One of the pigs responsible for Freddie Gray's death was acquitted on all charges by a "Black" judge
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stringer bell
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http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/us/baltimore-officer-edward-nero-freddie-gray-court-verdict.html?_r=0
Officer Is Acquitted of All Charges in Freddie Gray Case
BALTIMORE — A police officer was acquitted of all charges on Monday in the arrest of Freddie Gray, a black man who later died of injuries sustained in police custody. The verdict is likely to fuel renewed debate over the way the police patrol poor and minority neighborhoods.
The officer, Edward M. Nero, sat as Circuit Judge Barry G. Williams, who was the sole decider in the case, read his decision in the noiseless cavern of Courtroom 234.
Officer Nero, who was implicated not in the death of Mr. Gray but in the opening moments of his arrest, was found not guilty of second-degree assault, two counts of misconduct and of reckless endangerment.
The verdict, the first in any of the six officers implicated, comes a little more than a year after Mr. Gray died in April 2015 of a functionally severed spinal cord that he sustained while in police custody. Mr. Gray’s death embroiled parts of Baltimore, which has a history of tension between the police and its residents, in violent protest and became an inexorable piece of the nation’s wrenching discussion of the use of force by officers, particularly against minorities.
Many demonstrators felt vindicated when the city’s top prosecutor, Marilyn J. Mosby, announced charges against the officers involved in the encounter with Mr. Gray on a sunny April morning in the city’s blighted Sandtown neighborhood. But the legal process has turned slowly. Judge Williams granted separate trials for each officer, but the first trial, against Officer William G. Porter, ended with a mistrial in December, catalyzing months of legal delays.
The trial of Officer Nero, 30, shifted the focus from the injuries that killed Mr. Gray, which was a crucial point in Officer Porter’s trial, to the opening moments of his arrest. It was never going to be the highest-profile prosecution in the case related to Mr. Gray; that will be Caesar R. Goodson Jr., the driver of the police wagon in which Mr. Gray is believed to have broken his neck. But, in a city that is already the subject of a federal civil rights investigation into whether officers use excessive force and discriminatory policing, Officer Nero’s trial renewed questions about when an officer can stop a private citizen and what an officer is allowed to do.
“I would say the trial has endangered a wider conversation about how police operate in poor communities, particularly poor communities of color that raises critical issues about society,” said David Jaros, a law professor at the University of Baltimore.
During the weeklong proceeding, prosecutors and defense lawyers agreed that the officers had the right to stop Mr. Gray, who had fled them in a high-crime area for no apparent reason. But prosecutors said Officer Nero and another officer, Garrett E. Miller, exceeded their authority by handcuffing, moving and searching Mr. Gray without first questioning and frisking him, as the law requires. Any physical contact they made with him while doing so, prosecutors argued, amounted to second-degree assault. Officer Nero was also charged with misconduct related to those actions.
“That’s what happens in the city all the time. People get jacked up in the city all the time,” Janice Bledsoe, a deputy state’s attorney, said during her closing argument on Thursday.
“That’s a separate issue,” answered Judge Williams, who repeatedly pressed prosecutors on whether they believed that every arrest made without probable cause amounted to a crime.
A lawyer for Officer Nero, Marc Zayon, said that the apprehension of Mr. Gray was legal, and that, even if it wasn’t: “Wrong or right isn’t the standard. The standard is, were they so wrong that it was unreasonable?” Mr. Zayon said.
Defense lawyers had watched the procedures play out with awe, since it is usually they, not the prosecution, who raise issues of illegal search and seizure in court. What is more, they said, illegal stops rarely result in criminal charges.
“If you’re going to go back and charge every police officer whose arrest was determined to be illegal with assault, or every search that’s deemed to be absent probable cause, you’re going to indict the entire police force,” said Warren Brown, a defense lawyer who has been watching the case.
Officer Nero was also charged with reckless endangerment and another count of misconduct for not restraining Mr. Gray with a seatbelt when he and other officers placed him in a transport wagon.
“When you have custody of someone, you have a duty to keep them safe,” Michael Schatzow, the chief deputy state’s attorney, told Judge Williams.
Mr. Zayon said it was the responsibility of the van driver, not Officer Nero, to secure Mr. Gray with a seatbelt, and that his client had not knowingly violated police procedure or the law.
“This is an officer with two years on the force,” Mr. Zayon said. “He was a baby, still learning with regard to a lot of this.”
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"Just another ? dead" - Pusha T
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If there's 3 of ya'll in the car with me, and we all know what i'm going to do, I shoot and ? 2 people, we all get charged with murder. Most likely, we all get found guilty too. So there's no way that all parties involved aren't responsible. Like the police and the prosecutors like to say, "You may not have pulled the trigger, but your guilt lies in your omission to attempt to intervene". As far as i'm concerned, everyone who could have stopped it, is guilty of involuntary manslaughter.
Even if a ? come get a strap from me and go air somethin out wit it, I still get charged, maybe not with the body, but i'll get charged with something, at the very least, complicity, and the worst being charged with Murder itself. And i'll be guilty most likely. Some accountability is better than no accountability, and the insignificant burden of being indicted, and going to court once a month for a year ain't gon cut it. -
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This guy's worse charge was 'reckless endangerment' anyway..probably would have gotten probation and still been workin if convicted smh
Lets not waste our frustration just yet black ppl.... -
The user and all related content has been deleted.
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yellowtapesport wrote: »This guy's worse charge was 'reckless endangerment' anyway..probably would have gotten probation and still been workin if convicted smh
Lets not waste our frustration just yet black ppl....
Somethin is better than nothin bruh....Oceans started with droplets.
I ain't sayin go out and stage a mass protest, but lets at least leave it on the bulletin board. -
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blame the jury
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Inb4 CVS closes early today
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Man I don't know wtf got to happen but something has to happen. ? just ain't changing. All this marching and other stuff but the results remain the same. I just don't know man.
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DA_Executionah! wrote: »blame the jury
This wasn't a jury trial.. The judge decided this case... -
Man I don't know wtf got to happen but something has to happen. ? just ain't changing. All this marching and other stuff but the results remain the same. I just don't know man.
We've been in the position of lowest on the totem pole since the 1600s. We're not going to change things in our lifetime. But we're making strides, just not fast enough for most of our liking, and that's great because it means there's no complacency. There's a quote from malcolm x about the oppressor taking the knife out our back. We're still removing it, i'd hope by the time i'm dead and gone we can have the knife totally out of our back and maybe start to heal the wound, but even that is pretty ambitious lol. What we seek is going to take lifetimes, we just have to keep pressin. Make noise when we need to make noise and keep taking our respect, and furthering our agenda in the background. We'll get there eventually. -
Man... let me chill before I get in trouble.
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Welcome to America
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Wow.....
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stringer bell wrote: »
I always used to mumble through the Pledge. It sounded like ? to me way back in 1st grade. -
It's becoming painfully apparent that black people can't get justice in America, so we'll justice have to settle for vengeance.
Here we have an other example of black not getting justice. I patiently wait on this talking loud saying absolutely nothing ? to tell what the "or else," part is suppose to be. -
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as expected
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Baltimore (CNN)Baltimore police Officer Edward Nero was found not guilty of all charges Monday in connection with the death of Freddie Gray, Judge Barry Williams ruled Monday after a bench trial.
Williams took 20 minutes to read the decision to a packed courtroom and near-capacity overflow room. Nero nodded as Williams said there was no evidence to support each individual charge, then tilted his head back in relief after the judge read the verdict. He then put his head down and sobbed. -
That was obvious