Brown and Johnson walked the whole way from the Market

Since I began writing this blog, I have been trying to argue that the white Monte Carlo drove Michael Brown and Dorian Johnson part of the way from the Ferguson Market and Liquor store to their encounter with Police Officer Darren Wilson. Today, however, I found proof that my idea was wrong.

Located at the southeast corner of West Florissant Avenue and Canfield Drive is a business called Shopping Center Services. That business had three cameras pointed at that intersection's sidewalks. Those three cameras filmed Brown and Johnson, a few minutes before the encounter, walking north on West Florissant Avenue, turning east on Canfield Drive, and walking east on Canfield Drive.

The information is on the Investigative Report, pages 167-168.

During the next few weeks, I will rewrite the relevant articles in this blog.

A race-baiting fabricator has been sentenced to jail

In the days and weeks following the Ferguson incident, many gullible people fell for the bizarre accusation.

* A White police officer became enraged that a young Black man was walking in the middle of the street.

* The White police officer reached through his vehicle window and seized the Black's neck.

* The White police officer drew his pistol and, through the vehicle window, shot the Black in the shoulder.

* The White police officer chased the Black down the middle of the street and shot the Black in the back.

* The Black stopped, turned around, raised his hands, and pleaded to surrender, but the White police officer shot the Black repeatedly at close range until the Black fell dead.

Such an incident is not impossible, but sensible people felt a healthy skepticism. Throughout the USA, however, millions of gullible people fell for for the yarn. Furthermore, these  gullible people hysterically hurled racism accusations against anyone -- even friends and relatives -- who did express healthy skepticism. The racism accusations were intended to silence the skeptics, who tried to discuss the evidence objectively.

It's important for sensible people to keep in mind that some people in our society are race-baiting fabricators who want to incite racial paranoia and rage throughout our society. Sometimes fabricators falsely embellish actual incidents (e.g. in Ferguson), and sometimes fabricators create completely imaginary incidents.

Gullible people who reflexively fall for race-baiting fabricators and who self-righteously accuse skeptical people of being racists  consider themselves to be intellectually or morally superior, but they are obnoxious fools.

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Fortunately, a race-baiting fabricator recently was sentenced to jail and to a large fine for creating an imaginary racism incident. The story was reported by Tom Haydon for the website NJCOM on June 17, 2016.

Kayla McKelvey (right) being sentenced
for fabricating a racism incident.

A Superior Court judge Friday sentenced a Kean University [in Union, New Jersey] graduate to 90 days in jail and five years probation for posting Twitter messages threatening to kill black students on the campus. 

However, Judge Robert Mega expressed his disagreement with the plea-agreement and sentence for the defendant, Kayla McKelvey, an African American woman, who admitted writing the messages because she wanted to bring attention to racism on campus. 

In her statement to the judge, McKelvey apologized for sending the messages, which said black students would be shot. She admitted the tweets were wrong but said her intent to raise awareness about racial issues was correct. 

McKelvey, 25, and a former president of the university's Pan African Student Union, said she "made a poor error in judgement to shine a light on an issue that is important to me. My intent was to expose racism on campus," McKelvey said. She opened her statement by apologizing to the university and Union Township police, and to her friends and family. .... 

The messages were sent during a protest last November about racism on the campus. McKelvey in court today said that during the rally she heard "people yelling white power, calling us monkeys." 

She had pleaded guilty to a charge of creating a false public alarm, and in exchange, the prosecutor's office agreed to recommend the three-month sentence. 

Mega, before announcing the sentence, challenged Union County Assistant Prosecutor Shawn Barnes to defend the plea agreement. 

"Why shouldn't I reject this plea," Mega asked. He said the threats caused mayhem on the campus and could have turned the university community "into a tinder box." 

Barnes replied that it was a third-degree crime, that McKelvey had no prior criminal record, that she agreed to pay $82,328 in restitution to law enforcement agencies that investigated the threats, and that the plea agreement had been discussed with Kean University. 

McKelvey's lawyer, Thomas Ashley, had asked Mega to place his client on probation, with no jail time, saying McKelvey had been an honor student, a homecoming queen, a student leader on the campus prior to graduation in the spring of 2015, and had a history of community service. Ashley said McKelvey once had a bright future but now has suffered, losing her job as a certified personal trainer, and losing nearly all her friends. 

Barnes had previously argued for a three-month jail sentence, saying that Friday was the first time McKelvey had expressed remorse. He said the 10 threatening messages spread panic across the campus, and caused more than half of students to miss two or three days of classes, all because McKelvey wanted to attract more protesters to her rally. .... 

Authorities say that on Nov. 17, 2015, McKelvey, then a graduate of the university, participated in a protest against racism on the campus. McKelvey left the rally midway through, however, going to a computer station located in a university library and creating an anonymous Twitter account to post the tweets. She then returned to the rally and spread word of the threats. ...

Race-baiting fabricators can cause destructive riots and racial animosity in our society. The harsh sentence imposed on McKelvey should discourage other people who contemplate such antics. Perhaps McKelvey herself might have been discouraged if the Ferguson liars had been prosecuted for their perjury.

Although it was possible that some real racist was using Twitter to broadcast threats to murder Blacks at Kean University, such a situation was unlikely and deserved healthy skepticism.

A judge has ordered the release of the full transcripts

One complication in the study of the Ferguson incident is that many words of the transcripts released to the public have been whited-out. The words have been whited out in order to protect the identities of the witnesses, who were promised anonymity.

Many witnesses perceived that there were people with criminal mentalities in Ferguson who would attack "snitches" who told the truth about the incident to police investigators and to the grand jury. The anonymous "snitches" contradicted the public liars and caused the grand jury to refuse to indict Police Officer Darren Wilson.

Keep in mind that many people in the neighborhood participated in massive rioting, looting and arson after the killing and again after the grand jury's no-indictment decision was announced. The inciters of arson included Michael Brown's stepfather Louis Head, who urged the neighborhood mobs to "burn this bitch down!".

Immediately following stepfather Head's incitement many businesses and automobiles were destroyed by arson.

In these circumstances, the witnesses who actually did see the incident and then testified truthfully to the grand jury still have good reason to fear for their safety if the Brown family and the neighborhood's looters and arsonists ever learn their identities.

The Brown family is trying to sue for a huge monetary compensation for the death of Michael Brown. For that lawsuit, the family's lawyers have demanded to obtain the full transcripts in order to identify all the witnesses. Now the family has a monetary interest in "persuading" witnesses who previously testified about what they actually did see, in order to match the testimony of the liars who did not actually see the killing.

Recently a federal judge consented to the Brown family's demand but imposed restrictions on the lawyers' distribution of the new details. This decision was reported by AP reporter Jim Suhr, but his article did not explain whether the family members themselves -- or just their lawyers -- will obtain the details to identify the witnesses. 

Michael Brown's family will get unredacted transcripts of grand jury proceedings involving the officer who killed the 18-year-old, a federal judge said Monday, marking the first time someone other than a prosecutor or grand juror will see uncensored details of the secret proceedings. 

U.S. District Judge E. Richard Webber's protective order spelling out terms of the release requires St. Louis County prosecutors to hand over the testimony and the names of grand jury witnesses to attorneys for Brown's family, which is pressing a wrongful-death lawsuit. The order bars the attorneys designated to see the grand jury items from making any of them public, lest they be jailed for contempt.  ....

St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch publicly released heavily redacted transcripts of the grand jury testimony, but he refused to release the names of witnesses, who were promised anonymity.

An attorney for McCulloch's office, Linda Wasserman, had opposed the disclosure request and later sought to limit it. In a recent court filing, she cited "continued grave concerns, in light of the lives at stake, regarding the efficacy of a protective order in controlling the short-term and long-term threat of personal harm to innocent persons called as witnesses in this case." 

Monday's order also calls for authorities to release unredacted transcripts of witness interviews, written statements obtained by St. Louis County police, audio-record transcripts and autopsy and scene photographs not previously disclosed. 

"We now get the chance to have an unblemished look at who said what to whom and under what context," Anthony Gray, the family's attorney, told The Associated Press. "We consider this to be a huge development in the case — very significant and monumental in terms of discovery." 

Brown's parents are suing Wilson, the city of Ferguson and its former police chief, Thomas Jackson. 

Peter Dunne, an attorney for the defendants, declined to discuss Monday's order, saying he did "not want to get sideways with the court" by speaking publicly about it. 

"It was done with a tremendous amount of concern expressed by the judge and others about making sure that proper balance was struck between the need for the information and concerns expressed by people who frankly didn't want information about them disclosed," Dunne said. ....  

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Many witnesses saw the incident from their apartments, and so the whiting-out of their addresses in the transcripts causes difficulties in picturing their narratives. The reader must use the clues that remain in the transcripts. For example, a witness might remark that he was looking at Brown's left side as Brown was running away from the police vehicle. The witness might remark that he saw Brown's footwear fall off, right before Brown disappeared from his view. The witness might remark that his apartment was on the building's second story. Analyzing such clues, the witnesses standpoint might be determined.

For example, the witness whom the Justice Department designated as Witness 129 and whom I designated as Stairwell Man was sitting in the stairwell outside his apartment, which faced a parking lot. The released transcript whited-out his name, his address on Canfield Drive, and a location description (which floor? facing which direction, etc.).

When he heard noise on Canfield Drive, he looked out from the stairwell. He could see some moments of the incident but could not see other moments, because another building blocked some of his view. Based on the moments when he saw Brown's footwear fall off and when he saw Brown and Wilson disappear from his view, I deduced that Stairwell Man was sitting in this location:

Stairwell Man could see Brown and Wilson at some moments
but could not see them at other moments, so Stairwell Man's
location can be deduced. 

Suppose that the Brown family's lawyers identify and re-question Stairwell Man. He already has been recorded telling police investigators that he could not see either Brown or Wilson during the fatal shots, because his view of both was blocked by the neighboring building. So he will not be able to provide new insight into the fatal moments.

Rather, Stairwell Man might surface considerations that the Brown family's lawyers would prefer to remain ignored. For example, Stairwell Man told the grand jury that a white car turned around and approached the police vehicle where Brown and Wilson were arguing. That remark of Stairwell Man's was ignored during the grand-jury questioning. That remark might open a can of worms for the Brown family's lawyers in a civil trial. After all, Dorian Johnson jumped into a nearby white car during the incident.

Having studied the available testimony, I fell certain that re-questioning witness and clarifying their statements will hurt the Brown family's argument much more than help it. More, better information works to the Brown family's detriment.

A civil trial would end in defeat for the Brown family, but the trial would cost the Ferguson city government a lot of money and more controversy. The Brown family's various legal procedures to identify and re-question witnesses aggravate the nuisances and so motivate a settlement.

Besides, if the Ferguson government gives a huge amount of money to the Brown family, the Obama Administration will compensate the Ferguson government by awarding that much more federal aide to the city. The Obama Administration always is looking for clever ways to give money to African-Americans with bogus complaints, and this would be another opportunity to do so.

-----

Because the full transcripts are being released to the Brown family's lawyers, I suggest that the District Attorney's office should be open to adjusting some of its decisions about text that was whited-out. For example, the Stairwell Man transcript might continue to white-out his precise address, but an annotation might confirm that he lived in Building 3.

False Accusations of Racist Crimes

Many of the people who believed the false accusations in the Ferguson incident were insufficiently skeptical. The story was unlikely -- that a police officer repeatedly and fatally shot, in the middle of a busy residential street and in broad daylight, a person standing still and raising his hands and trying to surrender. The story was possible, but it was unlikely. The proper attitude toward the story would have been skepticism.

On the other hand, many people argued that it was unlikely that three witnesses -- Dorian Johnson, Piaget Crenshaw and Tiffany Mitchell -- would conspire to tell a false story in the mass media. Therefore, the proper attitude toward police officer Darren Wilson's story was skepticism. That argument too is valid.

Since, however, it turned out that the lies were told by those three African-American "witnesses", not by Wilson, the lessons from this particular incident revolve around the skepticism that should be directed toward racism accusations. It does happen often that racism accusations are lies.

The Fake Hate Crimes website provides a list of hundreds of racism accusations that turned out to be hoaxes. In general, same people concoct racist incidents that did not happen.

In the case of Michael Brown, a fatal incident did happen, but the incident was distorted deceitfully by liars who insinuated in the mass media that the death was a racist murder. This hoax launched a months-long orgy of racism accusations. Millions of liberal zealots of all colors hysterically hurled daily racism accusations against normal people who expressed any skepticism about the unlikely story of Michael Brown being murdered while trying to surrender.

Fortunately, the many Black and half-Black witnesses who actually did see the incident testified truthfully and ultimately exonerated Wilson.

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As I write this article, the most recent hoax listed (#217) in the Fake Hate Crimes website is an accusation that three African-American female university students -- Ariel Agudio, Asha Burwell and Alexis Briggs -- ere subjected to a racist attack on a public bus in Albany, New York. No such attack happened.

Fortunately, the three liars have been arrested and charged for concocting this racism hoax. Here are photographs of them in handcuffs.

Ariel Agudio, Asha Burwell and Alexis Briggs,
arrested and charged for a racism hoax in Albany, New York

The racism lies were told mainly by Burwell but were confirmed falsely by Agudio and Briggs. As in the Ferguson incident, the collaboration of thee witnesses in telling a false story can convince many people in the public -- especially political liberals of all colors who believe racism accusations reflexively.

In this yarn about supposedly rampant racism in Albany, New York, the three African-American female students got onto a public bus and were attacked physically by a mob of White racist university students. Fortunately, however, several cameras on the bus filmed the incident and eventually showed that Burwell herself was the racist attacker. Furthermore, police investigators were able to interview many people on the bus, confirming the racism hoax.

Liberal White students who had been inclined to believe the racism accusations were dismayed when the truth was revealed and the three liars were arrested. For example The New York Times reported:

.... Many of their peers, however, saw the videos and charges as evidence of betrayal. 

“It’s disappointing and saddening that somebody who seemed to be trying to help the movement would be the one to set it back,” said Lauren Hospedales, a freshman, referring to Ms. Burwell. She said she was worried that “it’ll be harder for people to believe and support” minority women in similar situations in the future. .... 

Yet already, students said, their classmates — on Twitter, on the anonymous bulletin-board app Yik Yak and in passing remarks — had turned from conversations about discrimination and diversity to snickering about what they saw as the young women’s lies.

“I feel like they kind of messed it up for the rest of us,” Olivia Bishop, a junior, said on Tuesday. “It’s like, I stood up for you, and now to figure out that you wanted this whole thing to be a hoax, it’s disappointing. It’s just honestly the saddest thing in the world.”

Perhaps the severest and most righteous public denunciation of the three liars was made by an African-American in this video. Unfortunately, I do not know his name.

Beginning at about 1:10 we see an elderly African-American woman, Alice Green, respected in Albany for her Civil Rights activities, who was allowed to watch the bus’s video before the public was allowed to watch it. Ms. Green reports in a televised interview that she did not see any attack by Whites on the three Black women.

Beginning at about 3:40, the unnamed Black commentator remarks that Asha Burwell, the apparent leader among the three Hillary Youths, has a brother who is an NFL professional football player. Burwell’s brother was so upset by her accusation that he came to Albany and threatened the White student who allegedly hit her. Subsequently, that White student became so frightened that he fled the school and went into hiding. (This indicates to me that Burwell knew and had a gripe with this particular White student before she hit him on the bus.)

The black commentator remarks that not only was this White student terrorized, but Asha’s brother risked his career as a professional football player by becoming involved violently in Asha's racism hoax.

Beginning at about 8:55, the Black commentator mentions that the Albany University’s president interrupted his vacation and returned to Albany to deal with this racism hoax.

It will be interesting to see whether the University president will initiate any disciplinary measures against student Asha Burwell for creating a situation that caused a White student to flee the school and to go into hiding. After all, universities should be safe places for all students.

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The below video includes all of Burwell's telephone conversations with the 911 dispatchers.

Listening to those conversations, I was impressed mostly by Burwell's inability to describe the alleged incident. Essentially, she reported that the three women were “jumped” because they were Black. Beyond that core allegation, Burwell was not able to describe the incident to the 911 dispatchers.

Burwell's story lacked any sequence of events, any circumstances, any details about the participants.

As I have been researching this blog about the Ferguson incident, I have read dozens of transcripts of interviews of witnesses. Some of the witnesses were police patrolmen and investigators, and their statements all are cogent. Most of the witnesses, however, were ordinary, random by-standers who happened to see some of the incident.

Most of those by-stander witnesses were inarticulate. Their statements were ungrammatical, non-sequential, incoherent, confusing.

Most of those Ferguson by-stander witnesses apparently had poor intelligence and education, and so it’s understandable that they had difficulty describing what they unexpectedly saw.

In contrast, in the Albany incident, the "witnesses" were university students. They too were unable to describe the incident intelligently, even though they were central participants.

Listening to the 911 calls on the above video, I noticed a couple of other aspects.

First, the callers were hyper-critical of authorities. The callers were angry that police did not appear at the bus immediately to investigate and punish the racist villains.

Second, the callers repeatedly threatened to inform the mass media if the 911 calls did not cause police to appear immediately to investigate and punish the racist villains.

These two aspects of the Albany incident reminded me of the Ferguson incident, where likewise many neighborhood residents were hypercritical of police officials and investigators. The neighborhood residents saw their main defenders in the mass media.

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Update (May 7, 2016): 

As a consequence of their race-baiting hoax, the University at Albany has expelled Burwell and Agudio from the student body and has suspended Briggs for two years. A local newspaper, the Times Union, reported:

The decision to dismiss the students came through a student conduct board, which is separate from the criminal justice system. A hearing before a student conduct board is scheduled when a student is facing suspension, dismissal, removal from residence or at the discretion of an administrator. 

The three did not appear for their scheduled student conduct board hearing March 9, as their lawyers cited a conflict of interest in which UAlbany served as judge in the board hearings and witness in the criminal case. 

In their absence, only two witnesses spoke at the hearing, according to a confidential letter recapping the hearing. 

One witness was Inspector Paul Burlingame of the University Police Department, who cited video, audio, witness interviews, and more than 300 hours of investigation as he testified to the board that the three women started the fight. 

"There is absolutely no evidence which supports Ms. Burwell's version of events that the incident was precipitated by a female passenger hitting Ms. Burwell while Ms. Burwell was seated," Burlingame said, "and in fact, there is no video evidence showing Ms. Burwell being struck by anyone at all." 

Because the incident was first reported as a hate crime, Burlingame testified that victims of the assault did not come forward at first as they feared for their safety. 

Only when they learned there was video of the incident did they reach out, Burlingame said. 

Two students withdrew from school due to the incident, Burlingame testified at the hearing. 

"One of the female victims," Burlingame said, "withdrew out of concern for her physical safety." 

Burlingame said another student withdrew, "having been the target of threats made on social media because of the false reports made by (the women) of his having participated in an alleged hate crime. ... 

The only other witness at the hearing was by Joseph Brennan, a UAlbany vice president of communications and marketing, who testified that the school suffered "reputational harm" as a result of the conduct of the three women. 

Brennan testified that the women's actions impacted the school's recruiting and created a disruption that exceeded that of "floods, hurricanes, power outages and fatalities" he had encountered in his 25-year career. He said UAlbany has already received notifications from families that they would not send their children to "such a place" and that his office has had to cancel production of a fundraising video and a social media campaign as a result of the three women's actions. ...

.

Blacks are more likely to be shot by police because they resist arrest

African-Americans are much more likely than other ethnic groups to be shot by police officers because African-American are much more likely to resist arrest. For example, in San Francisco, African-Americans resist arrest about eight times more frequently than Whites, according to an article written by Emily Greeen, titled "African Americans cited for resisting arrest at high rate in S.F." and published by SFGate:

African Americans in San Francisco are cited for resisting arrest at a rate eight times greater than whites even when serious crimes are not involved, according to statistics drawn from court records. 

From January 2010 to April 24 of this year, law enforcement officers cited suspects with resisting arrest 9,633 times in cases where the suspect was not charged with a felony. African Americans accounted for 45 percent of those cited, even though they make up just 6 percent of the city’s population. 

The statistics are drawn from San Francisco’s case management system, which tracks court cases in the city. They include arrests made by all law enforcement agencies that operate in San Francisco, including the police and sheriff’s departments. ....

Whites, who make up roughly half of San Francisco’s population, made up 39 percent of those cited for resisting arrest. Asian Americans, who make up roughly a third of the population, accounted for just 3 percent of those cited for resisting arrest. Latinos are not broken out as a separate demographic and instead are generally included among whites. .... 

“Any person who has contact with the police should cooperate, regardless if they believe they are in the right or not,” [Police Department spokesman Officer Albie] Esparza wrote in an e-mail. “When anyone does not listen to order and resist police efforts ... those individuals will be held accountable for their actions regardless of age, race, creed, religion, gender, etc. .... 

In San Francisco, racial disparities in arrest rates are commonplace. African Americans made up 47 percent of all people arrested by San Francisco police from 2009 to 2014, according to department statistics. ... 

Of course, apologists for African-Americans who resist arrest argue perversely that such statistics prove merely that police officers harass African-Americans disproportionately. To read a lot of such sophistry, read the entire article.

Outside of San Francisco -- everywhere in the USA -- African-Americans disproportionately commit crimes and resist arrest. Because of these two factors -- 1) committing crimes and 2) resisting arrest -- African-Americans are extraordinarily likely to be shot by police officers.

Michael Brown was just one example of this ubiquitous phenomenon. Brown, a few minutes after committing a strong-armed robbery, was stopped by a police officer. Brown punched the officer in the face and tried to grab the officer's pistol. Then Brow ran away. Then Brown turned around and charged at least 16 yards toward the police officer, trying again to grab his pistol. As a consequence, Brown was shot dead by the police officer.

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American Rennaissance magazine recently published an article written by Edwin S. Rubenstein and titled "The Color of Crime, 2016 Revised Edition", about racial differences in criminality. A small part of this article addresses the issue of police officers shooting Black people. The article's executive summary includes the following findings:

* In 2015, a black person was 2.45 times more likely than a white person to be shot and killed by the police. A Hispanic person was 1.21 times more likely. These figures are well within what would be expected given race differences in crime rates and likelihood to resist arrest. 

* In 2015, police killings of blacks accounted for approximately 4 percent of homicides of blacks. Police killings of unarmed blacks accounted for approximately 0.6 percent of homicides of blacks. The overwhelming majority of black homicide victims (93 percent from 1980 to 2008) were killed by blacks.

Rubenstein is the president of a company called ESR Research. He has worked as a senior economist at W.R. Grace & Co., and as research director at the Hudson Institute. His articles have appeared in Harvard Business Review, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Investor’s Business Daily. He is the author of two books: The Right Data and From the Empire State to the Vampire State: New York in a Downward Transition.

In his article's part about police officers shooting Black people, Rubenstein wrote (emphasis added):

... the Washington Post investigated every reported case of a fatal shooting by the police during 2015. It found 990 cases, with the following racial distribution of victims: 

     White: 50.0 percent (495 victims) 

     Black: 26.1 percent (258) 

     Hispanic: 17.4 percent (172) 

     Asian: 1.4 percent (14) 

     Other/Unknown: 5.2 percent (51) 

Given their proportions in the population, a black person was 2.45 times more likely than a white person to be shot and killed by police, a Hispanic was 1.24 times more likely, and an Asian was only one third as likely. It is reasonable to expect people of different races to find themselves in potentially lethal confrontations with the police in proportion to their likelihood to commit violent crime, with blacks most likely and Asians least likely. 

.... in California — a large state that keeps consistent statistics on race and ethnicity — blacks are arrested for violent crimes at 5.35 times the white rate, and Hispanics at 1.42 times the white rate. The low likelihood of Asians being killed by police is in keeping with low Asian arrest rates for violent crime. The black and Hispanic multiples for police shooting deaths are well within the arrest multiples — the black multiple is less than half — and certainly do not suggest undisciplined police violence. 

Moreover, FBI data show that from 2005 to 2014, blacks accounted for 40 percent of police killings. Since blacks were approximately 13 percent of the population, it meant they were 4.46 times more likely than people of other races to kill a police officer. ....

The Washington Post noted further that all but 93 of the 990 people fatally shot by police were armed, usually with a firearm or knife. The unarmed victims had the following racial distribution: 

     White: 34.4 percent (32 victims) 

     Black: 40.8 percent (38) 

     Hispanic: 19.4 percent (18) 

     Asian: 0 percent (0) 

     Unknown: 5.4 percent (5) 

An unarmed black was therefore 5.6 times more likely than an unarmed white to be shot by police, and a Hispanic was 2.6 times more likely. The black multiple is certainly high, though not that much higher than the California violent-arrest multiple of 5.35 noted above. ....

It may be that race differences in how suspects behave when they are arrested explain at least part of the difference. There are no national data, but a five-year study of non-felony arrests in San Francisco found that blacks were 9.6 times more likely than whites (including Hispanics) to be charged with resisting arrest, and whites were 8.6 times more likely than Asians to be so charged. In Chicago, from September 2014 to September 2015, blacks accounted for 77 percent of arrests for obstruction of justice and resisting arrest (page 4 of report), meaning they were 6.8 times more likely than non-blacks to be arrested on these charges. If these findings are typical, they help explain why the arrest of a black non-felony suspect — who would more than likely be unarmed — could escalate into potentially lethal violence. 

.... A 2015 Department of Justice study (page 3) of police shootings in Philadelphia found racial differences in “threat perception failure,” that is, cases in which an officer shot an unarmed suspect because the officer thought the suspect was armed. ..... 

Because African-Americans commit crimes disproportionately, they become engaged in hostile encounters with police officers disproportionately. Because African-Americans resist arrest disproportionately, they are shot by police officers disproportionately.

Trayvon Martin waited for darkness before casing homes to burglarize

I have interrupted this blog for several months because I have been busy with some personal business. In the meantime, I have been inserting four articles about the case of Trayvon Martin being killed by George Zimmerman in February 2012.

* The first article reported that Martin was paranoid because of his addiction to Purple Drank, an intoxicating concoction of codeine, juice and candy.

* The second article reported that Martin's addiction made him paranoid and belligerent.

* The third article reported that Martin paid for Purple Drank by burglarizing homes. 

This here is my fourth and final article in this series. Soon I will resume writing about the Ferguson incident. 

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On February 26, 2012, the day of Martin's death, the sky began dark in southern Florida at the following times:

* Sunset = 6:21 p.m.

* Civil twilight = 6:44 p.m.

* Nautical twilight = 7:11 p.m.

The sky was cloudy, and rain was falling. 

The expressions civil twilight and nautical twilight are defined as follows:

Civil twilight is defined when the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon. ....  in the evening it is called dusk.  

This is the limit at which twilight illumination is sufficient, under good weather conditions, for terrestrial objects to be clearly distinguished .... the horizon is clearly defined and the brightest stars are visible under good atmospheric conditions in the absence of moonlight or other illumination.  

.... in the evening after the end of civil twilight, artificial illumination is normally required to carry on ordinary outdoor activities. 

----- 

Nautical twilight is defined when the sun is 12 degrees below the horizon.  

At the ... end of nautical twilight, under good atmospheric conditions and in the absence of other illumination, general outlines of ground objects may be distinguishable, but detailed outdoor operations are not possible, and the horizon is indistinct.

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In order to make another mixture of Purple Drank, Martin walked to a store to buy Skittles candy and Arizona Watermelon Fruit Juice Cocktail, his favorite additives to the main codeine ingredient. 

The store's closed-circuit camera recorded him paying the cashier for the candy and juice at 6:24 p.m. 

Instead of walking directly home to make his Purple Drank, however, he waited until the sky became dark. 

First, he stayed right in front of the store and asked three men to buy him a cigar that he could use to make a marijuana blunt. (Martin was too young to buy the cigar himself.) By the time the three men bought the cigar and gave it to Martin and then he walked away from the store's front, the time had become 6:30. 

The distance from the store to the apartment complex was about a half-mile, so Martin could have reached the complex by about 6:40 -- a normal walking pace is three miles an hour, so a half-mile is ten minutes. 

However, Martin apparently found a nearby place, covered from the rain, and smoked his blunt for a half-hour. He did not enter the apartment complex until about 7:05 p.m. A few minutes later, Zimmerman saw Martin casing homes there to burglarize.  

The main reason why Martin dawdled for that half-hour was that he was waiting for the sky to turn dark enough for him to case homes without being seen. When Martin entered the apartment complex at 7:05, the sky was turning from civil twilight into nautical twilight. The sky turned dark a few minutes earlier than normal because of the clouds and rain   

Right after the sky turned dark and Martin entered the apartment complex, events developed as follows:

7:09:34 – 7:13:41 — George Zimmerman calls the Sanford Police Department from his truck.

7:11:33 — Zimmerman tells the police dispatcher that Trayvon Martin is running. .....

7:13:10 — Zimmerman says he does not know Martin's location.

7:13:41 — The end of Zimmerman's call to Sanford police.

7:16:11 — First 911 call from witness about a fight, calls for help heard.[16]

7:16:55 — Gunshot heard on 911 call.

Because Martin was addicted to Purple Drank, he was chronically paranoid, and he attacked Zimmerman murderously. Fortunately, however, Zimmerman was armed and was able to shoot Martin in self-defense. 

Trayvon Martin paid for Purple Drank by burglarizing

I have interrupted this blog for several months because I have been busy with some personal business. In the meantime, I am inserting four articles about the case of Trayvon Martin being killed by George Zimmerman in February 2012. In the first of the four articles, I described Martin's addiction to Purple Drank, an intoxicating concoction of codeine, juice and candy.

The most expensive ingredient was Promethazine Codeine. The cash price for a 240-millimeter bottle was around $23. The juice and candy to accompany such a bottle would raise the cost to, say, $30. So, sipping Purple Drank all day, every day, is a habit that costs some money.

Martin was a high-school student who did not have a known wage-earning job. Martin earned money by burglarizing homes. In late October 2011 -- the exact date is unknown -- he was detained because he had vandalized lockers in a restricted room in his high school. The School Resource Officer searched Martin's backpack and found at least 12 items of ladies jewelry, a man’s watch, and a flat-head screwdriver described as “a burglary tool”.

When Trayvon was questioned about who owned the jewelry and where it came from, he claimed he was just holding it for a “friend”, whom he would not name.

On October 21 -- before Martin was detained in the school -- a home was burglarized a few blocks from the high school. The items found in Martin's backpack, as described in School Police Report 2011-11477, match the items stolen from the home, as described in Miami-Dade Police Report PD111021-422483. The below image shows that the locations of the burglarized home and Martin's high school.

The red star is the location of Trayvon Martin's high school
The red line indicates the home that Martin burglarized.
The image can be seen at a larger size here. 

However, because the school district was trying to minimize the disciplining of African-American students, the school police report was not forwarded to the local police department. Instead, the items in Martin's backpack were classified as merely "found items" and were placed in a lost-and-found property room.

After Martin was killed in February 2012, the incident involving his backpack was investigated and was revealed to the public. Eventually the items found in Martin's backpack were located in the property room and returned to the family whose home had been burglarized.

This story is told in much more detail in this Conservative Tree House webpage.

My key points:

* Trayvon Martin was addicted to Purple Drank, a codeine concoction.

* One consequence of his addiction was that he became paranoid, which made him belligerent.

* Another consequence of his addiction was that he burglarized homes in order to earn the money to buy the Purple Drank ingredients.

* The final consequence of his addiction was his paranoia and belligerence caused him to attack George Zimmerman, who had noticed him casing homes to burglarize.