A picture is worth a thousand documents.
Posted on 05/01/2015 10:49:42 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Charges filed against the six Baltimore police officers for their involvement in the death of Freddie Grey will be dismissed, a George Washington University law professor predicted in an interview with The Daily Caller.
John Banzhaf, who teaches public interest law, says that the charges announced by Baltimore state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby on Friday “go too far.”
“I think a prosecutor is going to have a hard time proving that the actions did in fact cause death, since they seem to have no theory as to how it occurred,” Banzhaf said in a phone interview.
Gray was arrested on April 12 after a foot chase with police. He was transported in a police van to a processing center, where he was found unresponsive. He was then taken to a hospital, where he underwent surgery.
His death on April 19 touched off massive protests across the nation, as well as rioting and looting in Baltimore.
Mosby said Friday that Gray’s arrest was illegal and that officers failed to provide him with medical assistance, even though he asked for it numerous times. A medical examiner ruled Gray’s death a homicide and determined that he suffered a broken neck and sustained a wound on the back of his head consistent with hitting it on a bolt on the van door.
The driver of the police van faces the toughest charges. Officer Caesar Goodson Jr. was charged with second-degree depraved-heart murder, manslaughter, assault and misconduct. Three other officers face voluntary or involuntary manslaughter charges. The other two face assault and misconduct charges.
But Banzhaf, who is most famous for his successful campaign to get smoking ads removed from TV, says that Mosby will have to show how each of the six charged officers directly contributed to Gray’s death.
“I think it is very difficult to pin responsibility on one person when you have four or five or six each doing a variety of things — or not doing a variety of things — which in some generalized way contributes to the overall outcome.”
“Again, you have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, that each of the individuals — Officer X, Officer Y, Officer Z — what he did or didn’t do was a direct cause of what happened,” Banzhaf said.
Baltimore police policy dictates that arrestees placed in a police van must be restrained with a seat belt. However, the president of Baltimore’s Fraternal Order of Police has argued that the policy went into effect just days before Gray’s arrest. He also said that the new policy was not being properly communicated to beat officers.
Banzhaf says that even if Gray’s arrest was illegal, as Mosby asserts, the “chain of legal causation” appears to have been broken. Thus, the officers who arrested Gray should not face many of the charges they are accused of committing.
He presented a scenario in which an officer is charged in the death of an inmate who was falsely arrested and then beaten to death in jail. He said that opening the door to that type of charge creates a slippery slope.
As for accusations that the officers were negligent in failing to provide medical care to Gray even after he asked for it, Banzhaf said that the defendants would likely bring experts who will testify that prisoners often make false claims about injuries.
“I think the cops will be able to find lots of experts who will say ‘this is pretty well standard,'” Banzhaf said. The officers’ defense experts would likely argue that “lots of people who are arrested start screaming that they are in pain, they can’t breath, they are hurt and so on. They do it to get leniency, or to get cuffs removed, and they also do it so that they set up claims stating that they were mishandled by police.”
Banzhaf also said he believes Mosby overcharged the officers.
“To be fair, many prosecutors … do overcharge,” he said.
He said that overcharging would be particularly effective in a case with multiple defendants. By overcharging, one defendant is more likely to open up about the actions of a co-defendant.
But given Mosby’s flimsy case, Banzhaf says that those who are happy with Friday’s announcement may be disappointed if a judge throws the case out.
“The people who are cheering saying how wonderful this because they support Mr. Gray may be very sadly disappointed when a judge looks at this and says, ‘Well, Ms. Mosby, you just can’t come in here and say ‘at some point somebody did something and we believe this caused his death.””
“You have to tell me when it happened,” Banzhaf said.
He said that besides Mosby overcharging as a prosecutorial strategy, she also may have done so because of public pressure.
“I think any prosecutor in her position would recognize that Baltimore is a tinderbox and that if something decisive wasn’t done now, it would likely lead to more riots and more problems,” Banzhaf said.
“So, better to do something now and appear to be decisive,” he said.
Bttt
If people who are behaving irrationally or suspiciously can run away and police can't stop them, none of us are safe, anywhere. What happens when the maniacs (is "maniac" racist?) show up in the suburbs and the police stop them in ways the suburban population expects? Will they bring their excuses to riot outside their sphere of influence?
Think it through.
I do think about it, especially because of that outbreak by hundreds of young 'uns mostly from the city at the cinema I go to. The police from several departments handled it real well, yet the media tried to gin it up by finding parents who were upset about how their children were treated.
Toxicology report will be interesting
Were all the cops in the van? Why would there be six cops in the van in the first place? Lots of things I’m not getting about the scenario.
Apparently, his spine was not completely severed...about 80% from latest reports.
Again, if he were white, would anybody be mourning his demise? I think not.
Shattering Irony! Black cops being swept up in a PC mob wave!
This indictment is a s bad as any infamy we have read of in history.
This whole business is coordinated on a national level. Whether there is a guilty verdict or not, you can bet a doughnut that this sort of agitation will continue. Guilty, and the agitators set a precedent. Not guilty, and the agitators rub it in the faces of the "aggrieved". Win-win.
Big surprise that a female Al Sharpton type would let her emotions take over and press charges based on her desires rather than the facts. Incompetence combined with racial grievance and emotionality never turns out well. That’s why there are no thriving cities/towns/anything run by them.
Spines do not sever themselves.
Leaks from the coroner's report indicate that his neck wound matched the shape of an exposed bolt on the door in the back of the van. How his body impacted the door is an open question.
Other leaks indicate that the police gave him a "rough ride." If so, their actions would have contributed to Gray's death, which would warrant a manslaughter charge, at most.
Interesting....Dershowitz and now this guy.
Doesn’t bode well for B’more. What will the ever sympathetic mayor and city council do when this blows up in their face because of their own actions?
A picture is worth a thousand documents.
And yet, here he is standing up, entering the paddy wagon.
miraculous!! beaten with sticks, bats, irons, golf clubs (Obama’s) assault weapons, a small tactical nuke!!, and still able to stand.
I wonder if it wasn’t intentional, to give the lovely lads of Baltimore yet another excuse for wealth redistribution this autumn, or maybe early next summer?
But let's look at the possibilities:
1. He broke his own neck, police are exonerated - Blacks riot, because it is "clearly false", he couldn't do that to himself
2. The police broke his neck, and failed to render aid, but are overcharged and found not guilty - Blacks riot
3. The police broke his neck and failed to render aid, police are found guilty - Blacks claim a further foundation for future riots, because police are racist
4. He broke his own neck, but police are convicted anyway - Miscarriage of justice, and Blacks claim further foundation for future riots because police are racist
No matter the outcome, the foundation is laid for more riots in the future... some sooner than others. The forces of evil win no matter what.
If I may add one more to your list:5. Sun rises in the east—Blacks riot.
I hate to break it to you but you don't know squat about the subject matter:
http://www.acadianaaddiction.com/heroin/symptoms-signs-effects
Behavioral symptoms:
Aggression
Violence
Interpersonal problems
Inability to interact normally with others
Loss of relationships
Unkempt appearance
Drug-seeking behaviors
Changes in normal behavior patterns
Failure to fulfill major life responsibilities
“Nodding off”
Problems at work or school
Lying
Lack of protective measures
Hiding the drug in various places
How much heroin have you taken?
Mike Utley, an offensive lineman with the Detroit Lions, fell face first trying to block another player in an NFL game in 1991. He couldn't break his fall. His neck snapped back and was paralyzed.
So, it is definitely possible to simply fall and break one's neck.
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