The dashcam video of the public execution of Philando Castile has been released, and it is actually worse than I imagined it would be:
Yanez met with two special agents from the BCA at 1:42 the day after the shooting, accompanied by two attorneys, Tom Kelly and Robert Fowler. It had been a long 17 hours for Yanez and his attorneys noted he had only gotten a couple hours of sleep. Yanez had only pulled over two people since starting his shift at 6 p.m. Since it was a slow night, a recent convenience store robbery, to which Yanez responded to the week before, was very much on his Yanez’s mind, and he was keeping a close eye on the store. He saw a white car pass and thought the driver appeared to match the description of one of the robbers. But when the agents asked Yanez in the interview to elaborate, he couldn’t offer many details. He wasn’t sure about height, weight or even gender. One had cornrows or dreadlocks. One had a hat on.
“And then just kind of distinct facial features with like a kind of like a wide set nose,” he said.
Translation- “I PULLED HIM OVER BECAUSE HE WAS BLACK.”
He then goes on to say he smelled marijuana but told him he was being pulled over for his headlight, so he’s already contradicted himself several times. He pulled him over because he was black. The taillight was an excuse, the marijuana is just bullshit to cover his ass.
There are so many things to unpack here, but really, one of the easiest things we could do, right this very instant, without costing a penny, endangering the public, or requiring any roll-out or training that would lead to an immediate decline in these sorts of encounters is this simple: an immediate ban on traffic stops for bullshit like expired tags and broken taillights and crap like that. We all know those only exist (at this point) to harass people, particularly black people, and because taxcut jeebus requires that towns and municipalities fund themselves with bullshit tickets for crap like this. This is not rocket surgery.
Let’s go through the list of recent high profile murders and incidents involving traffic cops:
Philando Castile: Taillight. Dead.
Walter Scott: Taillight. Dead.
Samuel DuBose: Front license plate. Dead.
Eric Garner: Selling cigarettes. Dead.
Freddie Gray: Riding his bike away from police. Dead.
Sandra Bland: Failure to signal lane change. Dead.
We could go on and on and on. Stop the bullshit. We’re not serious or mature enough of a country to deal with systemic racism or implicit bias, so let’s treat cops like kids and limit their interaction with the public and the people who clearly scare them so much. We’ll save lives.
Lee Hartmann
John, you are one righteous dude. Your writing is a ray of light in a dark world.
hitchhiker
cosign.
I keep thinking that this is all how it must have felt to be in Bosnia or Germany or Italy or the 1860s USA, before things got completely out of hand.
Things feel right on the edge of completely out of hand.
lollipopguild
@hitchhiker: If our idiot Repthugs pass their “death to Americans” healthcare bill then we may have a “things get out of hand moment” or two.
waspuppet
Two things:
1) Color me slightly less than shocked that the NRA hasn’t been up in arms about this execution by trigger-happy government agents of a man legally carrying a gun like Jeebus himself commands.
2) And for whatever non-sequitur-but-not-really reason, ever since the verdict I’ve been thinking about Jefferson Beauregard Sessions feeling “rushed” and “nervous” when faced with the life-or-death situation of Kamala Harris asking him questions.
Philando Castile was probably feeling rushed and nervous too. But I guess that’s only a get-out-of-difficult-situation-free card for Jefferson Beauregard Sessions. I wonder why that is.
eclare
@waspuppet: Nailed it.
jl
Also, quite a list of teens, mostly black and Hispanic, but some white, killed or maimed for the crime of ‘sassing the cop’.
Cheryl from Maryland
This! Tell, it John. I and my husband were in a rental car in Las Vegas earlier this year. The stupid rental car didn’t have automatic headlights, so when we exited the parking garage at night, the lights weren’t on. We had gone a block before the police pulled up beside us, honked, and let us know about the lights. My husband said thanks, dumb rental car, we turned on the lights, we all laughed, the police went their way. After they left, we looked at each other and said: We are upper middle class white people in their 50’s. We got the benefit of good intentions. African-Americans and other POC do not. It is so wrong.
Omnes Omnibus
I got pulled over for having a taillight and headlight out last New Years Eve. (I knew about the taillight – parts were on order; the headlight was news to me.) The cop was polite, called me sir, told me he wasn’t going to ticket me, and wished me a good evening. Yes, I am a middle aged white guy.
This shit is utterly wrong.
mai naem mobile
Maybe if the fucking jury would convict a cop the rest might be more careful. What did this jury see that they let him off. I don’t even care if it’s involuntary manslaughter . Just Something .
TenguPhule
If the jury saw this video and still let him off for manslaughter, they all deserve to burn right alongside him.
Roger Moore
One thing I’ve suggested is to do away with the idea that local governments should be primarily locally funded. Most states have already implemented some level of central funding for education so that poor school districts aren’t completely screwed. We should extend that to other basic government functions like police, fire, and courts so that all citizens are provided with an acceptable level of basic government services. That would diminish the need for local governments to rely on fines for revenue. We could further reduce the temptation by centralizing the revenue from fines and civil asset forfeiture so they’d only be used as penalties for wrongdoing.
Of course I know it’s vanishingly unlikely to happen, since it would benefit poor blah people at the expense of rich whites.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I’m sick of this shit. I was in the car a few weeks ago with my wife, who was driving, and our two girls, 5 and 10. My wife didn’t quite stop at a stop sign, and a police guy pulled us over. We’re white. And I never even for a half second had to think, “What if this guy gets scared and shoots one of us?” This doesn’t even come into our minds. If we’d been Black, I know we’d have been scared shitless, scared for our lives, or at least my wife and I would have been. The guy said that since my wife had a good driving record, he was going to let us off with a warning. Not even a ticket.
TenguPhule
@hitchhiker:
Shit, I was hoping it was just me.
Lapassionara
Just heartbreaking.
VOR
The BCA = Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, basically Minnesota State cops not affiliated with the local police departments.
Dave
I had longer comment about this and the defense of the indefensible when it comes to LEO’s and the idiocy and how morally myopic it is….. But I’m tired I’m tired of this tired of it and I don’t even have to live it. I hate that I’m thankful that my mixed race goddaughter is my goddaughter and not godson because while she will have to deal with far more bullshit than she should she won’t be as targeted as if she was a he. Just tired of it all and I don’t even have to live it first hand.
Schlemazel
@Cheryl from Maryland:
I used to travel extensively for work. Sometime in the mid-90s I started noticing that hotels and restaurants were asking *some* people for a photo ID with their credit card. Never me though but always black men.
The wife & I were in Vegas and decided to have the buffet. The couple in front of us (African-American) was asked for ID & my better half was worried because she was not carrying her license only the card. I told her not to worry because we were white so they were not going to ask us. She didn’t believe me. Guess what? They didn’t ask. Its just another one of the million slights people of color have to deal with while pretending they don’t notice.
debbie
A day or two after the DuBose murder, while driving to work, I counted the number of cars coming toward me that didn’t have a front license plate. In a 3-mile stretch, there were 10 such cars. None of those drivers were dead.
Patricia Kayden
This a million times.
Roger Moore
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
I wonder if some of the fear is a vicious cycle, where each side sees the other’s fear and it makes them even more afraid themselves.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I counted seven shots. Seven. And they arrested his girlfriend. For riding while Black, I guess.
Patricia Kayden
@waspuppet:
Sessions was shocked because a Negress was off the plantation and had the nerve to question him, a proper White gentleman, about any dang thing. I can imagine him on his fainting couch commiserating with his wife: “It’s shocking when the darkies don’t know their god given place. What has this world come to?”
Mnemosyne
@Schlemazel:
Heh. When I was working at Crown Books in the 1990s, I asked every customer who used a credit card for a photo ID (standard practice).
The only one who ever threw a hissy fit? That’s right, a middle-aged white guy.
It’s only when you said that that I realized why he had a hissy fit.
Catherine D.
I am confused – was this shown at trial? Hadn’t heard that. If not, did the prosecutors sit on it? This stinks. (Not that the whole trial and verdict don’t already, but WTF?)
Mnemosyne
Also, I’m not going to watch the dashcam video. I’ve thought since the day it happened that it was a completely bogus stop and the cop basically executed Mr. Castile for Driving While Black, so I don’t need to see video confirming that.
Gvg
We need to have cops be tested periodically that they aren’t too afraid to be trusted with a gun. Cops should be licensed. A fear test where the tester doesn’t end up dead….
Dave
@Roger Moore: Likely I’ve seen similar situations. Expecting someone or institution to treat you like crap does the same thing. Made worse by the training/environment that many LEO’S seem to inhabit the “the anyone can kill you at any time so you must always be vigilant” environment. It’s a trivially true statement that sounds good, and it’s hard to argue against awareness, but it has consequences man does it have consequences. I lived that in Iraq/Afghanistan it made sense but it has a cost and I have never seen anyone in law enforcement hierarchy/training acknowledge those costs. It costs citizens and it costs LEO’S even many who will never realize it. And they swim in it. That’s not even beginning to grapple with race/class etc.
TenguPhule
I would be saddened but not surprised if this video touches off some unrest in that area.
Villago Delenda Est
Cole, only one thing to say in response to this rant:
Right FUCKING on!
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
It was also really cool how the dumbfuck shot Castile seven times and then they waited five or six minutes before they botehred to try to help him. I guess he was dead by then. Fuckers. But, you know, if Black people would just get their shit together and stop blaming everybody else for their problems, this wouldn’t happen any more. Or something. Sometimes I don’t know if there’s any hope for this country.
lamh36
I just can’t even…I couldn’t even watch the FB video.
Villago Delenda Est
@Patricia Kayden: I have no problem at all believing this is what went down at the Sessions home, and it makes me want to look for a sour apple tree.
Hungry Joe
I’ll go a step further: Disarm the police. That’s right. Disarm them.
Cops can carry all the weaponry they want in their cars. Pistols, shotguns, tasers, flamethrowers, RPGs, ray guns — I don’t care. But when they exit their cars they should not have guns on them unless there’s a good reason. What’s a good reason? Robbery in progress; shots fired; apprehending a suspected felon who is known to be armed and dangerous. What’s not a good reason? Traffic stop; neighborhood dispute; domestic violence; warrant serving, unless target has a history of violence. At the end of a shift, if the cop has for any reason taken a weapon from the car, there’s a form to fill out. The form is reviewed by superiors. Was the reason justified? Fine; good job, officer. Was it not? Well, what’s your excuse? And here’s ten hours of mandatory training on how to handle these situations without a weapon.
Just the sight of guns on cops’ hips escalates every situation. Try going into a home unarmed, even to serve a warrant and make an arrest, and see the difference. No screaming “GET ON THE GROUND! GET ON THE GROUND!” Simply arrest the guy. If you determine that, Uh-oh, I need a gun, well, go back to your car and get one. Or get a flamethrower if that’s what’s called for. Whatever. Just know that you’re going to have to explain why later.
Will this mean that cops will be targets? Nope. Seems like damn near every time I hear about a cop being murdered, he or she is just gunned down. Their weapons did them no good because it was an ambush — they never saw it coming. So guns as a defense doesn’t make sense; I bet it makes them MORE likely to be targets.
Enough. Way more than enough. Disarm the police.
jl
@waspuppet:
‘ And for whatever non-sequitur-but-not-really reason, ever since the verdict I’ve been thinking about Jefferson Beauregard Sessions feeling “rushed” and “nervous” when faced with the life-or-death situation of Kamala Harris asking him questions.
Philando Castile was probably feeling rushed and nervous too. But I guess that’s only a get-out-of-difficult-situation-free card for Jefferson Beauregard Sessions. I wonder why that is. ‘
As for Session, people tend to feel rushed and nervous rather easily when they are being less than completely honest.in their responses.
I can’t watch the dashcam video. It is a sickening case. Castile may not have realized he was doing something wrong at all. When the officer yelled to not reach for the gun, it might not have even registered. Castile may have thought it was obvious he was reaching for his wallet, not the gun. I can imagine myself making the same mistake in a similar situation. I’m a middle aged white guy, so chances I would get shot would be much much very much lower though.
TenguPhule
@Hungry Joe:
Uh, that’s one of those you want to be armed. And I understand police tend to hate those the most. Because both sides can turn on them unexpectedly.
TenguPhule
@Hungry Joe:
Sorry, that’s not how it works in real life. Not even the British try that.
You can have armed police and unarmed police. But do not think the unarmed ones are going to have time to run to their car for a firearm. Hell, it would be criminal negligence to leave an unattended gun in their car in the first place.
Olivia
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.): They arrested his girlfriend for objecting to the shooting of her boyfriend while being black.
TenguPhule
John’s tweeting or retweeting that the GOP Senators are now working furiously to murder us all with the AHCA. A bit of early voting?
ETA: Ah, officially scheduled for next week.
hitchhiker
The other day I asked my fb friend group (mostly white people, as I am) how many times they’ve ever been stopped in their lives. Me, maybe 8 or 10 times in 50 years of driving, but I can only remember 5.
Philando Castile was stopped on average every 4 months for his 14 years of having a license. He paid almost $7,000 in fines and fees over that time.
And every single time, I have no doubt he was in fear of his life — which even when I was running around with a variety of drugs, I never, ever was.
This is what Chris Hayes’ book, A Colony in a Nation, is about — the double society we all inhabit, but only some of us are able to see both. White people live in the nation, where people are generally fair & authority is there to enforce just laws. People of color live in a colony, where they expect to be abused and punished and suspected because they are. As I was reading it, I kept seeing an imaginary black person eyeing me like, “You didn’t know this shit? Really?”
I feel like we got Trump because I didn’t do enough about it.
TenguPhule
Cal Thomas needs to DIAF. Immediately if not sooner. No link, I’ll just sum it up as “LIberals and the left are the cause of most of the political violence in America.”
Eric S.
It was sometime last year i walked into the Addison (Wrigley Field) Reed line stop on my way to work. Damn near everyone carries a backpack or a messenger bag or laptop bag. There was a table of LEOs – i learned later TSA- inside the station. They only person out of a dozen that was “randomly” stopped asked for a bag search was the African – American woman. All us white people walked on unmolested.
Schlemazel
@Mnemosyne:
the foolish woman that married me signed her current card with “CID”, 95 time out of 100 they never ask to see ID. Being white is the easy setting on the video game of life. Sure, you can still die but the game gives you a lot more breaks and easier challenges than if you had to play at the POC level
Schlemazel
@Catherine D.:
All the defense needed was to convince the jury that the officer feared for his life. At that point it becomes “he said-she said” and despite what people say they believe cops more & give them the benefit of the doubt
Steve in the ATL
@VOR:
That fuckin’ Flowers.
Dread
You assume America, or rather older white America, wants to change those laws, when they’re working perfectly for what they’re designed for: keeping a book on the neck of black Americans, so old white America can be safe from the scourge of ‘scary’ black men.
Adam L Silverman
@waspuppet: The Armed Intelligentsia has not yet weighed in now that the dashcam video is out. However, based on the previous coverage the conventional wisdom among them is that he was stoned, therefore a prohibited person – as in shouldn’t have been able to get a conceal carry permit or buy a firearm because he used drugs. On the Federal form 4473 that has to be filled out for purchase of a firearm there is a specific question about drug usage. A “yes” answer is disqualifying for purchase. And lying on the form is a felony. So the collective reasoning is that he was a drug user who committed a felony when he falsified his 4473 and his conceal carry permit paperwork. Therefore he was a prohibited person who should not have had a gun, nor the conceal carry permit, and was an unprosecuted Federal and state felon as a result. As a result: righteous shoot.
Uncle Cosmo
@Omnes Omnibus: Late for a dance one Friday night a couple of years back, fuming at the car crawling along in front of me for several miles at 20 mph on a 5-lane city street that was effectively 1 lane in either direction. When I finally got past he put on the flashing lights – unmarked police car – & pulled me over. I got out my license & registration. & rolled down the window. When he got to the door he said Sir, I’m not going to give you a ticket, but why were you tailgating me? I told him I hoped it would get him to go a little faster, since I couldn’t pass him.
When I heard about Ferguson I went back over all the times I’d been stopped by the police & replayed them, replacing my grayheaded white self with a young black man. That was when I started to understand “white privilege.”. And you’re right, it’s bullshit.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: That makes no sense of course.
Viva BrisVegas
I don’t want to sound callous, but is it normal practice for police to shoot someone and then just leave them to bleed out while they watch?
On that video it’s 5 minutes between the shooting and any attempt at ascertaining life signs or trying resuscitation. To describe the attitude of the cops there as casual is an understatement.
Also, what kind of cop shoots multiple times into a car containing a child, without even first seeing a weapon?
Adam L Silverman
@VOR: But no longer as effective now that Lucas Davenport is a US Marshal.
Uncle Cosmo
Just FTR: Torrential rains in Democrat-heavy precincts of GA-06 tonight. Violent storms in heavily pro-Remain London on the day of the Brexit vote. Is Putin fucking with the weather now?
TenguPhule
@Adam L Silverman: The girlfriend admitted the weed was hers, not his. So much for any hopes of intelligence to be found there.
TenguPhule
@Viva BrisVegas:
For POC, yes. SATSQ.
RL 大芒果
It all goes back to Reagan…..starve the beast wasn’t ever going to work so it morphed into squeese the folks at the bottom.
We are seeing the backlash of our first black president….change is never easy nor is it linear. Resisit, work for change, keep pushing…the future belongs to us if we have the will to shape it.
Ol'Froth
I make traffic stops for taillights out all the time, and for a very simple reason. Most people don’t realize they have a burnt out taillight, and its a safety hazard. Twenty-five years and I’ve never written a single citation for it, just informing people that they had a light out; they’ve without exception, black or white, been thankful for me telling them that.
Omnes Omnibus
@RL 大芒果:
QFT
Mnemosyne
@Schlemazel:
The cop probably did fear for his life, because the most primitive part of his subconscious was screaming that Black man + gun = DANGERDANGERDANGER!
That doesn’t mean it was a rational feeling.
Eric S.
@Viva BrisVegas: i don’t want to call it SOP but I’ve often heard the theory that accidental death is “cheaper” than a maiming. That’s a civil law concept but I’m sure it permeates the criminal thinking.
Adam L Silverman
@Steve in the ATL: He’s probably out fishing with that Johnson guy.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: I am merely the messenger.
Mnemosyne
@Viva BrisVegas:
They did the same thing when Tamir Rice was shot, and he was a 12-year-old child.
Hell, when an NYPD cop accidentally shot into a dark stairwell and struck someone, he called his union rep before he called an ambulance, and the victim died. That guy might actually have been fired, but I can’t remember.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: Tracking.
cs
I’ve been stopped maybe 10 times in my life. Maybe 15. But none since 2011, and 2011 was the first time since 2008.
I always think about that stop in 2011 whenever the cops shoot a black person. In 2011, I had just moved to a new state. I had a very beat up 20 year old Cherokee which still had my old state’s tags. Even though I work in a very white collar environment (software dev), I take advantage of the lax dress code and sometimes look really rough. And I did that day. Long hair, very long beard. Have darkish, olive-ish skin for a white guy of mostly German descent. My spouse said it was my “Mexican drug dealer” look that day with all of that combined.
And maybe that’s why the state trooper targeted me. Saw two cops doing their 69 with their SUVs in the interstate median. One of them peeled off as soon as I passed. I was going probably 5 under the limit. Not because of the cops but because my Cherokee was loaded down with boxes and it doesn’t like going fast anyways. The cop followed me for 30 minutes. Finally, when I hit the exit, cop hit the lights and pulled me over. Had my huge black dog with me because she likes field trips. She was barking her head off at this strange guy who approached my car. Despite that, once the cop saw me up close and realized I wasn’t a Mexican drug dealer doing a cross-country delivery, and once he heard me speak in my generic polite educated white guy accent, he didn’t worry about the dog. He didn’t worry about me. Said something about how I should always use turn signals when exiting the highway and to be careful.
And that was it. I wasn’t shot. Dog wasn’t shot. He didn’t ask to look in the pile of boxes in the back. I wasn’t frisked. I can’t even remember if he took my license and registration. I’m sure he did, but the whole thing was over in just a minute or two, so he didn’t look at them too closely.
Also remember a time, a few years later, when that same Jeep finally died. Middle of the night. Jeep’s already pulled over to the shoulder. Wife’s on her way to pick me up and tell me that it’s probably time to buy a new car now. While I’m waiting, highway patrol shows up. We talk about the joys and pains of driving old Jeeps. I tell him what sound it made when it died. Cop says he has no clue what’s wrong but wishes me luck on getting it fixed. Tells me he’ll radio it in so I won’t get an abandoned vehicle tag as long as I get it towed away within 24 hours. I say that’s fair. We shake hands and he drives off. I’m sure he probably ran my plates when he pulled up, but he never asked for my license and was completely relaxed the whole time.
I know both of these stories are boring, but that’s my wish for everyone. Everyone in this country deserves very boring stories about their encounters with police. And everyone, who’s just a normal person trying to get through their day, deserves to have those encounters be rare.
Smiling Mortician
@jl:
Which is why I saw Sessions as the cop in the analogy, not as Castile. He’s the one who fires off 7 shots for no reason other than that he felt squicked out by the dark guy.
TenguPhule
@Mnemosyne:
Fired and convicted. He was asian.
Mnemosyne
@Eric S.:
LAPD found out the hard way that that’s not always true. Look up the successful lawsuit filed by the family of one of the North Hollywood bank robbers.
Adam L Silverman
@TenguPhule: It is what it is.
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
I am only asked if they look on the back of the card because I don’t sign my cards, it says, “Ask for ID.” Never had a problem with doing this, but of course I’m an old white guy. Now that cards are chipped I very rarely even have to show my card to anyone of course, maybe this will help cut out a lot of the racism. In my retail business I’d ask everyone except regular customers for an ID, seeing as how the retailer is responsible for charges if the card is listed as stolen or lost. Don’t know the law now, what with the chipped cards or even a swipe, that the retailer never touches or sees.
Now for the original thread.
This shit has been going on since there was the first cop. It used to be beatings, which at least there was a better chance of survival, even if the concept was still fucking wrong. I used to own a business just south east of downtown LA and the LAPD used to drive around in an unmarked gang car, 6 huge fuckers. They’d get out and harass any black man they saw and if they didn’t like what they heard or believed it was nightsticks all around. But now it’s just shoot for most cops. Even if they don’t pull the trigger, there is always the thick blue line that can not be crossed.
I have a friend who retired after 30 yrs on the CHP. He told me that most cops when he retired were far more likely to shoot first and worry about the details later. And it shouldn’t be pay, saw 2 days ago that the starting salary for a Pasadena cop is $77,000.
The issue is of course racism and “law and order,” their order of course. And it is in most police departments because it comes from the top down. If it didn’t, that thick blue line wouldn’t be so impenetrable. And you can also tell it is top down because there are departments that just don’t accept that cops can do no wrong, no matter what they actually do. But they are rare. And I’d imagine it’s not as simple as all that but we also can’t in any way rule out that 60,000,000+ million people voted for an asshole who ran on racism being acceptable, and worse yet, even normal.
rikyrah
I can’t watch those snuff films. They sicken me.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@Catherine D.:
Yes, it was shown at the trial. Don’t blame the prosecutor for this; he did the job we’d want him to do. This is 100% on the jury and the nature of the law governing police shootings.
Davebo
@Ruckus:
Is this from decades ago? If the card is listed as stolen or lost why would the card fulfillment device approve the transaction?
-ly Ballou
@TenguPhule: White evangelicals gonna white evangelical. Thomas has been horrible for decades.
Stan
@Hungry Joe: Some good points there but, domestic calls are the most dangerous calls cops go out on.
Stan
@Hungry Joe:
And how exactly is that supposed to work?
“Oh fuck, this guy has a gun, I’d better run away and get mine” ?
JustRuss
@Ol’Froth:
I realize that’s how it’s done, but what if you just noted the license and sent them a postcard–better yet, a text– saying “Fix your taillight”? The whole process could be automated and it would save everyone time and hassle.