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If you saw the horrendous video of the white officer in
North Charleston, S.C. shooting an unarmed black man in the
back (eight shots were fired and five hit their mark) you
knew what was coming next.
And it did. The white officer said he was following
appropriate procedures and then, as if on cue, he uttered
the expected phrase, “I was afraid for my life!”
However, the shooter did not realize that a passerby had
a video and was taping the incident of the shooting
including the officer going to the body and asking the dead
man to, “put your hands behind your back!”
Of course being dead (one bullet pierced his heart),
the fallen man could not comply and probably, according to
the shooter, he was obstructing official business or at the
very least, resisting arrest.
It is amazing and quite puzzling how the dead simply
cannot or will not comply with basic police orders!
But, I digress.
If there ever was a more potent and appalling case to
make for police reform, this is the poster child for those
changes in how and when police can use lethal force.
Now, remember, this man, Walter Scott, age 50, was
brought to the attention of the shooter due to his Mercedes
Benz having a broken tail light. Yes, a broken tail light.
When the soon-to-be-dead man pulled into a nearby
parking space, the shooter confronted the soon-to-be-dead
man about the tail light and apparently, the soon-to-be-dead
man ran away since he thought that he was going to go to
jail for possible warrant(s) for failure to pay child
support.
At some time in this scenario, the soon-to-be-dead man
and his executioner met and maybe words were exchanged but
by any account, the shooter indicated that he first shot the
soon-to-be-dead man with his Taser and, with that, the
soon-to-be-dead man took off running away from the officer.
No fight…no weapon on the soon-to-be-dead man. Just a
50-year-old black man trying to get away from what he thinks
is going to be an arrest for failure to make child-support
payments.
However, the shooter has a different agenda. An agenda
that involves death to those who drive with broken tail
lights on a Mercedes Benz and especially death to those who
dare to defy a police officer and leave his presence without
his permission.
The soon-to-be-dead man, not taking into account that
he was dealing with a shooter who had murder in his heart,
decided to make a run for it and wouldn’t you know it; the
shooter got spooked and mad and thought, “How dare this soon
to be dead man, diss me and run away!”
In the course of running, the soon-to-be-dead man, with
the lines of the Taser gun still stuck into him, never
dreamed that driving a Mercedes Benz with a bad tail light
and not being current on child support payments would mean
that you forfeit your life with this trigger happy cop.
So what does Mr. Shooter do?
Simple. He unsheathes his gun and as if he is training
his sights on a mangy rabid dog who needs to be put down for
the good of the community, Mr. Shooter becomes judge, jury
and executioner and decides to take down this law breaker.
A law breaker who posed no threat to the safety of the
shooter or to anyone else around. It was simply a case of a
soon-to-be-dead black man dissing a white cop when the soon
to be dead man decided to leave and leave in a hurry, in
spite of just being tased.
As he is leaving, still with the evidence of the Taser
strings attached to him, the soon-to-be-dead man, is
probably thinking, “Oh well, they got my car, my license
plate number…they will come to my house or serve me with a
warrant anyway, so I will leave.”
However, the shooter had other plans. The shooter
unleashed the power of the State of South Carolina and
plugged Walter Scott with eight bullets flying towards him.
The death angel sped to its given appointment and claimed
another victim.
To the surprise of the victorious shooter, he and the
death angel had company. A bystander was recording the whole
execution and eventually gave the video to the horrified
family.
The shooter, thinking that no one saw his criminal
actions and thinking what he was doing was under the shield
of a safe defense such as, “he said, she said”, was about
to be exposed.
Imagine the shock of this shooter when the video hit
the news and he saw himself murdering an unarmed black man
when the soon-to-be-dead man was running away from the
officer.
Imagine the surprise of the shooter when he realized
that the gig was up and he could not play the role of the
put upon cop who was defending himself against a frenzied
black man who had a gun or a knife.
Did the video show the cop later trying to “plant” the
spent Taser gun on the dead man?
Time will tell what cover-up acts were hastily put into
play but the whole time, the shooter did not know that he
was being watched in broad day light by the seeing eye of a
cell phone camera.
Can you image what the outcome would have been without
the testimony of the video? Result: inconclusive evidence …
not guilty.
Credit this murder charge being placed against the shooter
due to a brave bystander doing the right thing and recording
this hellish act of murder.
Thankfully, the City of North Charleston charged the
shooter with murder and did not wait for weeks or months to
come to a decision since the video vividly made the case for
a murder charge.
What this nation saw was a commercial-free public
execution which lends credence to accounts by black folks
nationwide that such merciless killings of black people by
some corrupt police officers have been carried out and
covered up for hundreds of years.
Was the shooting based upon race? Question: If that had
been a 50-year-old white man driving a Mercedes Benz with a
busted tail light and even with warrants for not paying
child support, would his family be making funeral
arrangements at this time? Answer: choose any one of the
following answers: (1) No; (2) No; (3) No; (4) All of the
above.
Contact Lafe Tolliver at Tolliver@Juno.com |
