Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Life or Deaf



(I wrote originally wrote this blog last year, it still references an interesting story so I decided to post it even though it is terribly old.)

There was a man named Donnell Williams. Donnell was in his tub taking a bath. He was relaxed and enjoying his warm bath. When he was done and got out of the tub, he was surprised to find guns pointing at him just seconds after wrapping a towel around himself.

"I ain't never been so scared," says Williams.

Kansas police, forced themselves into his home in response to a falsified cell phone reported shooting.

"I kept going to my ear yelling that I was scared. I can't hear! I can't hear!"

That didn't stop Kansas' finest from shooting him with a taser.

He was deaf, more than half naked and obviously unarmed. I don't need to tell you that Donell Williams is black. This kind of stuff only happens to poor minority groups and it is pretty sad.

We can sit here and claim that the police were scared for their lives in a bad neighborhood but the man was alone, he didn't make a move and was naked. They had many men, armed with guns. Because he didn't seem to respond they shocked him.

According to the story they have since apologized but really, what good does that do.

I can imagine myself listen to my earphones in my own home when people bust in and shoot me with a taser without provocation. This is the stuff that nurtures distrust and resentment towards the police departments of our local neighborhoods.

If they can teach cops basic Spanish words to deal with multicultural citizens, they can teach them basic hand signals.


Story Links.

Channel 12
Blog

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

very true. Sometimes they don't think do they. And officially apologizing for it is just not good enough really. Dont' know if you heard the story that happened in London back in 2005. A guy was shot EIGHT times in the public tube. He was "mistaken" for a suicide bomber. Fair enough if you "mistake" someone but to shoot them 8 times is no mistake, that in my opinion is making sure he's well dead! Obviously they officially apologized for their "mistake" on national TV and it just makes me laugh. Sorry we shot your son eight times Mrs. Menezes, it was a mistake....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4713753.stm

HektikLyfe said...

WOW. I had never heard of that story. It is terrible!

You'd think people could be tested for things like this, but how can they truly test a group attitude?

People change when they run in packs.