Derek Chauvin conviction makes us less safe in the long run?

by philg

As predicted in How’s the Derek Chauvin trial going?, the jury agreed with the government and the rest of Derek Chauvin’s life will be at taxpayer expense, as planned, but in a prison rather than a squad car or at a desk.

Short-term positive: we don’t all have to pay higher insurance premiums to cover $billions in losses from mostly peaceful protests that would have followed an acquittal ($1-2 billion in damage from last summer’s, according to Wikipedia).

I wonder if the long-term consequences of conviction will be negative for Americans who interact with the police. Once this one bad apple is locked away, nobody will be motivated to consider whether police should be unionized and therefore effectively immune from the consequences of any misconduct short of appearing to kill someone in custody on a video recording.

In the comments to the first Chauvin-related post, I cited an NPR story: “After police officers gained access to collective bargaining rights, there was a substantial increase in the killings of civilians — overwhelmingly, nonwhite civilians.”

Having more non-white police officers won’t help, based on the George Floyd killing, since two of the four officers involved were non-white. My comment regarding those other officers:

[what Chauvin was doing] was plainly something that other police officers in Minneapolis though was okay because three of them were there on the scene and didn’t try to stop Chauvin. Now, however, his brother/sister/binary-resister officers are coming out to say that what Chauvin did was way off the reservation (and we don’t need Elizabeth Warren to tell us how bad that is).

If they can paint Chauvin as a single bad apple then they can keep the system in place indefinitely ($300,000+/year total compensation, practical immunity from almost any wrongdoing via unionization, etc.). They can say “We convicted Chauvin so now #ProblemSolved and #MissionAccomplished.”

Senorpablo’s response:

the fact that ALL FOUR of these guys didn’t have the sense to not kill a guy in broad daylight only emphasizes the level of systemic corruption in law enforcement. Not one of these guys had the sense and stones to prevent Chauvin from killing another man and also ruining his own life? I expect the same authority and power complex that police display towards the public probably exist in their own hierarchy. Police are put on the hero pedestal–we must give them tremendous latitude and we can’t possibly fire them because what they do is so dangerous(it isn’t at all). It’s a great marketing job done by the unions or whomever. It seems like the majority of police training focus on their safety and well being, at the expense of those who they are paid to serve. It’s a completely voluntary job so this seems backwards to me.

If 1-4 guys are convicted and imprisoned, it isn’t “systemic corruption” as Senorpablo put it, but 1-4 guys who are outliers.

The research psychologists say that what we consider to be fundamental personality characteristics are actually artifacts of the environment we’re in. People behave consistently because we tend to see people in the same environment over and over. If the psychologists are right, Chauvin’s behavior was strongly influenced by the environment he was in (unionized police officer in which it is almost impossible to be fired).

Since Elizabeth Warren was mentioned above, I can’t resist pointing out that she seems to be here in Jupiter, Florida with us:

Related:

  • Shooting of Justine Damond (George Floyd‘s life turned out to be worth more than Justine Damond’s, though Justine Damond had no criminal background (Floyd had been convicted of eight crimes); the city paid out $20 million to Damond’s family and $27 million to George Floyd’s. Imagine if these payments, instead of coming from taxpayers, were funded by reduced raises to the police!)

54 thoughts on “Derek Chauvin conviction makes us less safe in the long run?”

  2. Why don’t any of us ever get to write one of those Elon-Muskian one-line super-genius replies to your posts like: “Jury trial system is great” and have it be completely obvious that Everything is Now Explained? I understand. We’re not super-geniuses.

    First of all, it’s not over yet – for Chauvin or the other three officers who are scheduled for trial in late August (and who are all walking around free on $750,000 bail in the meantime.) I think there’s going to be an appeal. I also think his defense attorneys did a terrible job in their closing arguments (they got the law wrong and were admonished by the judge!) and not calling him to testify was also a mistake. So there is plenty of room for twists and turns in the plot. Don’t count on skipping out of those higher insurance premiums yet.

    I was struck by the relatively short amount of deliberation the jury needed to reach their verdicts and how unequivocal they were. The fact that other police officers, including the Minneapolis Chief, testified against him was very significant, and they didn’t have a lot of trouble making up their minds based on the evidence and testimony they heard.

    Your larger question is more difficult. I’m working on an answer to that in another window. Back later.

    • > If they can paint Chauvin as a single bad apple…They can say “We convicted Chauvin so now #ProblemSolved and #MissionAccomplished.”

      First approximation answer as of this morning is that none of the people in the Biden Administration or elsewhere are calling it that; in fact just the opposite. I think the verdicts have actually strengthened their resolve to reach much more deeply into police practices, including unionization and their contracts. They now have a successful blueprint: “Now is the time for more police in this country to come forward and change the system. Or we will change it without you.” The DOJ has already begun their probe in Minneapolis as of this morning and all off the energy and momentum are moving in that direction.

      Heretofore, local jurisdictions around the country have been granted a great deal of latitude regarding the policing practices and in their own jurisdictions. That’s going to change. Increasingly these standards and practices (and the contracts that result) are going to be federally-mandated.

      I don’t expect them to abolish police unions outright, but there are going to be changes to everything from training practices to collective bargaining and contracts nationwide. I also think bodycams are going to be nationwide and virtually every future case involving lethal force will be tried in the media. The days of an encounter ending with lethal force being rewritten to absolve the officers of blame are over. This case ended them.

    • My view having watched the trial from afar is that Chauvin was not given a fair trial and whether or not he was as Phil glibly puts it “a bad apple” is far from clear. Lots of evidence went in that wouldn’t have in a normal trial, where the presumption is in favor of innocence, and there is an argument that the venue should have been moved because at least some jurors must have concluded that they and their families were at risk if they didn’t kowtow to the mob.

      On the other hand lawyers don’t decide whether clients testify — clients do. A defendant testifying in a criminal trial presents lots of risks and they very rarely testify. We don’t know a lot about Chauvin — for example is he verbal, quick witted, articulate, hot tempered? Most police are probably not all that articulate and no match for a quick witted prosecutor. Also at least in the federal system a defendant who testifies and is convicted will be wacked even harder on sentencing for lying under oath and various grounds of appeal will be foreclosed.

  4. I forget if two or maybe three of the other officers were trainees on their second day out, and Chauvin was their training officer. Obviously they all had a superior respinsability as humans, but some level of Milgram experinent was clearly at play. In fact I wonder if Chauvin wasn’t partly motivates by a desire to break in the new guys and check the reaction. You know how it is, if you don’t weed out the compassionate people during their probationary period, it’s all sorts of problems down the line.

  5. What I am missing from all of these self righteous blaming Chauvin is: How should Chauvin have arrested a guy with a criminal record of violent felonies, while high on drugs?

    From what I have read and considered facts, Floyd killed himself by taking drugs, and I expect the majority of police will agree with this.

    I see a continuum of people willing to commit violence, and allowed to do that to some extent legally, on the top is the US Navy Seal, and on the bottom, a bouncer or poorly trained security guard. In between are prison guards, police, soldiers, TSA etc.

    The risk to the public interacting with these people increases when lower capability people are armed and expected to achieve some safety objective.

    If I am the subject of a traffic stop, there are 2 factors that can cause me to get killed or injured.

    1. To what extent does the officer perceive me as a threat.
    2. To what extent is he a sadist on a power high, that is looking for excuses to kill or maim without consequences.

    If this officer stopping me in traffic is a former navy seal, I expect he would have been weeded out early if he was a sadist, or not highly skilled, so this would be pretty safe.

    On the other hand, if the police officer is scared and/or sadistic, the interaction could be much more dangerous to me.

    With local government ready to throw police under the bus, I expect more marginal people to enter the profession, as high quality people that earlier would become cops avoid the profession, the marginal police recruit will be the type of person that earlier would have become a TSA “officer” or prison guard.

    This is going to result in lower crime clearance rates, and ultimately more violence, perhaps more use of tasers, as a taser death is much harder to blame on the officer.

    • What’s up with the constant SEAL worship? Why are Army Special Forces never brought up?
      FYI SEAL teams have put together quite the disciplinary record over the last decade or so, including convictions for war crimes in which their fellow sailors testified against them (to their credit), so it’s not like the Army, Navy, Police, has any foolproof way to weed out sadists.

      In any case the way whatever your theories on policing, there was no reason to keep kneeling on his neck for an extra three minutes after he’d stopped moving.

    • [In any case the way whatever your theories on policing, there was no reason to keep kneeling on his neck for an extra three minutes after he’d stopped moving.]

      Agreed, although the prosecution expert witnesses did concede that there was no sustained pressure on the neck, the majority of the pressure was on the shoulder and back, not neck.

      Regarding SEAL worship, I agree, you never know there are no bad apples, but if we were able to secretly plant microphones on prison guards and SEALs, I would be very happy to bet even money against you on who are actually doing illegal or immoral stuff, in favor of the SEALs.

      And yes, there are of course many highly qualified warriors that are not seals. The SEALs represent a common ground.

    • Viking – your ideas about what might happen to police recruiting and policing as a result of police not getting away with murder in broad daylight are complete speculation. Maybe it’s the power tripping meat heads that will chose another career once accountability becomes part of the job. And besides, can our police and justice system possibly get any worse than it is now? Highest incarceration rates in the world by a large margin, and we’re not in great company with the closest 6 countries being pretty sketchy. We incarcerate 4.5x the UK’s rate.

      You opinion about the cause of Floyds death is unfounded and ignorant. The defense could not find one person in the entire country to testify under oath in way which remotely supports your statement.

    • Senorpablo,
      A meathead skinny Chauvin is not. We actually do need big cops on a beat. I recall 30 years ago in NYC, cops are traditionally tall and large and not afraid to use their police batons and no murder of unarmed petty criminals. It were tougher times, there were police car pursuits with shootings but cops had good sense to shoot tires off fleeing vehicle in the neighborhood where I visited, not the driver or a passenger. Those police shooting of unarmed are because many cops now are not physically strong and do not come from gun culture. Mandatory paper target training can teach so much. I believe that rise of killings of unarmed suspects by police is due to relaxing and changing police hiring standards in the past 30 years that result in hiring weaker and less gun-handy cops. Back then I read far left papers like Village Voice, killing of unarmed civilians by police was not their topic.

  6. If Chauvin had put Floyd in the traditional prone restraint it would have been more dangerous but it would have looked perfectly acceptable to everyone.
    The crowd wouldn’t have been riled up, the video wouldn’t have been used as propaganda, and he likely never would have been charged in the first place. Floyd would still be dead–that much would be the same. In fact, he probably would have died faster.

    • It would help if Chauvin released Floyd when he started complaining of inability to breath and sat him on the ground against the car and did not brought his all body weight in a knee on Floyd’s upper back instead.

    • oneteothree – It takes a remarkable level of denial to characterize a video of real life events as propaganda. How long do you keep a restrained guy on the ground with a knee on his neck? What was the point of that? How calm and compliant did George Floyd need to be before Chauvin found the courage to remove his knee from his neck? Apparently there was no level of compliance that would have satisfied Chauvin, because you can’t get any more compliant than dead, which is what George Floyd was for all intents and purposes for the last three minutes with a knee on the neck.

      Can you imagine being such a coward that you have to keep your knee on the neck of an unarmed, handcuffed, dead person, who never threatened you physically, with three other officers present?

      Chauvin was a deeply flawed person, as are his apologists.

    • *It takes a remarkable level of denial to characterize a video of real life events as propaganda*

      You are a flat-out moron.

    • @phil

      What happened to any kind of moderation of this board? Someone like Sam is openly allowed to espouse naked racism and insult fellow posters?

      Birds of a feather I suppose.

  7. Obama always said if you like over dosing from fentanlynal you can keep over dosing from it!

    • Toucan – If you think Floyd is “bad garbage” for stealing $20, tell us what you think of the Chauvin’s, who allegedly engaged in fraud to the tune of $37k?

      Re tax evasion:
      “The complaints allege that from 2014 through 2019, the Chauvins underreported their joint income by $464,433. With unpaid taxes, interest and fees, they now owe $37,868 to the state.”

      Just some good ol’ WHITE collar crime, but at a scale of 1850 X? And he’s a convicted murderer. Does that raise to the level of “old garbage” too?

    • George Floyd is a piece of trash. His criminal dealings go way beyond stealing 20 dollars. He is a career criminal who once robbed a pregnant lady holding a gun against her fetus! I am so glad he is dead! I do not care about black lives but I do care about George Floyd and am so glad he is dead!

    • Toucan – nice story about the pregnant assault, too bad it’s made up and you’re easily manipulated. Why do conservatives have to fabricate and exaggerate everything to excite and enrage their own fellow travelers? You’re probably still glad he’s dead, even though your number one reason for hating the guy was completely imagined and spoon fed to you. Meanwhile, you look the other way for a white murderer and serial tax cheat who was a well paid government employee, a trained professional with fiduciary duties to, and tremendous authority over, the public.

    • @Senorpablo, when you live on the edge, be it you are rich or poor, fortunate or not, white/black/brown/pink/yellow or what have you, engaged in fraud for $1 or millions, rob someone at gun point or plastic knife, et. al. are all irrelevant. The big elephant in the room is being over looked — no, actually it is being IGNORED.

      All the rioting (when justice is not in your favor) or all the jubilant speeches (when justice is in your favor) and all the lectures and reminders of oppressed for centuries (when things aren’t working for you) means absolutely nothing until when you address the root cause of the problem. Please see my other post from yesterday on this topic where I called out 2 issues — a) leaders and b) family life-style. Fix those and then we can discuss unjust and oppression.

      Simply put, George Floyd was living on the edge and his life was taken away by a white cop — intentionally or not, a bad cop or not — is not the real story here. Using *this* incident or others similar to it as a cry and reminder for unjust and oppression toward colored folks by non colored folks is *totally* ignoring the elephant in the room — in fact it is oppressing those in need even further because you are not after the *real* issues.

      Again, let me remind you, I would be in full support of unjust and oppression IF this was back in as little as 1960’s, 70’s or maybe even 80’s — but today, no way.

    • George! I have lived on the edge my entire life and I love it. I still do not care about black lives!

    • @Toucan, we all live on the edge day-in day-out, but some choose to live in a smart way while others in a dumb way.

  8. The most obvious result of the trial is that police will be a lot more reluctant to arrest in black neighborhoods, better to just look the other way, keep your job, put food on the table for your family, don’t risk being tried for homicide for making the wrong move in an arrest, and crime there will rise. But hey, who cares? Most of us don’t live in those neighborhoods. And we can do just like they do in South Africa –build walls and electric fences around our homes and hire private security details to keep the riff raff out.

    • This isn’t some weird gray area. He knelt on his neck and back for more than 8 minutes. It wasn’t some crazy heat of the moment split second decision. I study the Sicilian Mafia for a living, and strangulation was their preferred method of killing rivals, partly because it avoided having to get rid of weapon, but also because if you can throttle somebody until he’s dead it proves you’re a stone cold killer. And the mafia guys were at least allowed to tie a rope, so they didn’t have to continuously apply pressure themselves. If a police office doesn’t feel like they can make an arrest without emulating the MO of psycopathic killers, good riddance.

    • Andrea,

      You are a very very bad person. It was not the officer’s fault that George Floyd had an overdose! George Floyd was a horrible person and I am glad he is dead. Good Riddance to bad garbage. Also I do not care about Black Lives!

    • Nobody ever accused you of caring about black lives, Sam.

      As for being a bad person… There’s about five people in the world whose opinion I care about in that regard, and I am afraid you’re none of them.

      Your post therefore fails to convey any information. Do you know what the techbical term is for something that at first appears to be a signal, but conveys no actual information? Noise. Your post is noise. Static. Faint garbled echos of a soon too be bygone world.

      Pshhhhhhssssssshhhhhssh…

    • @sam You insulting someone’s intelligence over a typo doesn’t make me question their intelligence, it makes me question yours.

  9. If four police officers can’t contain an unarmed, handcuffed suspect without killing him something is terribly wrong.

    Chauvin killed Floyd in plain sight, in front of witnesses, and it was captured all on film…verified by coroners, other policemen, other members of law enforcement, several doctors, and the billions of people on this planet that saw the film.

    Chauvin got what he deserved.

    • Jim,

      You are a very very bad person. It was not the officer’s fault that George Floyd had an overdose! George Floyd was a horrible person and I am glad he is dead. Good Riddance to bad garbage. Also I do not care about Black Lives!

  10. After CNN signaled to jurors their identities are fair game for doxxing, this was the only likely outcome. Give some credit to the individuals serving – who would want their home address, job, and future professional career jeopardized? No one in real life is on the set of “12 angry men”

    There is a chance the verdict will be thrown out on appeal on account of Maxine Waters who apparently told protesters in Minnesota that if the defendant wasn’t convicted, they should “get more confrontational.”

  11. I was expecting no guilty verdict or a least a hung jury. In my opinion, Derek Chauvin lawyer did a very poor job presenting his case — there was simply NO solid evidence to conclude that Chauvin knee on George Floyd’s neck kill Floyd. For all we know, if Chauvin had locked Floyd in his cruiser right after handcuffing him, Floyd may have still ended up dead. But all of this is now history and behind.

    Given now that the drums of oppression and unjustness are being drummed by colored and minorities folks, one must ask why we still have this issue today after when we spent — generation after generation — huge amount of resources and gave colored and minority folks the advantage of cutting the line so they have that extra edge to advance and move up? Why do we still have poor neighborhood and schools with higher crime levels and lower graduation levels at colored and minority communities vs. mostly white communities?

    I think their are 2 basic reasons:

    A) Leaders — It amazes me to see how their selected leaders, who are suppose to be their eyes, voices and guidance, live a lavish life, in a neighborhood far away and far safer then flock they are leading.

    B) Live style — It all starts from within the family. If the parents do not look after their kids, to remind them that it takes hard work to advance in life, it will all fall apart and this carries on to the next generation and next.

    I know (B) is not easy for most disadvantaged folks, but we have (A) to make this happen (they are given a lot of resources and power to do so) but show me when (A) has made an impact for (B), a real impact. All I see is (A) getting better off, while (B) staying behind generation after generation.

    Also, there are more colored folks getting killed by colored folks each week then a colored folk getting killed by a white cop (or white person) in a year. How come this doesn’t make it to the news? Where is the outrage and the rioting? Is it just to be killed by someone of your color/kind vs. others?

    “According to the FBI’s data, 8% of the reported murders of Black people were committed by white offenders (234 of a total of 2,925) and 88.9% by Black offenders (2,600).

    FBI data from 2017 also follows this trend: 80.2% of white victims were killed by white offenders, 8.9% of Black victims were killed by whites, 88.5% of Black victims were killed by Blacks, and 16.1% of whites were killed by Blacks ( here ).” [1]

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against equality and justice. After all, I am a white immigrant myself who immigrated to the USA with my family, leggily, from Syria back in 1981 and I know what’s like to be in the minority and disadvantaged (we immigrated with almost nothing on us). Furthermore, I want this country to be successful because my kids will be growing in it. What I don’t accept however is when someone keeps crying for justice but yet they want to live the easy life off of others (like myself). My family and I worked our ass off to get where we are. We hardly took vacations, drove fancy cars, acquired non life essential expansive stuff or partied and spent like there is no tomorrow. As a result, today my family and I don’t live pay-check-to-pay-check and we do not agree with this unjust outcry.

    So excuse me if I say enough with this BS. We are not living in 1700’s, 1800’s or even 1900’s any more. If the unjust and discriminations outcry was happening in 1960’s, 70’s or even 90’s, I would have marched with you, but today I won’t — be it you are snow white, regular white, off white, black, red, green, blue, yellow or any colored and minority group of your choosing.

    [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-data-racial-murder/fact-check-false-data-on-u-s-racial-murder-rates-idUSKCN24I2A9

    • would love your take on the Boulder mass shooter. Incident presents to me as Islamic jihad, given the choice of a King Soopers in one of the most affluent neighborhoods in Boulder (whereas shooter drove past 3-4 other King Soopers in less affluent areas). The family immediately pushed the “mental illness” narrative on the media. Most of those who suffer from mental illness engage in self-harm, and not these violent attacks on Western culture & way-of-life.

    • @Suzanne, to me, the 2021 Boulder shooting by Ahmad Al Aliwi Al-Issa boils down to a family that shouldn’t have moved to live within the Western culture. You can see my take about it via multiple posts I made [1] on this topic.

      At a high level and as a metaphor: when I take a vacation on a cruse ship, I put on my vacation clothing, I attends events and shows and I dance to the music. In short, I “adopt” and “mix-in”. The Al-Issa family did not do that — adopt — when they immigrated to the USA.

      [1] https://philip.greenspun.com/blog/2021/04/02/how-was-the-immigration-of-ahmad-al-aliwi-al-issa-supposed-to-benefit-an-average-coloradan/

    • “…there was simply NO solid evidence to conclude that Chauvin knee on George Floyd’s neck kill Floyd. For all we know, if Chauvin had locked Floyd in his cruiser right after handcuffing him, Floyd may have still ended up dead. But all of this is now history and behind.”

      Clearly, you didn’t see or read the testimony by the several Medical Examiners, Pulmonologists, Cardiologists, EMT Personal, etc…

      It was murder in plain sight.

    • George – for all we know George Floyd would have died in the beck of the squad car? That’s possibly the most ignorant thing I’ve heard regarding the trial. Yeah, and I could be struck down by a meter today. No one testified to that effect. And, in order to believe that, you have to ignore a tremendous amount of evidence to the contrary, including 9 minutes of video in which you can clearly see a compliant George Floyd being suffocated by officer Chauvin. Floyd himself, and numerous bystanders, told Chauvin he couldn’t breathe. A fellow officer couldn’t find a pulse, and for an additional three minutes Chavin continued to suffocate Floyd. Murder.

      Your immigration story has given you zero insight into systemic American oppression. Your crime statistics are meaningless. Why leave Syria? I mean, if oppressed people would stop being oppressed, there would be no oppression, right? Black people have endured 400 years of oppression and racism. They didn’t choose to come here. You expect people to overcome oppression on their own. Why couldn’t Syrians do the same, why come to the US rather than overcome in their native home? Rise up! It’s just a matter of desire, right?

    • @Jim, that’s what the prosecutor medical expert said, but not the defense medical expert [1]. So, who do we believe? We can say that we are both picking sides, but I much rather say, and is what I said that “there was simply ***NO solid*** evidence” which is my conclusion without picking sides.

      @Senorpablo, Floyd has history of drug usage and a heart condition. That alone puts him at a higher risk to die be it with this incident or some other incident involving a black or colored fellow. Floyd for not cooperating when arrested increased his chances of dying.

      The crime statistic is from the US government, not mine. If you disagree with it, you can take it up with the US government — even better take it up with the black and colored community and leaders.

      My personal immigration story was to show that in 1 generation my family and I were able to navigate though life in the USA, where we started with nothing, knew nothing of America, didn’t speak the language and got zero help from the government — but yet we made it to a middle class family. If we were able to do so, why cannot black and colored folks do the same with all the help they have been getting for generations? Why generation after generation we still have the same low level education and high crime level?

      Yes, my family and I moved out of Syria because we were oppressed in Syria. Yes, black folks *were* oppressed for 400 years — but all that changed at least 50 years ago. How many black and colored generations does it take to overcome oppression? How many black and colored leaders does it take to *really* look after their kind vs. themselves (see my original post for (A))? And when will black and colored families change their life style (see my original post for (B))?

      Could you please enlighten me why (A) black and colored leaders, who speak for black and colored folks are doing so well while many black and colored families are not and (B) black and colored families are not taking responsibilities to better their own and kids life? Here is a small hint on (A): as I was growing up, my parents made sure I was home doing my homework and made sure they knew where I was at and who my friends were.

      Simply put, it comes down to mom and dad. They have the ultimate responsibility to look after their kids, be an example for their kids and sacrifice themselves for their kids — regardless of the circumstances.

      And let me make it clear, I’m not putting ALL black and colored folks in one basket, after all, there are many successful black and colored folks both at high and middle class levels and even poor who live a simple life (and I work with black and colored folks day-in day-out). I’m questioning black and colored families in neighborhood with high crimes, broken families and school dropout — that never seem to improve.

      [1] https://www.npr.org/sections/trial-over-killing-of-george-floyd/2021/04/14/987134841/watch-live-defense-testimony-resumes-in-derek-chauvins-trial

    • George – again, your personal immigration analogy is incredibly ignorant. Why can’t black people do the same as you? I don’t know, pick any of a million reasons. Why aren’t you a surgeon, or as rich as Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos? If they did it, surely you can too? See how incredibly dumb that sounds? Maybe your family was successful in Syria, and/or had a good work ethic and strong genetics? Perhaps 300 years of slavery and forced breeding wasn’t kind to those descended from slaves? I never said your crime statistics aren’t accurate; I said they’re meaningless. Crime isn’t the root cause of oppression, it’s a result of it. Crime is largely a result of poverty and poor education. Low income neighborhoods do not get the same quality of education as high income neighborhoods. That’s just one example of systemic, societal oppression. Not being treated fairly under the justice system is another. George Floyd was killed for allegedly stealing $20. Meanwhile, the officer who killed him, was a serial tax cheat who defrauded the government of nearly $40,000 over many years. He would have gotten a fine and never seen the inside of a jail cell for that. $20 theft vs. $40,000. Both crimes non-violent, once gets jail, the other a fine. White collar crime is tolerated and intertwined with good business in America. Meanwhile, petty theft fills up the prisons. The war on drugs was an unmitigated disaster cooked up by conservatives. Another example is the difference between crack cocaine and powder cocaine. Same chemical, different package. One of which is favored by minorities and received a 100x stiffer sentence! That went on for 20 years. If you’re a wealthy white person snorting powder, no problem. If you’re a minority smoking crack from a pipe, game over.

      https://www.aclu.org/other/cracks-system-20-years-unjust-federal-crack-cocaine-law

      I agree with you that good parenting would be a major contributor to rising from poverty and oppression. I’m guessing your parents were probably doing okay at some point back in Syria and had their heads on straight? But, that doesn’t happen by magic or by will, or in one generation. And just because it can happen in theory, and in very rare circumstances does happen, doesn’t mean it’s reasonable to think it’s possible on anything but a very small scale.

      The list goes on and on. Our society is absolutely rigged against the poor and uneducated. As for your going on about leaders, why was Martin Luther Kind killed? Too charismatic, too powerful, too right. You can’t even calculate how devastating his death was to the civil rights movement.

      https://www.splcenter.org/what-we-do/civil-rights-memorial/civil-rights-martyrs

      You think that a list of atrocities like this can be overcome in 50 years? The injustice, the fear, government and law enforcement sometimes participating if not looking the other way. Maybe if there’s motivation. But what possible motive do racist people have to stop being racist? People who committed these crimes in the 60’s and earlier can easily still be alive. They have surely passed their racism on to numerous generations by now. Great, great, great grandchildren if not beyond. If anything, we saw a massive resurgence in racism during the Trump years. You think that because some laws are passed, and because black people can vote now, that racism and oppression are gone? Total, absolute nonsense.

    • George….this case isn’t about Floyd or his upbringing. It’s about the cop that knelt on his neck for 9 seconds and killed him as a result of that.

    • @Jim, and that’s the point I’m trying to make over and over — someone (Floyd who happens to be black) was killed (intentionally or not, which we will never know) by someone else (who happens to be a white cop) — but yet look at how much attention this case is getting and how much money Floyd’s family was paid ($27 million). If other killings that happen in the US (at least 40 homicide a day) were receiving 1/10 of this much attention, we would be having a different discussion.

      @Senorpablo, I can counter your points again and again and you will counter back again and again but by now it is fair to say that we will not see eye-to-eye.

      Question: what about other families that lost their loved ones at the hand of colored or white person or cop but such family only got local news coverage, for a day or two and no compensation or televised justice, how should they feel about justice for their lost?

      There is an elephant in the room and it is being ignored.

    • George – you’re the one who continues to miss the point. 40 homicides per day, so what? You have no concept of fiduciary duty or government responsibility. Government officials, and people in power are held to a much higher standard than every day citizens. Give me one single, solitary example of someone being killed in broad daylight over an agonizing 9 minutes, with zero provocation, including video and eyewitness accounts, and preferably by a government employee with the duty to serve and protect, and three of his co-workers standing by. That’s why $27MM. And, they could have gotten much, much more probably.

      It’s not uncommon or that large an amount:

      https://topverdict.com/lists/2018/united-states/top-100-wrongful-death-settlements

    • @Senorpablo, I get it now. It is better and justice will be served if ones loved one is murdered or killed at the hands of a government or cooperation so that the victim’s family get a better televised justice and a good payoff. Tell that to the 40+ families who’s loved one will be homicide just today at the hands of ordinary citizens with no big name or big backing.

      Your refusal to see and discuss the elephant in the room is no longer adding value to this post and its readers. I’m done discussing it.

    • George – you keep saying there’s an elephant in the room, but as big as it is, you haven’t been able to articulate it. You just keep saying there is one. If you’re the only one who can see it, and it’s as big as you say it is…

  12. Pity background demographic evidence isn’t admissible ar trial. It might well have swayed the jury that saw the defendant kill another man, in cold blood, in broad daylight and in front if children.

    • Why can’t you spell? What is wrong with you? I am going to call the grammar and spelling police!

  13. Andrea and Senorpablo-

    My understanding after lightly following the trial is that the prosecution did not claim that a knee to the neck killed Floyd (knee to neck was refuted by police bodycam evidence), but that it was more the prone position that killed him. Was that your understanding after following the trial?

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