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What is it exactly that makes America’s conscience incapable of being shocked? Where are the moral consciousness and all the America’s religiosity? What is it that makes Americans able to see gray where there are black and white, or exercise simple common sense to sort out clear facts? Why are people going to church and call themselves Christians, when they live their lives contrary to principles that Jesus Christ died for, fairness and social justice?
On November 18, a video surfaced of New Mexico police causing a riot on a state highway south of Taos. According to press report, the incident occurred On Oct. 28, but the video was only released this week by a New Mexico TV station. Most newspapers and television news stations around the country reported the story as some routine traffic stop, in which the driver acted in manners as to cause the police to turn enraged and violent in the presence of a group of children ranging in age from 6 to 18. The LA Times’ John Glionna wrote, “A routine suburban traffic stop it was not,” and continued, police described the incident as “an intense 43-minute-long dangerous situation that placed the public at risk.” The Huffington Post’s David Lohr wrote, “The trouble began after Farrell apparently disobeyed the officer’s orders, driving off after being told to take her keys out of the vehicle.” Why is the entire burden for this travesty being placed on the mother, the only civilian at the scene? Why are the police not being held to a higher standard, as they should be? Where is the media’s serious analysis of what is shown on the video? Where is the outrage at the police conduct all throughout this recorded rampage?
What the video shows: A police officer pulls over a vehicle on a road and told the driver, “you were doing 71 miles an hour on a 55 mile an hour road.” The driver spoke softly to the officer, or her voice was not well be picked up by the officer’s dashcam. The police officer left and returned to the passenger’s door of the vehicle and handed the driver a citation. The officer spoke calmly and told the drivers that he had written a ticket for $126.00. The officer then explained to the driver that she could pay the fine or appear in court to contest the ticket, which is the law in almost all states. The officer could then be heard saying, “You have 30 days to send the payment or go to court.” At that point, the duty of the police officer was to wish the driver farewell, perhaps tell her to slow down, and then walk away. That should have, and would have been the end of that traffic stop. Instead, that excuse for a police officer stood there and began a brand new line of inquiry and argument, asking the driver what she intended to do. This should never have been a part of what started as a routine traffic stop. Clearly, the man had already checked the driver’s license and the vehicle’s registration, and if there was any arrest warrant on the driver or the vehicle was on the road illegally, he would have moved to arrest the driver rather than writing her a speeding ticket.
Officer I-can-get- away-with-murder was undoubtedly on a mission. After telling the driver that she had 30 days to pay or appeal the citation in court, he proceeded to demand that the driver tell him what she intended to do. The driver can clearly be heard murmuring that she did not have the money or did not know what she was going to do, which is perfectly understandable and within her right. The police officer escalated by asking her to answer whether or not she wanted to “appear before a judge right now.” Then he wanted her to sign the ticket that she had 30 days to dispose of. Any fair-minded person with minimal intelligence could see that excuse-for-a-law-man trying to find a reason to get that mother out of the vehicle. He was fixing for a reason to arrest her, and she knew it. This came through when he told her, “I’m trying to help you.” How and what was he trying to help her with, after he had already written her a citation and just handing there to harass her? The man would not leave and just drive away, because he had an ulterior motive; he was working himself up into frenzy. He had malice in his heart, and it comes through on the videotape. Something about that van full of Black children driven by a Black mother had possessed him. The mother did not answer yes or no as to what she might decide to do about the citation. That was a perfectly reasonable position that should be expected from any reasonable person. She did not raise her voice; she did not use foul language, neither was she disrespectful. But she was afraid; something about the game that guy in uniform was playing on the side of the road did not seem right. It does not seem right on the tape either. When the man could not get the mother to lose her temper, he told her to wait there while he goes back to his cruiser. The man was looking for pretenses to elongate the stop; he was up to no good. At this junction, this has gone way past a routine stop into scary territory. Officer highway robbery was holding this mother against her will under false pretense; there is no foundation for the foot dragging. He was violating her rights. She drove away. The woman was probably scared out her wits, being on the side of the road with somebody with a gun and other dangerous weapons, and who appears unstable.
somebody with a gun and other dangerous weapons, and who appears unstable.
Should the driver have driven away? Perhaps not! However, had she waited for the man to come back to the van, no one knows for sure what would have happened. This man had no more reason to keep this driver on the side of the road, or to go back to his cruiser. The traffic stop was over once he handed her the citation. The idea that this so-called police officer would need to know whether or not he needed to take that woman before a judge right there and then on a simple speeding infraction is ludicrous. Even after the mother drove away, she stopped the car just a few feet down the road, once the police started chasing her. What did they want with that woman in a car full of children, after her papers had already been checked and cleared? Everyone must answer that question. Everything in the conduct of this New Mexico police officer, past the point where he handed the driver a citation is morally and constitutionally offensive, and unacceptable. The driver was not under arrest and was driving away with a citation, which means that the police had her information. Therefore, there was absolutely no reason for the police to approach the vehicle, which they were now fully aware, contained several children, and unleashed such uncontrolled and animalistic violence, and rage that are rarely seen among animals in the wild.
The notion that this mother provoked this obnoxious behavior in those policemen, who should have been there to serve her, and protect those children, is disgusting. In addition, the fact that a driver drives away after receiving a traffic citation and stops once pursued is no reason for a policeman to fix to arrest that driver. As for this business of obeying police orders, American citizens should not be required to jump off a cliff just because a person in uniform demands that they do so. What if she did not hear or understand that the officer wanted her to wait there. After all, she had received a citation, which she could have interpreted as being free to go, unless the brute in the blue uniform had something more nefarious in mind. What else could have been going on, except for whatever malice that New Mexico policeman was cooking up in his head? When the car stopped in the second instance, the policeman’s killing instinct was in full gear and on display; he approached the vehicle, opened the door, and asked the driver to “get out or I’ll pull you out.” This was supposed to be “America,” where a citizen was supposed to be free from this type of treatment. But so what if large segments of the population live under constant police harassment, threats, and fear and oppression, without liberty in the pursuit of crumbs?
American citizens are being harassed, abused, intimidated, and have their rights egregiously violated every day by police without any eyebrow raised. The press has virtually become an accomplice in this uncivilized and disgraceful state of affairs. Many chiefs of police are impotent, completely irrelevant, and incapable of setting the most basic standards or enforce any code of conduct for their departments. While even police should be allowed some degree of error, mistake, misjudgment, and discretion, unlike what they afford half of the fellow citizens, no level of misconduct by police should be acceptable. That a police officer would lose control to the point where he would attempt to smash a window in the faces of young children sitting in a car should shock the conscious of any living being. The mother was the driver of the vehicle; so the question is, what was the point of smashing the window where the children were seated? That police officer put the children in danger. The mother was trying to protect them against what she surely could sense was a dangerous man. He violated to the public trust, if one is to believe that injustice to one is injustice to all. After driving away and saw the police cruiser chasing her, the mother stopped again, until she saw more of the same savages descending on the scene.
Mom drove away to protect herself and her children against what she must have perceived to be a clear and present danger. She stopped in her hotel parking lots where she felt safer. So why a bunch of children was be made to lay face down on the ground when the vehicle pulled up to the curb in front of the hotel? But this is America where a citizen can go to bed upstanding and wake up a criminal in the making. This is not public safety. This is a police state where law enforcement officers have robbed the population of all rights. The young boy who got out of the car and tried to separate his mother from the gang member acting under the color of law, and played some little game of tag-you’re-it, then ran back into the car and locked the door to protect himself from being shot, is now being charged with assaulting a police officer. Police officers’ job is not the most dangerous in America. Many people work in more dangerous jobs, not on taxpayers’ dollars, and yet they are not given a license to go around and terrorize the public or kill others at will_ a little thing called discretionary power. The mother has all kinds of bogus charges pending against her. There is no doubt that with the help of some corrupt and unethical district attorney in the area, the gang in uniforms can probably get her to plead guilty to something or another and ruin her life, in the same manner police have succeeded in ruining the lives of millions of Americans. The media is reporting some type of pipes being found in the car. The press is so totally bankrupt that today’s journalists will report on things they have no clarification or confirmation on. Marijuana is now legal in several states either in small amount or for medical purposes. What do the pipes have to do with a man standing on the road and firing bullets at a car full of children, as if he were playing in some cheap movie? It is time that everyone tries to grow a conscious and some national pride, and demand that police behave with respect for their uniforms and consideration for the admirable officers in their rank. The country does not need a uniformed gang. Those who align themselves with the police and admire the force should stop making excuses for their misdeeds and begin to settle for nothing short of transparency and one hundred percent accountability. Police misconduct does not begin and end with beating and killing; it ranges from abuse of discretion, to intimidation, harassment, violation of civil and constitutional rights, lying in official reports, lying under oath, to extreme brutality, murder, execution, and the assassination of American citizens. The Los Angeles Times reported that New Mexico State Police Chief Pete Kassetas pledged a thorough review of the incident, saying he has “concerns relating to the conduct of the officer who discharged his firearm.” That is not enough. This scripted jargon is old, unbecoming, and stands for nothing. Many police departments hardly have a functioning internal affairs department. Police departments all over the country have shown that they cannot police their own, and do not feel accountable to the public. The officer who discharged his weapon is not the sole villain in this debacle. The officer who initiated the stop maliciously brought about the events that signal to a degenerate police force more than they speak to any wrongdoing by Oriana Farrell. The traffic violation was a civil offense. That is why officer manic was trying so hard to detain her until he could find some excuse to arrest her, thereby turning the civil driving offense into a criminal matter. Had Ms. Farrell driven away after she was handed the ticket, endured all the harassment, and then filed a complaint, Chief Kassetas’ department would have, without a doubt, found that the officer behaved “according to protocol,” and that Ms. Farrell was free to leave ‘at any time’ if she so chose – she was not under arrest at any point, until the schizophrenic man in the blue uniform made sure that she would be. But when she thought she was free to drive away, she was chased down and then told to turn around, at which point she knew that she was going to be arrested. Only in America_ when they say “anything you say can and will be used against you…” they mean everything and anything at all can be used against you. Well, next, the New Mexico police department will ask the public to not rush to judgment; to take this into context; they will explain that their officers acted according to their training, all of the same poor excuses to keep a core of sociopaths in fermentation among what would be otherwise a dignified corps of public servants. The world has overcome all sorts of calamities, including the plague, leprosy, syphilis, and more, America must lead in eradicating police abuses. The time has come for the United States government to declare a war on police misconduct, one of America’s modern Frankenstein’s monsters.