Daily thread for news/updates/discussion of George Floyd protests - June 11

Pelosi: Police unions want to be part of reform conversation

Really now? Can't possibly see how this is a conflict of interest.

Kind of an offbeat one, but still interesting and worth noting:
Lady Antebellum Are Changing Their Band Name To Get Rid Of Its Slavery Connotations

The band, best known for their hit song "Need You Now," will now be known simply as Lady A, "the nickname our fans gave us almost from the start," they said in an Instagram post.

"As a band, we have strived for our music to be a refuge…inclusive of all," they said in the post. "We’ve watched and listened more than ever these last few weeks, and our hearts have been stirred with conviction, our eyes opened wide to the injustices, inequality and biases Black women and men have always faced and continue to face everyday."

The band said they'd decided to make the change because "blind spots we didn’t even know existed have been revealed.⁣⁣⁣"

"Antebellum" refers to the Antebellum South, a period in the southern US before the Civil War, when slavery was legal and in widespread use.

Seattle PD engages in disinformation campaign about autonomous zone.

Thread of pictures from the autonomous zone

[Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff] apologizes for appearing in photo-op with Trump after forceful removal of protesters

This woman 'died three times' after Seattle Police hit her with a blast ball

News story about the attempted murder of a protester by police that I commented about in a previous daily thread.

Federal Arrests Show No Sign that Antifa Plotted Protests

Inciting a riot. Hurling a Molotov cocktail. Plotting to sow destruction. Those are some of the most serious charges brought by federal prosecutors against demonstrators at protests across the country in recent weeks.

But despite cries from President Trump and others in his administration, none of those charged with serious federal crimes amid the unrest have been linked so far to the loose collective of anti-fascist activists known as antifa.

A review of the arrests of dozens of people on federal charges reveals no known effort by antifa to perpetrate a coordinated campaign of violence. Some criminal complaints described vague, anti-government political leanings among suspects, but the majority of the violent acts that have taken place at protests have been attributed by federal prosecutors to individuals with no affiliation to any particular group.

Punisher co-creator designs skulls for BLM (as a bonus says trans rights).

Fraternal Order of Police: Chicago officers who kneel with protesters could be kicked out of police union

“I don’t believe it’s the time or place to be doing that,” said Fraternal Order of Police President John Catanzara.

In office for only a month, Catanzara is laying down the law for his members.

“If you kneel, you’ll be risking being brought up on charges and thrown out of the lodge,” Catanzara said.

It has become a common scene over the past week, seeing police officers around the country kneeling with protesters as a symbolic show of support for the Black Lives Matter movement.

But Catanzara says it is essentially an act of treason for police officers, because those protesters are pushing for policies he says will hurt the police.

G.O.P. Platform, Rolled Over From 2016, Condemns the ‘Current President’

Can you guess how divided backs and whites are on race in the US?

A more whimsical jeopardy-type quiz for this whole thing.

Atlanta Police officer charged in tasing of college students was named in prior excessive force lawsuit

One of the six Atlanta police officers charged last week after allegedly using excessive force on two college students was named in a lawsuit over a 2016 shooting during a police raid that killed a mentally ill man.

Details of the 2016 incident are spelled out in two separate and related federal complaints, the first a civil rights lawsuit filed by the victim's mother and a second from the Fulton County District Attorney seeking documents related to the raid.

According to the DA complaint, on August 5, 2016, Jamarion Rashad Robinson was killed after a federal task force went to serve an arrest warrant at Parkside Camp Creek apartments in Atlanta. That complaint says the task force was made up of 14 law enforcement officers from eight Atlanta-area police departments, and at least one U.S. marshal.

Robinson was shot at least 59 times, according to the complaint, which adds, "the officers fired over 90 rounds into or inside the apartment," with 9 mm and .40 mm submachine guns and .40 mm Glock pistols.

"At the conclusion of the shooting, a firearm was located, which the officers claimed that Mr. Robinson fired at them three times. However, when the firearm was recovered, it was damaged and inoperable." The complaint does not name the officers who fired, reading "one or more defendants began 'spraying' bullets."

How do black Americans see their racial identity?

75 percent of black Americans said their ethnicity and race was “very important to their identity,” significantly higher than the share of Hispanic Americans (58 percent), Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (40 percent) and white Americans (30 percent) who said the same. Another 15 percent of black Americans said that their race was “somewhat important.”

A thread on the history of Camden PD

What the world could teach America about policing

"For the 59841st time something considered unthinkable in America is normal in Western Europe." But more seriously though:

Even if the U.S. were to adopt similar standards to that of its European counterparts, it wouldn’t necessarily have the means to enforce them—at least not at the national level. That’s because, unlike many other similar countries, the American law-enforcement system is largely decentralized. The majority of the approximately 18,000 law-enforcement agencies across the U.S. are run at the city or county level, employing anywhere from one to 30,000 officers. The hyperlocalized nature of the system means that the standards and practices these agencies employ can vary widely. Unlike England and Wales, whose 43 police agencies are subject to the scrutiny of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, an independent body, American policing has no federal oversight authority.

Sherman argues that the establishment of an Inspector General of Police, or some such equivalent to the British inspectorate, at the state level would solve this problem—a recommendation he also made to President Barack Obama’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, which was established following the fatal 2014 police shooting of the black teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Such an authority would operate in the way its British equivalent does—by monitoring police forces to ensure that they are abiding by a certain set of rules and regulations and cutting the funding of those that don’t.

Residents of CHAZ respond to the President

How does the police see policing?

It's almost comedic:

In that survey, 67 percent of officers said they thought the deaths of black people in encounters with the police were isolated incidents, compared with 31 percent who said those deaths were part of a broader pattern. The public, by comparison, had almost exactly the opposite reaction — only 39 percent of Americans said the police killings of black Americans were isolated incidents, while 60 percent said they were part of a broader pattern. (More recent surveys of the public also indicate that around 60 percent of Americans think that these incidents are part of a broader pattern.

Most police officers also diverge from the protesters on the issues underlying these high-profile killings. Eighty percent of police officers said the country does not need to make more changes to ensure that black Americans have equal rights with white Americans, according to the 2016 Pew survey. That’s much higher than the share of Americans overall who held that view (48 percent).

Similarly, survey results from the 2014 Cooperate Congressional Election Study suggest that white police officers in particular are less likely than white Americans overall to think that the lingering effects of slavery and current racial discrimination make it harder for black Americans to succeed. They are more likely to agree with the idea that “blacks should work their way up without special favors,”5 according to political scientist Brian Schaffner of Tufts University.

As mentioned above, black officers tend to have somewhat different views from white officers.7 For example, 69 percent of black officers said the protests against policing tactics reflected some genuine desire to hold the police accountable, compared with just 27 percent of white officers. And a majority of black officers (57 percent) said that the deadly encounters between black people and the police were part of a broader pattern

72 percent of officers are non-Hispanic white, about 11 percent are non-Hispanic black and about 13 percent are Hispanic.8 By comparison, about 60 percent of Americans overall are non-Hispanic white, about 13 percent are non-Hispanic black and about 18 percent are Hispanic, per 2019 estimates by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Well, this thread has gone off the rails, so... let's just take a break until tomorrow's gets posted in about 6 hours.