Racist Killing and Impunity 289


A social culture where perception of others is not conditioned by skin tone is obtainable. In the process of getting there, a system of law with no impunity for racism and with exemplary punishment for agents of the state in contravention is essential.

A court will judge whether there was intent to kill George Floyd; what is absolutely apparent is there was certainly no intent by the police to preserve his life or health. It is also plain that the force used was wildly disproportionate for the alleged offence. It is further undeniable that police violence in the USA impacts particularly on black people, and that in dealing with black people the police act with an arrogance founded on anticipated impunity. The societal change whereby the majority of adults have camera phones at the ready has given a new power of resistance to the public in this regard. That must be reinforced by exemplary sentencing.

The law currently takes the opposite approach:

If a police officer unlawfully harms a citizen, the officer is subject to assault or homicide charges—no different than if the officer committed these crimes off duty. [2] However, if a citizen unlawfully harms a police officer, the citizen is automatically subject to aggravated assault or aggravated homicide charges, which carry more severe punishment. [3] In fact, some states make the intentional killing of an on-duty officer a capital offense. [4] Enhanced charges in police encounters are thus asymmetrical. They only apply if a citizen harms an officer but not if an officer harms a citizen.

Police who kill in the course of their duties are given every latitude by the courts and far lower sentences than others who kill. That attitude needs to reverse. Police need to understand that their duty to protect and deal fairly embraces both the alleged victim and the alleged criminal. Breach of this public duty to protect should be an aggravating factor when the police kill, and sentences should be stiffer than for the general public. There are moments in public discourse where you need to come down off the fence and decide which side you are on; I am on the side of Black Lives Matter.

Here are two murdered men who have even less chance of receiving justice than George Floyd.

There is a stark contrast between the justified international outrage at Floyd’s death, and the unremarked killing of just a couple more Palestinians. I recommend this twitter thread by the ever excellent Ben White, and the links it gives. Ben does not mention that Iyad, on the left, was on his way to classes for those with special needs when he was chased and gunned down by Israeli soldiers.

This may surprise you. The police in the USA have less impunity for killings than the police in the UK.

Even as straightforward a case as the murder of Jean Charles De Menezes, who did nothing wrong whatsoever, brought no action against the police in the UK. The killing of Sheku Bayoh in Fife had obvious parallels with that of George Floyd, yet nobody was charged. 457 people have died in police custody since 1998, from all causes. From 2005-2015 10% of 294 deaths were “restraint related”. That is 30 people in the UK in ten years who have died at the hands of police in much the same way George Floyd died. That figure excludes those shot by the police.

Not one British policeman has been convicted of an unlawful killing in all these deaths. – not one. The last British policeman convicted was in 1969. That is what I call real impunity.

Source: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/655710/Deaths_in_police_custody_A_review_of_the_international_evidence.pdf

And that is without examining the similar impunity enjoyed even by private contractors in the UK responsible for the many deaths in the prison system and in immigration detention.

Impunity is a major problem all round the world, and everywhere it enables disproportionate use of state violence against minorities. But it is most sinister in a state like the United Kingdom, where the support of the prosecutorial and judicial institutions of the state for those who enforce the state’s monopoly of violence is absolute, and where the public are so conditioned to the power of the state they do not even notice the impunity.

The United Kingdom is full of people, right now, looking at the images of unrest from the USA and telling each other that the way the police kill black people in the USA is terrible. We do not process that in the UK law enforcement officers enjoy still greater impunity than in the USA.

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289 thoughts on “Racist Killing and Impunity

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  • Stephen Cowley

    Most America blacks are killed by other blacks. If you take the police out of the equation, that is likely to increase.

    • Vivian O'Blivion

      Oh well that’s alright then. If a few dozen unarmed black folks are strangled or shot in the back per year, we’ll put that down to collateral damage.
      Twat!

        • Piotr+Berman

          Statistics in the National Review can be misleading. The simplest method would be to count sentences for the killing, and since policemen are never sentenced, they contribute a fat zero to that statistic. Then there is a disparity in the methodology of sentencing. A large number of people sentenced in USA are framed, and for that there are several methods, the most widely used are “jail house confessions”, jailed people telling tall stories of confessions in exchange for dropped or reduced sentences for their crimes. Those approaches are directed predominantly at poor people who cannot afford adequate defenders, especially poor members of minorities.

          • Spencer Eagle

            94 percent is a very significant and provable figure, perhaps you could point us towards the figures for the number convicted murderers who are ‘framed’? I’d be very surprised if it was 0.001 percent of that 94 percent. It is of course a lot higher in movies and the A-Team.

        • Red Corvair

          Yes, the meme is hard is hard to kill. And it seems really hard for people to understand why the crime figures are so high in that community. How come there are so many black and brown people in the … 2.3 million inmates (!!) of the US prison system? It’s not in their genes, it’s in the system. We should know it by now. Maybe this other figure should help: 94% of those in prison never appeared before a judge! And while they’re not worth a dollar in the street they become worth thousands in the private prison system. Slavery is well and alive in the US.
          And why should so many poor US neighborhoods have a life expectancy worse than the level of the poorest countries while in the rich neighborhood a few miles apart people are horrified to think they may ever die before the pill that gives you eternal life comes on the market?
          Here’s a black American who made a killing and is now celebrated in a too-well-known white American way: Michael Jordan’s “Last Dance:” A Celebration of the American Nightmare: https://www.blackagendareport.com/michael-jordans-last-dance-celebration-american-nightmare

          But let’s not forget Craig Murray points here mainly at Britain in this article, where the figure of condemnation of policemen who killed in duty is … Nil! Zilch! Zero condemnation! The UK is (wrongly) known around the planet, however, as an exemplary justice system! The “Magna Carta country”! Don’t let UK’s most famous political prisoner Julian Assange (and the British citizens) ever forget it! And watch how Scotland recently tried to do away with the citizens’ juries! It is high time the citizens woke up to stop the authoritarian slippery slope.

        • Ian

          Of course ‘black on black’ crime is real. You say it as if there is no such thing as white on white crime, which is broadly comparable 83% v 90% in 2016. The discrepancy is easily explained by the socio-economic circumstances that black Americans are consigned to. So what is your point. There are crimes committed by both black and white people. Well, hold the press.
          Spare us the crocodile tears. Violence isn’t the only marker of racism, which is deeply ingrained across all sectors of the US, and given rocket boosters by Trump. The faux concern by whites who eagerly bring up ‘black on black’ crime as if it is proof of anything at all is just a racist meme – deliberately giving the false impression that black violence is somehow worse, that it is their fault, and that racism can’t possibly be to blame for their treatment by white officialdom like the police. It is a complete diversion, and makes no sense unless you include stats for white on white crime, which of course, although comparable, is never held to indicate how violent whites are. Just look at school shootings -white crime; US terrorism (McVeigh etc) -white crime. Where are the crocodile tears for the poor violent whites?

          • pretzelattack

            to an above poster, look up project innocence. we don’t know how many people have been framed, because the framers who control the courts and the police aren’t eager to tell us. it’s been a concern for years, and significant percentages of people convicted have been exonerated.

          • Yalt

            80% of murder victims knew their killers. 15% were relatives, more than half were sexually or romantically involved with them. In a society as deeply segregated as the US it’s little wonder that the killers and victims tend to be of the same race.

            (Data’s from a US DOJ study of prosecuted murder cases.)

    • Jack

      Relating to black on black issue,
      “A more recent study was conducted by Michigan State University and the University of Maryland, compiling a list of more than 900 fatal U.S. police shootings in 2015 using crowdsourced databases from The Washington Post and The Guardian.[1] Then, they asked police departments for information about the race of the officers responsible for the shootings. They found black police were more likely to kill black civilians than white civilians. However, the same held true for white and Hispanic officers: ”
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_bias

      • Ian

        “A study carried out at the University of California found “evidence of a significant bias in the killing of unarmed black Americans compared to unarmed white Americans”.[1] In this study, the probability of being shot by the police as a black, unarmed person versus as a white, unarmed person was 3.49 times higher. Unarmed Hispanics’ likelihood to be shot was 1.67 times higher than for unarmed Whites.”
        Choose your quotes.
        Such a confused article, with so many caveats, it doesn’t amount to anything.

  • Mary

    The dangerous situation now existing in the US was not helped, and actually inflamed, by the blond buffoon’s tweet –

    .’These THUGS are dishonoring the memory of George Floyd, and I won’t let that happen. Just spoke to Governor Tim Walz and told him that the Military is with him all the way. Any difficulty and we will assume control but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts. Thank you!’
    5:53 am · 29 May 2020′

    Twitter have concealed it. Now he’s after Twitter.

  • Mary

    I notice that there is no category on that graph for ‘Death following the use of Taser’. There must be very many.

    Taser use by police in England and Wales reaches record high
    20 December 2019
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-50862398

    ‘However, Taser use remains controversial. According to Amnesty International, 18 people in the UK have died after a Taser was discharged against them by police since the device was introduced 16 years ago.

    Oliver Feeley-Sprague, Amnesty UK’s police and security programme director, said: “A large number of officers fail the Taser training course, either in the proficiency of using it or their judgement about when to use it. This demonstrates very clearly that a Taser is not suitable for every officer.”‘

    • Spencer Eagle

      If we recall the ACPO petitioned the Home Office for the introduction of the taser as a means of ‘last ditch defence against armed individuals’. They are presently being widely used as a means of gaining compliance through threat, not for defence, indeed the number of taser discharges within the walls of police stations has risen year on year. It is now being used routinely as a means of punishment and torture. Even the manufacturer describes it as ‘less lethal’ not ‘non lethal’.

      • Kirt

        It’s all about control by the Police.
        The profile of police officer is a school bully. There are no academic qualifications required these days.
        You give the police the tools or laws and they get manipulated against the population. Bring back Dixon.

  • John+A

    The official autopsy report is almost identical to that of the unfortunate newspaper vendor in London a few years ago who was knocked to the ground by a bullying policeman and subsequently died. Apparently Floyd had underlying heart problems, possible intoxicating substances in body and no signs of strangulation. Obviously he was at death’s door anyway, nothing to do with how he was mistreated by the police. Move on, as Boris would say…

    • bevin

      It is noteworthy that both this case and the de Menzeres killing to which Craig alludes, were referred to the DPP who decided against prosecuting any of the police involved.
      And that now that DPP, Keir Starmer is the leader of the Opposition. In Minnesota the former prosecutor is now a Senator and a potential candidate for the Vice Presidency, she too shot to prominence by refusing to prosecute police for murder while ensuring the imprisonment of as many blacks-including some who were notoriously not guilty- as she could. Not coincidentally one of the police officer/murderers she did not prosecute after a civilian was killed was Derek Chauvin, who appears to have been the killer of Floyd.
      Centrist politicians specialise in simultaneously embracing vaguely liberal causes and the practical implementation of the most callous and racist measures- attacking Iraq, for example, or Libya, or Syria, or Yemen. And making sure that the military units involved contain enough women, openly gay men or transsexuals to satisfy the ‘left.’

      • Kempe

        Simon Harwood, the uniformed thug who pushed Ian Tomlinson to the ground from behind, was tried for manslaughter but acquitted. Too often officers who are brought to trial get let off which is something else that needs investigating.

        The De Menzes inquest returned an open verdict which let the police off the hook. The obviously biased coroner told the jury in advance that he would not accept a verdict of unlawful killing.

        In both instances it’s notable that the police lied and lied to try and cover themselves.

    • Peter+M

      “Obviously he was at death’s door anyway, nothing to do with how he was mistreated by the police”.

      I have seen the more complete version of the video on CGTN and very clearly it shows the man was obviously incapacitated, unable to walk and stand, incoherent in speech (try to understand the words uttered when the considerate officer helped him to rest on the ground) before the same officer released him with from this earthly vale of tears. A good deed done by an obvious ex Scout.Why let the man suffer any further. Three cheers for Mr. Chauvin.
      Funny that name, add an ist to it and it fits amazingly….

      • Piotr+Berman

        chauvinist, etymology: late 19th century: named after Nicolas Chauvin, a Napoleonic veteran noted for his extreme patriotism, popularized as a character by the Cogniard brothers in Cocarde Tricolore (1831). The figure of Chauvin continues the long tradition of the mythological farmer-soldier or miles gloriosus (“boastful soldier”) from ancient Roman theater, and probably was just a stock character in vaudevilles etc.

    • Spencer Eagle

      Yes, Ian Tomlinson, the only person in the history of medical science to die from a ruptured spleen as a result of a light fall onto a flat surface. His injuries were consistent with having had the pointed end of a police baton violently thrust into his back, you can see his murderer adopting a stance necessary for this type of attack in the footage.

    • karel

      Those doing the autopsy should have looked for traces of fresh novichok. It is highly likely that Floyd took sniff of it just before being arrested.

      • Shatnersrug

        Funnily enough the pathologist in the case of Ian Tomlinson was the very same man who when confronted with a woman dead from cuts and bruises to her head Locked in the back room of a council flat in Camden Town decided that it was again clearly a case of natural cause. It was later discovered she was the first victim of the Camden ripper. Was Freddy Patel MD incompetent or was it simply that he could be trusted to return a verdict that the police required?

  • Republicofscotland

    I have an inkling that some US states police forces hire certain individuals for their aggressiveness, and of course they close rank when one of them goes too far.

    In Scotland the death of Sheku Bayoh is definitely suspect, Amir Anwar who represents the family has been trying for years to get a public inquiry into his death, again the police and their enablers close ranks to protect their own. The Scottish version of the Orgreave scandal which has somewhat slipped under the limelight, also leads me to believe that Police Scotland like the RUC now the PSNI, are subservient to England Met force.

    • Spencer Eagle

      The US is the same as the UK, large numbers of police are recruited from the armed forces. Preconditioned desensitized to acts of violence and in full acceptance of gang rules means they are ideal for the job.

      • CasualObserver

        You’ll find that former service is no longer a shoo in for joining the police either here or in the USA. These days they want degree educated people, which is odd considering that 99% of police work is dealing with maybe 15% of the population who are basically too stupid to live their lives without negatively impinging on the lives of others.

        We are relatively lucky in the UK in that standards relating to police recruitment and behaviour are streets ahead of those ‘Enjoyed’ by the Yanks. And the Twin Cities does have what seems to be an appallingly bad record on police standards, remember that Aussie woman who was shot by a City policeman a while back ?

        Then of course there’s the record of this Floyd chap, from what’s emerging he does seem unlikely icon material, and certainly he had enough contact with the legal system, and police, to know that American Coppers wont take but a fraction of of the abuse that a British Bobby will take, before exercising force.

    • Stevie Boy

      I believe a number of US Police forces are provided with training by Israeli specialists – I wonder if the same is true in the UK ?

      • Spencer Eagle

        Yes, just like all good paramilitary organisations the British police are constantly sharing ‘expertise’ with military, police and spooks from around the world, and of course homegrown psycho’s such the SAS. Ironically, as part of their exculpatory evidence to the De Menzes inquiry, the Met used the excuse of having trained with the Israeli anti terrorist units as the reason why they fired 11 shots into the head of an innocent man, whilst he was already restrained. The militarization of police in the UK is well and truly out of hand, it is no longer about upholding the law, it’s about suppressing the population. I have it on good authority that the Met has several ‘belt fed’ light machine guns in its inventory, most suitable for mowing down waves of charging North Koreans, but really intended to protect key London addresses from mobs.

    • Yalt

      Just to be clear, policing in the US is a municipal or township matter. Chauvin was hired by the City of Minneapolis, not the State of Minnesota.

      State police forces are typically only involved in highway patrol.

    • Herbie

      Yeahbut, that’s in a wee war kinda thing.

      Comparable with the Black Panther killings and other similar events.

      But here we’re talking about the number of people killed in the course of ordinary everyday policing.

      The RUC, for example, were fully armed from the foundation of the Northern state, but weren’t known for the killing of citizens in the course of their normal daily policing duties, even during the heights of the conflict in the North, when their colleagues were being murdered day and daily.

      Cops today, seem to have no real enemies.

      Perhaps they need an enemy.

      And all’s left I suppose. is any uppity member of the public who challenges their “authority”.

  • Michael+Droy

    Jean Charles De Menezes
    The woman in charge of that particular operation who would have been the person to order fire, was Cressida Dick. A certain end to any male officer’s career, or indeed any hetero-sexual’s. She advanced to the very top Police job Commissioner for the Met.

    • Mr V

      Not only the assertion that causing murder would do anything to career of most US/UK officers is laughably wrong, I have no idea what must be going in the mind of someone who equates males with heterosexuals and can’t even spell that word. Especially seeing that until recently the UK police made life of gays hell, much like black treatment in USA, certainly not celebrated them. Is this some sort of new dog whistle homophobia mixed with misogyny? Oh no, how dare women wander out of kitchen!

  • Glagaire

    “It is further undeniable that police violence in the USA impacts particularly on black people, and that in dealing with black people the police act with an arrogance founded on anticipated impunity.”

    I can’t agree with this, thus making the “undeniable” element immediately untrue. I think it would be far more accurate to say that the violence impacts more on poor people. You will find the same patterns of behaviour with respect to brutality and excessive force in areas of the USA with far higher majority white populations and in police districts with a far higher number of black officers. The abuse of force is a common element of police culture worldwide but it is shaped to some extent my the culture of the individual states and in the USA it embraces a particular concept of ‘fraternity’ that both endorses and protects such activity.

    This is not to say that racism is not an issue in the USA, however, I do suggest that the US media’s extreme focus on instances of police violence with black victims, and lack of coverage of incidents where white citizens are similarly abused, presents a skewed perception of the problem. In essence, it is Plato’s Republican class of Silvers, comfortable in the knowledge that as long as they uphold the Gold’s social hierarchy they will face no serious widespread reforms and only the most egregious cases (as now) will be punished on an individual basis.

  • J

    Worth noting that Minneapolis police (and many other metropolitan police forces) train with Israeli military and police, absorbing their methods and undoubtedly attitudes too.

      • Stephen+Ambartzakis

        Phil, you couldn’t be more wrong. The nuclear explosives were developed by South Africa and Israel supplied the delivery systems using American technology. By the way, the horrible practitioners of apartheid remain the only government ever to have voluntary destroyed their nuclear weapons. Makes you think, or should, anyway.

    • seydlitz

      I do not think the British state needs any training in police violence.Having acquired an empire it developed the art and skill to keep the plebs in line.

    • Herbie

      Yeah, that’s a problem.

      And I think they’re being trained in military methods rather than civilised policing methods.

      I doubt it’s the Israeli Police who are doing the training.

      No. One of the things Israel has proved exceptional at, is managing a large belligerent minority.

      I expect it’s this expertise is being sought.

  • Pyewacket

    In addition to deaths in Police custody, not necessarily directly involving a Police Officer, there’s also those who die as a result of road traffic accidents. Recently reported by the Guardian that 42 died in 2019, worse in a decade and up 13% on the previous year. I’ve never heard about the prosecution of these tragic incidents either.

    • pretzelattack

      i think a couple of cops were convicted for negligent homicide, letting a restrained prisoner bounce around in the back of a van as a form of entertainment or punishment (who knows?).

  • djm

    Inconveniently for the usual suspects on manoeuvres, George Floyd died of a heart complication complicated by intoxicants. The preliminary autopsy makes it clear he did NOT die of strangulation or asphyxiation.

    But that MUST mean the autopsy is racist …..

    • Spencer Eagle

      We all know coroners, no matter the country, piss in the same pot as the police do.

    • Ian

      No, it means the violence with which he was treated, completely unnecessarily, was fatal for him. Which is racist.

    • Jay

      Just fell down dead in other words, coincidentally on the very same day this incident occurred. Yep, highly unlikely that autopsy was racist.

      • Peter+M

        https://www.strangulationtraininginstitute.com/health-issues-result-from-strangulation/
        “A common but little understood abuse method is partial strangulation, and its long term effects are staggering.

        What most victims, and many professionals who deal with domestic violence every day, don’t know is that it can cause brain damage, pneumonitis, miscarriage, heart attacks, and delayed death, days or even weeks after the assault.”
        or here:
        https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4211813/
        “Strangulation describes the process whereby an external force is applied to the neck that results in a depressed or complete loss of consciousness….
        We report a case of a patient who was victim of manual strangulation and presented with ischemic stroke due to low cerebral blood flow. The hemodynamic mechanism is described and occurrence of brain injuries secondary to manual strangulation is discussed based on a literature review.”

        Funny, when someone complains of not getting air and becomes unconscious after 5 minutes that sounds to me there is a problem of supply with oxygen.
        But what do I know, I only studied some physiology and anatomy etc. and veterinary basics during my various studies to become a lab-tech for bio labs and later a BSc in agriculture.

    • Peter+M

      “The report, conducted by the Hennepin County Medical Examiner, states there were “no physical findings that support a diagnosis of traumatic asphyxia or strangulation”; however, the combined effects of being pinned down by an officer as well as “his underlying health conditions and any potential intoxicants in his system likely contributed to his death………..
      The report states Chauvin, who was arrested on third-degree murder and manslaughter charges Friday, kept his knee on Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, and nearly 3 minutes after Floyd became unresponsive”
      https://www.complex.com/life/2020/05/george-floyd-autopsy-underlying-health-conditions-likely-caused-death

      Now, the “potential intoxicants” sounds very much like the “highly likely” by UK gov. spokespeople or ex prim ministers reagrding incidents in the UK. What does |”potential” mean in this context? Like “potentially pregnant”?

      • Mr V

        It means, let me translate, “this black scum was drug junkie, good the street was cleaned by our excellent boys”. Same dog whistle as “her shirt was too short” in rape cases, classic victim blaming. Multiple actual experts were amazed at the speed of the “autopsy”, especially seeing drug tests take days, meaning that part was completely baseless even if we generously assume the victim used any (which he didn’t). As well as were shocked by complete inability to notice bruises and broken bones inevitably resulting from someone kneeling on your neck. That was not “autopsy”, that was racist hit piece made in minutes without even bothering to look at the body, too bad some idiots bought it…

  • James Cook

    Reminder Craig of what you have already stated:

    Violence and the State
    3 Dec, 2019 in Uncategorized by craig | View Comments
    The state rests its power on a monopoly of violence. Indeed, in the final analysis a state is nothing but a monopoly of violence…………

    Conditions have now/are been/being created for calculated authoritarian rule. Opportunities will not be wasted by “the state”.

  • Phil Williamson

    As this post mentions, the State demands a monopoly on violence; day-to-day, this is imposed by the police and the courts but the ‘court of last instance’ is the military.

    The US provides a unique ‘exception’ to this rule, however, in the form of the 2nd Amendment. 100 years before the formation of the first Communist parties in Europe, this legislation guaranteed the right of American citizens to bear arms and to organise themselves into a non-State controlled militia, i.e. a peoples’ army. Stated thus, the reactionary motives of anti-2nd Amendment “progressives” in the USA are revealed as having nothing to do with “saving lives” and everything to do with disempowering the working class and increasing the power of the State. Very “progressive”.

    In October 2012, Laura Spinney (https://www.lauraspinney.com/, https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=laura+spinney&btnG= and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Spinney), who has recently written a best-seller on the Spanish ‘flu pandemic (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pale-Rider-Spanish-Changed-World/dp/1784702404/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=laura+spinney&qid=1590845321&s=books&sr=1-1), wrote an interesting article in New Scientist on the civilising influence through history of an armed population: Lethal weapons and the evolution of civilisation (https://ronbarak.tumblr.com/post/34109415689/lethal-weapons-and-the-evolution-of-civilisation). It’s worth a few minutes of your time.

  • Jay

    Thanks for highlighting these salient facts amid acres of MSM gibber soaked in hypocrisy and wilful blindness.

    • Yr Hen Gof

      Indeed, it should also be recorded that the Metropolitan Police’s involvement in the murder of Daniel Morgan was worthy of more extensive public exposure. Their connivance with other corrupt police forces and Murdoch publications; further, the immediate employment by Murdoch of a man then said to be Britain’s most corrupt police officer – and where was he to be based: well, Israel of course.
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Daniel_Morgan
      The police were after all invented to protect the rich from the poor…

      • Herbie

        “The police were after all invented to protect the rich from the poor…”

        Aye, they were that.

        1822, in Ireland.

        All ready for the oul food shortage.

  • Jkick

    Looks staged in my opinion.

    A bus driving past, in the video of the alleged killing, with ‘open your eyes’ across the side, an image of George Floyd next to a Corona Light poster, rioting breaks out on E. 33rd Street, co-incidence?

    • J

      Staged as in a pre-arranged murder to deliberately spark race war or staged to mean the event was completely fake with ‘crisis actors’ and nobody was strangled to death on the street by a policeman?

      • Herbie

        Jkick.s version seems to be the latter combined with the former, but with real cops acting out a non-lethal drama, filmed by an actor, and George Floyd survives.

        They all get paid handsomely and quietly disappear to God knows where.

        Meantime their paymasters have ignited a Black/White Race war, in media at least.

        Complete fantasy, of course.

    • wonky

      I tend to agree. The victim and the policeman knew each other, too. Apparently they both were bouncers for the local ..masonic lodge (!! no kidding !!) and even had worked shifts together. Then there’s the two notorious Soros sponsored organisations “Black Lives Matter” and “Antifa”, responsible for most of the violent mayhem that ensued. It looks like a psyops/regime change operation by ye ole pre-Trump deep state. An attempt at an “American Spring”, so to speak. During Corona times, no less. Cynical? Well..

  • nevermind

    The nature of a special relationship so it seems is the retention of power and control in the western hemisphere and its countries.
    If we shut our eyes and think of a state that could represent an open fair and nondiscriminating Government, we would have nothing to do with the US, one would break up all relations and contracts with such a country that is deeply scarred by institutional racism at home, and externalised racism against Afro Americans, Africans, Muslims, Chinese and Russians world wide.
    My new normal would make a racist federal dictatorship US a persona non grata state. why should be back up such violence on a regular basis by giving these excesses our support in everything they do?

  • glenn_uk

    Better still, why not kick all the whites out. I’m pretty sure the people remaining three wouldn’t make such a mess of the place, and be such a menace to the rest of the world.

  • Republicofscotland

    As for Jean Charles de Menezes, Sir Keir Starmer (it makes a mockery out of Labour having an ennobled leader) who was the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) found that the gunmen, sorry I meant police officers who murdered him in cold blood, I meant neutralised him, had no case to answer to.

    That’s not the only policing scandal Starmers been involved in.

    https://www.thecanary.co/

    • Stevie Boy

      Socialism in the UK died when Corbyn was defeated and Starmer took charge. The Tories and Labour are just different cheeks of the same arse. Maybe it’s time for someone to start up a new political party as all the existing ones are contaminated in one way or another.

  • Stevie Boy

    It’s also the case that the US Police are provided with legal and financial support – something rarely available to their victims.

    • Spencer Eagle

      Just like British police they get another essential ingredient necessary to wriggle free of charges, time. In contrast with anyone else accused of committing a serious crime the police are unhindered when it comes to concocting and massaging their version of the events. Look at the death of Irene Collins of Middlesborough, she died four days after being savagely attacked by an out of control police dog that had entered her home in 2014. The police were given four years to concoct their version of events and in 2018 the Teesside coroner decided Mrs Collins had died of ‘natural causes’. The dog, which had previously bitten 10 other people prior to the incident, was destroyed.
      https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tees-45605943

  • Antiwar7

    It’s not a racial thing, it’s a police brutality thing. In the US, far too many cops are arrogant, brutal, and unprofessional. Not all cops, but too many. I knew a white guy who was beaten so bad after being handcuffed that he had permanent damage. And all he was doing was asking why they were beating up his friend. It was at a St Patricks Day parade. I’m white, and when I was 14 I was roughed up by white cops. When I asked why, the response was, “Shut the f*ck up or we’ll break your f*cking jaw”. They never explained or apologized, but I could hear from their dispatch radio that they suspected me of robbery.

  • Jack

    Nothing have proved that this particular police was a racist or that his intent was to kill this man, I think that discourse could be dropped right away, it only fuel the people setting america on fire now. That would not make sense since he was being filmed by bystanders and his own body camera would exposing him good. This police might be charged with manslaughter though.
    In the street CCTV footage that have been leaked show two other cops that are themselves belong to different minority groups.

    There was a black police man that killed a caucasian woman some years ago that got big headlines, that too had nothing to do with intent to murder, nor racism.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond

    Also
    Report: White police officers are not more likely to shoot minorities
    https://phys.org/news/2019-07-white-police-officers-minorities.html

  • Xavi

    From these comments you’d think you were just as likely to be killed by a cop in the US if you’re white.

    • Monster

      No US cops prefer to kill blacks, so there’s no need for any awkward questions or well funded legal claims. Incidentally, black on black killings is a specious argument concocted from within the deep state.

  • Tony M

    Consider your virtue, well and truly, loudly and clearly signalled, its not going to help with your present predicament, but it’s not intended to curry favour, you’ve long been like a moth to a flame, flailing helplessly against insoluble issues and problems, near and far. There should be panel-game, Have I Got a Cause For You?

    Degrading treatment is the rule in police custody. Self-harm, even suicide often results from the injustice of the arrest itself, of people if guilty of anything they were trying to correct a previous injustice or abuse of state power, infringement of their own, some close other’s or both’s rights. Quixotic acts that don’t go down well, righting certainly moral but also legal wrongs, where the legal part is a matter of opinion or of such terrible ill-law that ought never to have been, or interpreted by some in entirely imaginative new ways, that accrue them power. The law will never back down from a position, course of action once embarked on, even if forced out of inaction and into that course by some thrid person or agency with malign motivations and intent backed by falsehoods, and they’ll deny any wrong resulting till the end of time, even if they were just the supporting cast and implict threat of force, and some are more equal before the law than others. That we have all lived in a police-state for some time (and I’m not referring to the the present Corona-Affair), across the UK, is undeniable.

  • FranzB

    A film worth seeing re racism in the USA is ‘I am not your negro’ which is about James Baldwin

    At one point Baldwin says when talking about racism that he is not so much concerned about black people but more about white people and the USA as a whole if the issue of white racism isn’t addressed.

    One remarkable scene is when he addresses the Oxford Union. When he finishes, all of those present give him a standing ovation. Much to his surprise.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ol9Tf39jh8

  • Tony M

    Not all our police are bad but there are some animals kept in a corner, thrown some meat from time to time, who can be called upon to dish some some gratuitous violence, who’ll go the limit and at times beyond it, even if the arrest-victim has shown no sign of non-compliance, to impart the lesson, whilst others keep their hands cleanish and consciences relatively untroubled, who look on as if they weren’t actually there, but enjoy the spectacle all the same and will deny what they’ve seen afterwards. No less guilty, but decent in most other respects.

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