Entries Tagged 'BART Police' ↓

From the Chronicle:

“Oakland and BART police officers shot and killed a man Saturday morning near the Fruitvale BART Station when, authorities said, he charged the officers holding a knife in each hand after leading them on a chase for blocks.

Five officers opened fire on the man when he threatened an officer after police unsuccessfully tried to subdue him with a Taser stun gun, Oakland police Officer Jeff Thomason said.”
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When does it stop?

From the LA Times:

“In response to a request by The Times, the court on Thursday released videos of the shooting that have been played for jurors in court, including some footage that has never before been made public.

Both sides contend that the footage supports their account of what led up to the shooting.

Alameda County prosecutors argue that the videos show Mehserle looking toward his holster as he drew his .40-caliber handgun and then pointing his handgun out in front of himself in plain view before he fired. Mehserle never told other officers at the station that the shooting was an accident or that he had meant to grab his Taser. Instead, he told one officer: “I thought he was going for a gun.””
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Unfortunately, there is no embed code currently available for the video.

From the Tribune:

“The BART Police Department will start redistributing Tasers to its force this week, nearly two months after the use of stun guns was halted so that officers could be retrained and updated on new department policies.

“Beginning this week and hopefully completed by next Monday or Tuesday, we will redeploy Tasers to all police zones,” police Cmdr. Dan Hartwig said Monday night, adding that officers will be able to choose whether or not to use them.”
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Well, I guess this confirms the idea that the removal of tasers was a red herring. Gotta love a good “policy review!”

The Chronicle is reporting that Kenton Rainey is likely to become the next Head Cop at BART. Rainey comes to BART from San Antonio where he was head of the airport police. Prior to that he’s been involved in various controversies in departments around the country. He sued the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department for racial discrimination – and won. He was also basically chased out of his post as Chief at Fairfield for siding with community members against white officers involved in a shooting.

Clearly, the people at BART are trying to respond to community pressure. Hopefully, however, the community will remain strong in their demands that the BART police be disbanded. Maybe there are compromises worth making, but this chief is not enough to change BART’s racism and culture of violence.

From IndyBay:

“Tony Pirone, the BART cop who, along with his partner BART cop Marysol Domenici, physically and verbally abused Oscar Grant and his friends on the Fruitvale BART platform on January 1st, 2009 — setting up and escalating the situation that Johannes Mehserle walked into just minutes before he shot Oscar Grant in the back — has finally been fired by BART.

Exactly two weeks after the largest demonstration for justice for Oscar Grant in over a year took to the BART system’s underground stations in San Francisco — demanding that Tony Pirone be fired by BART and tried for his crimes by the Alameda County DA — BART has finally fired racist and violent BART cop Tony Pirone.”
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This has to be counted as a major political victory and certainly a great step in the direction of police accountability. Pirone’s lawyer is already claiming that the firing is “political” – which is supposed to mean 1) that only urban African-Americans actually want it to happen (and really there’s a sort of connotation that it’s a kind of petulant and irrational demand) and 2) that it has no warrant given what occurred on the platform. I think we should say “DAMN STRAIGHT!” to the idea that the firing is “political.” First, fuck all their ridiculous stereotypes about who’s allowed to fight for Justice for Oscar Grant. They’ve tried every racist trick in their OLD-ASS book to divide the movement on race and class lines. Here’s the fact: this is a movement across race and class lines and it represents a serious alliance between radicals of a BUNCH of different stripes and WE’RE WINNING. Secondly, are you CRAZY? If Pirone’s lawyer is so sure Pirone’s totally “innocent” (as innocent as a cop can be anyway), why not let him stand trial? They know he doesn’t stand a chance – he’s a homicidal racist and there’s video to prove it. What scares the hell out of them is that Mehserle could actually be convicted. If we keep pushing, HE WILL BE CONVICTED.

Anyway, it’s not everything. But, it’s certainly something.

From the SF Chronicle:

“Marysol Domenici, 29, was fired Wednesday by interim Police Chief Dash Butler. He followed the recommendation of a law firm BART hired to do an independent internal affairs probe into the shooting by former Officer Johannes Mehserle, who faces a murder trial this summer.”
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Hopefully, this is a signal that there is more to follow. In particular, BART MUST fire Pirone and he MUST be charged with a crime. It’s hard to see how Domenici’s conduct could possibly call for her to be fired if Pirone doesn’t face similar consequences. It’s also important to note how shitty it is that the first cop to be fired in connection with Oscar Grant’s murder is a woman. She didn’t pull the trigger, she didn’t punch him, or yell racial slurs, but she’s the first one fired. No doubt she deserves to be fired – and worse. Still, can BART seriously think that it’s more important to fire her than Pirone…? Smacks of good ol’ boy sexism!

According to the Chronicle:

“Daschel Butler, Berkeley’s retired police chief, will be appointed BART’s interim police chief while the transit district conducts a nationwide search for a new chief, the agency announced Tuesday.

Butler, who retired after 12 years as Berkeley’s chief in 2002, is expected to take charge in mid-January after completing state requirements. He’s replacing Chief Gary Gee, who announced he would retire earlier in the year after drawing criticism for the department’s handling of the Oscar Grant shooting early New Year’s Day. His last day is today.”

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Yay for good ol’ boy politics.  GO TEAM!

From the Chronicle’s Matier and Ross:

“Hundreds of extra cops – including BART officers, Oakland police, and sheriff’s deputies from San Francisco and Contra Costa County – are being called either to ride BART or patrol its stations into the early morning hours…

The beefed-up presence is in reaction to last year’s fatal shooting of Oscar Grant, an unarmed passenger who was killed by a BART cop while being held facedown on a station platform at 2 a.m. New Year’s Day.”

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The cops and the article both frame this as if 1) party-goers were somehow responsible for the shooting of Oscar Grant and 2) more cops would prevent party-goers from causing such things again.  First, Oscar Grant was murdered by Johannes Mehserle after being punched and harrassed by several BART police who worked in collusion with one another.  One ought to assume that this was not an abberrant way for these cops to handle the situation – it is and remains their standard operating procedure.  No party-goer is responsible for the death of Oscar Grant.  No amount of unruly or disruptive behavior or “back-talk” (UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE) warrants (or causes) cold-blooded murder.  Those who say otherwise use what I call the “she had it coming” logic.  “Sure,” they say “her husband beat her and eventually killed her.  But, the dinner was always cold.”  That this logic is reprehensible and disgusting should be self-evident.  But, even if you believe that the “party atmosphere” somehow set the stage fore Mehserle’s brutal murder of an innocent man, surely it does not follow that therefore there should be more Mehserles out on BART trains!!!  In general, I don’t like to be at parties where people have guns (or clubs, or tasers…).  My reason: THEY MIGHT USE THEM!

Cops are the problem, not the solution.