Thursday, November 17, 2016

Minnesota officer charged

Police officer charged in fatal shooting of Philando Castile
"No reasonable officer would have used deadly force under these circumstances," prosecutor John Choi said in announcing the three charges against officer Jeronimo Yanez.


Philando Castile’s fatal encounter last July with St. Anthony police Officer Jeronimo Yanez lasted only a minute, but quickly escalated from a “respectful and compliant” exchange to one steeped in confusion and fear.
In an extraordinary move by a Minnesota prosecutor, authorities said the officer, not the civilian, is to blame for the tragic events that turned a traffic stop in a Twin Cities suburb into a flash point in the national debate over racial profiling and police use of force.
Before Yanez, no officer had been charged in more than 150 police-involved deaths in Minnesota since 2000.

Yanez (Hispanic) is expected to plead not guilty. I believe that the prosecutor in this case may have his hands full getting twelve people to agree with the notion that he gave Yanez every benefit of the doubt and concluded that his actions were completely and unequivocally unreasonable.

This is one of those cases where many of the facts are not going to be in dispute. Both parties will stipulate to the fact that Castile was shot and killed by Yanez. Both will stipulate that Castile was carrying a gun. Both will stipulate that he had a permit.

The trouble is that this is not a black and white case of violating the law. Police officers are legally allowed to discharge their firearm under circumstances where they feel there is danger.  At the heart of the matter is the state of mind of the police officer at the time. The police officer will suggest that he felt there was imminent danger for him or possibly for others, and that his shooting was based off of this belief. The prosecutor first must disprove Yanez's suggestion he felt danger, which seems a daunting task to disprove someone's state of mind.

Using the "Hillary Clinton Standard" the prosecutor must also prove that Yanez was not only fully aware that his actions were in violation of the law, but that his actions carried "malicious intent". Otherwise, the "no reasonable officer would have shot" rhetoric... would be replaced by "no reasonable prosecutor would bring charges" rhetoric.

1 comment:

wphamilton said...

CHT, the "Clinton standard" is only valid as far as the Justice Department directs in specific investigations. I think we all know that, and we know that the "standard" will disappear as soon as the people who invented it are removed from Justice.

It does raise the question, were any laws broken by the invention and specific application of this fictional "standard"? And if so, will we ever see enough evidence to really know?