Category Archives: Crime

UPDATED: Gray Snapped His Own Spine. Yeah. Right.

Crime, Criminal Injustice, Justice, Race

Fox News’ Megyn Kelly, who when calm speaks in CAPS, was super-excited tonight. The cause for her excitement was a stupid report released by the Washington Post, according to which Freddie Gray appears to have broken his own neck and spinal column. Ridiculous.

The source of this nonsense was a “prisoner sharing a police transport van with Freddie Gray,” and who was “separated from Gray by a metal partition and could not see him.”

That settles it, then. Mr. Gray severed his own spinal column.

“We disagree with any implication that Freddie Gray severed his own spinal cord,” said Jason Downs, one of the attorneys for the Gray family. “We question the accuracy of the police reports we’ve seen thus far, including the police report that says Mr. Gray was arrested without force or incident.”

I believe it is as I had surmised: The oafs likely dug their knees into the spinal column and snapped it.

The video “shot by several bystanders …shows two officers on top of Gray, their knees in his back, and then dragging his seemingly limp body to the van as he cried out.”

UPDATE (4/30): NO RESOLUTION, YET.

“Baltimore police,” reports the Wall Street Journal, “… have concluded their investigation into the death of Freddie Gray and turned the results over to the city’s chief prosecutor.”

Police officials also revealed that the police van carrying Mr. Gray after his arrest made a previously undisclosed stop before he reached the Western District police station and was taken to a hospital. Deputy Police Commissioner Kevin Davis said a privately owned surveillance camera captured the stop. He offered no additional details, and it was unclear if that stop shed any new light on Mr. Gray’s injuries.

Based on an earlier police timeline, this stop occurred after one where Mr. Gray was placed in leg shackles because he was acting “irate” and before another where police moved Mr. Gray off the van floor and placed him in a seat. At a fourth stop, police picked up an additional prisoner before reaching the station.

Mr. Gray wasn’t buckled into his seat and wasn’t offered medical attention he requested, police have said.

MORE.

An English Speaker’s View Of ‘A Room To Destroy’ *

Crime, English, Race

I’m going to defend Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, who claims she misspoke or was misconstrued when she said about the rioters in Baltimore: “We also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well.”

This is a case of English misspoken. These days I no longer understand what most people around me say, because they can’t put together grammatically coherent sentences. What the mayor meant to convey is that there were unintended consequences to giving the crowds the “space” to protest: hooligans took advantage of the provisions put in place for peaceful protest.

“We also gave those who wished to destroy, space as well” came out wrong. The fact that the mayor’s response to the riots mirrored her botched words—her police force stood down—didn’t bolster the credibility of her office’s clarification.

* The post’s title is a botched play on E. M. Forster’s “A Room With A View.” Sorry, my bad.

Waiting To Exhale In Baltimore

Crime, Criminal Injustice, Critique, Race

After waiting on the signal from Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, Maryland’s Republican governor, Larry Hogan, finally called up the National Guard, late Monday, to deal with the “Black Lives Matter” riot that is “convulsing” the city. This time, on account of the murder of Freddie Gray, earlier this month.

Had he failed to wait that period of grace for an OK from the black mayor, the white governor would have probably been called a rrrrrrrrrracist.

Officials like the governor continue to renounce the connection between the ubiquitous gangs—on this occasion, the Black Gorilla Family, Bloods and Crips—and rioters who put the finishing touches to each “Black Lives Matter” protest. The protest is 95 percent peaceful, promised the governor of Maryland, today. The looting, arson, rock-lobbing, robberies and assaults are executed by an element separate from the peace lovers.

Whatever you say, Gov.

Yawn.

One suggestion to liven things up a bit more: When addressing the media, Baltimore officials should consider hiring the sign-language guy who rocked Nelson Mandela’s funeral, instead of the stuffy woman who currently gesticulates for them. The South African was the coolest, most creative and original act at the funeral. All the more so considering he didn’t even know sign-language.

Freddie Gray’s Arrest Conjures Carol Anne Gotbaum’s

Crime, Criminal Injustice, Justice, The State

Freddie Gray, whose fatal injury in police custody led to his death, was clearly manhandled by the officers. Three to 4 oafs likely dug their knees into the spinal column of this slim man. Something bad happened to the vertebrae. The arresting oafs failed to immobilize Gray’s neck in the patrol wagon, even though he was already limp and listless. The affected vertebrae could have further snapped or moved by the van’s motion, resulting in the injury that killed Gray.

The reports on Gray’s injury conjure Carol Anne Gotbaum’s trauma. The petite 45-year-old who weighed 105 pounds was scrummed by meaty policemen in Phoenix’s Sky Harbor, tackled to the ground, and a knee jabbed into her skinny spine. She was then thrown in a holding cell, where she was shackled and chained to a bench. Minutes later Carol Anne Gotbaum was dead.

What a shame that nobody marched for Mrs. Gotbaum, too.