First it was the incident with George Floyd. Now scarcely two weeks after that incident, from which followed countless international protests, riots, fires, and all sorts of activity around the world- some of it understandable and a lot of it unbalanced -there is another potentially incendiary event that has taken place in Atlanta, the capitol of Georgia in the US. This incident had the death of a black man at the hands of a police officer that was caught on Police bodycam as well as security cameras at a local Wendys. Following the incident, a mob of people in Atlanta descended upon the Wendy’s restaurant where it took place and set the restaurant on fire before rioting throughout the city, including walking onto and shutting down highway I-75 that runs through the city.
Now many times I have written about police abuse as it is a major trend in the US that has been growing since the Patriot Act was passed in 2001, and while one can argue that it was growing before that point, it was following this incident nearly two decades ago that one can mark a veritable “inflexion point” on a graph by which changes already in place that concerned civil liberties advocates can say took on a sharp increase that has continued unabated since then. This phenomenon is the militarization of the police and a change in policing philosophy from one of “peace keepers” to “law enforcement officers”, the former being one of emphasizing public order, and the latter being the “enforcement” of laws, sometimes to the point of abuse. While there are many abuses that police in any country can be criticized for, but the US is a special case because not only it the phenomenon widespread, but there is a lack of balance many times in how police work is applied- innocent people are harshly treated even to the point of death, and at times in the face of blatant evidence showing abuse, crimes for which the average man would be severely prosecuted and potentially sentenced to life-long sentences in jail for are given a free pass by the court system because the person who did the crime was an officer.
This observation is a major trend, but it is not to say that “the police” are “the problem”. As noted, the main issue is a lack of balance in the application. It is not, as some have done using similar arguments or observations, to suggest that police are not necessary, or that one needs to “abolish the police”, or that to elect a quasi-anarchic form of government would work. The reason for the existence of the police is the same reason that the so-called “lawless” societies where police are non-existent do not result in successful nations forming, but rather dictatorships where tribes rule by force and fight each other in violent wars. If this philosophy were true, then Somalia should be a bright example for the world to follow, but instead, the society is a complete dump. This is not because of “low iqs” or anything to do with race- remember that Somalia was inhabited by the Cushite Empire as well as the ancient civilizations at Hadramout in Yemen, and both were very powerful nations that were run by a Hamitic and Hamito-Semitic peoples. Rather, the reason why Somalia is a dump, among many other reasons, is because she has no organization, and one of the ways to organize people in a society so they cooperate and do not engage in violent, selfish, or disordered behavior is to have an agency of enforcement, of which the police is the basic unit no matter where one goes to in the world.
Police have always been with the human race, and will always be until the return of Christ because the inherent disorder that comes from a “natural state” and the need to restore order by an agency whose purpose is to bring force is the admission of the existence of Original Sin, for if there was no Original Sin, then man would only need to “evolve” himself by actions and thoughts to a place where he would cease to do crime, but this is not so. Such a thing has never existed because of Original Sin, and while there are corrupt police, the police exists to try to keep the corrosive forces of the effects of Original Sin from destroying the ability of different peoples to relate in a civil manner with each other.
Returning to the video in question, I watched both the Police Bodycam and the security camera footage from Wendys. The evidence in the video was abundantly clear- the man who was killed by the police officer was not murdered, and the officer did nothing wrong. Rather, the guy who was killed was the aggressor, and his situation was completely avoidable but culminated in his own demise because he did things that forced the cop to shoot him. To the credit of the cop, Officer Garrett Rolfe, he showed considerable restraint in the face of a very difficult situation, and gave the man, Rayshard Brooks, more chances than would have been afforded to most in the same situation to stop acting in a dangerous way before using deadly force.
Let’s take a look at this video and see what we can see.
The first video is about 7 minutes long. The action doesn’t start until 5:20, but to give a back story, Rayshard found himself confronted with police after falling asleep in his van at the Wendy’s drive-thru and thus blocking up traffic. The employees called the police, and not surprisingly (as with many of such cases involving odd driving behaviors), Brooks was found to be clearly intoxicated. This first part of the video shows Brooks attempting to talk his way out of his situation, but officer Rolfe is not believing him, and says he can smell the alcohol on his breath, and Brooks admits to drinking “one and a half margaritas”. Officer Rolfe then administers a breathalyzer test, and not surprisingly, without admitting the number on camera, says that Brooks is intoxicated and he is under arrest for DUI. So far, there is nothing out of the ordinary here from any encounter with a drunk driver and police.
At 5:20, Officer Rolfe proceeds to put Brooks under arrest, and Brooks hits the officer and starts trying to run. Officer Rolfe is trying to keep control over Brooks- another standard procedure -and threatens to taze him (5:29). Instead of being a civil human beings and stopping, Brooks grabs Rolfe’s tazer and tries to run away with it. You can her Rolfe yelling “Hands off the tazer” (5:39) as Brooks is trying to grab it. At 5:51, Rolfe is still trying to stop Brooks, and yells at him to “stop fighting” and at 5:53, “he’s got my fucking tazer”.
Things become really intense then, because Brooks refuses to stop fighting. From the sound, Brooks fires the tazer twice at Officer Rolfe, first at 5:57, and then four seconds later at 6:01. A second later at 6:02, Officer Rolfe fires his gun three times at Brooks, killing him.
One can see an alternative view of the incident here from Wendy’s Security camera.
Now what happened here?
-Officer Rolfe approaches Brooks in a direct and friendly manner about a call he received concerning his behavior that was causing a public disruption. There is no racial animosity as the video clearly shows.
-Brooks takes the breathalyzer test and fails, the officer proceeds to arrest him in a non-violent, non-threatening manner.
-Brooks attacks the officer unprovoked and tries to escape- two crimes in one.
-Brooks refuses to stop after Officer Rolfe threatens to taze him- note that Officer Rolfe DID NOT just taze him, but gave Brooks the courtesy of issuing him a warning EVEN AFTER HE WAS ATTACKED
-Brooks does not listen, and he then commits another crime- he steal the tazer from the officer.
-Officer Rolfe chases Brooks- note that even after Brooks stole Officer Rolfe’s tazer, he DID NOT just take his gun and shoot him on the spot, but still told him to stop.
-Brooks them turns around and attacks Officer Rolfe TWICE USING HIS OWN TAZER, at which point Officer Rolfe shoots Brooks.
I have often criticized the police and said there needs to be police reform in the US. This is a serious issue. However, I do this out of a desire for mercy and justice on behalf of all people, so that society may attempt to have the most balanced approach to a situation without resorting to the danger of supporting extreme approaches to problems that do not require such.
That said, there is absolutely nothing wrong that this officer did in this encounter. To the contrary, Officer Rolfe exhibited extreme self-restraint, patience, and a desire to resolve the situation without deadly force but was left without a choice FOR THE PROTECTION OF HIS OWN SAFETY AND THAT OF THE PUBLIC.
Rayshard Brooks acted like a thug and he died like a thug, and he has no one to blame but himself. Officer Rolfe acted heroically and should receive an award for his conduct because he did NOT have to give Brooks as many chances as he did to cease his behavior. He was fully in his legal rights as an officer to use deadly force much faster than what happened, but he CHOSE not to. This is not the sign of a “bad cop” that I often criticize, but of a good cop who like many takes his job seriously and is trying to make the best of a difficult situation in which his own safety is in danger.
Yet what has been the response? Officer Rolfe was fired less than 24 hours after the incident is potentially facing prosecution with potential felony murder charges from the Fulton County DA.
Murder or felony murder. Those are the two charges Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard said could fit former Atlanta Police Officer Garrett Rolfe for the shooting death of Rayshard Brooks Friday night.
“There are really three charges that are relevant: one would be the murder charge in the state of Georgia. That charge is a charge that is directly related to an intent to kill,” Howard told CNN’s Frederica Whitfield Sunday afternoon. “The second charge is felony murder and that is a charge that involves a death that comes as a result of the commission of an underlying felony. In this case, that underlying felony would be aggravated assault.”
Howard continued, “The only other charge that might make any sense at all would be some voluntary manslaughter charge. But I believe in this instance, what we have to choose between, if there’s a choice to be made, is between murder and felony murder.” (source)
If there is anybody who should have faced charges it would have been Rayshard Brooks, for what could have ended as a simple DUI that results in a “hiccup” in one’s life that while not small certainly can be surmounted and moved on from in time, his actions that he did of his own personal free will resulted in his death after committing a series of additional, severe crimes in an approximately 45 second period.
Likewise, what are people in Atlanta doing? Instead of condemning Brooks’ criminal behavior, a clearly notable segment of the Afro-American community along with additional persons has chosen to stand behind the criminal Brooks and responded to his actions by burning down the Wendy’s restaurant where Brooks died.
Protesters have burned down the Wendy’s restaurant in Atlanta where a black man was shot by police as he tried to escape arrest, and blocked a major highway in the city.
Rayshard Brooks, 27, was shot dead on Friday night after police were called to the restaurant over reports that he had fallen asleep in the drive-through line. (source)
Ask yourself, what does Wendy’s have to do with this? Not only are many employees out of work now and potentially could have been killed, but they have committed an absolute crime of arson. Officer Rolfe did NOT commit a crime- he was doing his work in his official capacity to the specifications of the law as well as exceedingly good conduct in moral standards, and now he is facing the ruination of his entire life for choosing to do what is right in a difficult situation to protect his own safety.
Another major issue that I have not heard discussed in the context of this case is the use of the tazer.
I have not written about tazers before at Shoebat.com, but for many years I have always been cautious about the use of tazers by police because unlike what many lobbying groups for police or the military-industrial complex have said, tazers are not “non-lethal” weapons, but rather “less-than-lethal”. While it is uncommon, a tazer can kill a man, and many of such cases have been noted over the years, as they can send a person, even with one shock, into cardiac arrest or cause other forms of permanent damage. They are less likely to kill a man, but they are still potentially lethal and need to be treated as such. This is a point that many lobbying groups such as the ACLU and groups that represent the welfare of poor persons, especially in urban areas, have noted as a major criticism of tazers.
Therefore, it is fascinating to hear lawyers from Brooks’ family saying that the tazer that Brooks shot at Officer Rolfe was “nonlethal”.
L. Chris Stewart, an attorney for Brooks’ family, said the officer who shot him should be charged for “an unjustified use of deadly force, which equals murder.”
“You can’t have it both ways in law enforcement,” Stewart said. “You can’t say a Taser is a nonlethal weapon … but when an African American grabs it and runs with it, now it’s some kind of deadly, lethal weapon that calls for you to unload on somebody.” (source)
This statement is race bating of some of the worst kinds.
It is police departments for years who said “nonlethal”, and it was ACLU and many “pro-black” groups saying that tazers are indeed “lethal”- of which I agree with the latter as “less-than-lethaL” which I noted above. Now that the situation is where Brooks shot a tazer- seemingly twice at Officer Rolfe, his attorney is saying that the police and military-industrial lobbies are correct to call it “nonlethal”, and the only reason he is doing this is so he can try to justify a racialist approach to the matter, with Brooks’ own family members saying that Atlanta is a “black city” and, no joke, calling it “Wakanda” (0:10).
Look at the video of the shooting again. What else was Officer Rolfe supposed to do? Say “Pretty please stop firing my own tazer, which could kill or seriously incapacitate me, so I can arrest you?”
Tazers are made to incapacitate a person so they can’t move and can be arrested easier in a hostile situation. If Officer Rolfe was hit with his own tazer, given the behavior of Brooks towards him, is it not unreasonable for him to believe that his own life could be in danger? If Brooks is such a man as to attack a cop while running away, steal one of his weapons, and attempt to use it on him, then he is very likely that he could take Officer Rolfe’s gun and use it to murder him.
What was Officer Rolfe supposed to do? Let himself potentially be murdered by a drunk man trying to flee from justice brought about by his own self-inflicted actions?
Officer Rolfe did nothing wrong. Instead, he is being “thrown to the wolves” as the Atlanta Chief of Police has resigned, the DA is talking about prosecuting Rolfe, and people are protesting and making racialist remarks about Brooks’ death because Rolfe was white and making demands while completely ignoring Brooks’ blatant and dangerous criminal behavior and Rolfe’s attempts to resolve the situation calmly but had to respond for his own safety.
One of the reason why “third-world” countries are called “third-world” is because of their behavior which is based on a certain mentality in the people. Part of this is a tribalistic mindset in which a person will be defended no matter what his actions are and without respect to justice because “he is one of us” rather than looking at the whole situation. This is not to say that there are not problems and miscarriages of justice that take place, but rather that when a real crime happens of which there is no way that a reasonable person could deny that one man was clearly in the wrong and another not, to defend the one in the wrong by saying “he is our kind and therefore we must protect him and advocate for his behavior because he is one of us and it does not matter what happened to the other person because he is not one of us, but because our man was hurt we have license to act in a disordered way without regard to the situation.”
This mindset is toxic to civilization and is a hallmark of any “third-world dump” no matter what the race of the people who inhabit it or where the place is, because the issue is not and never was race, but always was behavior. This is also a way to cause an increase in racism and tribalism, because in the case of Brooks, many people will look at this situation and believe that there is no way that “black people” can be reasoned with, and therefore will be more likely to take not only a biased view of “their own” against situations of conflict that involve others, but will also use it as a way to justify racialist ideas and even eugenics.
In other words, the response of many to the Brooks’ case is the best recruiting tool for many of the racialist groups that have been discussed here at Shoebat.com, because all they have to do is point to situations such as the Brooks incident and say “this is what happens when you try to reason with blacks.”
Shoebat.com has worked very hard to try and dispel racialist narratives and bring reconciliation between all the sons of Ham, Shem, and Japheth because all men are made in the image and likeness of God. We have written constantly about the need to address even small examples of racialism to prevent them from becoming larger issues, and noted that the Bible contains in the story of Ham, Shem, and Japeth the answer to all of the racialism in the past and today. It is incredibly frustrating to have to revisit the same issues continually not because of the need to teach, but because as “nation [is divided] against nation”, what are, objectively speaking, clear matters of right and wrong are politicized and charged with racialist language to fit a particular narrative and used to justify supremacist ideas or violence in the name of gain and power, and simple things become potential bombs when there is no need for such to ever be.
What happened with this Rayshard Brooks shooting was not a matter of race. It was a criminal who attacked a patient cop and refused to stop, and then tried to inflict potentially lethal damage on the cop, to which the cop was forced to respond with deadly force. Race had nothing to do with this, but only the disposition of the man whose choices lead to his own self-inflicted demise.
What is disgusting and disturbing is that so many people would attempt to make this into a race issue for arguably nothing less than the expansion of their own power and the ability to indulge their own personal racism while accusing others of being “racist”.
That is a formula for social destruction.