Another black man was chased, beaten, and executed by the police. It’s a familiar story, but this one adds another twist: Eric Harris was shot accidentally by reserve deputy Robert Bates.
Bates, 73, accidentally shot Eric Harris on Thursday, according to Maj. Shannon Clark, after Harris — the subject of an undercover gun and ammunition buy by the Sheriff’s Office’s Violent Crimes Task Force — fled from arrest and then fought with a deputy who tackled him. Bates, Clark said, thought he was holding a stun gun when he pulled the trigger.
He thought he was holding a stun gun when he pulled the trigger
…how does that kind of poorly trained, absurdly incompetent arse get on a police force, and even handed a deadly weapon? This is where the story gets even worse. He bought his way in.
Bates apparently is not alone as both a donor and reserve deputy. While the Sheriff’s Office has not released its full roster, Clark said other wealthy donors are among the agency’s 130 reserve deputies.
“There are lots of wealthy people in the reserve program,” he said. “Many of them make donations of items. That’s not unusual at all.”
Bates has donated multiple vehicles, guns and stun guns to the Sheriff’s Office since he became a reserve deputy in 2008, Clark said. The Sheriff’s Office did not have an itemized list of donations made by Bates available Monday and deferred that question to the county commissioners’ office, which tracks those items.
Holy crap. This is a thing? Rich people can buy a gun, donate it to the police department, and then get a badge that allows them to hunt black people? Having lots of money is sufficient qualification to get yourself on the police force? And the Sheriff’s Office doesn’t see a problem with this?
Swaggering fools who want the ‘glory’ of being a mightily armed cop are precisely the kind of people you least want to employ in this job. My respect for the police just dropped again — I’m going to have to start digging a hole for it. Apparently, 73 year old insurance executives are indistinguishable from the cops.
Purchasing commissions is an old tradition
The Zimmerman/Martin case pretty much stood for the proposition that anyone (you don’t have to be a cop) can shoot an unarmed Black man and walk away into the sunset. This case where a wealthy man can buy a badge and shoot to kill a Black man is not surprising. Just sad.
Here’s the thing, too – if you watch the video, you can clearly see Eric Harris put his hands up and you can see him being taken into custody. The point of tasing him at that point would have been…? I cannot fill in the blank. And then to shoot him instead, accidentally or not…
Oh, and the other officers on scene. Atrocious. “Fuck your breath.” Never even called EMS, and when asked, they said they didn’t realize he’d been shot. When Bates clearly says he did with the words “I shot him! I’m sorry!”
Not incompetence.
Malice.
Hmm. No one saw this coming? I mean, think about it – you cut funding to police, so they can’t hire officers, but you still need police, so… you either weaponize the bloody neighborhood watch, or you create a “reserve” division. Since, again, you don’t get jack shit for money to fund the cops you already have, never mind this “reserve”, you take donations, because… police departments are supposed to be some sort of private charity, don’t cha know? Obviously, if the donation comes from someone really rich, well, not everyone really rich is going to want to donate without some sort of compensation either, so… since you can’t build a new wing (not a hospital, or the like), or add a silly plaque to the new cop car, or a name plate on each gun donated, or some stupid BS like that… well, gosh, why not just hand them a gun (or, if its a open/conceal carry state, just let them come to the scene with one), and let them, “take notes and stuff”, its not like they are going to be doing actual cop work, like shooting people, right?
I just… no fucking words for this….
BS!!!! Not “incompetent with weapons”, but “incompetent with rationalizations for gun usage”. Really thought he was firing a stun gun? The story (linked) says he has had a year of experience as an actual police officer, long before buying his way back on. That exp boosted his ranking to “advanced” (from the options of (a) basic, (b) intermediate, (c) advanced). So, I don’t buy that excuse.
OTOH, if not BS: how similar is a stun gun, in weight and heft, to an actual LEO gun? If too similar to be easily mistaken, in panic, then stun gun makers need to redesign ’em a bit different to distinguish them more when grabbed in a panic situation.
Orrrrr, why have LEOs equipped with the choice? Just arm them with stun guns only. problem solved. what could go wrong…
That specific kind of “incompetence” (or willful malice…) is not unprecedented. In the trial of the Oakland BART police killing of Oscar Grant, the attorney for the killer (Mehserle) “argued that Mehserle mistakenly shot Grant with his pistol, intending to use his Taser when he saw Grant reaching for his waistband. […] On July 8, 2010, the jury returned its verdict: Mehserle was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and not guilty of second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter” (quoted from the linked Wikipedia page).
My vote is for malice, every time.
re 6 et al:
Hanlon’s Razor: ‘Never assign to malice what can be explained by stupidity.’
——————————
I think, however, the amount of stupidity required for this incident is unreasonably large. Malice is a much easier ‘feature’ to attribute. Even, unintentional malice, as in: the ‘default’ attitude of wealthy whites about ‘criminal’ POCs.
This needs to be mulled over a bit.
Maybe we need to call and demand answers from the Tulsa TSCO Reserves abt the circumstances? Force them to act. Contact info within.
Also, .@Manolo730 @Ab_Weezy Here’s difference between police issued taser guns a 9mm glock. You think officer was confused?
I refuse to diminish the officer’s responsibility in killing Eric Harris by attributing his actions to stupidity or incompetence.
To me, it sounds a lot like he wanted to go around playing cop in his retirement, and had a very distinct idea of what ‘playing cop’ means. This includes shooting people in high-stress situations because heroism.
While the action may have been accidental, the mindset certainly isn’t.
Malice.
If you’re looking for a common thread that can explain all these incidents, it is modern Republicanism.
It is their authoritarianism, their racism and xenophobia, their appeal to fear, their total love for guns and the rich, their unrelenting assault on government, social welfare and the poor, their cheap piety masquerading as morality, and their disdain for any regulation (unless it involves sex among consenting adults).
These MF’ers have taken over the country and managed to convince enough idiot citizens to keep voting for them. In Ohio where I live they dominate all branches of government now and their obsessions are to unleash fracking everywhere, ban all abortions and — the latest! — remove pretty much any regulations for concealed weapons: a new bill will eliminate concealed-carry permits, as well as mandatory training. Yea baby! Any Ohioan 21 or older will be able to pocket a gun and strut around, no need to know how to use it (hey, unless you’re black: remember John Crawford, buying a toy gun at a Dayton Wal-mart last summer, shot by cops without even a warning, and, of course, they were not indicted by our idiot citizens).
I’m so fucking pissed of right now with people in general but specifically with this country and my state.
It’s not just Republicans. The Ferguson and area government is mostly Democrat-led (governor, mayor of St Louis, mayor of Ferguson, etc.), and lookit how that worked out. Yes,the Missouri Senate and House of Representatives are majoritarily Republican, but this isn’t just Republicans, nope. Can’t hide behind those politics.
This razor isn’t really sharp, given that playing the village idiot may well be the oldest defense mechanism the brotherhood of vicious bastards ever invented
re j rockford @10:
I love their justification: “voluntary training is virtually universally taken and the state training is too weak compared to the voluntary training. Eliminating the stat training will make all the gun holders more competent and more skilled.”
yeah, fer sure.
how bout this for an analogy:
State speed limits are too low, everywhere. Every automobiler exceeds the limit, without inevitably crashing, so eliminate speed limits everywhere. Drivers will be better drivers without those wimpy speed limits.
That is a perfect analogy, as cars are more deadly than those little pewpew guns. Cars are 3,000lbs of steel (at the least) hurtling down the street at MANY miles per hour. They need far more skill to operate … /snark
#11: It’s not just Republicans.
It’s Modern Republicanism (I think I’ll start capitalizing it), which has also infected so-called “heartland” Democrats. I’m talking about the current ideology and obsessions of the Republican party as a thing. It’s very different to traditional conservatism and should be recognized as a specific political dogma.
There are many Democrats in the Midwest and South who are no different than Republicans. Some have absorbed elements of Modern Republicanism and unfortunately our media has also accepted it as a legitimate perspective.
Although it is increasingly rare, the odd Republican may even sometimes stand up to Modern Republicanism. For instance, Ohio Governor Kasich (an otherwise conservative and certainly not a generally nice man) seems smart and savvy enough to have done the right thing in Ohio by vetoing several extreme Republican bills.
If you want to see Modern Republicanism in all its glory just follow the current crop of presidential hopefuls. They are all anti-science and evidence, pro-gun, pro-rich, pro-religion, anti-poor, anti-sex and abortions, and so on (and please don’t bring up Rand Paul; he’s moving toward Modern Republicanism as fast as he can).
@re #3
Ok, this is outright surreal.
Humanity is testing my Faith in it again, but I Shall Be Strong.
The escalation of violence on black people is… Someone is pulling my leg.
Is this the ugliest belated April’s Fool ever?
This is the point where a secret cabal of evil SJWs has been manufacturing fake videos to make fun of us all.
My ability to cope with reality is breaking apart.
I’m going to bed.
Tomorrow I’ll wake up, I’ll read the news and I will be told that all of this was fake.
Because otherwise I just can’t even.
How do you guys cope with this?
How do you continue to believe that a better world is possible, if this is the raw material that we’re given?
There are days when I don’t. Those are the bad days. But, eventually, someone else comes along and does something like this, and I cling to the thought that, even if good is in the minority, it’s still there.
I was at a Democratic rally a few years back, somewhere in rural/smalltown Missouri. It felt like a Republican rally. There was a young woman imitating a county singer so badly that I couldn’t guess which one, and a old white male candidate barking about God, guns and guts. I could tell it was a little leftist in spots, but mostly it told me that if you are expecting Democrats from Republican areas to be all enlightened, you are barking up the wrong tree.
I’m not going to claim to be an expert on all devices of stun guns and small arms, but in my experience, no. There are some models of stun guns that resemble gun constructions, but every one I have ever seen as not had the same heft or balancing as a regular gun. All stun guns are required to have bright orange/ yellow striping on them if they are the gun-like model, and most stun guns continue this color scheme.
If they aren’t the gun-like model, they look and feel absolutely nothing like a small arm. I don’t know about Oklahoma and Tulsa, but my god-father is in the staties up here in Minnesota. He said that they are required to keep the stun gun and the small arm on opposite sides, there are different catches in the holsters, and they are trained in recognizing the differences. Our cops also carry pepper spray.*
The idea that one might switch them up in the heat of the moment is POSSIBLE, but not particularly probable. Having held and fired both, I would never mix them up if I was blindfolded and picking up the weapons, at least not the kinds I’ve fired. I would say that is lawsuit-level negligence in cop policy if they use that similar of models.
*It’s still not enough. 12 hours of training is all the statues mandate for cops. They need to have less stringent hiring requirements (all cops here need a degree in criminal justice) and more pre-training by the state. They also have a history of pulling out that taser a little too fast (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/03/taser-pepper-spray-in-school_n_6882920.html) and our city police here in Minneapolis respond to the north side a litte too slow. Our cops also say stupid, awful things about rape and play politics (poorly) with our mayor.
They are kneeling on his head.
Then he shoots him.
The word is execution.
’twas brillig @ 5,
This.
He had enough money to buy a hunting-humans license from the police chief so I guess he’ll easily buy his way out of this little bit of bother. [My prediction: 100 hours community service for being a silly-billy.]
There is no possible way to mistake a Glock 19 (what he almost certainly used) with a Taser X2 or X26P. It can’t be done. I’ve handled and fired all of them and I assure you that he could not possibly have mistaken one for the other after drawing them. A Taser has a safety toggle that must be disengaged before firing. Glocks rely on an extraordinarly heavy trigger pull in lieu of a true safest catch. The man is no better than the murderer in South Carolina.
∆ Should read safety catch
Bullshit, as others have noted. This asshole knew exactly what he was doing.
John Rockford
No, no it isn’t. This is what conservatism looks like, and what it has always meant.
Bloody.
Hell.
–
This is what happens when neocons rule the fucking roost. The New White Supremacist Atheists cause many deaths. Bill
We even have Bill Maher’s, whose defense of Netanyahu’s racism is yet another example of a New Atheist becoming “utterly deranged” by their anti-belief. ISIS is the perfect external enemy to distract you from confronting the barbarity at home. I hate bullies. Pure & simple. Religious bullies. Secular bullies. Racist bullies. I will bully bullies. Always have. Always will. After seeing the new Michael Brown video, I want to state this as eloquently and sensitive as I can: that racist runt who shot him is fucked.
Fucking neocons.
So the police in the US has become a country of its own? Like the Chinese army?
Does it run unrelated businesses yet?
@26 eh? How do you get to bring gnu atheism into this?
It’s the “deputy” thing. Sheriffs used to be able to just deputize anyone to assist in the capture of a suspect. Now they usually have paid reserve folks, but there’s still a lot more informality to it than with regular police officers – that’s why these guys could essentially buy their way into deputy status.
Sheriffs in general are a weird holdover from the past in the US, back when law enforcement in most towns and counties consisted of one (or a handful) of elected officials. They never really got displaced or absorbed with the rise of professional police forces. It’s the same reason we still have elected judges in some state court systems.
So it’s not just Australian cops who try to pull the “I thought I was holding a taser” bullshit. I wonder if that lame excuse is in the taser manual.
QFT. Sweet Christ on a pogo stick, but I beginning to lose track of the many serious issues that the US Police force has. You can buy a position as a reserve Sherriff? Who the ever-loving fuck thought that would be a good idea?
People at zero risk of being shot by one.
Being law enforcement, Bates was clearly an example of responsible firearm ownership and operation.
Up until he suddenly wasn’t.
Just like every other time.
#15
I don’t think it’s actually escalating. I think it’s always been like this; we’re just starting to hear about it more in the news now, is all. The excuses are unbelievably bad because they don’t even expect to have to make them.
New info: Bates has been charged with 2nd-Degree Manslaughter on the grounds of Culpable Negligence.
From the info given, it would seem that this 73-year old man who bought himself a place in the Sherriff’s reserve deputies genuinely did mistake his firearm for his tazer.
I can only assume that the taser Bates used was a type that’s shaped like a gun, which raises the question of why the hell are police tasers shaped like guns?! It would only make sense to have a gun-shaped taser if LEOs didn’t also carry guns.
Also, why are 73-year-old men allowed to pay-for-play cops and robbers?