Tag: darren-goforth

On the recent violence involving law enforcement

I had hoped when I wrote my post some eleven months ago about the murder of Darren Goforth that it would be the last time I wrote anything about the topic of violence directed against police. Sadly, the recent murder of five Dallas Police Department officers during protests of the shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile.

So we add the following events to the timeline from my previous post linked above (not yet intended to be a complete list):

  • 2016 July 5: Alton Sterling was shot by police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, following a 911 call from a homeless person saying Alton was threatening people with a gun.
  • 2016 July 6: Philando Castile was shot by Jeronimo Yanez, an officer with the St. Anthony Police Department in Minnesota.
  • 2016 July 7: Five Dallas area police officers are killed (four from Dallas PD, one from DART’s police force) and nine other people are injured in an ambush at a protest organized by Black Lives Matter. It is the deadliest day for law enforcement since the terrorist attacks of 2001 September 11.

The loss of life which Black Lives Matter was protesting in Dallas and elsewhere was unfortunate. I’m not going to go into whether either shooting was justified, but what really bothers me is that someone got angry enough about this to go ambush a bunch of police officers who had nothing to do with either shooting as an apparent symbolic retaliation.

It should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway for the record. I fully condemn the attack on Dallas area law enforcement officers as a senseless act of terrorist violence and an egregious affront against our decent society and the laws which govern it. Further, an attack against police officers of a completely different jurisdiction than those involved in the shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, or for that matter any violent response to the shootings of those two men, is not going to solve a damn thing.

I believe it is still possible for us to unite as a society against violence. If the officers who shot Alton or Philando were wrong, they need to be held accountable. We cannot allow those in charge of enforcing the laws which maintain order in our society to get away with breaking those same laws, or the agency/department policies that govern their work.

As long as they remain non-violent, I encourage whatever future protests Black Lives Matter or other organizations feel necessary to address this issue. But I reiterate the point I make above: violence isn’t going to solve a damn thing. All it’s going to do, especially after the law enforcement officers in the Dallas area have lost their lives for no good reason, is make whatever strife and conflict between citizens and cops even worse.

And yes, I have criticized law enforcement agencies on this blog in the past, and and some point will probably do so in the future. However at the same time I recognize that law enforcement is a tough and dangerous job, and that laws are what hold our society together. As stated by the FSF on their “Words to Avoid” page: “Laws, at their best, attempt to implement justice.” And as I have said before, usually those who make the laws get it right, but not always.

That thing in New Braunfels

There are things that make me proud to be a Texan. To say the least, this isn’t one of them.

PoliceOne recently published this story (linking to the original article in the San Antonio Express-News) about the New Braunfels PD’s seizure of a 2007 Chevrolet Corvette Z06, which they repainted and gave it a really lame name inspired by a certain toy and cartoon franchise recently turned movie franchise, which I will not reprint here because I believe it to be in poor taste.

My biggest objection is:

The conspicuous vehicle will be mostly used during community outreach events to excite youth about law enforcement, [New Braunfels Police Department spokesperson David] Ferguson said to [the San Antonio Express-News].

The drug problem would have been solved long ago by decriminalization. The only reason there is money in the drug trade is that it is illicit. The law is simply the wrong tool used to solve the drug problem. Not only are we losing the War on Some Drugs (as it has been called), I think it’s safe to say this war is in its endgame. In fact, if we are going to call it a war, I’d say it’s the law enforcement equivalent of Vietnam: not only is it lost, but our law enforcement agencies are still fighting it even though it’s been lost and there’s no hope of winning it this way.

Let’s look at an alternative reality where drug usage was decriminalized, and treated strictly as a social problem. The street price of most narcotics would drop back a lot closer to the cost of manufacture. The dealers would be doing good to afford something like an old station wagon or minivan to move their goods across town; a Corvette would be out of the question. The law enforcement agencies would no longer be able to rob drug dealers of their cars (and yes, were it not for the fact this was the government using means of legal process, the taking of this Corvette would qualify as robbery). Even if they somehow were still able to take the drug dealers’ vehicles, somehow painting up an old station wagon and sending it around town does not strike me as the kind of thing that will get kids saying they want to grow up to be cops.

So in essence, this is about a car thief showing off his ill-gotten ride to the world. Except, in this case, the car thief wears blue, carries a badge and gun, and worst of all gets paid for with our tax dollars.

Look, I get that kids will read about Darren Goforth and have second thoughts about a career in law enforcement, the same way they will likely read about Eric Cropp and reconsider becoming a pharmacist. (I draw the parallel here, because while Eric is a free man today, his career as a practicing pharmacist has likely ended.) But the kids have the right to know that from a certain perspective, that car is stolen property and the cops are no better than the drug dealers and drug users who will steal what they want.

Finally, I suggest a new name for this sports-car-turned-police-recruiting-tool: The New Braunfels Phallus-mobile. Because when it comes down to it, that’s really what it is: New Braunfels PD waving the equivalent of a huge dick at the world. Really, I think they should just put it back in their pants.

Regarding the murder of Darren Goforth

I’ve been meaning to write about this subject for a long time. I didn’t intend for things to quite literally hit close to home before I posted. It’s just the way it played out. I had intended to write specifically about the goings-on in Ferguson, Missouri, shortly after one of the major developments.

Before I go into the timeline leading up to this event, I acknowledge that the murder of Darren Goforth made national (US) news, if not international. I certainly don’t like it when my hometown makes the news like this, and I am pretty sure I’m not the only one.

Now, some of the events preceding this, so we may understand how we got here (not intended to be an all-inclusive list):

  • 2009 January 1: Oscar Grant is shot and killed by Officer Johannes Mehserle of the BART Police, when the officer claims he mistook his gun for his Taser. This incident was dramatized in the film Fruitvale Station, which I wrote a post about shortly after having watched the film.
  • 2010 November 5: Mehserle is sentenced to two years for involuntary manslaughter.
  • 2011 June 13: Mehserle is released on parole, having served only 11 months.
  • 2011 June 30: BART settles a wrongful death lawsuit with Oscar Grant’s mother and daughter for $2.8 million. A similar lawsuit from his father was denied.
  • 2012 February 26: Trayvon Martin is shot and killed by George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer, in Sanford, Florida. The circumstances of the shooting are considered dubious by many. Zimmerman is initially not charged with a crime, but later would be charged with second-degree murder.
  • 2012 July 13: George Zimmerman is acquitted of second-degree murder in the shooting.
  • 2014 May 21: BART settles a wrongful death lawsuit filed by five friends of Oscar Grant for a total of $175,000 split between them.
  • 2014 August 9: Michael Brown is fatally injured by gunshots fired by Officer Darren Wilson of the Ferguson (suburb of St. Louis, Missouri) PD. He was a suspect in the theft of several packages of cigarillos, during which he allegedly shoved a store clerk (which might make it a robbery, turning what would be a Class A misdemeanor into a Class B felony). Michael’s body was left at the scene for over four hours, sparking outrage from the majority-black population in Ferguson.
  • 2014 August 10-12: Memorials for Michael Brown begin peacefully, but at least one evening candlelight vigil gets out of hand, and some looting takes place.
  • 2014 August 14: Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky denounces the shooting as a tragedy and calls for the demilitarization of police forces.
  • 2014 August 15-30: Information about the Michael Brown shooting was released. At first Ferguson PD refused to name the officer involved due to security concerns (death threats against the officer). Eventually Darren Wilson is identified as the officer who fired the fatal shots.
  • 2014 November 24: The grand jury in Ferguson no-bills Darren Wilson.
  • 2014 November 29: Wilson resigns from the Ferguson PD with no severance, due to security concerns, and through his attorney states he “will never be a police officer again.”
  • 2014 December 20: Two NYPD officers are shot and killed in the Bedfort-Stuyvesant neighborhood in Brooklyn in an apparent revenge for the murders of Eric Garner and Michael Brown.
  • 2015 March 4: The US Department of Justice announces Darren Wilson will not be charged in the shooting of Michael Brown.
  • 2015 August 28: Harris County Sheriff’s Deputy Darren Goforth is shot and killed at a gas station in Cypress, Texas (suburb of Houston).

Now for my thoughts.

With every fiber of my being, I condemn the murder of Darren Goforth. I know very little about Darren’s career as a sheriff’s deputy, only that it lasted ten years, which is a rather long time in any line of work. Given what little I have read seems to point to Darren as a good person, if not a good cop as well, I feel comfortable giving the benefit of the doubt.

A lot of the previous posts on this blog may have left readers with the impression I’m “anti-cop”. Strictly speaking that is not true, though I am not shy in the least about speaking out against law enforcement officers, law enforcement agencies, judges, and other people and elements of our legal system, who have done rather reckless and stupid things in the name of the law. To the best of my knowledge, Darren wasn’t one of those cops.

To say the least, Darren’s death was undignified, brutal, and barbaric. He died as the result of an absolutely senseless crime. He didn’t deserve this. Nobody in decent society deserves to die like this.

In the United States, we are a society governed by laws enacted to maintain order and civility. We are not governed by the law of the jungle, and we aren’t just a bunch of wild animals. In that vein, I would like to remind everyone out there that, according to our laws, the suspect in this case is innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The suspect in this case has the right to due process of law including a fair trial, the right to a trial by jury (if desired), the right to not incriminate himself (Fifth Amendment), and the right to effective counsel (a defense attorney), the same as any other suspect accused of a crime.

The trial is probably months away, maybe even over a year away. But regardless of the outcome when it is decided, I am asking everyone to keep the peace, particularly in the Houston area. Rioting as a result of the outcome, either way, won’t accomplish anything either. Peaceful protesting is fine, but the key word is “peaceful.” Violence will not solve any problems at hand here, it can only make them worse.

That’s all for now. I’ll have more to say on the topic in a followup post.