Responsive Ad
News

Violent White Folks Who Were Taken Into Custody With Loving Care By Police

marky
by marky 11:37 AM

violent white people arrested with tender loving care

UPDATED: 8:00 a.m. ET, Sept. 25, 2023

Originally published: June 18, 2019

Only in America can police respond to separate calls for the same thing and have two different results depending on the race of the suspect.

It’s tough to reconcile the way the application of certain law enforcement tactics appears to fall along racial lines depending on who the suspect is. In America, when a white man goes on a murderous killing spree, he often lives to tell about it. But when a Black man commits a minor law infraction, like a traffic offense, he may lose his life at the hands of the folks paid to protect him.

For Sonya Massey, she did far less.

As such, when a jail inmate accused of murder is captured on video standing around with a bunch of cops who are assuring him that he will be taken care of, and then that inmate has a casual discussion with one of the cops about how he won’t be in lockup for long, there’s one safe bet you can make:

That inmate is or was a cop.

Former Sangamon County Deputy Sean Grayson has been charged with three counts of first-degree murder, aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct for the July 6 shooting of Massey. Video footage of the shooting makes it so hard to justify the use of force that the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office didn’t even bother trying to justify it and disavowed Grayson instead. Sean Grayson is, for all intents and purposes, a criminal in the eyes of law enforcement, or at least he would be if he were any civilian defendant, especially a Black civilian defendant, facing the same list of charges whether they had been convicted of anything or not.

Yet video footage obtained by NBC 5 Investigates through a Freedom of Information Act request shows Grayson standing in a room at Menard County Jail discussing his case and jail conditions with deputies with the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office and the Menard County Sheriff’s Office, who can be heard discussing how to temporarily keep Grayson’s name off the county jail’s website.

“Alright, Sean these guys will take care of you,” one Sangamon County deputy tells Grayson on his way out of the room.

“You are free to ask if you need something, we’ll get you through it,” a Menard County deputy can be heard saying.

One could almost get the impression that jail wasn’t so bad a place the way these cops sound like employees at a five-star hotel who are booking a room for a celebrity guest. If Sonya Massey hadn’t been shot, and instead was arrested for attempted assault with a deadly pot of water—which would have been a trumped up charge as, despite Grayson’s claim, there’s nothing in that video that indicates she was about to throw boiling water at the deputies—it’s just really hard to imagine she would be seen in a room surrounded by deputies fawning over her to assure her that her stay at the detention facility was as pleasant as possible.

The footage also shows Grayson predicting he will be released soon and cop-splaining to the deputies that he’s only in custody in the first place due to a safety concern—not because he shot a Black woman to death for no discernable reason.

“That’s what the state’s attorney agreed. That’s what the state’s attorney made the charges, so. They said this is for my own safety to put me in custody, so … so here I am,” Grayson said.

“Well, this whole SAFE-T Act bullsh*t … that’s why hopefully I’ll be out tomorrow,” he continued.

Imagine getting the royal treatment as a jail inmate and still complaining that it’s “bullsh*t.”

Of course, Chief Deputy Ben Hollis denied in an emailed statement to NBC 5 that Grayson is receiving any preferential treatment at the jail.

“Mr. Grayson is not receiving any special treatment or being afforded any privileges not afforded to other inmates of the Menard County Jail,” Hollis claimed.

Speaking of those “other inmates,” it turns out there’s only four of them.

NBC noted that during the 90-minute video—(that’s an hour and a half of Grayson palling around with officers of the law like they’re in the locker room after a round of golf)—Grayson is heard discussing with the deputies the low inmate population at the jail, which is currently only housing five inmates total.

Must be nice.

Violent white folks who were taken into custody with loving care by police

The contrast of racial dichotomies in the criminal justice system is one that we’ve seen time and time again depending on the color of a suspect’s skin.

For perspective’s sake, convicted murderer and former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd over nonviolent allegations surrounding a counterfeit $20 bill. Since Chauvin murdered Floyd, 20-year-old Daunte Wright was shot and killed after a traffic stop stemming from too many air fresheners hanging from the rearview mirror and 22-year-old Amir Locke was shot and killed seconds after cops roused him from his sleep during the type of botched no-knock raid that killed Breonna Taylor in her own home.

Examples of the difference along racial lines in law enforcement reactions to similar reports of crime keep pouring in.

One glaring instance of law enforcement not being nearly as trigger-happy with white people as they are with Black suspects came courtesy of a viral video on social media. While it was unclear when, where, and why a violent encounter happened between a store patron and a police officer, it was very clear that the cop never once felt threatened enough to use lethal force.

violent white person safely arrested by police

Source: Twitter

Precious context was missing from the video, which began recording as the cop and suspect were already grappling in an aisle of what appeared to be a liquor store. The cop, who employed a leg-sweep takedown of the suspect likely learned from departmental training, exercised the kind of restraint rarely if ever seen with nonviolent Black suspects, like Jacob Blake, who was unarmed when he was shot in the back multiple times at close range as he tried to enter his car in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The video ended with the cop handcuffing the suspect, who had assaulted the officer. Scroll down to see the full video.

In Florida, a self-described Trump-supporting white supremacist with a huge swastika tattooed on his chest caused a racist disruption at a restaurant, threatened to sexually assault one woman, and then physically attacked another. When the police finally arrived, there was no brutality to be seen; no reckless shoving of the suspect’s head into a squad car. Instead, there was some jovial joking taking place as the suspect, identified as Nicholas Arnold Schock, was carefully eased into the back of a police cruiser.

In fact, the restaurant’s employees and patrons used more force than the police did.

It was a far cry from, say, how Baltimore cops treated Freddie Gray before he sustained his deadly injury in the back of a police van over suspicions about a pen knife.

In another stunningly similar example, an armed white man who allegedly shot and injured a police officer after barricading himself in a home during a contentious standoff with law enforcement managed to be peacefully arrested in North Hollywood, California, in June. Police responded to a reported active shooting and somehow took the armed man into custody without resorting to the lethal force we see officers use so many times with unarmed Black people.

 

The incident in West Hollywood came nearly two weeks after a suspected double murderer who was also accused of a range of other violent crimes was safely taken into custody without the police resorting to any violence, let alone lethal force. Peter Manfredonia was arrested in Maryland six days after he allegedly killed a 62-year-old man with a machete, held another man hostage, stole the hostage’s guns and vehicle, killed a former classmate, and kidnapped the former classmate’s girlfriend in her car in Connecticut.

The Hartford Courant reported that police said, “no one was injured when he was arrested.” He’s also a white man, which likely explains his life being spared by members of a profession that have typically responded with deadly intentions to Black people suspected of lesser crimes, if any at all. It was a stark contrast to the reports of police shooting unarmed Black people who were not suspected of multiple murders and leading police on an interstate chase for nearly a week.

Oh, and who can forget how Ahmaud Arbery‘s accused killers — father and son Gregory and Travis McMichael — who are on video shooting the jogger were gently handled during their arrest? More on that below.

That treatment stood in stark contrast to the videos circulating on social media showing how police were responding to nonviolent Black people accused of violating social distancing guidelines during the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.

Roger Hedgpeth was arrested a block away from the White House after threatening to kill the president of the United States. The Florida man was armed with a sheathed knife on his left hip, according to a report from The Washington Post.

A D.C. police report revealed that Hedgpeth told a Secret Service officer, “I am here to assassinate President Donald Trump. I have a knife to do it with.”

The report described the 25-year-old as a “critically missing/endangered person as well as a mental health consumer.” He was taken into custody by the Secret Service for threatening “to do bodily harm and possession of a prohibited weapon.” The knife on Hedgpeth’s person had a 3 ½ inch blade. He was also wearing an empty pistol holder, according to the report.

 

Benjamin Murdy of Harford County, Maryland fired nearly 200 rounds from a rifle and a handgun, while “police never fired a single shot,” according to WMAR Baltimore. After an hour-and-a-half standoff with Harford County police, the Maryland man eventually called 911 and turned himself in. Despite the evident threat Murdy posed to the arresting officers – a threat that has resulted in the killing of many Black suspects – Murdy who was taken into custody peacefully and later charged.

Murdy opened fire on Harford Sheriff’s deputies after they arrived at his home following a report made by Murdy’s girlfriend who claims that he shot and killed her dog during a dispute.

“We’re familiar with him,” said Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler, “He’s been the subject of a couple of protective orders from a previous relationship and then I think from the current one. I’m not up to spec on all of those, but he had made statements in there that he would take out police if they ever came to the house.”

Murdy’s neighbor was heading to take out his trash at the time and had to quickly seek cover to avoid being hit with the rapidly fired bullets. Bobby Schell said that although he hid on the other side of his truck, which ended up being riddled with bullet holes, he was grazed on his right knee and hit in the scrotum.

Murdy was charged with attempted first-and-second degree murder, first-and-second degree assault, reckless endangerment, aggravated animal cruelty and other related charges.

Florida woman Serina Probus was accused of two separate violent felonies, one of which the 20-year-old admitted to being “too high on cocaine to remember,” the Tampa Bay Times reported. Despite the clear threat to the safety of the arresting officers — a threat that police have quickly killed Black suspects over — Probus was somehow able to be peacefully taken into custody and as a result smiled proudly in her mugshot. Her treatment stood in stark contrast to how cops typically react to Black suspects accused of the same or less.

Serina Probus, arrested for hitting a man with her car and trying to pee on an officer

Pictured: Serina Probus | Source: Pasco Sheriff’s Office

Police said Probus was drunk when she bit her sister on the hand for trying to prevent her from leaving a home with her 6-month-old daughter early in the morning of New Year Day. When police responded, “Probus cursed at them and tried to kick out a window in the patrol vehicle as she was being arrested and was placed in a hobble restraint to bind her legs,” the Tampa Bay Times wrote. “As she was being restrained, deputies said she tried to pee on them, then spit on them once she was in the car.”

After Probus was booked on “the misdemeanor charge of domestic violence and felony charge of battery on a law enforcement officer,” she was hit with another felony charge of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon stemming from an accusation in October when she allegedly intentionally hit a man with her SUV.

History has shown that Black people accused of much less have suffered much worse fates at the hands of police, especially in Florida. But the rules change when white folks are involved, as shown by the Pasco Sheriff’s Office, which happily snapped Probus’ gleeful mugshot.

It was unclear if deputies stopped to get her some Burger King on the way to being booked, which is exactly what happened after Dylann Roof — the admitted racist murderer of nine parishioners in a historic Black church in South Carolina in 2015 — was peacefully arrested even though he was considered armed and very dangerous.

Jerri Kelly decided the best reaction to four Black teenagers who knocked on her door while fund-raising for their high school was to pull a gun on them and keep her firearm aimed at them until police arrived. While the obviously racist episode that unfolded in Arkansas resulted in Kelly being arrested, it took the Wynne Police Department — which arrived on the scene to see Kelly holding the boys at gunpoint while they were forced to lie on the ground — five days to actually take her into custody.

Kelly, the wife of the local jail administrator, was arrested with tender loving care for something — if the roles were reversed — that arguably would have gotten one or all of the boys shot and/or killed by police. She had the audacity to plead not guilty to four counts of aggravated assault, false imprisonment and endangering the welfare of a minor.

The list of similar examples literally goes on and on and serves as further proof that when you are white, no matter if you gun down people at a church or even assault police officers, you can expect to be peacefully arrested. Must be nice. See below for more.

The post Violent White Folks Who Were Taken Into Custody With Loving Care By Police appeared first on NewsOne.


Post a Comment

0 Comments