In the following days and weeks, Randall’s mother searched for answers in vain, calling the Texas Rangers and the Rusk County district attorney’s office. She had no idea how her son wound up dead after a police traffic stop. “No one was telling us anything,” said Tippitt, who was born and raised in Rusk County and now cleans houses for a living.
Her first shock came two months after the shooting when a grand jury returned a no bill in the case, meaning it chose not to indict Iversen for killing an unarmed man.
The second came last summer when Iversen’s lawyers turned over the dashcam video after she filed a federal lawsuit. Nearly two years after the shooting, she finally got to see, in brutal detail, what happened in the moments before her youngest son was killed.
“The only person that was attacking anybody was Sgt. Iversen attacking my son,” Tippitt said.
Iversen quietly retired after the shooting and fought in court to keep the video from being made public. Its release sparked a backlash in rural Rusk County. It also set Randall’s mother on a crusade to get justice for his killing.
But whether that will happen — and what it would even look like — remains to be seen.
Archived at https://archive.is/CNGGK
What if we just had the death for cops who were found guilty of shooting unarmed people for no reason? Like, no appeals, nothing; just straight to the firing squad upon guilty finding.
That said this was Texas.
The WHO investigates police shootings in Texas?!
I would settle for ANY fucking accountability at this point. If an unwarranted killing by a police officer meant they could never again serve as police or any kind of security officer in the US that would be a giant leap forward.
Yeah, some people wanted to use my spitballed idea as a platform to voice their anti-death penalty sentiments (despite me clearly delineating what I was saying from that process), but all I’m really trying to get at, is that if there were SOME sort of very very serious consequences for what is essentially negligent homicide, then maybe these cops would think twice before gunning down unarmed people.
Are people even thinking for five seconds about the ideas they’re upvoting?
the death penaltystate-sanctioned murder, but it’s a fucking awful practice that doesn’t do shit. That’s why so many first-world countries and even many developing countries no longer have it and why the US is such an outlier. The US should be embarrassed about its continued use of the death penalty, not clamoring for more and worse.This is just masturbating your rage boner to fantasy land punitive justice, not a serious policy suggestion to fix a single problem with the police.
In general, I oppose the death penalty. My argument against it goes broadly along the lines that our social contract is based around the system protecting each individual (thus, it cannot kill them), and that rehabilitation should always be on the table (benefits everyone).
I definitely think that people in power that abuse their power in order to commit a crime should be far more severely punished that an ordinary person committing the same crime.
Whether the above extrapolates to the point where it is justified to execute police officers that have body cam footage of themselves executing unarmed, non-threatening civilians (there are plenty such cases) is actually a question I’m a bit torn about. There are a couple videos out there (that no one should see) which show police straight up purposefully executing civilians that are either incapacitated or otherwise neutralized (lying face-down, spread eagle, unarmed). Should these warrant execution of the officer involved? I haven’t concluded for myself what I think yet.
So Texas’ state sanctioned murder by police officers is cool with you?
Straw men are ubiquitous on this site… It’s always the final destination of every discussion with someone “just asking questions” (yet somehow hitting every right wing talking point).
Lemmy has a lot of benefits over reddit, but I believe people have started to realize that it’s very simple to game and astroturf.
Not saying that’s the case here, just something I’ve noticed recently.
i just immediately block people that are like that, or trying to bait an arguement, you learn to recognize it if you been to reddit.
he supports bootlicking cops.
He wasn’t convicted and the whose system was used to cover for the cop. It took two years to just see the actual event. They investigated themselves. The use of the grand jury is almost always a farce. The death penalty is no deterrent for those given Free rein to kill as they see fit with no consequences.
And even if by some miracle those with the power to prosecute do so, they still have to find a jury to actually convict a cop. In many places, that is not happening. The guy in Florida who got some popcorn thrown at him murdered a man and was let go by a jury. And I’ve seen many people argue he was in the right.
It is not just a problem with a corrupt system. It is a corruption of a large segment of society. Too many people are ok with this happening. The US especially is on a course to destruct. I don’t think there is anything that can stop it. It has been happening for a while, and seems to be speeding up. But most don’t see it. Those in the future will be better able to pinpoint when the tipping point came. I think we are already past it. Oh well.
Cops are armed, terrified, and don’t need to consider literally any consequences. Gotta love it.
Probably one of the few situations I wpuld actually support the death penalty.