I've lived in So. Cal a long time and actually been subject to the police freaking out over one thing or another, but Christopher Jordan Dorner has put them off the chain and running down the street. They are scared and stating straight out on television they are, there is one Captain that hasn't left his home and that's not a good look in my opinion for law enforcement.
I'm 6 2 and 220 pounds, I look nothing at all like Chris Dorner and I was joking with Sweetie that I was going to get my son in law to drive me around, but they are shooting at little white guys too!
I first got wind of Dorner as kind of an oh shit. You know when you hear tell of a gruesome murder now a days, but they are ticking out with such regularity you feel the pain of the event but you’re just numb. On February 3rd two people got murdered in Irvine. That was kind of a trip. Irvine is a private town. It was the brain child of one man and it is a cookie cutter planned town very homogeneous and extremely safe. Irvine is as safe as any place in America can be.
Yet there was a young couple Monica Quan and Keith Lawrence gunned down on the roof of the parking structure of their condo complex.LA Times link They had just gotten engaged, and the first things I thought were some bastard must have had issues with their relationship, crime of passion and put it in the list of other crimes I’d check out when there was some sort of resolution.
The next couple of days hit with information that made it sure this incident was not going to be some back burner event. They think this person is a cop? He’s dropping pieces of information all over the Southland trying to hijack boats etc, wait a minute he’s black? Folks at that time I actually thought it was a love thing when I found out concurrently Keith Lawrence was also Black and in law enforcement. They let it be known then there was a manifesto and I thought it was going to be a love letter an if I can’t have her he can’t either. The media was describing it universally as “rambling” so I didn't even bother to read it.
Then all heck breaks loose in So. Cal.
Dorner's Manifesto is apparently not an if I can’t have her it’s a declaration of war on the LAPD. During the night Dorner moves on targets he had outlined shoots one LAPD officer and wounds him in Corona then moves down the road to Riverside and ambushes two Riverside police officers sitting at a red light killing one and severely wounding the other.
During that dark night of the police in terror officers riddle the truck of a pair of ladies who were delivering newspapers to a neighborhood that contained one of Dorner’s targets. According to their attorney the police didn’t even provide the courtesy of identifying themselves or attempting to make a felony stop. The Los Angeles Police just opened fire at the Torrance Corral wounding both women one seriously. Very soon after a young man trying to get some surfing in before work was stopped in a truck that fit the description of Dorner’s only in that it was also a truck and told he could go about his business, moments later he was T-boned by police and his truck shot he thankfully was not hit.
It was then that I personally decided to crack open the manifesto and then that the initial oh shit I uttered at the death of the couple got capitalized to OH SHIT. His first words after the obligatory I’m not a bad guy and those who know me are going to sure be shocked.
Unfortunately, this is a necessary evil that I do not enjoy but must partake and complete for substantial change to occur within the LAPD and reclaim my name. The department has not changed since the Rampart and Rodney King days. It has gotten worse. The consent decree should never have been lifted. The only thing that has evolved from the consent decree is those officers involved in the Rampart scandal and Rodney King incidents have since promoted to supervisor, commanders, and command staff, and executive positions.
I’ve written about my experience surrounding king’s verdict before Thinking of London and Remembering When My City Burned but never about Rampart. To try and unpack all that was behind that is way too difficult in this offering. Let’s just say the LAPD conspired to frame, rob, brutalize, lie, drug deal, I’m running out of detestable things the people charged with protecting our city did to the citizens of our city.
The southland it’s people of color and probably the rest of the world began to read the manifesto, and the first impression I got is he’s not insane in that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s perfectly sane in that respect but the goal he has is that of a madman. It tells the story that way too many people in our country bobbed their heads in understanding with. A police force that is brutal violent and racist a man who tried to work within the system to fight such abuses and was instead punished for it.
You could see the familiar divisions with the right wing horrified anyone could sympathize with a murderer and whatever other message he might have to be ignored, the other side horrified that our police forces might behave in such a manner as Dorner alleges, and here we are.
There is currently a 1 million dollar bounty on Chris Dorner’s head. Average reward on the death of regular citizens is 50K in So. Cal. It’s for capture and conviction thank God or I’d be more afraid to step out of my door than I currently am. Our law enforcement agencies are catching 600 there is Dorner tips a day, and every brother who looks remotely like LL Cool J, or the father from That’s so Raven is hunkering down or investing in T-shirts that say “I’m Not Chris Dorner Don’t Shoot Me Bro!”.
Difficult questions are floating around with serious implications. Is taking Dorner’s accusations seriously and investigating negotiating with a terrorist? They’re calling him a domestic terrorist. Can a flood of racism make otherwise “Law Abiding “Black” Citizens” snap? What manner of incompetence has lead flying at citizens who are not Black men. Doesn't the Constitution say you're innocent until proven guilty? Since when did police decide that on the street and toss in executioner on their job description? Heck I even see numerous tweets calling him Rambro like he's a hero or something for having stood up to the man, like killing innocent couples and ambushing people is heroic. Yeah Chris Dorner is going to leave a mark.
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