JUST SAYING
BY RAUL HERNANDEZ
“I Can’t Breathe.”
NYPD Cop Daniel Pantaleo’s firing for the death of Eric Garner was a no brainer — he used an illegal chokehold to kill a suspect that the video record indicated wasn’t resisting. Garner was charged with a non-violent crime but never convicted. Are you presumed innocent?
Apparently, Pantaleo didn’t get the memo that chokeholds should not be used, especially when other idiots with guns and badges are piling on, holding down a suspect while he is saying: “I can’t breathe.”
In this country, cops are held to a higher standard.
The New York cop union defended its dues-paying member. The police unions have never seen a cop beating or fatal shooting that they couldn’t defend.
So, citizens with cameras are now protecting people from abusive and racist cops.
Without the recording of Garner’s death, he would have been demonized, and Pantaleo and the other cops would have said the magic words: “I feared for my life’ and Garner reached for a weapon or tried to take a cop’s gun.
It is all scripted.
The Garner family would have no grounds to sue because it would be difficult to surmount the cops’ words and the state’s evidence against Garner.
On the other side, we need the police. They should also be paid high salaries and given great benefits. It is a highly stressful job with high rates of suicide, divorce, and alcoholism.
But good cops don’t stand by and watch bad cops disgrace the badge and terrorize the community.
Police departments need to weed out the bad apples — they are armed, dangerous and a detriment to the community.