad or worse) and should be abolished.

Reform has been implemented in some cities with remarkable reductions in the number and rate of police killings. In fact, over a period of two or three years, the number of police killings in New York City was reduced 90%. In other cities, the number has been reduced by half or more in a very brief period, largely by changing the rules of engagement and use of force, and by a key factor: issuing the command from the top to STOP THE KILLING.

Strangely, or maybe not, officers obey.

I use Albuquerque as an example because that's the city I'm closest to and that's the one I've been most recently involved in activism against police violence. At one time, the kill-rate of APD was proportionately the highest in the nation. Albuquerque police were killing as many as two a month, which doesn't seem like a lot, but given the half-million or so population, it was huge. Many, too many, of these killings were simply outrageous. Mentally ill and suicidal individuals were being shot and killed routinely. People who were not armed, not threatening, who were running away or surrendering, you name it, they were being shot by police and killed over and over. Sometimes they were caught on tape, but even when they weren't the reports were horrifying. The Deputy County Manager's son was killed by police. A Valencia County judge's daughter was killed by police. A suicidal man who was not threatening anyone but himself was shot by a police sniper. A homeless schizophrenic surrendering to police was shot and killed. On and on and on, the bodies kept piling up. Albuquerque was getting a reputation for police wilding second to none in the nation.

Activism against this police violence had been going on for years, but nothing seemed to affect police conduct, not even the tens of millions of dollars the city was paying out to survivors of loved ones killed by police. And then... it changed. Practically overnight, the killing stopped.

A number of factors went into it, of course, including a scathing report of "unconstitutional policing" from the DoJ, but key was the order going out to STOP THE KILLING. (Another factor may have been the incident in which a police supervisor shot up one of his undercover officers in drug sting gone bad, but we'll never really know...)

For almost a year, APD killed no one, and ever since, the rate of killing by APD has been very low. Three, maybe four a year, compared to dozens in the past. You wouldn't know this though because there has been no coverage by the media -- not even locally -- of the change in the kill rates by APD, nor has there been any investigation into why. For the record, there have been three killings by APD so far this year.

It's as if blinders went on as soon as the killing (almost) stopped.

But other cities, such as Las Vegas and Oakland, also experienced steep reductions in police killings when the order went out to Stop. And their reductions have received at least a little bit of coverage in the media.

The point is that police killings don't have to happen. The killing is a choice made by departments, not an immutable fact of life and death or "split second decisions." It's always a choice, and in my view, based on my study of hundreds of killings by police and the experience of cities where police killings have been reduced significantly, 90% or more of police killings are simply unnecessary -- regardless of whether they are ruled "justified."

And in the cities where police killings have been reduced, it doesn't take years of "dialogue" and "conversation" -- it can happen almost overnight if the order goes out from the top to STOP.

I think we're almost at the tipping point where police departments have to stop. They simply can't keep killing like this and preserve any legitimacy with the growingly restive public. The recent spate of killings has been gawd-awful, and the efforts by police departments to hide the evidence, to lie and spin these killings in their own favor, to taint the investigations and sway the public by selective release of snippets of information and evidence, and particularly to blame the victims, just isn't working any more. The lies, the false narratives, the withholding of video evidence, the refusal to be open and transparent with the public, the arrogance, all lead the public to delegitimize the police, and once that happens it's all but impossible to restore confidence in an institution that is seen as an enemy of the people.

I have hope, I always have hope, that this situation will change for the better, sooner rather than later, but I've been an activist against police violence for decades. It's seemingly never-ending.

But change can come, and I'm not about to give up...

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For the record: When Yelling Commands is the Wrong Police Response