Posted on 09/04/2002 5:18:09 AM PDT by Pern
Gonzalo Martinez had no criminal record.
His mother says he was a hard-working young man in an import-export business who supported her while helping to put his brother through college.
But on Feb. 15 he was shot dead after being pulled over for a traffic violation by Downey, Calif., police. A video, shown last night on "The O'Reilly Factor," appears to show the young man raising his hands on the orders of the police before being shot repeatedly by a police officer wielding an assault rifle.
A spokesman for the city of Downey said Wednesday that a second, unreleased video of the police shooting of Gonzalo Martinez shows Martinez's hands were not raised at the time, supporting the city's contention that the shooting was justified.
The shooting has brought months of protests in Downey and was shown repeatedly on local Spanish-language television and in Argentina, where Martinez's parents came from. But the case has frustrated the family because it has drawn less attention than the highly publicized beating of a 16-year-old in Inglewood in July.
Robert Alaniz of Hill & Knowlton, the public relations firm hired by the city to represent it in the case, said the second video, shot with a camera mounted on the dashboard of a police car that had pursued Martinez, would not be released until the district attorney's office finishes its investigation of the Feb. 15 shooting.
Alaniz said the police video would be made available to the media "when, as we expect, the district attorney concurs with [our opinion], that this shooting was justified."
He said the district attorney's office has been provided with the police video.
Downey "is trying to urge the D.A. to push forward on his investigation," Alaniz said.
The FBI also is investigating the Martinez shooting, which has led to demonstrations by the Martinez family and Latino activists.
According to the police account, the shooting occurred after a 12-minute chase, during which Martinez at one point backed his car toward officers in an apparent attempt to run them over. A coroner's report added that, when Martinez later emerged from his car, he made "furtive" movements with one hand, which led the police to open fire.
Steve Lerman, the attorney who is representing the family in a lawsuit against the city, said that he has been trying, so far without success, to obtain a copy of the police video and that he believes there may even be a third video, shot from a police helicopter.
In any case, Lerman said, the district attorney's investigation has had access to eyewitnesses who believe that the police shooting of Martinez was not justified.
If the eyewitnesses are given proper credence, "they'll have no choice but to find that this shooting was not only not justified but was a criminal act," Lerman said.
Of course the DA will agree with the police, they are all in the same 'club'.
I watched this on the The O'Reilly Factor last night, the guy had his hands raised, and one of the police just blasted away with an automatic weapon. The cop should be in jail for murder, no 'if's', 'and's', or 'but's'.
The guy had one hand raised, for sure.
If there's another video that shows something else, then O'Reilly's attention will no doubt force release of it sooner rather than later.
It sure doesn't seem possible to have two videos and one shows his hands raised, yet the other does not.............
No, it doesn't. Maybe his hands flew up as he was shot? We need police, but not uncontrolled sadists. Why use an assault rifle at a traffic stop? On the other hand, why try to outrun the cops on a traffic stop (not much justification, but curious)?
P...B...S: Your idea has merit - hands flying, but... I don't ever understand someone running from a stop - just begging for trouble........ I wouldn't want to have to make that life or death decision when a kid has run from me then finally gets stopped - hands possibly reaching for a weapon.......
The good news is that the family members of Mr. Gonzalez do not have to wait for the DA to make a decision to seek relief for "damages" in court.
"Hafer v. Melo, 502 U.S. 21 (1991) — State officers may be held personally liable for damages based upon actions taken in their official capacities."
This Supreme Court case gives the precedent to proceed with a civil suit against the police officer that shot him.
Hill and Knowlton is a high powered mega sleaze PR firm, for those who are not familiar with the company.
If the second video is more favorable to the police why not release it right away? I think we know the answer to this.
You saw him with both hands raised?
"..during which Martinez at one point backed his car toward officers in an apparent attempt to run them over."
Was this on the video also?
I think the evil assault rifle made him do it. It is a good thing they were banned from the serfs under Clinton
Call me skeptical, but I fail to see a consistency between "a perfectly clean record" and a 12-minute chase.
The FBI knows it's only permissible to shoot unarmed eagle scouts while they unbuckle their seatbelts, as opposed to this case. < /sarcasm>
And anyone who would question anything any LEO or LEA would do is desecrating the graves of the FDNY and NYPD heroes who died on September 11, 2001.
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U.S. Department of Labor
Occupational Fatalities per 100,000 Year 1999 |
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Commercial Fishermen
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162
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Timber Cutters
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154
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Air Pilots
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65
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Construction Laborers
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37
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Garbage Collectors
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34
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Truck Drivers
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28
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Electricians
|
12
|
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Gardeners (non farm)
|
11
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Police
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11
|
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Carpenters
|
7
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I'm hoping you forgot you 'sarcasm off' tag.
Did you look at the table? Is the sarcasm tag really necessary?
I bet you need a "laugh" sign when you go to the movies so you know when to laugh, too.
The last years of his career were spent as the Chief Juvenile Detective in his department. When he died, a number of the young men whose lives he’d touched years before came forward to tell how his timely and sometimes tough-love intervention turned them around.
I know that many officers STILL try to live that creed today. I also know that there are officers out there who, despite the rulings by the Supremes that they have no obligation to specific, individual citizens, would stand between one of us and a bullet – and have.
My sister is married to a good guy – who was also a good cop.
And I STILL vividly recall a business trip and having a flat tire. I pulled onto the narrow shoulder and was opening the trunk when I spied a Georgia State Trooper’s car cross the median, hit the flashers and pull in some distance behind me and a bit closer to the road, shielding me and my car from the 70 MPH traffic. SHE got out and asked if I needed any help. I told her I could probably handle it. She said she’d keep her unit there until I got done.
THEN she spotted my cane and saw that I was partially disabled. Before I could object, she was in the trunk, had wrestled the spare to the ground and was jacking up the car, all the while asking me to remain safely near the guard rail. About that time, two county deputies stopped and pitched in. The lady trooper cut her hand fooling with the jack and soiled her freshly pressed uniform wrestling the dirty flat back into the trunk. They couldn’t have been nicer! I took their names and wrote highly complimentary letters to their superiors – all of whom promptly acknowledged them and thanked me for the kind words.
These officers – like my uncle – grasped the significance of “To Protect and Serve.”
I also recognize that the cops – like Gort in “The Day The Earth Stood Still” -- are simply the muscle (the “enforcement”) behind the legislative and statutory “law” enacted by society as a whole. That is, after all, why it’s called “LAW ENFORCEMENT.” And although it could be argued that this society may be morphing into the homonym for “whole” as you read this, these laws are enacted by our alleged “representatives” meeting in generally safe, quiet and opulent chambers far from the increasingly mean streets where the cops ply their trade. If the cops have too many intrusive and abusive laws to enforce, check the nearest mirror for a likeness of the responsible party.
And if the cops ARE abusive to the general citizenry, why aren’t HUNDREDS or THOUSANDS of us RAISING UNHOLY HELL at each and every meeting of the responsible governing body? French political philosopher Joseph D'Maistre declared that "Every people gets the government they deserve."
Have we really become the “nation of sheep” an author foresaw many years ago? If so, we have little right to object to the shearing. Or the coming slaughter and culling of the flock. And my guess is that the culling will begin with the most troublesome and noisiest sheep. And guess who THAT is?
An old friend is a ranking officer with a large police department. I would rate his love of our freedoms and the Constitution against anyone here at FR. A few years ago, he told me that IF the order to begin some sort of weapons round-up among the general citizenry ever came down from “on high,” we would quickly know about it from the reports of disturbances and gunfire from the neighborhood cop shop: Fully HALF the officers in his department are Second Amendment guys. He and they would be the first to resist such an order – physically if necessary. What should scare us all is the shift in our demographics and the continuing leftist indoctrination by the government schools, making it impossible to know how much longer that ratio – and sentiment – will hold.
Having said that, I also recognize that EVERY large barrel contains some bad apples -- and SOME cops are “cowboys.” Some are simply power driven megalomaniacs who would have dropped on the OTHER side of the law had their lives drifted a degree or two off the course they did take.
I believe this to be especially true of far too many federal law enforcement types who have allowed their egos and hubris to become as bloated as the bureaucratic federal behemoth they serve. Their mandate is no longer to “…protect and serve” the citizens who pay their salaries: It is to crush any meaningful resistance to a growing body of procedures, regulations and policies – too frequently enforced under severely tortured interpretations of the underlying legislative enactments (if any) – and often put in place by executive fiat. The massively abused SEIZURE statutes – laws the author of which now seeks to RESCIND! -- spring to mind.
And one cannot but help to wonder how the clear criminality of the Clintons – and their subsequent avoidance of any penalty – has played into the problem. There now seems to be a bright line between the easy, highly flexible, slap-on-the-wrist law for the rich and powerful and the rigidly enforced law against even the tiniest victimless “crimes” committed by those of us further down the food chain. Does anyone in his right mind believe THAT will NOT engender added disrespect for ALL law?
Could those things be a large part of the problem in some of the highly disturbing – and DEADLY (on BOTH sides) – confrontations we have witnessed over the past decade or so? Gordon Kahl, Ruby Ridge, OK City, Waco, Beck… This list WILL lengthen and we’d all better pray that WE will be spared.
Roman historian Tacitus warned that one could tell the level of corruption in a society by the NUMBER of its laws. Anyone doubt the level of corruption here?
Am I the only one who thinks we’re long overdue a serious review of the NUMBERS of laws under which we are now forced to exist – and which are increasingly used not to assure our safety or well-being, but to COMMAND AND CONTROL us and KEEP US IN LINE.
Only the most tyrannical and power-crazed members of law enforcement could possibly object to that.
The modern counterparts of my Uncle Bob would not object.
It is THEY, after all, who are most likely to catch that bullet – probably fired by someone who has symbolically screamed to himself “I’M MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GONNA TAKE IT ANY MORE” -- referred to earlier when they sally forth to serve that flimsy warrant or make that bogus arrest.
Roxane and the DEA seem to like them.
However, I have become convinced of this: No matter how unwarranted, or accidental, or sadistic, or idiotic, or just plain unbelievable a cop shooting may be, the shooter will get off with a short stint in a desk job while he and his buddies laugh about it over a few beers, then when the media publicity dies down, he will again strap on a weapon and go back on patrol. Possibly with a promotion to SWAT.
I'm not a very religious man, but I know when we die, we go before the Almighty Judge, and there won't be any fancy lawyers to argue your case and get you off. And the judge already knows all.
Stay safe! It's a jungle out there.
I believe the leading indicator for corruption in government -- OUR government -- is the complete absence of accountability.
Criminal negligence by goverment agents is normally just swept "under the rug".
No one can pretend not to be involved in these issues -- not if they (or their children) drive the same streets as the 'bank robbers' . . .
Well, I ain't goin'!
Your post is very well stated.
With South American connections?
Why use an assault rifle at a traffic stop?
Why carry guns at all? They rarely use them.
Everything I've seen of this tragedy suggests that the police were not being careful, and are liable for this loss of life -- and, yet, everything I've seen of the Downey police suggests that this was not deliberate and, if anything, came from desperation.
The same Downey police treated me with professionalism, speed, and courtesy when I was robbed at gunpoint, at midnight, in a grocery parking lot. Four cars came within a minute of my call. The detectives investigated thoroughly before giving up due to very little physical evidence. (The scumbag got $25 and ran up $200 on my credit cards before I cancelled them at 3 am.)
Downey is a quite peaceful community of 110,000 on the eastern edge of Los Angeles County, almost exactly in the middle of the L.A. metro area. It's had a quietly effective city government since being incorporated in 1957.
About half of the residents are white, one-fourth Hispanic, the rest a mixture of dozens of other ethnicities, mostly Asian, very few blacks. Racial or ethnic strife has been nearly nonexistent for decades. It's a mixed enclave, in one sense -- Hispanics dominate to its north and west, blacks to the southwest and south, whites to the east, Asians to the northeast. I don't see any racial undertone here from police versus residents, emphatically unlike L.A.'s Inglewood and its recent -- non-deadly -- incident.
For what it's worth, that's some background. This has shaken many in Downey quite profoundly, precisely due to its being so unusual.
Just curious ... which small, West Texas town?
Bingo! Principle?!?! What's that?
Note to self: Credit card robbery -- Call BANK, then police . . .
Not seen the tape yet, but you're far too kind.
His family should get to execute the cop. (after trial)In public. This has got to stop.
I know you're joking, but still, I lost nothing, and I knew I'd lose nothing, except some time and hassles. New cards were issued, fraud affidavits were submitted, and my accounts were credited. I'd better get such service, with interest rates as they are on these cards! (The one card the scumsucker didn't use, American Express, was replaced in 36 hours via FedEx. Now, that's service.)
That parasite went to two gas stations, a grocery, and a Denny's to charge that $200. Nobody asked for identification. Nothing on unmanned-gas-pump surveillance cameras. *sigh*
Far more important was to get the police there, and to my apartment, before the asswipe used my stolen keys and the home address in my wallet to do something to my brother, then home asleep. The police escorted me home and came up to check the apartment before my bro and I (who'd come to get me) went inside.
As I wrote, I have a sizable respect for the Downey police.
That said, if someone stuck a 'hot weapon in MY face for no good reason, I couldn't help feeling like it cost me something . . .
Sounds like an episode of Seinfeld. Did he work for Vandaly Industries? :)
The guys mother and lawyer claimed last night that the victim didn't have a criminal record. Bill found out different. It seems he was arrested for cocaine posession and a DWI.
There's still no justification for the shooting, though. Like I said, the cop should be in jail for murder, just like you or I would be if we shot and killed an unarmed man.
One rule applies to all, there can be no elite class that doesn't have to follow the laws all citizens are expected to.
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