Under Obama, Police Have Never Been Safer. Huh, Who Knew?

Following the shooting of police officers in Dallas this week, conservatives raced to Twitter to blame President Barack Obama, but the data doesn’t support their complaints.

Former Rep. Joe Walsh tweeted, “Obama’s words & [Black Lives Matter]’s deeds have gotten cops killed.” Rep. Steve King claimed the shooting had “roots” in the “anti-white/cop events illuminated by Obama.”

But according to an analysis by the Chicago Tribune, blaming Obama or Black Live Matter activists, who began protesting shootings by police following the death of Michael Brown, isn’t supported by any of the data available. In fact, their claims are outright false.

The Officers Down Memorial Page paints a different picture than conservatives would have the public believe. The site tracks law enforcement officers murdered in the line of duty in real time and shows an average of 101 police officers deliberately killed each year under the Reagan administration. Under George H.W. Bush that number fell to 90, to 81 under Clinton and 72 deaths per year under George W. Bush.

As for the Obama administration, that number has continued to drop. The average number of police murdered during his presidency has fallen to an average 62 deaths each year through 2015. Looking at projections for 2016, that number stays the same.

There are so few officers being killed intentionally that just the Dallas shootings skew the data showing a 44 percent increase. Without the murders this week, the year-over-year rise would only have been 17 percent.

This isn’t about better medical care and quicker response time either. Under Obama’s administration, assaults on police officers have dropped as well. The FBI reports that in 1988, the final year of the Reagan administration, police had 15.9 assaults per every 100 law enforcement officers. However, at the end of the Clinton administration in 2000, that number dropped to 12.7 assaults for every 100 officers. Under the Bush administration, it fell again 11.3. The trend has continued under Obama’s administration. The most recent data from the FBI shows that in 2014 it decreased to 9.0.

Facts, they always ruin the narrative of the ignorant! 

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West 

WHAT TRANSPIRED BEFORE THE VIDEO EMERGED

City Patrolman Michael Thomas Slager is seen here in this undated photo provided by the North Charleston Police Department. (Photo: AP/North Charleston Police Department)

On Tuesday, South Carolina police officer Michael Thomas Slager was charged with first-degree murder for the shooting death of Walter Scott. Charges against South Carolina police officers for shooting someone are extremely rare. But what was particularly remarkable in this case was, for at least two days, Slager was apparently unaware that video of the entire incident existed.

This provides a unique opportunity to observe how one police officer sought to avoid accountability for his actions.

Between the time when he shot and killed Scott early Saturday morning and when charges were filed, Slager — using the both the police department and his attorney — was able to provide his “version” of the events. He appeared well on his way to avoiding charges and pinning the blame on Scott.

Then a video, shot by an anonymous bystander, revealed exactly what happened.

Actual raw footage of the shooting:



On Saturday the police released a statement alleging that Scott had attempted to gain control of a Taser from Slager and that he was shot in a struggle over the weapon. The Post And Courier reported the initial story:

Police in a matter of hours declared the occurrence at the corner of Remount and Craig roads a traffic stop gone wrong, alleging the dead man fought with an officer over his Taser before deadly force was employed.

A statement released by North Charleston police spokesman Spencer Pryor said a man ran on foot from the traffic stop and an officer deployed his department-issued Taser in an attempt to stop him. 

That did not work, police said, and an altercation ensued as the men struggled over the device. Police allege that during the struggle the man gained control of the Taser and attempted to use it against the officer.

The officer then resorted to his service weapon and shot him, police alleged.

The story clearly came from Slager but he was able to use the authoritative voice of the police department to bolster his narrative. Meanwhile, Scott could only be defended by friends who did not witness the incident. “Walter was a nice, good, honest person… He was a grown man working hard to take care of his family,” said Samuel Scott, the victim’s cousin.

By Sunday, the police department had clammed up and refused to release any additional information about the events. (It’s unclear when the department became aware of the existence of the video.)

On Monday, Slager sought to reinforce his narrative, this time releasing a statement through his attorney. From The Post And Courier:

Slager thinks he properly followed all procedures and policies before resorting to deadly force, lawyer David Aylor said in a statement.

“When confronted, Officer Slager reached for his Taser — as trained by the department — and then a struggle ensued,” Aylor said. “The driver tried to overpower Officer Slager in an effort to take his Taser.” 

Seconds later, the report added, he radioed that the suspect wrested control of the device. Even with the Taser’s prongs deployed, the device can still be used as a stun gun to temporarily incapacitate someone. 

Slager “felt threatened and reached for his department-issued firearm and fired his weapon,” his attorney added.

If the video had not surfaced, that’s where the story might have ended. In nearly all cases where an officer fires a weapon, that is the end of the story. A study by The State found “police in South Carolina have fired their weapons at 209 suspects in the past five years” but none were convicted. “We ruled all the shootings were justified – and we looked at dozens and dozens of them,” one former prosecutor told The State.

In this case, the video revealed a very different scenario. Scott, who was unarmed and fleeing, was shot in the back by Slager from a distance of at least 15 feet. After Scott was fatally shot, the video appears to capture Slager planting an object next to Scott.

How many "justified" police shootings would have been ruled on differently if videos were available to corroborate or contradict the police officer's account. Based on what we've seen when videos are available, we'd have to assume that a lot of so-called justified shootings have been shown to be out and out murder by those sworn to uphold the law. It's way past time for a change in law enforcement.

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

WHO KILLED MICHAEL BROWN?

ALL REASONS WHY MICHAEL BROWN DIDN'T DIE

VIDEO COURTESY OF MARK FIORE



It seems that everyone but Darren Wilson is responsible for the death of Michael Brown. It’s Michael Brown’s fault, black-on-black violence is at fault, it’s a culture of disrespect and lawbreaking that’s at fault, take your pick. Perhaps the best spew of logic came from Rudy Giuliani, who essentially said, if you black people didn’t kill yourselves so much we wouldn't have to send so many white cops down there to kill you as well.

Yes, crime in black communities is bad. Yes, white police officers killing unarmed black people is bad. Are we not capable of holding two thoughts in our collective head at the same time? It sure seems that many people only talk of “black-on-black” crime when they are defending a white police officer.

Now that another tragedy has happened in the blink of an eye and the police officer who choked Eric Garner to death on camera was not indicted (who you gonna’ believe, your lyin’ eyes or the police union?), let’s hope the growing outrage continues to spotlight police brutality and brings an end to these all-too-frequent killings.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

BLACK KIDS MORE LIKELY TO BE KILLED BY POLICE THAN WHITE KIDS

Who knew?

There’s a lot we don’t know about how many people have actually been killed at police hands in the United States, thanks to woefully inadequate transparency and federal record-keeping. But there’s one thing we do now know: Among those we do know were shot by police, black teens were 21 times more likely to be shot dead than their white counterparts.

“The 1,217 deadly police shootings from 2010 to 2012 captured in the federal data show that blacks, age 15 to 19, were killed at a rate of 31.17 per million, while just 1.47 per million white males in that age range died at the hands of police,” a new ProPublica report explains, noting that if whites were killed at the same ratio there would have been another 185 white deaths, just during that three-year period, just of those in that narrow age range.

To arrive at this statistic, ProPublica analyzed the list of 12,000 police shooting deaths that were self-reported by agencies to the Federal Bureau of Investigation between 1980 and 2012. Because this data is self-reported and departments are not required to submit information, this data likely significantly ucounteractsthe number of shootings. Florida departments, for example, haven’t submitted data since 1997 and New York City hasn't submitted data since 2007. And the FBI asks only for “justifiable homicide ”figures, meaning in those instances where the shootings are most overtly viewed as unjustified or the litigation is ongoing, departments are less likely to report.

Still, assessing available data may provide the best insight we have into how grave racial disparities in police violence are, particularly when it comes to young black men, who were stopped by NYPD officers in 2011 more times than the total number of young black men in New York City. Unsurprisingly, past analyses have also found disproportionate violence against blacks, including a 2007 investigation by Color lines and the Chicago Reporter in 10 major cities. An NAACP report of Oakland, California, found that 37 of 45 police-involved shootings were of blacks, while zero were of whites. “Although weapons were not found in 40 percent of cases, the NAACP found, no officers were charged," Mother.

Studies of human and police behavior suggest that racial bias is baked into policing, particularly because individuals mis-perceive the threat posed by African Americans. Nonetheless, a 2012 poll after the George Zimmerman verdict found that that the gap between whites and blacks who think the justice system is biased was greater than ever.

portions of blog from thinkprogress

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West

COP SEXUALLY ASSUALTS 7 WOMEN AND GETS RELEASED FROM JAIL

OFFICER DANIEL KEN HOLTZCLAW SEXUALLY ASSAULTS 7 WOMEN AND WALKS ON BAIL

Oklahoma City police officer Daniel Ken Holtzclaw was released from jail Friday as he faces charges for allegedly sexually assaulting 7 different African American women while he was on duty. Among the claims against him are forcible rape, burglary, and felonious stalking.

The judge who initially set his bond at $5 million said he researched his target victims and tracked them down before assaulting them, according to Michigan Live. The 27-year-old former college football player’s bond was later reduced and he paid $500,000 to be released from jail and placed on home arrest. Holtzclaw was removed from duty in June after a women reported a sexual assault during a traffic stop. Many other women subsequently came forward.

Holtzclaw’s sister had initiated a campaign on GoFundMe To raise money for his legal defense. The site removed the campaign citing complaints, even though it would not heed calls to take down the lucrative fundraising campaign for Darren Wilson, the officer who shot Michael Brown. But in the first 72 hours, the campaign had raised nearly $7,000. And the campaign continued to solicit donations to fund Holtzclaw’s bail through its Facebook page. They are also selling t-shirts through that page with the messages “FREE THE CLAW” and “JUSTICE4DANIELHOLTZCLAW.”

In any given month, there are multiple reports of on-duty cops raping women. And while the details of the allegations against Holtzclaw have not yet been made public, other instances of assault often involve police abusing their position of power against women who called the cops seeking help. In Milwaukee, a teen mom who called 911 because someone threw a brick through her window was raped by one of the officers and then held in jail for four days on charges of assaulting the officer. That officer had been previously accused of assaulting several other women — two of them prisoners — but hadn’t been charged in those incidents. In Baltimore, a woman reported she was raped by a cop who reported to the scene of her car accident. And in Georgia, a woman was assaulted by a cop after she called 911 to report domestic violence. Rather than arrest the husband accused of assault, the officer took the victim in his car and gave her the choice between going to jail or having sex with him, then used his gun during the rape.

Unlike police shootings, these instances are most likely to become public only when criminal charges follow. Those incidents that have come to the fore illustrate the ways in which women are victims of police violence, too.

"White privilege" you say? Rogue cops you say? Absolutely and unequivocally yes!

When does society and our justice system hold Barney Fife's to a higher standard? What kind of people are we when we support brutal corrupt cops through our wallets?

Daniel Ken Holtzclaw, poster boy for the code of blue......"who me"!

NFTOS

Editor-In-Chief

Roger West