The Death of a Civilian
I get the feeling the investigation is going to go on forever and the public may never have a complete story about the shooting. For sure she was not shot from the front. More likely than not, it came from the side and close to behind Renee.
Trump Officials Lie After Killing of Protester Renee Good, CEPR, Dean Baker
I have a jobs report to write up this morning (4.6 percent and 42k are my guesses) and have some time on the road this weekend, so may not be here for a few days. I did want to take a moment to comment on the killing of Renee Good.
Long ago, I remember reading the great English historian E.P. Thompson making the point that when you have an incident where the police or military kill protestors, what is more important than the initial incident is the official reaction. Nervous and poorly trained people with guns make mistakes or can get carried away with anger. That is horrible when it results in innocent people being killed or wounded, but it happens.
What matters for policy purposes is how the government responds. Does it promise a serious investigation, does it try to make amends as best as possible to the victims or the families?
In the Good killing the reaction is 180 degrees in the other direction. Donald Trump and Kristi Noem immediately pushed absurd lies about the event, which we can all recognize. We have the videos.
Trump told us the ICE officer was run over and subsequently hospitalized and is lucky to be alive. It’s clear as day that he was not run over or injured at all. He is shown hustling to his car to get away from the scene of the crime.
Noem pushed a crazy story about how the ICE officers had their car stuck in snow and then were surrounded by protestors. Again, this picture clearly had nothing to do with reality. No one was stuck in snow and no one was surrounded, except perhaps Renee Good before her killing.
JD Vance decided to throw in that Good was a domestic terrorist. Although it may not seem that way most of the time, Vance has been to law school. He knows that he can lie about a dead person with impunity since their family can’t bring a defamation suit. (The reluctance to use defamation suits against these clowns is something I cannot understand.)
Anyhow, when the government laughs and lies about shooting its political opponents, it’s a scary sight. This is not a time to back down. There are protests all over the country, those in a position to do so should find one. And don’t let them distract you from the Epstein files that they are illegally concealing.
suspect the reluctance to file a defamation suit is probably the lack of resources (i.e. money) to do so, and of course the attacks from the MAGA crowd
david:
Smaill “d” used as it matches your comment.
Resources are an issue. Resources to pay for an attorney is the issue. The other issue being the probability of winning as opposed to losing. The question remains is whether you can afford to lose?
your
One issue being the loss of money. Another issue speaks to integrity. The final issue being, “what do you have to gain from this?”
If your goal is to expose the injustice, than have at it knowing you may lose and it will costs you.
Why would this investigation go on very long? They have a lot of video, they have the vehicle, the cause of death is not disputed by anyone. Minnesota has already indicated that this may be a crime, so interviewing the agent isn’t happening in Minnesota. The controversy isn’t over what happened. She did certain well-documented actions and he shot her 3 times. No one is waiting around for a break in order to “solve” this case. The investigation is nearly over but the disputes about whether she represented a credible threat to safety will go on for a long, long time. If she was not a credible threat, it was some degree of homicide. If she was a threat, then it was an understandable action with no criminal consequence for the agent. The facts already are, and will continue to be, a type of Rorschach test, heavily influenced by feelings about Trump.
1. She was not a criminal.
2. Serving in Iraq, Vietnam, etc. is not a good foundation for being a police officer.
3. There are no “public” well documented evidence as the Trump administration has blocked normal channels of investigations.
4. There was no reason to shoot Renee Good. He could have moved out of the way and let her go if he was in the way. Later on, others pick her up at home.
5. He panicked and took the most extreme measure..
6. There are no well documented actions as the administrations have blocked all information.
7. You do not shoot first and ask questions later. She did not have a bullet-spewing weapon. In which case, if he was in the way of her moving car, the moving car would have hit him and caused injury. One round in the lower corner of the windshield and two on the side.
8. Machismo got in his way.
We were trained in crowd control.
@Bill,
He *should* have moved out of the way and let her go if he was in the way.
FIFY