Officer Omar J. Edwards
I came across the soul wrenching story of Officer Omar J. Edwards the other day.
It could be on Anystreet U.S.A. A guy comes outside to find someone going through the belongings in his car. Naturally, he gives chase and the thief, as they tend to do, escapes his grasp.
What’s different about this scenario, however is that the person giving chase is an officer - Officer Omar J. Edwards, who had just gotten off duty.
You can read the full story for yourself here, but the short story is: other cops got involved and Officer Edwards ends up getting killed in a neighborhood he was paid to protect. Another sad case of racial profiling.
The question could be asked, “Would Edwards have been shot to DEATH if he were white?” My answer, “Probably not.”
What’s even worse, whenever the cops in NY kill someone, they have 48-72 hours to “get their story straight” and to add insult to murder, they are allowed to speak to the other officers present during the shooting. FYI, these privileges are not afforded to any other citizen who murders someone.
But, what REALLY does it for me? Is this page, that says his death was “accidental” a mere FOUR days after he was shot to death at 25 years old. Stunning.
Officer Omar J. Edwards, R.I.P.
Tuesday, June 2nd 2009 at 9:41 pm |
Carlin:
I hear you. Thanks for sharing your experience.
My questions always go back to trying to understand why “mistakes” seem to happen in disproportionate numbers to Black people.
Thanks for reading and commenting.
Tuesday, June 2nd 2009 at 1:05 pm |
Wow, that is sad. “Friendly Fire” happens in a war zone far too frequently, and that’s when combatants are in uniform. I’m assuming from the description here that Officer Edwards was off duty? No excuses of course, but in the heat of the battle, its not as clear cut as it is here in the safety of our blogosphere.
I served in the US Navy, including deployment for Desert Storm. I had the good fortune of being trained by the best (the Marines train the Navy security forces, etc) and they talked about this kind of thing. Know your target, but when it comes down to it, bad things do happen.
End of the day, you do your best, and you live with your mistakes.
Carlin
http://twitter.com/carlincomm