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Johannes Mehserle
With all the media attention and community reaction--some crazy riots--the climate in Bay Area was too intense to hold the trial there. Therefore a judge ruled to move it to downtown Los Angeles. The family of the victim, Oscar Grant, is happy with the decision. Mehserle's lawyers are not.
"Citing the reaction to the 1991 police beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles, [defense attorney Michael] Rains also argued that the trial could drag that city back in time, and into 'the boiling cauldron we wanted to get out of in Alameda County,'" explained the San Francisco Chronicle. Rains also argued that with L.A.'s backlog of cases, the trial won't happen for some time and that it would be better to move the case to San Diego. Others argue moving it to San Diego would result in a not guilty verdict.
The incident was caught on tape. If you wish, you can watch it below:
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if we riot it should be against an oppressive education system and the poverty that goes unchanged here in the richest country in the world.
Los Angeles has come along way in having a mutual respect between citizens ,the officers of our city and the court of law that hears our case.
Our crime rate is down. Our police chief makes every effort to improve the relationship between the two of us and when there is a problem they address it in a serious and professional manner.
After watching the video I'm shocked at the gross disrespect, threats and antagonizing of multi-ethnic and gender police officers by these ADULTS.
I'm sure they were fighting, I'm positive they were drunk and resisting arrest. Mix that all up and your chances of something happening like this increase dramatically. The victim and all those around with cell phone cameras were practically BEGGING for it.
Officers need to improve but the state of education and poverty in this country is the more important issue at hand.
"The victim and all those around with cell phone cameras were practically BEGGING for it."
No.
Honestly, I don't think LA will riot about this. If this trial begins here, I only hope folks (LA and Bay Area) will come together, and protest peacefully.
Justice for Oscar Grant will hopefully prevail. I hope Mehserle gets what's coming to him.
Excellent! Thanks for posting the video! Because just reading again about Grant being shot to death isn't enough. It's so much more enriching actually seeing video of the last moment's of a man's life. How cool! We can all leisurely start the day watching a man being shot to death, over our coffee. And a note to those who enjoy provocative social commentary: You can click on the video a second time, and it'll bring you to YouTube where you can post funny comments on it like "FAIL!!!!" and "LOL!!!!"
lol
Canoga-I hear LAist will be posting Disneyland footage all day tomorrow.
L.A. will not riot over this. It wasn't an LAPD screw up.
Mehserle claims that he thought he had pulled his taser, which is probably true.
This illustrates the danger of police relying too much on these less than lethal devices, and using them to punish a detainee who is already restrained and no longer a threat to them.
I've seen cops do that with pepper spray too.
Where I come from, we call that a racist statement.
Then again, everyone knows that whitey can't be trusted to render fair and just verdicts.
I believe that there are African Americans and Latino Americans eligible to serve on juries who live in the San Diego area too, so I don't think it has so much to do with "whitey" as it does the ideological leanings of said area.
Oh yes...that's so much less insulting.
Thanks, jrb ; )
That's me Mr. PC
Lawyer: Have you now or have you ever been a member of the Republican Party?
TUA: Well, I'm a conservati....
Lawyer: Your honor, I challenge this juror for cause.
I don't know if you lived here or not way back when, but the trial of the police officers that beat up Rodney King was moved to Simi Valley, a place that it known to have a lot of retired police officers living there. It ended up a slam dunk for the accused officer's attys.
Then the city burned.
Rodney King trial?
Nope, never heard of it.
It's a wonder that a couple more people weren't shot! I guess it's OK to break the law that says you must obey a peace officer! The bunches of hoodlums riding these public transportation systems are often making trouble (listen to the crowd that sounds these bastards are making) one is afraid to even ride public transportation because of this sort of incident--and when the hoodlums won't follow orders and whether a cop shoots or not, it would NOT have happened if these a**holes were acting like good citizens! Mistaken shot or not, the unruly characters are TOTALLY to blame. Who in their right mind wants to become a peace officer today! When the four cops were murdered in Oakland when trying to catch a criminal, the crowds cheered the murders of the four officers. It is my PRAYER that when any of these thugs are in a scrape, and when someone is aiming a gun at them or such, I pray that they are ignored by the police! This goes to show what some ill behavior can lead to--and that the cop who shot is to be tried is an outrage! A true democracy would not need laws and law enforcement. But, because we have hordes of human animals running around and not showing ANY self-discipline, shit happens. Don't blame the cop--he probably was innocently reaching for his taser and not his revolver. This is a mirror of today's urban multi ethnic multicultural classroom! What about the Dr. who wasted away at people at Ft Hood? He is of the same category of the nuts in this frescas. Note that a black officer shot him--and thank God! Obey the laws as best you can and you may live!
Carthaginian, I'm not sure if you're aware of it, but a police officer is supposed to uphold the law, and make arrests when applicable.
Determining and dishing out the punishment is not supposed to part of the job.
Two idiots got into a fight with each other late at night on BART. The cops got involved. They should have cuffed them both, cited them for disorderly conduct, and sent them on their merry way, not execute one of them.
White, rednecks get into fights at bars all the time. Do the police start blasting away when they arrive on the scene? Come on.
Ugly American and JRB:
San Diego is a more conservative area, so I see nothing racist about the statement, and I don't see how or why lawyers would ask the political affiliations of the jurors... They may ask about how they feel about cops, though.
However, to JRB, if you actually watched the full Rodney King video, as the jury did, and not just the 30 seconds played ad nauseum, you'd probably have also voted "not guilty."
I did David, more than once. Yes King was acting like an ass. Yes he appeared to actually be taunting the arresting officers. And no I don't think he deserved getting beaten like that, especially since he had given up, was lying on the ground, and was no longer a threat.
Like this kid that got killed by a BART officer. He was handcuffed and lying on the ground. Even if the officer did mistake his 9mm for his taser why did he need to taser the kid, regardless of what the kid did to get arrested for?
When I see any police officers taped doling out those "distraction blows" I'm convinced they are punishing the person they have detained for their behavior. It's not their job to do that.