Murder In Blue

One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.- Joseph Stalin

Once again members of the so-called "Thin Blue Line", (the largest gang in the US) have managed to kill an innocent victim. This time, tho it is a 92 year old woman whom the gang members and their sponsors contend was a drug dealer. Not a very likely scenario, to anyone with even a normal IQ, obviously not a prerequisite for badge holding, is it?

Now we get to add one more person, a little old lady to the statistics. The polizei in Atlanta have already gone on the offensive where this drug war murder is concerned. Note that their fellow gange members gathered to pay homage to them when they heard their homies had been capped.

Assistant Chief Alan Dreher said the officers had a legal warrant and "knocked and announced" before they forced open the door. He said they were justified in shooting once they were fired upon.

He conveniently ignores the fact that they were unjustified in being there at all. They should have been cognizant of the fact that the occupant of the house was a 92 year old woman...if they had bothered to investigate rather than bust down doors. What are the odds that this woman was a drug dealer? Not very good, but drug warriors seldom care, do they?

In this day and age, when the failed drug war continues to claim innocent lives and real criminals use police tactics to terrorise the innocent it's no wonder that this woman opened fire on these gang members enforcers. Beyond the fact that there were no drugs here, these men were not in uniform and were attempting to break down her door. What reason did she have to believe that these were actually cops? None. The justified shooting in this case belonged to this little old lady, not the police. The true tragedy in this case of drug warriors vs. the people is that Kathryn Johnson is dead and that the officers survived and will likely face no retribution for their incompetence and the unnecessary killing.

The continuing militarisation of the police has killed yet another person and it is unlikely to end any time soon. Yet one more reason to end the War on Drugs before it kills again.

(Thanks to Radley Balko for the link to the video.)

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Drug War, Police, Police Brutality, Atlanta, Libertarian