Police Shootings? No Justice at Justice

Joseph Farah
Tue, 12 Jul 2016 21:00:00 -0700
Opinion

The back-to-back fatal police shootings last week of two black men, both caught on video, are understandably disturbing.

Before the retributive sniper attacks on police officers in Dallas, they were among the most talk-about stories across the nation.

What we see with our own eyes and what we hear, as well as the reports by eyewitnesses, of these incidents in Baton Rouge and outside St. Paul, Minnesota, should be enough to make any American's skin crawl.
Updated: Wed Jul 13, 2016

The back-to-back fatal police shootings last week of two black men, both caught on video, are understandably disturbing.

Before the retributive sniper attacks on police officers in Dallas, they were among the most talk-about stories across the nation.

What we see with our own eyes and what we hear, as well as the reports by eyewitnesses, of these incidents in Baton Rouge and outside St. Paul, Minnesota, should be enough to make any American's skin crawl.

I certainly mourn with the families and friends of Philando Castile, 32, of St. Paul, a school cafeteria supervisor, killed by police Wednesday, and Alton Sterling, 37, of Baton Rouge, killed Tuesday.

It's horrifying. It leaves me speechless.

One thing I can say with certainty: If state and local officials believe calling in the U.S. Justice Department to investigate is the answer, they are hopelessly wrong.

Why do I assert that?

Two reasons:

—The U.S. Justice Department and its boss, Barack Obama, have only served to fan the flames of racial division for the last eight years, thus becoming part of the problem rather than part of the solution.

—When perhaps the most egregious police shooting in recent memory occurred in the Justice Department's own backyard, Washington, D.C., the result was the worst cover-up, the worst whitewash of police wrongdoing I have ever witnessed in my lifetime. I refer to the outrageous, unconscionable, unjustified 2013 murder under the cover of authority of Miriam Carey, a 34-year-old dental hygienist with her toddler in tow. You can read the incredible gruesome details in the exhaustive WND series on her death for yourself. It's soon to be the basis of a book by WND Washington bureau chief Garth Kant.

I would go even further to suggest that this heavily politicized Justice Department, which even whitewashed Secret Service culpability in the Carey killing, will only make matters worse. This is the same band that refused to indict Hillary Clinton for crimes and cover-ups that would have put most of us in prison for a very long time.

Why do we suppose Big Government is better suited to serving justice?

When and where has that ever worked?

There's one more critical facet of these two recent police killings that are worth noting.

In both cases, the men killed had guns in their possession — and that fact led directly to their executions. For victim Castile, it was particularly heartbreaking. He had a concealed carry permit and offered to the police officers who had stopped his vehicle with his girlfriend and child aboard that he had in his possession a firearm and a permit for it. He was trying to be forthright, candid, helpful.

It cost him his life.

As he reportedly reached for his wallet at the instruction of an officer who demanded his license and registration, he was repeatedly shot and left to bleed to death without any medical attention from officers. They never even checked his pulse.

What attracted cops in Baton Rouge to the other victim, Sterling, was a call placed by a homeless man to police about a man with a gun. Sterling never drew his gun on officers. He can't be seen reaching for it as two cops tackle him to the ground. Then he is shot point black in the chest at least five times while he is subdued.

There is no excuse for this.

Cops like this are unfit to wear a uniform and carry guns themselves. Again, who has helped perpetuate this notion that armed civilians automatically represent danger to the public and the police?

I can think of no one more responsible for creating that climate of hysteria than Barack Obama.