Last Nerve: Why Blacks Dislike Cops

By Eddie G. Griffin (BASG)

Since no one else has the guts to ask the question, let me tread lightly then upon this holy ground of race relations. When the police can get on black people’s last nerve is exactly the way I want to frame the dilemma in the contradiction, because there is an ugly rumor that black people generally hate cops.

Let me cut to the chase at the street level. Here is a man who drives up to a black teenager and ask where he might buy some drugs.

Excuse me! The kid reached through the window and punched the white driver. “Git outta my face,” the kid said. The white man was a Fort Worth Police Department undercover agent.

Cut to the chase: The kid was charged with aggravated assault upon a police officer, and they contemplated adding the charge of attempted robbery.

I was infuriated. This happened in my neighborhood, where I teach kids to resist drugs at all cost. So, he punched the sucker in the mouth. Not exactly what I would have done, but damn near close.

It reminded me of an incident that goes all through me.

My cousin, a few years prior, was accosted in the same manner as a teenager. He was a clean kid, all his life, but he knew where there were drugs in the community, and this time he needed the money. So, he took the money from one undercover agent, went around the corner, and purchased some drugs from another undercover agent.

I was livid. It reminded me of my first attempted robbery.

In the 1960s, white people could not freely come into the black neighborhood without knowing somebody or doing some business. Around 1963, they started bringing in drugs, at first packaged like prescriptions. We had no idea they were undercover agents.

As they created drug kingpins, our image, as wannabe Black Panthers declined, because then the debate shifted from socialism to materialism, and the endless quest for the Almighty Dollar. The pimp-hustler-drug dealer image was winning the hearts and minds of black people in the hood.

History may recall, the Black Panthers first fight was against the drug dealers cropping up into the community. No one could snitch to the cops, because some cops were in on it. And, it was a terrifying thought to see the very same cop show up at the snitches' door. Some do-good black people got whacked, because they opened their mouths to the wrong people.

We took care of our business, ourselves, at the street level.

During the era of blaxploitation, actors portraying Black Panther revolutionaries would go in and rob and sometimes shoot up drug dealers. In real life, that led to a street level war, the first wave of black-on-black shootings. The FBI was right there in the mix, sometimes pulling the strings, and sometimes just letting nature run its corrupt course.

I was bar-hopping, hip-hopping, bopping along, from bar to bar one night when I chanced upon my brother Lawrence making a transaction with a white dude. The man wanted a black prostitute, and my brother promised he had just the woman.

When I realized it, I thought: OMG! The man had been sucked in by two Black Panthers. This was a trap, and as Lawrence would say, "a lesson to teach the white man that black women were not for sale."

I was down for jacking this guy. So, I listened to his plan. When the girl got the john to the motel, and made sure his pants were down, she would come to the door, and the stick-up boys would go in and rob him. But that was not what happened.

The john would not take off his pants, so the girl grabbed the portable heater off the floor and crashed it over his head. When she opened the door for the stick-up boys, all I could hear was the man screaming, “Officer, down!”

So, I drove away with tears in my eyes.


How We Became Outlaws


Alprentice "Bunchy" Carter was an African American activist and former gang member who was killed on January 17, 1969. He is celebrated by his supporters as a martyr in the Black Power movement in the United States.

In the early 1960s Carter was a member of the Slauson street gang in Los Angeles. He became a member of the Slauson "Renegades", a hard-core inner circle of the gang, and earned the nickname "Mayor of the Ghetto". Carter was eventually convicted of armed robbery and was imprisoned in Soledad prison for four years. While incarcerated Carter became influenced by the Nation of Islam and the teachings of Malcolm X, and he converted to Islam. After his release, Carter met Huey Newton, one of the founders of the Black Panther Party, and was convinced to join the party in 1967. In early 1968 Carter formed the Southern California chapter of the Black Panthers and became a leader in the group. Like all Black Panther chapters, the Southern California chapter studied politics, read BPP literature, and received training in firearms and first aid. They also began the "Free Breakfast for Children" program which provided meals to the poor in the community. The chapter was very successful, gaining 50-100 new members each week by April 1968. Notable members included Elaine Brown, and Geronimo Pratt.

The Black Panthers were opposed by the secret FBI operation COINTELPRO, and the party was referred to as "the greatest threat to the internal security of the country" by J. Edgar Hoover. As revealed later in Senate testimony, the FBI worked with the Los Angeles Police Department to harass and intimidate party members. In 1968 and 1969, numerous false arrests and warrantless searches were documented, and several members were killed in altercations with the police. The "Breakfast for Children" program was effectively shut down by daily arrests of members, with all charges most often dropped within a week. "The Breakfast for Children Program" wrote J. Edgar Hoover in an internal FBI memo in May 1969, "represents the best and most influential activity going for the BPP and, as such, is potentially the greatest threat to efforts by authorities to neutralize the BPP and destroy what it stands for." Later that year, Hoover submitted orders to FBI offices: "exploit all avenues of creating dissension within the ranks of the BPP," and "submit imaginative and hard-hitting counterintelligence measures aimed at crippling the BPP."

The Black Panthers were also rivals of a black nationalist group named Us, founded by Ron Karenga. The groups had very different aims and tactics, but the groups often found themselves competing for potential recruits. This rivalry came to a head in 1969, when the two groups supported different candidates to head the Afro-American Studies Center at UCLA. Bunchy has a son who was born in April 1969 after Bunchy was murdered.

At a Black Student Union meeting at UCLA's Campbell Hall on January 17, 1969, Bunchy Carter and John Huggins, another BPP member, were heard making derogatory comments about Karenga, the founder of Us. Other versions mention a heated argument between Us members and Panther Elaine Brown. An altercation ensued during which Carter and Huggins were shot to death.

BPP members insisted that the event was a planned assassination, whereas Us members maintained it was a spontaneous event. Former BPP deputy minister of defense Geronimo Pratt, Carter’s head of security at the time, has stated in recent years that rather than a conspiracy, the UCLA incident was a spontaneous shootout. The person who allegedly shot Carter and Huggins, Claude Hubert, was never found. Later, during the Church Committee hearings in 1975, evidence came to light that under the FBI's COINTELPRO actions, FBI agents had deliberately fanned flames of division and enmity between the BPP and Us.

The LAPD responded to the attack by raiding an apartment used by the Black Panthers and arresting 75 members, including all remaining leadership of the chapter, on charges of conspiring to murder Us members in retaliation. (These charges were later dropped.) This reaction fueled claims that Us was being used by the FBI to target the Black Panthers. Later in 1969, two other Black Panther members were killed and one other was wounded by Us members.

In the years following the deaths of Carter and Huggins, the Black Panther party became more suspicious of outsiders and became more focused on defense rather than community improvement. The group eventually became marginalized, and officially disbanded in 1980.

A TASER FIGHT IN FORT WORTH

Medical Examiner Dr. Nizam Peerwani admits TASER International Intimidating

… a young gunshot victim was pronounced dead at John Peter Smith hospital, and his body was picked up and brought to the morgue. “I got a call a little later from my investigator saying that the man was breathing about twice a minute and what should he do. I told him to call 911 and have the body brought back to JPS.” That was done, Dr. Peerwani said, and when the man's breathing stopped, he was brought back to the morgue, and the autopsy went on from there.

What was the Cause-of-Death? Gunshot wound or medical neglect?

And in these five taser related deaths:

November 2, 2004: Robert Guerrero, 21, Fort Worth, Texas
April 3, 2005: Eric Hammock, 43, Fort Worth, Texas
June 24, 2005: Carolyn Daniels, 25, Fort Worth, Texas
August 23, 2006: Noah Lopez, 25, Fort Worth, Texas
April 18, 2009: Michael Jacobs Jr., 24, Fort Worth, Texas

Why The Medical Examiner Does Not Attribute Cause Of Death To Taser Electrocution?

In an interview with Fort Worth Weekly writer Peter Gorman, Tarrant County Medical Examiner Dr. Nizam Peerwani says, “It's still very difficult to determine the role a Taser charge may play in a death, but what we can learn from history is that there are people in certain excited states who perhaps should not be shocked.”

When asked if he about the maker of the taser device, the doctor noted the actions of TASER International had "a policy of suing medical examiners who find Tasers as having contributed to or caused a death".

“That can be very intimidating, of course,” he said. But, he added, it doesn't affect his decisions. “We are working on a case right now where the Taser was used, and we are looking at it very closely. And if we determine that the Taser was a contributing factor, we will be clear on that.”
(Ref: http://www.fwweekly.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1463%3Adissecting-the-evidence&catid=30%3Acover-story&Itemid=375)

TASER International is known for winning lawsuits against medical examiners that attribute the cause of death to their product. The company has never lost such a lawsuit, something well known to law enforcement personnel across the country and around the world.

In Taser Intl., Inc. v. Chief Med. Examr. of Summit Co., Ohio, No. CV 2006-11-7421, Taser International, Inc. sued a county medical examiner to remove any mention of the device from the autopsy reports of three men who died after being shot with the Taser, and the court sided with the company.

The company successfully sued newspaper publisher Gannett Co. for libel, arguing that it published a series of articles that misled readers about the safety of its products.

The new Fort Worth Chief of Police, Jeffrey Halstead, revealed that TASER International had won every lawsuit brought against it... this, at a community forum after the taser death of Michael Jacobs, Jr. And, I assume that Peerwani was referring to the Jacobs case, in the above cite.

One of the brains behind TASER International’s legal strategy is, again, a Fort Worth law firm.

“Taser will use litigation in any way it possibly can to persuade the public that these stun guns don't hurt people,” said Robert Haslam, a Fort Worth, Texas lawyer and chair of AAJ's Taser Litigation Group. “There seems to be a lot of smoke, but Taser says there's no fire.”

ARE TASER RELATED DEATHS A LOT OF SMOKE AND NO FIRE?

The question goes to the root of making a determination of the time of death and its immediate causation. In theory, if the taser electrodes are not sticking in the body and the victim and not being “juiced” when the heart stops, the medical examiner is expected to rule the cause of death as simply the victim’s heart stopped. It had nothing to do with the taser electrocution that was administered only moments before.

The legal team knows that it is impossible to pinpoint the exact moment of death, because there are a series of bodily shutdowns before the subject finally expires. It is in this legal quagmire that lawyers like Robert Haslam build their defenses.

POLICE DEPARTMENT BIAS

There is enough reasonable evidence to cause law enforcement to question their use of these lethal “non-lethal” devices. But F.W. Police Chief Jeffrey Halstead may not an unbiased party in the deliberation. He is a 20-year veteran of the Phoenix Police Department and a former police commander with the Homeland Defense Bureau.

When TASER International was starting out with its new Thomas A. Smith Electric Rifle (TASER, for short), the Scottsdale, Arizona company found its first law enforcement custom next door, with the Phoenix Police Department.

COMMENTARY

Here is a police chief who grew up in TASER International country and a pioneer in the usage of electronic stun guns.

Here is a law firm that is part of the defense team, protecting the company name and reputation, maybe even plaintiff counsel on the intimidating lawsuit side of the question.

Lastly, here is a medical examiner that refuses to attribute the legitimate cause of death to taser electrocution.

We know how TASER International has courted the medical examiners profession, by sponsoring lavish conventions and seminars. The company has a campaign policy to win the hearts and minds of the law enforcement community, and to peddle it stun guns as a non-lethal alternative to deadly force.

It is a very aggressive company in expanding its market to the military, law enforcement agency, and now the public. C2 tasers can now be purchased and deployed for civilian use, under the auspices of self-protection.

WHO IS THIS TARRANT COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINER?

I have always been suspicious of medical examiners who exonerate police officers in Cause of Death cases. It is not unusual for a medical examiner to go in and “clean up” a mess made by brutal cops and prison guards. A suspect’s death or a prisoner’s death may be ruled a suicide by the medical examiner, while the rest of the inmates know otherwise.

A medical examiner’s testimony in court can determine whether the case is treated as a first degree murder or manslaughter or justifiable homicide.

Consider the case of Tarrant County Medical Examiner Dr. Nizam Peerwani, who is currently determining the cause of death in the Michael Jacobs, Jr. case.

Dr. Nizam Peerwani is probably the highest-profile medical examiner in the United States. His territory covers four counties, but he's been called upon often to lend his expertise as far away as Afghanistan and Bosnia.

Peerwani has traveled a great deal for organizations such as Physicians for Human Rights, the United Nations, and Human Rights Watch, investigating claims of genocide and other abuses in far-flung corners of the globe - all pro bono.

Asked about his international work, Peerwani launched into a story about going to Rwanda in 1996, where his group had to be protected by Nigerian special forces under the banner of the U.N. while they searched for mass graves. "We found one that had 550 bodies in it. Our group only did one grave, but there were many more from that time."

Such work has taken him to killing fields in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Indonesia, El Salvador, Iraq, and Peru. He was called to Afghanistan in 2002, shortly after the United States sent in troops, to investigate what had happened to about 2,000 suspected Taliban and al Qaeda members who allegedly had surrendered to a local warlord and U.S. ally and then been killed. Their bodies had not been located, but human rights officials believed they'd been buried in mass graves in the desert. Peerwani and others with Physicians for Human Rights questioned local shepherds, found the bodies, and identified them as those of the men who had surrendered to the warlord.

There's another area of human rights work where Peerwani is a player in a much different way. Amnesty International and other groups around the world for years have complained about the abuses of Taser electric-shock weapons by police agencies - especially in the United States and in Texas in particular.

Questions have been raised about several cases in which people died after having been tasered - in most cases, repeatedly - by Fort Worth police. Those deaths, in part, led the police department to change some of its policies on Taser use a few years ago.

Some local attorneys question Peerwani's willingness to go along with Fort Worth police on cases involving deaths by Taser. And there's some controversy about Peerwani's work for the federal women's prison hospital at Carswell. Judges, attorneys, former inmates, and families of inmates who died at Carswell or at local hospitals are outraged about the poor quality of the prison's medical care, which evidence suggests has led to many deaths. And yet, because Peerwani's private company holds the contract to do Carswell autopsies, families of inmates can't get copies of his findings on the deaths of their loved ones.

In another case that caused him grief, a young gunshot victim was pronounced dead at John Peter Smith hospital, and his body was picked up and brought to the morgue. “I got a call a little later from my investigator saying that the man was breathing about twice a minute and what should he do. I told him to call 911 and have the body brought back to JPS.” That was done, he said, and when the man's breathing stopped, he was brought back to the morgue, and the autopsy went on from there.

The medical examiner's offices are located on Feliks Gwozdz Place just behind JPS hospital. On the wall of the foyer, a large frame holds several dozen patches from the law enforcement agencies with which the office has worked, from local police departments across Texas to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the United Nations.

The Great Escape from Supermax

Let me set the record straight. There has been at least one successful escape from our supermax prison. I was there when it happened... Eddie Griffin

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

President Barack Obama was wrong, factually and historically, when he proclaimed nobody has ever escaped from one of our federal supermax. El Presidente must have been about 13- or 14-years old at the time of the Great Escape from Marion Federal Prison. Nevertheless, he was President and should have had the keys to the closet where the real history is buried and hidden.

Marion was supposed to be as escape-proof as its predecessor Alcatraz. I distinctly remember it happened before the Bicentennial Hunger Strike at Marion on July 4, 1976. The reason I remember so well is because the escape almost disrupted our plans.

At the time, we needed a positive press and a sympathetic public. The government had characterized us as being “the worst of the worst” and this frustrated incarcerated Black Panther members who maintained that they were POW political prisoners.

“MARION is the most written-about prison in the world. One of the battle lines drawn in October, 1983, was for public opinion. The government is winning this battle hands down. The Bureau of Prisons utilizes a highly effective public relations strategy which revolves around the agitprop slogan ‘the worst of the worse’ to describe Marion prisoners,” writes Ray Luc Levasseur.

When the escape jumped off, we cheered, but we also held our breaths, hoping the escapees would not hurt anybody. A murder of John Q. Public would hurt our political image as POWs and undo three years of planning and peacekeeping among the inmates. But it was hard not to cheer them on. We were all POWs and, as POWs, we reasoned, that every man had a duty and obligation to escape if ever the opportunity presented itself. This was U.S. Military Code of Conduct, and many of us were ex-GIs. But there was also a greater code forged among inmates.

An ingenious inmate invented a magnetic device that could trip all the electronic gates inside the prison. He tried to get a patent for it and even offered it to the government through the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Everyone thought he was crazy.

But then, one night during a Historical Society meeting in the visiting room, where white inmates congregated with outsider patrons, the device was deployed. It was attached to the framework of the grill doors, half of which led to the outside, directly to freedom. The inmate triggered the device and announced, “Anyone who wants to go, let’s go.”

All of the grill doors were wide open, but only eight men bolted to freedom. They rest were dumbfounded and frozen in their seats.

The guard watching the Control Center monitor reported that when he looked up, all he saw were the feet of the last man out. This set off an area-wide manhood, first in the heavily wooded area of the prison, and later on the highways.

The eight men stuck together, one of the men I knew only as “Frenchy” because he was busted in the French Connection and spoke no English. The eight fugitives came up on a farm house, and found an elderly couple alone.

They took the couple hostage. In an interview afterwards, the couple testified that they were well treated by the escapees. They had cooked for the couple, cleaned the house behind themselves, and washed the dishes before they departed.

This was the code of conduct we had adopted, black, white, and brown inmates alike. We called ourselves Marion Brothers.

All eight fugitives were later captured, one making it as far as Canada. Throughout the manhunt, no one was injured.

Troy Davis and the Ghost of Timothy Cole

There is no greater wrong that cannot be righted than to execute an innocent man. It is an irreversible act that cannot be undone. And, there is no greater torture than to let an innocent man rot in prison for the rest of his life.

By Eddie Griffin

A posthumous exoneration will not bring back Timothy Cole from an untimely grave. He had served honorably in the U.S. Army and was a student at Texas Tech University, according to House Resolution No. 62, filed by Representative Marc Veasey. But in the spring of 1985, he was snatched away and charged with the rape of Michele Mallin, a Texas Tech sophomore.

There was no physical evidence tying Cole to the crime and no fingerprints on the victim’s car, although the true rapist had driven it extensively. And besides, Tim Cole had a solid alibi: At the time of the rape, he was studying in his apartment while his brother was having a card party in the living room. Several young people testified at trial that Cole was in the apartment with them all evening.

Many years later, Mallin realized how she was primed by the district attorney to point the finger at the young black freshman. As for Cole's alibi, the DA characterized Cole's brother and friends as “brash, slick liars who would say anything to save their friend”. In the end, the jury believed Mallin, and Cole was sentenced to 25 years in prison.

The true rapist, in the meantime, waited quietly until the statute of limitation expired. Then in 1995, Jerry Wayne Johnson wrote a letter to the district court in Lubbock in which he confessed to raping Mallin. He got no reply. So he wrote another letter asking for an attorney so that he could legally confess. Again, he was ignored.

In the end, Johnson's confession came too late. Cole was found unconscious in his cell on Dec. 2, 1999. He died before prison officials got him to the hospital. He was 39 years old.

Timothy Cole was a vet and a college student, not a street thug. Troy Davis was a former sports coach, not a street thug either. He was convicted of the 1989 murder of Savannah police officer Mark MacPhail. Like Cole, Davis was convicted solely on witness testimony. Otherwise, there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime, and no weapon was ever recovered.

In the Cole case, the only eyewitness was the rape victim herself. In the Davis case, there were nine witnesses, none of who saw the actual murder. Since the time of their original testimony, seven have recanted or provided contradictory statements.

Tim Cole spent 13 years in prison, wishing, hoping, weeping, and looking for the day that the State of Texas would recognize its mistake. Four years after the true rapist confession, Cole was still in prison, still waiting... waiting for justice that never came.

Both cases should have sent up red flags of doubt. But there appears to be an insistence of southern justice to carry out a sentence even if there is reasonable doubt and no physical evidence. Justice here is not about guilt or innocence, but rather the supreme right of the state to execute whomever it wishes for whatever reason. Evidence does not matter anymore.

Market Flooded with Counterfeit TASER International Stock

Congratulations to everyone who worked on the Campaign against Tasers and Taser International, Inc. Your publicity of the many unwarranted taser death caused several financial giants to “short sell” the stock, whereby they made a profit when the stock fell. But something else happened. READ:

Taser International, Inc. sued Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Deutsche Bank Securities, Credit Suisse, Banc of America Securities and three remnants of Bears Stearns for engaging "abusive naked short sales" of TASER stock that have devalued stock and created millions of shares of "counterfeit" or "phantom" shares. (TASER International v. Morgan Stanley, No. 2008-EV-004739-B)

The complaint, filed nearly a year ago by Bondurant, Mixson & Elmore partners John E. Floyd and Steven J. Rosenwasser and Houston's James W. Christian and John M. O'Quinn, accuses the companies of violating the Georgia Securities Act, the state's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act and the Georgia Computer Systems Protection Act. A fourth count, added later, also alleges conversion.

NOTE:

The practice of short-selling is itself a long-standing and perfectly legal activity. A buyer who thinks a stock will lose value borrows some of that stock from a willing lender, sells it on the open market at the current price and then buys replacement shares and returns it to the lender. If the stock price has fallen, then the short-seller makes money on the transaction because he sold the borrowed stock for more than he paid for the replacement. If the price remains stable or rises, the short-seller loses money by having to pay more for the replacement than he received for selling the borrowed stock.

The short-sellers are generally hedge funds that borrow the shares either from their prime brokers -- the defendant companies -- or from a central clearinghouse established to hold and oversee such loans, the Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. (DTCC).

Under Securities and Exchange Commission rules, the seller of stock generally has three days to deliver the shares to a purchaser, or "settle," although in these days of computer transactions, no actual paper shares are transferred; rather, an electronic confirmation of the sale is sent to the purchaser

COMMENTARY

Short-selling is so much an integral part of Wall Street trading that people may tend to take the mechanism for granted. Like the Bernie Madoff Ponzi Scheme, a vacuum of phantom wealth is created in the short-selling process.

This is how the plaintiff, TASER International, describes the phantom of counterfeited stock created by the brokerages.

The suit includes figures purporting to show that, on a given day, the number of TASER shares the DTCC recorded as being held by the defendant companies could be vastly lower than the number the company itself claimed to control.

For instance, on May 22, Morgan Stanley claimed "beneficial ownership" of 11.7 million shares; the same day, DTCC records showed the company holding 2.6 million.

The so-called "phantom shares" also dramatically increased the number of TASER shares reportedly held by stockholders, the suit says.

“Objective shareholder voting data demonstrates that the defendants' unlawful selling of unregistered and unissued TASER shares flooded the market with counterfeit shares," it says. "For example, at the time of TASER's 2005 annual vote, TASER had approximately 61.1 million shares outstanding. Yet, approximately 82 million shares voted, an additional over-vote of approximately 20 million shares.”

UPDATE: Eddie Griffin (BASG) began watching TASER International (NASDAQ:TASR) stock at $5.01 per share. As of this writing, the price is $4.14.

The implication in the above cited case would suggest that TASER International, Inc. will not deliver on a short-sell of its stock. Security companies may cease trading the stock for fear of lawsuit.

Cause of Death by Psychobabble

AM I NOT HUMAN
A Human Rights Campaign

By Eddie Griffin

Do not be hoodwinked and bamboozled by “Psychobabble”.

What is “Psychobabble”?

When we studied why so many young black men were being put on medication during the 1970s, we recognized a new specialization in medical terminology.

Psychobabble is based on the idea that social and personal conflicts are more understandable through the use of complex, descriptive or special esoteric language. The word came into popular usage after the 1977 publication of Psychobabble: Fast talk and quick cure in the age of feeling, by author and journalist R. D. Rosen.

The Black Panther radical think tank, known as “The Collective”, was alerted by rogue CIA agent Philip Agee. The CIA mind control experimentation at USP Marion was shrouded in complex “psychobabble”. This was during the height of the Psych War of the 1970s.

Wikipedia defines Psychobabble is a form of prose using jargon, buzzwords and highly esoteric language to give an impression of plausibility through mystification, misdirection, and obfuscation. Psychobabble is also a psychological term used to denote the misdiagnosis and misclassification of natural variation in human psychology as psychopathological, or mentally disordered, and is based upon the premise of exaggerated overmedicalization of physiological ailments to increase profits for the medical industry.

Eddie Griffin describes how the CIA utilized psychobabble to cover for a secret mind control program called “Breaking Men’s Minds”.

The hardest part of selling psychobabble to the public is legitimizing the new language in misdiagnosing and misclassifying an event or a practice that needs to be rationalized to the public. In every case, it is controversial.

CASE EXAMPLE:

Jason Doan, age 28, was zapped him three times with a Taser and went into cardiac arrest and died. But Judge Monica Bast says the electronic stun gun did not cause Doan’s death. Instead, Bast says the most likely cause of his heart stopping was excited delirium, which was the official cause noted on his death certificate… but lack of medical information preclude a definitive declaration. “The cause of Doan's cardiac arrest and the manner of his death remain undeterminable,” Best wrote.

NOTE: Cause of Death

Wikipedia defines Excited Delirium as a “controversial term used to explain deaths of individuals in police custody, in which the person being arrested or restrained shows some combination of agitation, violent or bizarre behavior, insensitivity to pain, elevated body temperature, or increased strength. It has been listed as a cause of death by some medical examiners.

It only appears as a cause of death where police are involved in restraining agitated individuals. The term has no formal medical recognition and is not recognized in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. There may also be a controversial link between "excited delirium" deaths and the use of Tasers to subdue agitated people.

COMMENTARY

The term “Excited Delirium” is only used in police-related death. Otherwise, there is no recorded case of anyone getting overly excited and killing over. It is a cover term, a medical shield behind which taser-related deaths have been carried out.

As a former member of The Collective, I recall tracking back to the source where the new medical lexicon was being coined. That’s how I later became friends with Dr. Edgar Schein, on of the founding fathers of brainwash research and organizational behavior psychology. We corrupted the good intentional meaning of the word “brainwash”. Instead of a cleansing of the mind (rehabilitation) as the Chinese intended, the American psychologists were dibbling and dabbling in thought control science.

We tracked these ideas back to the think tanks that created them. We studied the rationale behind them and what made them so deceptive to the public. They knew how to generate blind, ignorant support, even for practices of torture. Thereby, reality was turned on its head. What was the public good and who had the power to define it, and to what extent would the public let the powers go?

This is why I am able to recognize that “Excited Delirium” cannot ever be the cause of death, because it is a medical fiction. Track the medical examiners connection with Taser International, Inc., and you will discover why medical examiners never list the cause of death as tasers; and those that do, get sued by the company, which has won every suit, except those secretly settled out of court.

Action Alert: Help Urge Passage of HB 2267 - Kenneth Foster Bill

HB 2267 would require separate trials for co-defendants in capital trials in which the death penalty is sought and would prohibit the state from seeking the death penalty for people who do not kill anyone but are convicted under the Law of Parties. It is fundamentally unfair to sentence someone to death, like Kenneth Foster was, if they did not kill anyone. The death penalty is intended to be reserved for the worst of the worst killers. People who do not themselves kill anyone are not only are they not the worst of the worst, they are not even killers.

The Law of Parties allows people who "should have anticipated" a murder to receive the death penalty for the actions of another person who killed someone. A person sentenced to death under the Law of Parties has not killed anyone. They are accomplices or co-conspirators of one felony, such as robbery, during which another person killed someone. However, in some cases a person can end up on death row under the law of parties even though they did not even know their co-defendant had any intention to hurt or even rob the victim, which is what happened to Kenneth Foster. A person who did not kill anyone, or intend anyone to be killed, should not be executed for the actions of another person.

Contact A Texas State Representatives

"After carefully considering the facts of this case, along with the recommendation from the Board of Pardons and Paroles, I believe the right and just decision is to commute Foster's sentence from the death penalty to life imprisonment," Perry said in a statement.

"I am concerned about Texas law that allowed capital murder defendants to be tried simultaneously and it is an issue I think the legislature should examine."

Ref. http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/governor-perry-grants-last-minute.html

Other References:

http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/pardons-parole-vote-to-spare-kenneth.html

http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/carter-and-tutu-plead-for-life-of.html

http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/hat-tip-to-lilana-segura.html

http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/call-for-reprieve-from-death.html

http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/petition-for-reprieve-of-execution.html

http://eddiegriffinbasg.blogspot.com/2007/08/scheduled-execution-kenneth-foster-jr.html

Taser Torture & Death Cases in Fort Worth, Texas, USA

Submitted by Eddie Griffin, BASG

OHCHR-UNOG
Committee against Torture
8-14 Avenue de la Paix
1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland
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RE: Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment

Adopted and opened for signature, ratification and accession by General Assembly resolution 39/46 of 10 December 1984, entry into force 26 June 1987, in accordance with article 27

PART I, Article 1
1. For the purposes of this Convention, the term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions.

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

On May 4, 2009, the Fort Worth chapters of the Southern Leadership Conference (SCLC), the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), and the community-based Carver Heights East Association, convened a joint press conference and prayer vigil outside City Hall for the families of Michael Jacobs, Jr., Noah Lopez, and Carolyn Daniels.

These families were interviewed by WFAA New 8 TV. (See Prayers for end to Taser use by police, reference http://www.wfaa.com/video/index.html?nvid=358374&shu=1)

In an article by Peter Gorman of the Fort Worth Weekly, entitled “US: Torture by Taser” (Ref. http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=12455), published June 24, 2005, the author details two prior taser deaths in Fort Worth. Robert Guerrero, who was apprehended in a petty burglary, was stunned for 10 seconds, “double the normal length of time”. In the next minute, Guerrero was jolted three more times with five-second blasts. When he stopped breathing and could not be revived, the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office later listed the cause of death as heart failure brought on by “acute cocaine overdose”. But a member of the Medical Examiner’s staff —who asked not to be named — told Fort Worth Weekly that “the amount of cocaine found in Guerrero’s blood would not normally have caused him to have heart failure.”

The other Fort Worth Taser victim, Midland architect Eric Hammock, died in April 3, 2005 after he ran from police, tried to take on an officer, and ended up suffering heart failure — like Guerrero, after getting hit repeatedly with a Taser while he had cocaine in his system. The medical examiner’s report, released on April 28, showed that Hammock suffered from heart disease and that he was jacked way up on cocaine. The official cause of death, in layman’s terms, was heart failure caused by cocaine intoxication. As in the Guerrero case, the Taser was not considered a contributing factor in Hammock’s death, despite the multiple jolts he had received.

According to Amnesty International, between 2001 and 2004 more than 70 deaths occurred in the United States and Canada to people in police custody within hours or days of their being hit with a Taser. By 2005, those kinds of deaths reached 103 just by March — and there were at least two additional deaths in April, including Eric Hammock’s in Fort Worth. Michael Jacobs, Jr. was reported to be # 405.

Here is the numeric chronological listing of taser deaths by the Fort Worth Police Department, along with date of death and age of victim.

#81 November 2, 2004: Robert Guerrero, 21, Fort Worth, Texas
#109 April 3, 2005: Eric Hammock, 43, Fort Worth, Texas
#130 June 24, 2005: Carolyn Daniels, 25, Fort Worth, Texas
#214 August 23, 2006: Noah Lopez,25, Fort Worth, Texas
#405 April 18, 2009: Michael Jacobs Jr., 24, Fort Worth, Texas

As of this date, May 6, 2009, the investigation into the death Michael Jacobs, Jr. continues. Here was a mentally ill young man, distraught, and refusing to take his medication. His family called for the assistance of the authorities and medical personnel. But EMS (Emergency Medical personnel) was, instead, sent away from the scene. They were called back nearly an hour later while Jacobs was in the process of dying.

TASER International, Inc., the manufacturer of the Electronic Control Devices (ECDs), has been careful and meticulous to disassociate its weapons from causation of death, although these instruments emit up to 50,000 volts of electricity through the human body. Besides this, the company has repeatedly boasted that no Taser has ever been proven to be a “direct cause” of a fatality, a statistic that has not gone unnoticed by the new Fort Worth chief of police, Jeff Halstead, who hails from Phoenix, a few miles from Scottsdale, home of the taser producing corporation.

In its strategy to win the hearts and minds of the public, TASER set out to “gain market acceptance, establish and expand direct and indirect distribution channels”, through its “ability to attract and retain the endorsement of key opinion-leaders in the law enforcement community.”

Secondly, TASER has waged an intense propaganda and legal battle against the press. The company sued newspaper publisher Gannett Co. for libel, arguing that it published a series of articles that misled readers about the safety of its products.

“Taser will use litigation in any way it possibly can to persuade the public that these stun guns don't hurt people,” said Robert Haslam, a Fort Worth, Texas lawyer and chair of AAJ's Taser Litigation Group. “There seems to be a lot of smoke, but Taser says there's no fire.”

Robert Haslam is misinformed, as well as Chief Jeff Halstead, who has, in turn, misinformed the public about the danger of tasers. A San Jose federal jury awarded the family of Robert Heston, Jr. an amount of $6 million against Taser International on the grounds that the company “failed to warn police that its stun guns could be dangerous when used on people under the influence of drugs or in conjunction with chest compressions”…. this award was a Product Liability award against Taser international, the “stun gun” manufacturer.

More recently, the company has fought back, forcing some medical examiners to change their autopsy reports on taser-related deaths.

In Taser Intl., Inc. v. Chief Med. Examr. of Summit Co., Ohio, No. CV 2006-11-7421, Taser International, Inc. sued a county medical examiner to remove any mention of the device from the autopsy reports of three men who died after being shot with the Taser, and the court sided with the company.

Judge Ted Schneiderman, of the Summit County, Ohio, Court of Common Pleas, found: “There is simply no medical, scientific, or electrical evidence to support the conclusion that the Taser X26 had anything to do with the death of Dennis S. Hyde, Richard Holcomb, or Mark D. McCullaugh. The medical examiner failed to present any evidence on the use and effect of Taser devices.”

THEREFORE:

WE CHARGE that TASERS ARE TORTURE, as defined by the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

WE CHARGE that Tasering is “an act by which severe pain and suffering” is “intentionally inflicted”, willfully and knowingly that these devices emit 50,000 volts, more than enough to electrocute anyone on the spot.

WE CHARGE that Tasering has caused more than 400 deaths in the United States since 2001 to victims who, otherwise, would not have been given a death sentence, and in many cases, totally innocent of any offense.

WE CHARGE that TASER International is deceiving the public, public officials, and politicians with its non-lethal or less-the-lethal claim, giving civilian law enforcement the false assurances that its product is not deadly.

WE CHARGE that TASER International has used strong arm tactics against the press, against medical examiners, and anyone else who might causally taint its devices with “direct cause” of death.

WE CHARGE that TASER International has created a lexicon of its own to obscure real cause-effect relationship in taser-related fatalities. This includes the creation of the “Sudden In-Custody Death Syndrome”, since after tasing, a subject is taken into custody. In theory, it is “excited delirium” of an agitated state while being taken into custody that the subject has a seizure and dies. This is nothing more than legal babble designed to disassociate the manufacturer from liability of its product.

WE CHARGE that TASER International, Inc. and its supporters, backers, and investors are insensitive in not recognizing the innocent victims killed by its weapon. They assume no responsibility, nor do they express sympathy to the families.

WE CHARGE that TASERs have been used to inflict punishment on subject or to force compliance. In most of these instances, either no crime was committed by the subject, or the offenses are minor. They have tasered children with behavioral problems, women (some pregnant), and men (mostly minorities).

WE CHARGE that the Tasered Victims of Fort Worth were of minority persuasion. When more pain and suffering is intentional inflicted, disproportionately upon minorities, that also constitute TORTURE.

Shutting Down Fort Worth School System: Right Decision

By Eddie G. Griffin, Child’s Rights Advocate

Friday, May 01, 2009

When we received word that Dr. Melody Johnson was shutting down the entire Fort Worth Independent School District because of the international Swine Flu pandemic alarm, I was amazed. It was a bold and decisive act, the true mark of a leader.

ABC Evening News Charlie Gipson asked if the superintendent had “overreacted”. The medical reporter believed she did, but what other choices did she have?

My colleague Shawn Williams of Dallas South Blog asked the same question. Dallas reported only one confirmed case of swine flu. Therefore, it closed only one school.

Was Fort Worth overreacting?

When the news broke back to local WFAA 8, interviews with Fort Worth residents wholeheartedly supported Superintendent Johnson and her decision to close all the schools.

What wrong with them people over in Fort Worth? Have they gone hysterical?

There is a general consensus among us that it is better to err on the side of caution, to err on the side of our children’s safety. In fact, the City of Fort Worth has taken measures like Mexico City, canceling its annual Mayfest Downtown Celebration, and all other outside communicable activity.

Is it an overreaction?

Maybe. Maybe not. Prevention cannot be measured. But there is a maxim here: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Herein also is a principal in leadership.

In disaster contingency planning, begin with the Worse Case Scenario and work backwards.

The FWISD removed itself as a contributing factor in the transmission and spread of the swine flu virus. The school system will not be a contributory to any increased sickness or additional deaths associated with the disease. Instead, the time out will be spent taking preventive measures, such as scrubbing and sanitizing schools.

The schools will be closed until further notice (May 11). This is time enough to allow the virus to run its course, unless it spreads further.

Next, the Fort Worth ISD will not have to grapple with the disparity in loss school days between different schools. Instead, the school district is seeking a waiver for the loss days.

No one knows what a CDC Pandemic Level 5 Alert is all about. No one knows the magnitude of the national health threat. But we have had a contingency plan in place for a long time, including quarantining whole towns.

Today, Mexico City has quarantined itself because of over 160 deaths from the virus. She is the Worse Case Scenario. The City of Fort Worth and Fort Worth Independent School District has started with the Worse Case Scenario benchmark to develop a preventive and containment strategy, based upon their discretionary use of emergency powers and authority.

This is a wise decision, because nobody knows what tomorrow holds. But we, who believe, know who holds tomorrow.


WORD OF THE DAY
http://eddiegriffinbiblestudy.blogspot.com/