Washington’s attorney general has charged two Tacoma cops with murder, and a third with manslaughter, in the March 2020 killing of a black man when he was “tasered, handcuffed, and hogtied, with his face covered by a spit hood,” AOL News reported on Thursday, May 27, 2021 (read story here).
A medical examiner found that Manuel Ellis, 33, had an enlarged heart and was intoxicated on meth, and those were contributing factors, but ruled his death a homicide by asphyxiation.
Witnesses said the cops “attacked without provocation,” according to AOL News, adding that a home security camera recorded Ellis “repeatedly telling them he couldn’t breathe as he was being restrained.”
After Ellis died, the cops lied about what had happened. They claimed Ellis charged them when they approached him, and denied ever putting a knee on his head or neck. Multiple witnesses and videos proved those assertions were false.
Ellis was killed a few weeks before George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police in a strikingly similar incident. In that case, too, videos of police actions were crucial evidence.
Ellis was no angel. He had “a history of mental illness and addiction,” AOL News said. “In September 2019, he was found naked after trying to rob a fast food restaurant. A sheriff’s deputy subdued him with a Taser after he refused to remain down on the ground and charged toward law enforcement.” And on the day he was killed, police saw him “trying to get into occupied cars at a red light,” which would be very frightening for those drivers and their passengers.
But the cops’ job is to arrest, using no more force than necessary. A badge isn’t a license to kill, but some have treated it as one. Part of the problem is hiring standards. Police work is one of the few remaining good-paying blue-collar jobs accessible to young men with just a high school education; and given the physical nature of the work, recruiting priorities tend to downplay educational attainment and attributes like temperament and judgment. The result is that people end up in police work who shouldn’t be there. Racism and disparate treatment of minorities also are longstanding issues.
Abusive cops have long been protected by immunity laws and a “blue code of silence,” but that’s changing. Washington is among states making it easier to prosecute cops for excessive force. Most police agencies have clear-cut policies their officers are expected to follow, and the fact that cameras are now everywhere makes it harder to fabricate in incident reports and statements to investigators. Cities have been paying multimillion-dollar settlements, which is getting politicians’ attention, news media are reporting these cases, and George Floyd’s death provoked months of huge (and mostly peaceful) protests and public demands for change.
Police officers inclined to rough up, or kill, detainees can no longer take it for granted they’ll get away with it. And that’s a good thing.