Race, The Toxic Shame Of American Policing…

An inno­v­a­tive African-American woman Jackie Carter, sup­pos­ed­ly aghast at the Minnesota police mur­der of Philando Castile in 2016 has cre­at­ed a trans­par­ent paper recep­ta­cle pouch called the (not reach­ing) pouch.
The idea that a civil­ian would have to cre­ate some­thing that she hopes would pre­vent traf­fic stop deaths is hor­ri­fy­ing.
Police of their own voli­tion decide to stop mem­bers of the motor­ing pub­lic, there­fore the police should not be in the busi­ness of endan­ger­ing the lives of cit­i­zens when they make that deci­sion to con­strict peo­ple’s move­ment.
Only in sit­u­a­tions in which a stopped motorist threat­ens the life of a cop, should lethal force become an issue. As a for­mer police offi­cer, I am hor­ri­fied to see what is pass­ing for the rea­son­able killing of our fel­low human beings by the police who peo­ple believe is there to pro­tect them.
Philando Castile a hard-work­ing Minnesota man worked at a school dis­trict in his state and was legal­ly reg­is­tered to car­ry a gun.
On the day that trig­ger-hap­py cop Jeronimo Yanez pulled him over and asked to see his ID mis­ter, Castille had his fiancé Diamond Reynolds, and her 4‑year-old daugh­ter with him in the car.

None of that was enough to save his life even though he clear­ly told the cop point­ing a gun on him that he was­n’t reach­ing for the weapon but was try­ing to give him the doc­u­ments he demanded.that he was get­ting the doc­u­ments he demand­ed to see.
Yanez said he though Castile was reach­ing for a gun. He lat­er said in court, “had no choice,” and that he “thought he was going to die.” But Castile plead­ed before his death that he “wasn’t reaching.”

Yanez unloaded a bar­rage of bul­lets into Castille as he tried to get his iden­ti­fi­ca­tion.
In cre­at­ing the pouch, the inno­v­a­tive Jackie Carter said “I’m more fear­ful [for my son] in a car here than [when he’s serv­ing] in Afghanistan,” Carter told NBC BLK. Ms. Carter is the moth­er of a 30-year-old son.
Philando Castille was 32-years-old when he was gunned down by a fright­ened lit­tle boy who wore a police offi­cer’s uni­form but was no more deserv­ing of that uni­form that a five-year-old lit­tle boy.

Unfortunately, the pouch cre­at­ed by Ms. Carter will not change any­thing but if it saves one life it will all be worth it.
Philando Castile was with his fam­i­ly in his car, he told the cop he was a licensed car­ri­er of a weapon.
At the time Jeronimo Yanez opened fire on him he was still strapped in his seat­belt and had made no move to unbuck­le it.
Yanez’s part­ner and for­mer school­mate Joseph Kauser was on the oth­er side of the car and did not even see the need to unhol­ster his ser­vice weapon. Yet Jeronimo Yanez fired four bul­lets into Mister Castile’s seat-belt strapped body killing him on the spot.
Anyone trained in polic­ing knows that the posi­tion of Yanez to Mister Castile meant that in order for Castile to have posed a threat to him he would have to pull a weapon and then turn to his left aim the weapon and hope to hit Yanez who was not in the line of sight.
Philando Castile would also have to do so with Yanez’s part­ner on the oth­er side with a clear shot at him still strapped in the car.
What man opens fire on a cop while his wife and kid are in the car? Yet a St Paul jury acquit­ted Yanez who told the court he thought he was in dan­ger of dying. The dam­age was done even before Yanez went to tri­al as local papers lit­er­al­ly paint­ed him a choir­boy.
Despite Mister Castile’s demise, Jeronimo Yanez walked out of court a free man.
To add insult to injury the city of Saint Anthony, in a sep­a­ra­tion agree­ment gave Yanez $48,500 for agree­ing to leave the depart­ment.
So after killing mis­ter Castile he was acquit­ted and paid with the res­i­den­t’s tax dol­lars for the murder.

Philando Castile lost his life because there is not enough val­ue on Black lives. I would bet my last dol­lar that Jeronimo Yanez, a Hispanic cop would nev­er fire his weapon in a car in which there was a white fam­i­ly.
In fact, Jeronimo Yanez would absolute­ly not fire his weapon into an auto­mo­bile in which a Hispanic/​Latino fam­i­ly were the occu­pants.
The shock­ing yet inescapable truth is that law enforce­ment in America does not val­ue African-American peo­ple enough to speak to them respect­ful­ly, not esca­late sit­u­a­tions much less respect our lives.
And so even as I rec­og­nize the good heart and the thought process of Ms. Carter in cre­at­ing this prod­uct, I doubt it will help much.
The gun has become a weapon of choice for police when they inter­act with Black cit­i­zens.
Police are not peace offi­cers in the black com­mu­ni­ty, they are enforcers, there to keep the com­mu­ni­ty in its place.