SC officer charged with murder in man's death. Video catches him plant evidence.

[T.Lex]

(Wait. Isn't the sun one big fusion explosion anyway?)

 

[D-Ric902]

(Wait. Isn't the sun one big fusion explosion anyway?)

fusion reaction

keep it up and I'll make a meme for you

 

[T.Lex]

(But doesn't that result in an explosion? That helium doesn't like all that hydrogen or something?)

(I mean, maybe I misunderstood, and you agree with Kut all the time for millions of years?)

(Yes, I'm willing to let this way random derail die... or be extinguished into a black hole when gravity condenses it all into a singularity or whatever.)

 

[D-Ric902]

I warned you

 

[T.Lex]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to D-Ric902 again.

LMAO

 

[T.Lex]

Ushering the topic back to... the topic:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/10/u...ng-seen-as-crime-fighting-gone-awry.html?_r=0

Only particularly interesting tidbit:

After the shooting on Saturday, Mr. Scott’s older brother, Anthony Scott, 52, went to the crime scene. He stood taking pictures of his brother’s covered body with his phone when police officers and detectives approached. Three of them surrounded him, telling him to turn over his phone, he said.
“So, are you going to kill me, too, now?” Mr. Scott said he asked them.
He eventually handed them his phone. Hours later, Chief Driggers arrived, returned Mr. Scott’s phone and offered his condolences.
“The chief was very kind, very kind,” Mr. Scott said. “He was very gentlemanly, very different from the way everyone else was acting. Everyone else — it was eerie how they were acting. They were cocky.”

Taking the phone/pics from the brother is another troubling thing - about the whole department.

 

[gamer]

Question: doesn't Murder have to be pre-meditated? Or would manslaughter be the more appropriate charge in this situation?

 

[mrjarrell]

Ushering the topic back to... the topic:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/10/u...ng-seen-as-crime-fighting-gone-awry.html?_r=0

Only particularly interesting tidbit:


Taking the phone/pics from the brother is another troubling thing - about the whole department.

Hate to break it to you, T but cops all over this nation make a habit of seizing phones that people use to document their actions. Many times people refuse to hand over the phones and are arrested on BS charges and other times they are threatened. It's not uncommon for phones and cameras to be stolen. The brother was just lucky to get his back. Didn't read whether the photos or video had been erased (as is often the case).

 

[T.Lex]

Question: doesn't Murder have to be pre-meditated? Or would manslaughter be the more appropriate charge in this situation?

Every state has the ability to define crimes how they deem appropriate. But, most of them are roughly the same. I do not know SC law.

Generally, though, "murder" does not require premeditation. Rather, it is "knowingly" or "intentionally" killing someone. (I have seen other states with similar words, "willfully," etc.)

Hate to break it to you, T but cops all over this nation make a habit of seizing phones that people use to document their actions.

Yeah, but kinda like watching someone run a red light, it surprises me every time. :/

 

[mrjarrell]

As Popehat points out, the pretext for the initial stop may have been BS as, under Carolina law, you're only required to have one working tail lamp, anyway.

Section 56-5-4730 - Signal lamps and signal devices. :: 2012 South Carolina Code of Laws :: US Codes and Statutes :: US Law :: Justia

 

[D-Ric902]

Am I the only one that finds it disturbing that the brother is standing there taking pics of his dead brother.

condolences to him and his family, the shooting was obviously wrong and the conequences are becoming known. But was he thinking of his family, brother, or something else.

Maybe society has changed direction somewhat

 

[T.Lex]

Am I the only one that finds it disturbing that the brother is standing there taking pics of his dead brother.

I don't know. Personally, I have a hard time "judging" how someone processes their grief - especially under particularly tragic circumstances. Have experienced enough of it, and among family members and friends, and seen people I know, respect, and love deal with things in ways that I'm not comfortable with, that as long as their not endangering themselves or others, I think its better to just let them sort it out.

The brother seems to have a really good head about things. Perhaps he will try to leverage the tragedy into achieving some greater good, and wanted to do something to absolutely ingrain what happened. He could become an effective advocate for change.

 

[Kutnupe14]

I don't know. Personally, I have a hard time "judging" how someone processes their grief - especially under particularly tragic circumstances. Have experienced enough of it, and among family members and friends, and seen people I know, respect, and love deal with things in ways that I'm not comfortable with, that as long as their not endangering themselves or others, I think its better to just let them sort it out.

The brother seems to have a really good head about things. Perhaps he will try to leverage the tragedy into achieving some greater good, and wanted to do something to absolutely ingrain what happened. He could become an effective advocate for change.

It seems that this family is doing a lot of things right. I hope that keeps up. And it's worth pointing out that I feel sorry for the killer's mother as well. I can't imagine placing my mother in this situation.

 

[BigBoxaJunk]

Yeah, but kinda like watching someone run a red light, it surprises me every time. :/

In my work, I've learned that with people it's a mind-set thing. When something goes wrong, some people take an open approach in assessing the situation and working towards the best proper outcome, while not immediately thinking about appearances. Other's have an instinct to immediately think about appearances and CYA, then they assess the situation and go from there. Some people loath to break the rules, others will break the rules only as a last resort, and still others break the rules as their go-to first step.

I would say that I've found that most people I've come in contact with fall more into the first group.

Am I the only one that finds it disturbing that the brother is standing there taking pics of his dead brother.

I couldn't say if I'd be able to keep it together enough to think about things like independently documenting the scene, but I probably would if I could. Before cell phone cameras, I used to keep a disposable camera in the glove box of each of my cars, just in case. But, I've had a lot of training in investigation, so that's where my mind goes.

 

[T.Lex]

Something that just jumped out at me - is it right that this stop just happened this past Saturday? They went from shooting to murder in... 3 days? That's wild, to me. That suggests they had the video pretty soon after it happened. If they didn't... then there was some other compelling evidence that the investigators found pretty f'n quick!

It also kinda seems like a knee-jerk reaction. Wonder if even his supervisors were pissed about how the whole thing went down.

 

[Kutnupe14]

For the record, this "baller" had 4 children from 2 separate women (2 with each). He was married to both. His first wife died, he remarried and divorced his last wife. He was employed, and a veteran, who was given a general discharge due to something related to drugs in the late 80s. He apparently, as told by his family, kept an active role in his kids lives.

 

[BigBoxaJunk]

Something that just jumped out at me - is it right that this stop just happened this past Saturday? They went from shooting to murder in... 3 days? That's wild, to me. That suggests they had the video pretty soon after it happened. If they didn't... then there was some other compelling evidence that the investigators found pretty f'n quick!

It also kinda seems like a knee-jerk reaction. Wonder if even his supervisors were pissed about how the whole thing went down.

I can't make any educated call on how the officer should be "dealt with", but I remain convinced that he will be "dealt with" in a manner that is at least in some way affected by other recent events.

And, the one thing that I learned early in my career is that, the people who do things that put them in bad situations are often regular nice folks just like you and me. At times, it seems that words like "Evil" and "Innocent" don't exactly apply as often as they are used.

 

[T.Lex]

I agree. And I even think that might be a good thing.

I mean, part of this feels like it is a media-manufactured crisis. But, the reality is that officers - due in large part to prevalence of high definition cameras nowadays - are subject to more scrutiny than they used to be.

For the vast VAST majority of professional police, that isn't a problem (or shouldn't be). For the bad ones, or the ones who can't handle the professional aspects, they are being revealed. They should be dealt with fairly.

For too long, the bad/unprofessional ones have probably gotten away with things completely, or received more leniency than they deserved. That pendulum is swinging back to the middle. Hopefully, it won't go too far the other direction.

 

[AA&E]

Sure I do. How many of the federal employees pay any attention or actually learn anything from the (apparently) needless training? We endure more than our fair share of worthless training already. Someone who sees no value in human life should probably be weeded out long before they would be attending training as a police officer.

I heard an FBI agent (former state police) on fox news the other morning saying every time the FBI sends agents out into the field (serve warrant, surveillance, etc) they have a meeting where the rules of engagement are discussed and laid out. He said police officers get this briefing once in their career, during their time at the academy. He thinks this is something that should be a part of daily briefings. Not sure I agree with that, nor feel it would do much good. After awhile it would become mindless background noise. But I think he makes a valid point about the rules of engagement.. you have way more contact and potential for violent encounters on a day to day basis then an FBI agent does. yet they are briefed EVERYTIME they go out to enforce an action. Something to consider...

 

[AA&E]

If they did that you wouldn't have posted it here. So, now we get to go in circles about whose race baiting and who are racists.

I would have, I feel there are plenty of instances of injustice to go around. These incidents are not race exclusive, but the media would have you believe they are because it creates a sellable story and promotes outrage which leads to more opportunities for them to exploit.