More Troops Sent Into Ferguson Than Were Just Sent Into Iraq | The Free Thought Project
On Tuesday, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon announced plans to deploy more than 2,200 National Guard troops to the Ferguson area. Keep in mind that this is more troops than the 1,400 Obama recently announced would be sent to Iraq to fight ISIS at a cost of $3.7 billion dollars.
This raises some interesting questions. Does it really take more soldiers to be deployed in an American city to stem potential violence, than it does to defeat a foreign boogeyman “terrorist group,” that possess’ heavy weaponry, that politicians describe as a “serious threat” to America?
Nixon made the announcement after being heavily criticized by Ferguson Mayor James Knowles as well as Lt. Governor Peter Kinder, who said that more National Guard should have been in the area last night to prevent the violence and rioting that left many buildings and cars in flames.
The scenes on the ground resembled that of a war zone, with buildings ablaze and a small number of protesters engaging in looting and vandalizing, and riot gear clad officers firing teargas and pepper spray at protestors.
Oddly, the ones rioting and looting were for the most part left alone, while those standing in solidarity to protest the decision peacefully were the ones that took the brunt of the police violence.
At a press conference, Nixon said, “No one should have to live like this. No one deserves this. We must do better and we will. This morning and into this afternoon, I met with Guard and law enforcement leaders. All agreed that the violence we saw in the area of Ferguson last night cannot be repeated.”
St. Louis police chief, Jon Belmar, said that he needed an additional 10,000 officers to quell the mayhem seen last night stating, “I don’t think we can prevent folks who really are intent on destroying a community.”
Perhaps if law enforcement wasn’t initiating violence against the peaceful protestors, there would be less outrage and exhibitions of renegade behavior. People are only willing to be beaten and gassed, while peacefully protesting, for so long before they have had enough and begin to retaliate with violence.
While the main stream media portrays the mayhem on the ground as a result of looters and rioters, this behavior didn’t occur in a vacuum and was often precipitated by law enforcement’s initiation of aggressive action first, according to numerous journalist live streaming from Ferguson.
(Photo Credit: AmericaWakieWakie)
“For 104 days, the police have lied and said Mike Brown was killed 35 feet away from Darren Wilson’s SUV. It was actually 148 feet.
This distance is essential to the defense and how Darren Wilson must demonstrate that he “reasonably feared for his safety.” At the point in which Mike Brown ran half a football field away, how reasonable is it for an armed officer to fear anyone?”
Police lied. Mike Brown was killed 148 feet away from Darren Wilson’s SUV
“This isn’t a police officer. This is a fucking storm trooper. Look at him. Nothing about this man says protect and serve. This man’s profession is violence and his paymaster is the state.
This is the kind of jack-booted thug Governor Jay Nixon wants working on behalf of Missouri against the peaceful citizen protestors in Ferguson, and here’s where it gets extra fucked-up: This poster-boy for police militarization also happens to be a racist right-wing cop who recently shot and killed yet another black teenager.
Yep, that’s right. This is a confirmed photograph of Jason H. Flanery, the gun obsessed wingnut of a police officer who fired 17 shots at 18 year old VonDerrit Myers Jr. last month. Here he is, in all his geared-up glory, still very much on active duty, ready and willing to reign down even more brutality and terror onto the civilian population of Ferguson.”
When the Michael Brown verdict is announced, people can expect the police to take at least ten different illegal actions to prevent people from exercising their constitutional rights. The Ferguson police have been on TV more than others so people can see how awful they have been acting. But their illegal police tactics are unfortunately quite commonly used by other law enforcement in big protests across the US.
The First Amendment to the US Constitution promises the government will not abridge freedom of speech or to prevent the right of the people to peaceably assemble or to petition to the government for the redress of grievances.
Here is what they are going to do, watch for each of these illegal actions when the crowds start to grow.
1) Try to stop people from protesting.
The police all say they know they have to let people protest. So they usually will allow protests for a while. Then the police will get tired and impatient and try to stop people from continuing to protest. The government will say people can only protest until a certain time, or on a certain street, or only if they keep moving, or not there, not here, not now, no longer. Such police action is not authorized by the US Constitution. People have a right to protest, the government should leave them alone.
2) Provocateurs.
Police have likely already planted dozens of officers, black and white, male and female, inside the various protests groups. These officers will illegally spy on peaceful protesters and often take illegal actions themselves and encourage other people to take illegal action. They will even be arrested with others but magically not end up in jail. Others inside the groups will be paid to inform on the group to the government. Comically, when undercover police are uncovered they often claim they have a constitutional right to be there and try to use the constitution they are violating as a shield!
3) Snatch Squads.
Police will decide who they do not like or who they think are leaders. Then they will use small heavily armed groups to knife into peaceful crowds and grab people, pull them out and arrest them.
4) False Arrests.
The police will arrest whoever they choose whenever they choose and will make up stories to justify the arrests. If people are breaking glass or hurting others, those arrests are legal. However, the police will arrest first and sort out who they arrested later. Police in Ferguson have already wrongfully arrested legal observers, a law professor, and church leaders.
5) Intimidation.
As they have shown many times in Ferguson and all over the country, once the protests heat up, police will show up in full riot gear, dressed like ninja turtles (big flashy guns, plastic shields, big batons, shin guards, gas masks, flex cuffs) and act like they are military warriors protecting people from ISIS invasion.
6) Kettling or Encircling.
The police will surround a group and pen them in and not let them move. They will either arrest all or force them to leave in one direction. This, as the police know fully well, always sweeps up innocent bystanders as well as protestors. NYPD did this with hundreds on Brooklyn Bridge and at many other protests. Sometimes they deploy orange plastic nets or snow fencing, sometimes just lots of police.
7) Raids on supportive churches, organizations or homes.
Often the police make illegal pre-emptive raids on places where volunteers are sleeping, cooking or parking their cars. They lie to locals and accuse the protesters of links to violent organizations.
8) Pain Noise Trucks.
Police will also use LRAD noise trucks (Long Range Acoustic Device). First used in Iraq now used against peaceful protesters in the US. The trucks blast bursts of sound powerful enough to cause pain. Never approved by any court, this intentional infliction of pain is another sign of the militarization of the police. Police also use MRAPs Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles – heavily armored trucks which look like tanks but roll on wheels not treads. This is part of the intimidation.
9) Arresting reporters.
When the police are feeling the heat of public view, they will force journalists away from the protesters. Those who insist on engaging in constitutionally protected activity and returning to the scene will be arrested.
10) Chemical and other weapons.
When the police get really desperate and afraid, they will try to disperse the entire crowd with pepper spray, tear gas, and other chemical weapons, rubber or wooden bullets. If this happens the police have just about lost control and are at their most dangerous.
Dozens and dozens of different police forces which will be surrounding the protesters in Ferguson when the Michael Brown verdict is announced. There will be federal FBI agents, Homeland Security, US Marshalls, State Police troopers, County Sheriffs, and local city cops from the dozens of little towns in and around St. Louis. Perhaps this will be the time when the peoples’ constitutional rights to protest are actually protected. We can only hope. But in the meantime, look for these common police tactics.
Source: Bill Quigley for Alternet
Man Calls Police to Escort His Girlfriend, Cops Show Up and Shoot Her in the Head | The Anti-Media
A 40-year-old woman and mother of three from Ann Arbor, Michigan was shot and killed Sunday night after allegedly confronting police while holding a knife.
The woman’s boyfriend, Victor Stephens, 54, challenged the police on their handling of the incident, saying that the use of lethal force was excessive and that the situation could have been resolved through non lethal means. Stephens said:
“Me and her, we had an argument. Glass was being broke, so I called the police to escort her out,”
Police were called at approximately 11:45 pm by Stephens to escort his girlfriend from his property. When officers arrived, Stephens was in a separate hallway in the house away from where the incident occurred and she was pronounced dead at the scene. There were 5 other people at the house.
“They said ‘freeze’ and the next thing I know I heard (gunshots),” Stephens said.
Significant questions are being raised regarding the circumstances surrounding the event, the use of lethal force in the encounter by Ann Arbor police and the investigation being launched by Michigan State police into the fatal shooting.
Ann Arbor Police issued this statement and Police Chief John Seto asked Michigan State Police to conduct an investigation into the incident, saying that those involved in the shooting and the community “deserve an objective, unbiased review of the facts surrounding this incident.”
Whether that goal can be achieved remains to be seen, as there are clear conflicts of interest with having the police investigate themselves as well as potential difficulties in ascertaining facts as a result.
This concern over objectivity is what prompted Wisconsin to become the first state to mandate outside reviews in police killings earlier this year as a result of activist movements in the state.
Retired Air Force officer Michael Bell, an advocate for this legislation had filed a wrongful death suit against police, who cleared themselves of any wrongdoing after killing his 21 year old son in an altercation. Bell hired his own investigators and submitted an 1,100 page report to the FBI and US attorneys, which brought important evidence and circumstances to light surrounding the incident and police response, and led to the case being settled after 6 years in court.
In researching, Bell also found that, “In 129 years since police and fire commissions were created in the state of Wisconsin, we could not find a single ruling by a police department, an inquest or a police commission that a shooting was unjustified.” Demonstrating how difficult it can be for police to be impartial in their own investigations and citing lack of accountability as the culprit. Bell kept organizing and fighting for what ultimately became Wisconsin’s law mandating outside reviews.
In addition to objectivity in the investigation, police use of lethal force continues to be a major concern, with high profile incidents such as the recent Michael Brown shooting elevating the issue into the national consciousness.
Whether the investigation finds the killing justifiable or not, the question will remain of whether the deceased mother of three could have been disarmed and taken into custody without facing lethal force, and to what extent police should be responsible for attempting non-lethal means of resolution.
While some circumstances certainly justify the use of lethal force, it is intended to be the last resort in ending an altercation and only to be used when in extreme danger. If the facts come to show that this was not the case, accountability must be demanded. If nothing else, because the price for society is far too steep: 3 children will now enter adulthood in society with their mother having been taken from them by violence. And regardless of whether this woman was a good mother or not, this is not the kind of practice that engenders building a better society.
(Photo Credit: AmericaWakieWakie)
Often we hear the echo of our security culture tell us policing is an inherently dangerous job, and that therefore we should give deference to these people’s judgment whenever potentially hostile situations arise. In such scenarios whereby the killing of a civilian occurs, we are perpetually told the use of lethal force was not only necessary, but simply part of an ‘incredibly dangerous’ profession — that these killings merely are a result of cops protecting themselves in life-threatening situations.
Well I call bullshit.
On October 22 last year, Andy Lopez, a Mexican-American 13 year old boy, was shot seven times by Santa Rosa officer Erick Gelhaus, a man with a history of using excessive force in his duties. Lopez was walking home from a friend’s house holding an airsoft toy-gun designed to resemble an assault rifle. Gelhaus has claimed he thought the child was holding an AK-47, a detail suggesting he could see the toy-gun with clarity. Gelhaus says he shouted to the 13 year old to drop the ‘gun’. Andy turned around, allegedly holding the toy up. Lopez died thereafter, taking multiple gunshots — one of which through his chest — when Gelhaus opened fire.
Gelhaus did not wait for backup. He did not investigate what he thought he saw. He was in absolutely no danger. His judgement smacked of shoot now, think later. In fact, Andy Lopez, like the rest of us, was more in need of protection from Gelhaus the moment the deputy saw him than Gelhaus needed to ‘protect’ himself from Lopez.
Cops Are More Likely To Shoot You Than You Are To Shoot Them
Last November the Activist Post ran a story about the propensity of police officers killing civilians. Stated was the following:
“Since 9/11, and the subsequent militarization of the police by the Department of Homeland Security, about 5,000 Americans have been killed by US police officers. The civilian death rate is nearly equal to the number of US soldiers killed in Iraq. In fact, you are 8 times more likely to be killed by a police officer than by a terrorist.”
That statistic is alarming enough considering if the 4,489 American soldiers killed in combat in Iraq constitute a condition of war, then the killing of 5,000 American civilians by United States police departments ought to be viewed as a war on we the People by our very own government.
Still, having watched the Lopez family struggle for justice thus far, I wanted to know better how more civilians have been killed by cops in the United States than soldiers have died in Iraq.
I decided to compare the number of American citizens’ deaths by police directly to the number of police officers’ deaths by citizens since the start of the Iraq war; after all, if an officers job is so dangerous, it is we the policed who make it dangerous.
Since 2003, as documented by the FBI, there have been approximately 587 deaths in the line of duty directly as result of civilians’ felonious actions, i.e., lethal assault, shooting, manslaughter etc. Below is the breakdown by year.
Officers Feloniously Killed Since the Start of Iraq War
- 2003 — 52
- 2004 — 57
- 2005 — 55
- 2006 — 48
- 2007 — 57
- 2008 — 41
- 2009 — 48
- 2010 — 56
- 2011 — 72
- 2012 — 48
- 2013 — 53 (data not yet available, substituted 10 year average)
- Total = 587
The Myth of the Most Dangerous Job
After a minute of simple math (5,000/587 = 8.52), what might seem obvious became much clearer: A cop is far more likely — 8.5 times — to kill you than you are to kill a cop. Stated another way, when an officer comes into contact with you, you are far less of a threat to them than the perception our culture proliferates. The police are, in fact, more of a threat to YOU.
The idea that police have an incredibly dangerous job is what we Southerners call a tall-tale, a stretch of the truth to bolster an ego unwilling to accept mediocrity. Not to take away from what many fair-minded officers do every day, but as those stubborn things called facts would have it, policing is less dangerous than farming, fishing, logging, and trash collecting, as well as six other professions.
Now is the time to burst the cop myth and to stop giving them the deference to murder our friends and family in the street.
