My Michael Brown and Ezell Ford Moment

The facts may never be fully known in those cases, since the victims tragically are not around to testify. And the cases clearly differ in many Canada Goose Jackets ways.Still, there are similarities to the two recent cases. When the police confronted the two young African American men, it appears that the police were under the impression that both Brown and Ford had done little other than walk down the street. The Ferguson police chief told CNN that Darren Wilson, the officer who killed Brown, did not know at the time of the shooting that Brown had allegedly robbed a convenience store.What if Michael Brown and Ezell Ford had been white?This is not merely a rhetorical question. It is one that I can answer.In late January of that year, a time when I was diagnosed with schizophrenia and was in the midst of my second psychotic break, I trampled at two in the morning along the streets of Glendale, California, where my girlfriend Barbara lived. I feared that I might be assassinated, Canada Goose Outlet so I darted over to the police department canada goose uk black friday to seek help.As I have written before in a piece titled „Standing Up for the Late Kelly Thomas, Homeless Schizophrenic,” I was probably hoping for canada goose black friday sale a James Dean moment from Rebel Without a Cause, where the police would sit me down in a room, talk to me, give me perhaps a sandwich and milk, and straighten canada goose clearance sale me out until I was well enough to drive home to Venice, where canada goose I lived at the time.Unfortunately, I was told by the policewoman at the front desk that there was no one to talk to me and no place for me to stay except a jail cell. She canada goose factory sale then told me that I could make canada goose store one phone call, the very line that is often uttered to criminals.Needless to say, Canada Goose Online I declined the phone call and the jail cell and scurried out of the police department.But I was so terrified that I was going to be assassinated that I walked down the street, not the sidewalk, Canada Goose sale because the street had better illumination at two in the morning. canada goose coats I was afraid that someone might be lurking in a doorway or an alley and might kill me.As I walked down Canada Goose online the street, a policeman in a squad car that was driving slowly behind me blared out on a loudspeaker, „Get canada goose uk shop out of the street!”Startled, I jumped onto the sidewalk. At that point, I might have been more afraid buy canada goose jacket cheap of the police than I was of any killer loitering in the neighborhood.What if I had been African American? What would have happened to me?Is it possible that the police would have been more aggressive with me? Is it possible that they would have even arrested me?And what if I had fled from the police, simply because I was scared?I have Canada Goose Parka read that over the last 15 years the LAPD has instituted a new policy in which it „deploys” a team of social workers who are supposed buy canada goose jacket to join police officers when a suspect on the street suffers from mental illness. Yet Ezell https://www.getcanadagooseoutlet.com Ford, who was mentally ill, was still shot dead.It is possible that the police did not know at the time of the encounter with Ford that he was mentally ill, though he was well known in the neighborhood for his illness; and it is possible that Ford may have brandished a knife and charged the police, though witnesses have provided conflicting reports. I was put on such a hold, though it was not the police who did so. It was a doctor at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute.Many have suggested that Michael Brown, who did not suffer from mental illness, should canada goose outlet also have been Tasered if he approached Officer Darren Wilson in a manner that led Wilson to have „reasonable fear.” I agree.Had Wilson Tasered him, perhaps in the leg or the cheap canada goose uk arm, Brown would likely be alive today.Of course, some unarmed white people have been killed by the police too.Not unlike me on that night in January 1999, Kelly Thomas, a white man who suffered from schizophrenia, was cheap Canada Goose wandering uk canada goose outlet the streets of Orange County in 2011 when he was beaten to death by the police.Lest we think that Tasers are completely harmless, Kelly Thomas was Tasered multiple times and allegedly smashed in the head with fists, knees and the Taser before he lost consciousness and died. The officers who were put on trial in the case were acquitted of all the major charges, including second degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and excessive force.All of which tells me that we have to go beyond paying lip service to systemic problems in canada goose clearance our criminal justice system. As I have written many times before, including in the wake of the verdict in the Kelly Thomas case, we need to make truly substantive police reforms across the country to curb the use of excessive force. We need much more humane tactics in dealing not only with unarmed, young men, particularly those of color; we also need much more humane tactics in dealing with the mentally ill.

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