Smithtown Teenager Kills Three with His Car, Gets Only 30 Days in Jail

The scene after the crash caused by Steven Badke
(ABC 7)

While this happened a while ago, I feel the need to post about it because I feel it is an important issue and a glaring one. Last week a teenager from Smithtown, NY named Steven Badke, Jr. was sentenced to 30 days in jail as well as handed down $900 in fines relating to a car accident in which he was doing 80 mph, crossed the center line of Jericho Turnpike, and smashed into a minivan. Three people died that day - the son of the driver of the minivan, 13, and two passengers in Badke's car, both 17. The final charge that Badke was convicted of was reckless driving, a misdemeanor.

The original charges of criminally negligent homicide were thrown out by Judge C. Randall Hinrichs because he said that Badke's actions were that of someone who merely failed to perceive risk, rather than the legal definition of criminal negligence which stipulates that a person must create risk. I would argue that going 80mph and crossing the center line to pass another vehicle creates a serious risk to others (indeed, it took three peoples' lives in this case), but Judge Hinrichs seems to think otherwise.

So while Badke will serve only 10 days for each life he took (if he even serves the full 30), an equally dumb professional football player may well go to prison for over 42 times as long as Badke for carrying a gun and shooting himself in the leg, killing no one and injuring only himself. Yet the ironic thing is that 43,443 people died on American roads in 2005 (according to the DOT) while just under 31,000 deaths were reported due to guns in 2005 (with 55% of those deaths resulting from suicide). So if ten thousand more people are killed every year by a car than a gun, why does someone who kills three people while driving like a maniac get sentenced to less than the mandatory minimum for someone who merely possesses an unlicensed firearm (without intent to use it on another person)? It just does not make sense. Would Badke only be getting 30 days if he and his friends were fooling around with guns rather than cars?

If you kill someone recklessly, you kill someone recklessly; it does not matter how. If you go out randomly firing a gun around and hit someone, resulting in their death, you've killed them. If you go around driving without any regard for the people around you and hit someone, resulting in their death, you've killed them. I don't see much of a difference. If you're convicted of having an unlicensed firearm, you are a felon and can never legally own a firearm again. How much do you want to bet that at some point Badke will get his license, and thus the ability to drive, back, despite killing three people in a 100% avoidable car accident in which he was 100% at fault.

I'm not advocating the softening of the gun laws, I am saying that we need to harden the driving laws. You want to drive like that and kill people, you don't get your license back. Period. You kill multiple people while driving recklessly, you pay for it with more than 10 days per death. If you got your license permanently taken away for life for something like DUI, don't you think people would think twice about it? If you knew that you faced serious prison time - not just a slap on the wrist - for killing people while driving, don't you think people would be a little more careful on the roads? Instead, folks know that they can drive however they want and get away with it. This case is simply an example of that.

Blackwater Guards Surrender to U.S. Authorities

The U.S. Department of Justice has announced that five former Blackwater security guards will be charged for their involvement in a 2007 incident in Nisoor Square in Baghdad. Today the five guards, Donald Ball, 26, of West Valley City, Utah; Dustin Heard, 27, of Knoxville, Tennessee; Evan Liberty, 26, of Rochester, New Hampshire; Nick Slatten, 25, of Sparta, Tennessee; and Paul Slough, 29, of Keller, Texas, turned themselves in in Salt Lake City, Utah. They face charges of manslaughter and using a machine gun in a crime of violence and face a mandatory minimum of 30 years in prison if convicted.

Obviously this case brings up many legal issues, considering that the murders were committed in Iraq and the defendants are going to be tried in U.S. courts. Secondly comes the venue. By turning themselves in Utah - a decidedly conservative and pro-gun bastion of the country - some have speculated that the lawyers for the defense hope to have the case tried there and not in DC, where the case has been assigned. The defense lawyers argue that none of the men ever lived in DC and should not be tried there, yet they were employed by the State Department (via Blackwater) and committed the crimes while under the State Department's employ. Needless to say, the State Department is headquartered in DC. Why Utah is a more logical place than DC is beyond me.

But first comes the largest question (in my mind): does the US even have criminal jurisdiction in this case? The events occurred in Iraq, and thus my initial thought was that if the U.S. really wants to punish these guys, they should extradite them to Iraq to face charges there, considering the victims are Iraqi civilians. But, in the infinite wisdom that continues to guide Iraqi policy, all Blackwater employees were given immunity at the start of their business overseas. Therefore, the Iraqi government is powerless to prosecute anyone employed by Blackwater for doing anything in Iraq (until January 1, 2009). This seems to have led to some misbehavior on the part of Blackwater employees, including a Christmas Eve murder in which a drunken Blackwater firearms technician murdered an Iraqi guard of Vice President Adil Abdul Mahdi of Iraq. Instead of facing charges, the killer was allowed to sober up and fly back to the states (courtesy of Blackwater) while Blackwater paid the dead man's family $15,000.

Now in my opinion, these Blackwater guards involved in the Nisoor Square shooting should face charges, because in life there are consequences for your actions (hell, even OJ's going to prison). But the problem is, as John Adams pointed out long ago, we are a nation of laws, not of men. Because of a severe lack of foresight (this is becoming a theme in American blunders), these Blackwater guards may have a case that the Department of Justice cannot charge them with crimes committed overseas in a sovereign nation that they were granted immunity from. Now, the argument could be made that Iraq ceased to be sovereign when America forced its leader into hiding and set up its own government, but there is no way that Washington would admit that just to convict five guys of murdering innocent Iraqi civilians. While I would assume that the government has many avenues of civil repercussions it could pursue (to begin with, firing Blackwater entirely), including suing the company, it probably will not do this, either.

All of this brings up other issues with Blackwater. An average Blackwater employee makes about $600 per day, according to the Washington Post. According to the same article, an unmarried seargent in the armed forces given Iraq pay and relief from taxes makes $83-$85 a day. A married seargent with kids makes about $170 a day. The top US commander in Baghdad makes $493 a day. So the average Blackwater employee makes more than Army General Petraeus did. This is insulting to the troops. You want to talk about supporting the troops and being patriotic; paying private contractors more than 6 times what you pay the troops who (for the most part) volunteered to join the armed services is utterly ridiculous.

What happened in Nisoor Square was criminal; there seems to be little doubt about that. The defense of "They shot first" is weak when applied to women and children (at least one infant was killed), especially when U.S. soliders who arrived first at the scene denied that the Blackwater employees had been fired upon. The real question is: does the U.S. have jurisdiction to try the case on American soil in American courts? The accused were employees of a private firm, not U.S. troops, and had immunity from the Iraqi legal system, but not the United States'. I hope that the DoJ has an airtight case and has properly researched the jurisdictional issues and that the five guards are brought to justice in the proper way. If a foreign private contractor had security forces here shoot innocent American civilians, I highly doubt that the American population would be pleased if the killers got away with it. It's time we set an example of American exceptionalism in a moral sense and not an extra-legal sense. And while we're at it, maybe we can rely on the best army in the world to do our security in Iraq and not private contractors who see Iraqis as $15,000 targets.

Photos - Blackwater logo (Progress Illinois), A car destroyed in a September 2007 Nisoor Square shooting involving Blackwater (MSNBC), Timeline of Blackwater shooting in Nisoor Square (Washington Post)

Medford-Patchogue Continues to Cope with Racially Motivated Murder

More charges - and details - have emerged in the murder of Marcelo Lucero at the hands of 7 teens from Eastern Long Island. According to prosecutors, they are looking into whether some of the teens charged in the beating of Lucero had been involved in another beating of another immigrant. The seven teens apparently made a habit of going out and hunting down defenseless Latino residents to harass and beat on, referring to it as "beaner hopping." One of the defendants, Jose Pacheco, 17, admits to going out with two of the other defendants, Anthony Hartford and Kevin Shea, and knocking out a Latino man cold (the victim has yet to step forward). Pacheco perplexingly told authorities that it was a rarity for him to go out and do something like this: "I don't go out and do this very often, maybe once a week."

What is funny is that a lot of people are coming out and saying, "Oh, some of these kids can't be racist - they have Latino backgrounds," or "Look, they hang out with people of other races." Your background has nothing to do with whether you're a racist or not - your mindset does. If you do not like a person because of the color of their skin or their ethnicity or whatever, you're bigoted; it doesn't matter if you happen to share that skin color or ethnicity. And even if you hang out with people of other races, you can still be racist. If you go "beaner hopping" and attack innocent Latinos because of their ethnic background it does not matter who you hang out with. Let's put it this way: think about Southern slave owners. Some were very close personally to their slaves, some of them even had affairs with them (*cough* Thomas Jefferson *cough*). Would you argue that these Southern slave owners were not racist? Yet they hung out with people from other races and even fathered children with them.

One would think that this would be a time of reflection and deep introspection for the residents of the Patchogue-Medford area. But if the meeting held at the high school to discuss the incident is any indication, the human tendency to blame others when the shit hits the fan is alive and well. According to Newsday, many parents in the crowd at the meeting blamed the media attention that the ruthless attack has brought upon the community. A Newsday reporter, who was invited by principal Manuel Sanzone, began to be screamed at by the crowd and was physically removed by security despite making it clear that she had been invited by the principal who was holding the meeting. Meanwhile, the principal stood silent as the reporter was removed. If you can't even stand up to the forcible removal of a reporter you invited to the meeting, how are you going to stand up to prejudice and intolerance that led to the murder of an innocent man?

And today the New York Times came out with an article about the person who physically stabbed Lucero - Jeffrey Conroy - filled with quotes from family members and family friends saying the usual, "Oh my, I cannot believe it was him; he was such a good boy." Unfortunately for a lot of people, the way they act in public with their families and the way they act in private with their friends can be night and day (this case seems emblematic of that). Conroy could have been a great family member and all of that, but it does not change the fact that he plunged a knife into the chest of a man who had the audacity of being Latino. This is a kid who, according to police reports, has a swastika tattooed on his leg and was the ringleader of the "Caucasian Crew." Additionally, the Times article states that youths who additionally came forward and defended Conroy have backed off of these statements and have said that they were not, in fact, friends with him. One could see that coming, considering the Post had a picture of the accused group's "friends" running out of court, shielding their faces because they were ashamed to be friends with people who could do such things (because why would they shield their face if they believed that the men were innocent and being unfairly targeted by prosecutors?).

So while the charges have been upgraded for those involved - namely Conroy, who now faces second-degree murder as a hate crime - the six who were beating Lucero while Conroy stabbed him are still not being charged with murder, or at least manslaughter, and I ask, "Why not?" Their reckless actions led to the death of Marcelo Lucero and at the very least they are guilty of manslaughter. It's clear that not one of these individuals value human life (one of them was already involved in the death of somebody else). Hopefully as the anger dies down - and people stop blaming the media - the Patchogue-Medford community will be able to heal and move on from this hateful murder. Peace.

Photos - Jose Lucero, Marcelo's brother (New York Times), Jeffrey Conroy (center, in red) with his football team (New York Times), Marcel Lucero (Newsday), "Friends" of the 7 accused teens leaving the Patchogue courthouse (New York Post)

Seven Long Island Teens Kill Ecuadorean Immigrant in Hate Crime

Seven eastern Long Island teenagers face serious charges after they set out to "beat up some Mexicans" and ended up killing 37 year-old Ecuadorean immigrant Marcello Lucero. Lucero worked at a dry cleaners in Riverhead and was near the Patchogue train station when he was approached by the seven teens - a junior and six seniors from Patchogue-Medford High School - and was beat up. The assault culminated in a knife being pushed through Lucero's chest, allegedly by 17 year-old Jeffrey Conroy. The teens were arrested shortly after the assault nearby.

Suffolk County officials have charged the teens with hate crimes, and the prosecutor seems to be quoting the young men when he talks about their desire to do harm to someone of Mexican descent, leading me to believe that some type of confession or something similar has been offered up. A profile of the young men have come out. The alleged stabber - Conroy - is a three sport athlete at Patchogue-Medford and does not have a record. At least two of the teens have a Latino background - one being half-Puerto Rican and another having a half-Puerto Rican grandmother. The mother of one of the suspects claimed, "How can it be a hate crime? My son is half-Hispanic?" When it comes to the law, however, it does not matter what ethnicity you are; if you target someone based solely on certain immutable characteristics (ethnicity being one of them) you are guilty of a hate crime. It also does not matter if you are incorrect (as in this case, when the teens went to target a Mexican and killed an Ecuadorean) as long as your intent was based on the aforementioned set of immutable characteristics.

What is perplexing about this case - beyond the fact that people like this still exist in society - is that one of the teens is already involved in a fatal home burglary, in which the victim was 38 year-old Carlton Shaw and was found outside his home with his three year-old son asleep at his side. Overton eventually pled down to burglary in that case. My question is why is someone who is involved in a fatal burglary not in jail awaiting sentencing? Given that he was out of jail, why would his parents allow him out of the house? Are there no repercussions for his behavior? Did he not have a court-ordered curfew or some kind of sanctions because of his admittance of guilt in a case that led to a man's death?

Another perplexing thing is that while all seven teens are charged with gang assault as a hate crime, only one (Conroy) is charged with manslaughter as a hate crime. Why aren't all seven charged with manslaughter? In another case happening in New York, three men are charged with the death of NYPD officer Russel Timoshenko, despite the fact that only one of the three shot at the deceased officer. The definition of manslaughter in the second degree is "when he recklessly causes the death of another person." It was certainly reckless to go and "beat up some Mexicans" and it resulted in the death of a human being. It seems that the teens acted in concert (in that they surrounded Lucero and all beat on him before he was stabbed) and were all arrested together after the incident.

If these teens do not spend the majority of their adult lives behind bars, something is seriously amiss with this system. When you have such little regard for human life that you go out and beat on a man due to his ethnicity - resulting in his death - what use do you serve society other than as an example of what is wrong? What is sad is that it seems that Conroy could have had a future (the others could have, too, but the Newsday article seemed to focus on him), but he threw it all away on something stupid like this. And while the government certainly has a responsibility when it comes to dangerous individuals being out on the streets (in this case, the example of Overton), parents do not get off scot free. Schools don't raise kids, government programs don't raise kids, video games and television don't raise kids; parents do. I feel for some parents, because they try everything they can and still their kid screws up; other times the parents don't get involved as much as they should with their kids' lives and the kid screws up (I've personally seen both examples). I'm not going to judge the parents of these teens because I do not know them and that would be unfair. At the end of the day, a mother is without a son, a brother without his brother, because of the incredibly selfish acts of a group of teenagers with no regard for others. Hopefully these teens are locked up for a long time and cannot terrorize others again. Peace.

Photos - The seven teens being led out of a police station for their arraignment in Islip on Monday (Newsday), Victim Marcello Lucero (ABC News), A memorial set up to commemorate Lucero at the stabbing scene (1010WINS)

No Justice for Jayson Tirado

Following up on a story that I have discussed in the past, it appears that the NYPD officer who shot and killed an unarmed motorist in East Harlem back in October of 2007, then disappeared for 19 hours before turning himself in, will not face any criminal charges for his actions. As a quick refresher, Jayson Tirado and Sean Sawyer were driving on FDR Drive when they were diverted to East 116th street due to an accident on the highway. In the course of exiting the highway, Mr. Tirado cut off Sean Sawyer, at which point words were exchanged. They continued driving and caught up to each other at a red light, when more words were exchanged and Mr. Tirado allegedly made a reference to a gun. At this point - and this is where most of the contention in this case lies - Sawyer says that Tirado reached for something on the floor of his car and came up as if he had a gun. It is at this point that Sawyer fired two shots and sped away from the scene. Tirado was able to drive a few blocks before slumping over the steering wheel, dead. Sawyer was MIA until 19 hours later, when he decided to turn himself in. Both parties had been drinking that night.

So rack this up as another killing of an unarmed minority at the hands of the NYPD; a killing that will go unpunished. Civil rights charges will not be brought against Sawyer (nor should they be) because the man was acting as a civilian and was not in the course of his duties as a civil servant. But let's look at the most glaring facts of this case: Sawyer shot twice at a car in the middle of East Harlem and did not report the incident until 19 HOURS later, when he walked to a police station and told a sergeant about what had happened. Sawyer claimed that he did not even know anyone was hit and once he realized someone had been killed, he turned himself in. Does this mean that if he did not hit anyone that he never would have alerted his superiors of his actions?

Manhattan DA Morgenthau has said that Sawyer did not receive preferential treatment because of his status as a cop. So if I thought that someone were pulling a weapon on me, I could shoot and kill that person and wait almost an entire day before getting around to reporting it and I would not be charged with a crime? Something about that seems a bit odd. Additionally, if Sawyer was able to see Tirado place his hands in the car and come up as if he had a gun, wouldn't Sawyer be able to see if Tirado actually had a gun? It seems that Sawyer saw and heard a great amount in detail up until the critical moment of identifying a weapon.

Other points of Sawyer's story seem suspect. Sawyer says that he was cut off by Tirado and that Tirado started an argument with Sawyer. That doesn't even make sense. You mean to tell me that Tirado cut off Sawyer and Sawyer did absolutely nothing and Tirado then berated Sawyer for allowing him to cut Sawyer off? That just doesn't add up. Let's not forget that by fleeing the scene of the "crime" Sawyer did not have to take a Breathalyzer test. Various news outlets have reported that Sawyer was out at a Woodside bar for a good amount of time before killing Tirado, who had also been drinking.

Going back to the basics of this story: a cop killed an unarmed minority in New York City and will face no legal repercussions (yet again). Sawyer will most likely lose his job, but he has been suspended WITH PAY since the incident, so he has had plenty of time to get his act together to find new employment. If the roles were reversed and Tirado had shot Sawyer thinking that Sawyer had a gun, do you think that Tirado would walk away from a grand jury as a free man? I will end this post with two quotes. The first is part of a Big L verse that has more relevance of late: "One [cop] murdered my man like it was OK / For the life he ended, he got suspended with no pay / But if a man woulda took the cop life, he woulda got life / And never again see the street lights and that's trife." The final quote is from Tirado's fiancee's lawyer: "He [Sawyer] didn't even get ticketed for littering for leaving Jayson Tirado's body on the street!" Peace.

Photos - Sean Sawyer (www.nydailynews.com), Jayson Tirado and his daughter (www.nytimes.com), Officers inspecting Tirado's car following the early morning shooting (www.nypost.com)

Yonkers Cop and Yonkers DA Embarrass City through Mishandling of Police Brutality Case

While perusing Gothamist today I came upon a horrific story of police brutality up in Yonkers. It seems that Yonkers cop Wayne Simoes body-slammed a woman trying to help her niece through a medical emergency with EMTs last year. The woman, Irma Marquez, suffered brutal looking bruises, a broken jaw, and a four day stay at an area hospital. But her suffering did not end there, as she was arrested and eventually charged with obstruction of government administration and brought to trial last May, while Simoes got off scot-free and his actions were originally found to be within his professional code of conduct.

While the video is a little grainy and goes by quickly, Gothamist says that Marquez bumped into an officer at the scene (not clear whether it was Simoes), when Simoes approached and shoved Marquez. Marquez, as a human being, does not like being shoved, and objects to it (not physically, mind you). Simoes sees this as an invitation to slam her into the ground - head first. At trial, the jury acquitted Marquez of any wrongdoing.

So while Simoes may have thought he was getting off for beating on a woman, the feds stepped in and have charged him with violating Marquez's civil rights. Not only this, but one news outlet is reporting that the "blue wall of silence" that once protected Simoes has "crumbled." The officers at the scene, when presented with images of the highly incriminating videotape, stated that they felt Simoes went too far. If convicted, Simoes is looking at $250,000 down the drain and a harrowing 10 years in a federal pen.

What is more unbelievable about this story is the less than stellar job the DA's office did with this case. After an initial internal investigation within the police department cleared anyone of any wrongdoing, Mayor Phil Amicone said the city's officers "do their jobs the right way in full accordance with the law." Maybe he doesn't read the news much.

Since all of the bad press, however, Yonkers officials have turned to a time-proven political tactic: backpedaling. Westchester DA Janet DiFiore launched an internal investigation for her office, and has said that changes have been made (therefore, something clearly went wrong in this case). The Yonkers PD commissioner has requested that the internal affairs investigation be reopened. Looks like everyone involved in this case believes that Simoes did something wrong and that Marquez got the extremely short end of the proverbial stick.

Even if Simoes is acquitted of federal charges (though U.S. Attorneys don't tend to file charges on cases they don't think they have locked), the taxpayers of Yonkers can look forward to a settlement of the $11.3 million lawsuit that Marquez has pending against the police department. Peace.

Photos - Marquez's face after Simoes bodyslammed her to the ground (Gothamist), Yonkers Police Officer Wayne Simoes (Yonkers Tribune)

Justice for Ciara Durkin

Harking back on a story that I discussed a while ago, Massachusetts Army National Guard Specialist Ciara Durkin was found dead on a secure army base in Afghanistan with a single gunshot wound to the head. Her September 28, 2007 death occurred under highly suspicious circumstances, but the Army eventually ruled it a suicide. Those circumstances surrounding her death, however, seem to paint a different story.

Durkin had been home only three weeks prior to her death in Afghanistan and had told her family that if anything happened to her while she was overseas that they should have it thoroughly investigated. Additionally, she had told her sister that while working as a finance specialist at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan (the same base on which she was killed) that she had discovered some information that had made her some enemies on the base. Only three weeks after this she was found dead with a single gunshot wound to the head.

As if this were not suspicious enough, the Army initially lied to the Durkin family about what really happened to their daughter. The Army told them that Ciara had died in a combat situation in Afghanistan, which immediately aroused suspicion because Durkin was a finance specialist who rarely, if ever, saw combat. When pressed, the Army conceded that, in fact, Durkin had died not in combat, but next to a church on a secure part of the airbase.

Recent scrutiny of the case has come on the heels of a column by Ann Wright, a 29 year Army and Army Reserve veteran who recently retired in protest to the war in Iraq. Colonel Wright highlights numerous other cases of women dying in secure areas that are suspiciously labeled "suicide" by the Army. Some of the cases are quote shocking, as there are damning statistics cited by Wright (she says that 1/3 of women in the Armed Forces will be sexually assaulted or raped by their male military peers). The cases involve cover-ups of rape and murder on military bases, with evidence to go with it. The incident involving Ciara Durkin's "suicide" is one of the highlighted cases for its very suspicious circumstances, given Durkin's comments to her family less than a month prior and her unlikeliness of taking her own life (her family and co-workers cite no unusual or depressing behavior).

Something about Durkin's death is amiss, here, and it appears that there are several things that the Army is not telling the Durkin family. Senators Kennedy and Kerry have looked into it, but have resolved little. The Durkin family deserves to know the truth about what happened to their daughter, who was serving this country in Afghanistan. Given the Army's past cover-up attempts and the VA's disgusting treatment of post-war veterans, it is time to demand the truth. It's bad enough that over 4,000 soldiers have died in a war that was sold to the American public on bad intel, but to lie to the families of those making the ultimate sacrifice for this country is unconscionable. I am urging anyone who feels that nothing less than justice is warranted in this case to write to the public officials who will be listed after this post and ask them to press for information in this case. Peace.

Photos - Ciara Durkin (www.bostonherald.com), Durkin's casket following funeral services in Quincy, MA (www.daylife.com)

Public Officials to Write To:

Bill Delahunt (Congressional Representative to the 10th District of Massachusetts, which includes Durkin's hometown of Quincy)
Congressman Bill Delahunt
1250 Hancock Street, Suite 802-N
Quincy, MA 02169
william.delahunt@mail.house.gov

Ted Kennedy (Senator to Massachusetts)
Senator Ted Kennedy
2400 JFK Building
Boston, MA 02203
http://kennedy.senate.gov/senator/contact.cfm

John Kerry (Senator to Massachusetts)
Senator John Kerry
One Bowdoin Square
Tenth Floor
Boston, MA 02114
http://kerry.senate.gov/contact/email.cfm

Ike Skelton (Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee)
Congressman Ike Skelton
1401 Southwest Blvd, Suite 101
Jefferson City, MO 65109-2429
http://www.house.gov/skelton/email.shtml

New Orleans Cops

Suspects in the Danziger Bridge shooting on their way
to turning themselves (NOLA.com)

Today New Orleans suffered another setback. The police officers accused of killing 2 men on a bridge in the days after Katrina will be able to post bail. While the article did not mention the amount of the bail, the fact that the indicted suspects will even be allowed to post bail on such serious charges is ridiculous.

Four of the seven officers are facing the death sentence through first-degree murder charges. How many black cop-killers have been offered bail in a murder case? Yet these police officers are given the benefit of the doubt because of one thing: a shiny badge.

The mentally-challenged man they killed was shot 7 times - 5 times in the back, and no gun was found on his person or near him. This brings flashbacks of Amadou Diallo in New York and the trigger-happy police behind the crime. Let's not forget that those cops walked from their charges.

With the availability of bail for these officers, the judge is sending the future jury of this case a message that they are not violent and should not be held in jail like their civilian counterparts. At the end of the day, cops are people too and are susceptible to the same evils that we are, and should be subject to the same treatment as regular people in the justice system.

While the officers should be commended for staying in the city following Katrina when many of their brethren cut and run, that does not give them the right to murder at will. These officers need to be treated just as everyone else in the justice system. A badge does not exempt you from wrongdoing and it's time that we held the police in this country to the same standard we do everyone else.