SIX BPD
OFFICERS INDICTED FOR THE “IN CUSTODY”
DEATH OF
FREDDIE GRAY
The six
Baltimore Police Officers indicted for the in custody death of Freddie Gray
TAGS:
BALTIMORE POLICE OFFICERS INDICTED, STATE PROSECUTOR MARILY MOSBY,
PROSECUTORIAL
OVER REACH AND CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, SEEKING REAL JUSTICE OR PACIFYING AN
ANGRY
PUBLIC
?, THE REALITY OF POLICING IN HOSTILE COMMUNITIES, PROSECUTOR HAS ALREADY
CORRUPTED HER CASE,
“FAIR”
TRIAL NEAR IMPOSSIBILITY IN BALTIMORE
(Thursday May 21, 2015
Baltimore, MY) A Baltimore Grand Jury
decided today to level indictments of the six Baltimore Police Officers alleged
to have been responsible for the death of Freddie Gray, a 25 year old they had
arrested last month who died while in Police custody. The indictments, such as they are, ranging
from misdemeanors to felony depraved heart homicide, came as no surprise given
Marilyn Mosby, the Baltimore State Attorney’s announcement made just days after a week of
protests and demonstrations that saw several nights of violent rioting, that
she would seek such indictments.
Less than four months into her
reign as the State Prosecutor for the City of Baltimore, 35 year old Marilyn
Mosby has found herself confronting an arduous task. Before the Baltimore Police Department (BPD)
has concluded their own investigation having assigned over 40 investigators,
forensics specialists and crime scene analysts; even without the results of the
preliminary official autopsy finding having been made known to the lawyers for
the plaintiffs and defendants, Mosby announced her intention to indict
six BPD MOS during a hastily arranged press conference on Friday May 3rd.
Her announcement was riddled with many of the same phrases employed by
protesters some of whom participated in criminal activity during otherwise peaceful demonstrations;
Mosby’s announcement was a biased, litany of charges against the Officers based
on scant forensic data and absent the final autopsy report at the time. While
the BPD was conducting a sweeping investigation of the episode with over 40
investigators assigned to that detail, Mosby came to her conclusion to seek
Grand Jury indictments after having four investigators report back to her in
less than 24 hours. She neither
consulted with nor informed the BPD Chief Anthony Batts that she was poised to
make her announcement at a press conference until “about ten minutes before”,
according to Chief Batts, she stepped out in front of the wolf pack press. It was grossly obvious she was choosing to
indict to pacify the radical element in Baltimore; parroting protestor’s
language was a clear example of just how unqualified and inherently biased Ms.
Mosby is. She amateurishly proclaimed
that she “heard the calls for justice” and was prepared for “an aggressive
prosecution” of the Officers allegedly involved.
During that May 3rd
press conference she repeatedly commented that she has “heard the voices of the
protestors” and is aware of their “anger and frustration”. She made so many inappropriate statements
that she might have just admitted her indictments were meant to pacify and
quiet the vocal throngs expressing their anger peacefully as well as those who
opted to riot, burn and loot destructively.
Her announcement is being classified as one of the most
“unprofessional”, “weak”, and “shoddy” criminal indictment many legal experts
have ever seen. Without realizing it she
has already so drastically corrupted her “case” beyond repair and if she will
not recuse herself the Governor of Maryland or the State’s Attorney General
should take the proper measures to remove her from the prosecution of this
complex, volatile case that has garnered national and international attention.
Many prominent legal scholars,
former prosecutors and criminal defense attorneys have lambasted Mosby for her
“rush to judgement”, the subjective nature of her argument to indict and the
host of conflict of interests that engulf her.
She is married to Nick Mosby the Baltimore Councilman in whose district
the Freddie Gray episode transpired. She
has close ties to one of the attorneys representing the Gray family, Billy
Murphy, and he was a financial contributor to her campaign for the Office she
currently holds. Her objectivity must be
questioned given her years long affiliation with various community activist
groups and other organizations in Baltimore.
It is very difficult to imagine how she can conduct a legal proceeding
given her subjective history in matters addressing the alleged disparities in
the criminal justice system regarding young Black men.
By the very nature of her
elected Office, State Attorney Mosby as a sworn Officer of the Court is bound
to conduct her duties in strict accordance with the body of law that governs
our criminal justice system and jurisprudence.
She is mandated to be as objective in her pursuit of justice and has the
burden of proof; she needs to present her cases and prove the particulars of
each indictment beyond the scope of “reasonable doubt”. By her public statements it appears that she
has already corrupted her case to such a degree that a fair prosecution of the
indicted Officers is not possible. In
her youthful zeal, inexperience and misuse of her “public platform” she seems
to have not only grossly mishandled the “case”, but has also set the stage for
a mistrial at best, having all charges against the Baltimore Police Officers
dropped at worst, if her prosecution ever even makes it to trial. The range of charges against the Officers
alone will strain her ability to present arguments that go beyond the burden of
proof. The Officers need not “prove”
their innocence; Ms. Mosby needs to prove their guilt and, for Officer Caesar
Goodman the driver of the Police van transporting Mr. Gray, the charge of “depraved
heart” second-degree homicide is the most serious and will be the most
challenging to prove. Actually, as many legal experts have commented, all of
the charges will be very difficult to prove beyond reasonable doubt that is, if
the empaneled jury functions objectively which is debatable given the publicity
attending these indictments.
Compounding matters even
further is the fact that the controversial arrest and in custody death of Mr. Gray
did not occur in a social vacuum; his death is just the latest in a sad litany
of unarmed African American men who have allegedly died by the hands of Police
Officers in the last year or so. The
inherent difficulty, some say impossibility, to adjudicate a “fair trial” for
the Baltimore Officers, will necessitate Ms. Mosby’s ability to divorce Mr. Gray’s
death from what most in the African American community see as a systemic
pattern of Police abuses, brutalities and disregard for “Black Lives”. Six Baltimore Police Officers have been
indicted specifically in this case but the broader indictment against the BPD
as a whole and Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA’s) writ large will cast a heavy
shadow over the proceedings in a Baltimore courtroom.
Despite this recent tragic
rash of episodes of unarmed young African American men alleged to have died as a direct result of some interaction with a
Police Officer or Officers, there is no statistical evidence to support the
claims made by activists and self-appointed leaders in the Black community,
that the Police devalue the lives of people of color. Many commentators and talking heads present anecdotal
evidence as fact laying out numbers the source of which are dubious at best,
blatantly contrived at worst. The Department
of Justice, the top LEA in the country, admits there is no truly accurate data
collected, collated and analyzed from jurisdictions large and small that
indicates the veracity of the claims made by members of the African American
community regarding LEA’s impropriety in their neighborhoods. Many have presented numbers as “fact” with no
reference to the source of such numbers.
Clearly, the Attorney General and the Justice Department have a vested interest
in the collection of actual numbers, of real data but, as they readily admit,
there is a paucity in this area. Given
the number of public-police interactions on a daily basis across the country, the
overwhelmingly factual record plainly illustrates for all to see that 99% of
such interactions transpire without event or negative outcome. The jagged edges of these unimpeachable facts
are what sticks in the craw of those who expend their efforts to portray each Police interaction with a Black
or Brown skinned person, particularly young males, as an over reach of Police
powers, racial profiling, endemic racism among Law Enforcement Officers (LEO’s),
or an instance of aggressive bias. Are
there bad Police Officers; LEO’s who are racist bigots all too willing to be
heavy handed and short tempered with young men of color? Absolutely yes, there are. But, the number of LEO’s who fall into that
category represent an infinitesimally small number of men and women who wear
the badge. This fact is an untidy nuisance
to those who hope to present their arguments otherwise. That is their prerogative; they have the
Constitutional right to express their sentiments, record the actions of Police
Officers on their cell phones, protest and demonstrate for a contrary truth
but, after the dust settles, after the last embers of a burning building in a riot
zone are extinguished, the objective truths remain intact.
In many respects this argument
can be distilled down to the bare essentials.
Most of the most bellicosely vocal opponents of the Police are far
removed from the narrow concrete canyons of tough urban streets, densely
populated housing projects, and the reality of street crime in all its many guises.
While they may be earnest and well-meaning in their assertions and concerns about
the Police they speak from distances that preclude them from some of the
harsher realities of the streets. Isolated
and insulated from the “front lines” of the gritty, often violent aspects of
Law Enforcement, they make their judgments based on preconceived notions and
beliefs unabashedly ignoring the perils the men and women of the LEC put
themselves in every time they suit up to go to work. The profound misunderstanding between these
two factions, the LEC and its detractors poses an unbridgeable gulf that is
only spanned by irresponsible hyperbolic, inflammatory demagoguery. In this climate no honest exchange of ideas
and perspective is possible.
The fate of the “Baltimore Six”
will be determined one way or another in due process and time. Until that day life goes on, the ebb and flow
of life on the streets awaits no vindication or validation.
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