Make it easier on yourself, Ron; Dubose' car is two car lengths behind the car in front of him (about 16 feet for an average four-door car).
Lying to yourself is easy, so you should stop making it easy on yourself and start requiring a little honest rational thought from yourself. First, there are at least 2.5 car lengths between those cars. With even smaller 4 door sedans being about 15 feet each that means about 37 feet. Also the cop is another 5 feet back from the front of Dubose's car, so that puts him about 42 feet from the back of that white car.
The water stain in the middle of the street is more or less at the midpoint of those two car lengths,
Bullshit, the water stain is notably closer to the white car, more like 60% of the way there, meaning .60 X 37 = 22.2 (+5 feet from front of Dubose car to the drivers seat where cop is standing) = 27.2 feet that the cop was pulled and thrown by the forward motion of the car. In addition, he got up a few feet toward the left side of the road because the Dubose was not only going forward but steering to the left to get around the parked white car in front of him.
and by the time Tensing has rolled back to his feet he is slightly behind the position of the water stain. That's a displacement of fourteen feet maximum, far less than the 30 feet Loren and Derec are claiming.
Nope, closer to 27 feet which is quite close to the 30 they are claiming, and which makes it impossible that the car was not already well in motion and at least 10 feet down the road prior to the shot.
The car wasn't in motion when Tensing dove into the window.
True. DuBose started the car and put his right hand back on the wheel getting ready to take off, which is when and why Tensing dove in to stop him. Dubose hit the gas right after Tensing dove in.
It wasn't in motion when he fired the shot.
False, both the magnitude and timing of the fall after the shot require that the car already be accelerating at about .3 gs for about a second, putting it at about 7mph and 10 feet from where it started. In addition, there is the leftward motion of the car that was pushing Tensing backwards.
It WAS in motion immediately AFTER the shot
The car was in motion after the shot only because it was already in motion prior to the shot.
(you can actually hear the engine rev up in the audio)
The car accelerates rapidly after the shot and Tensing falls over, rolls, gets back to his feet.
False, you can hear no such thing. Any increase in seeming loudness of the engine would be expected by change in position of the mic when DuBose fell to the ground along side the car where the engine and exhaust sound would be greater. Also, the car is going faster, because that is what constant rate of acceleration means. It means increasing ground speed. A constant .3 g rate of acceleration means 0 to 7 mph after the first second when the shot was fired, 7 to 14 mph during the second after, and then 35 mph by 5 seconds and 56 mph by 8 seconds. A 2000 Honda Civic that is floored will be at 60 MPH at 8 seconds, and only 8 MPH after 1 second.
IOW, Dubose hit the gas very hard after Tensing jumped in, resulting in .3 g of force and 7 mph after the first second, which is when Tensing shot then fell, and the car continued at about the same acceleration which means ever increasing speed until it hit that object.
Your blinding ideology is getting an assist from your ignorance of basic physics.
Displacement of about 14 feet, let's call it a generous 16 for the sake of argument. He wasn't being dragged for that long, maybe a quarter a second. But covering 14 feet in one half to one quarter of a second means the car would have an average speed in that period of about 20 mph.
No, it would be closer to 27 feet in less than half a second, which would require that the car was going 35mph by the end of the first second., meaning more than 60 mph in less than 2 seconds, which is 50% faster than the fastest cars commercial cars available. Sorry, but a car like his only accelerated at about 0-60 in 7 seconds, which would mean it could only travel about 5 feet in the first half second, which in not even close to your absurd under estimate of 16 feet. Keep in mind that your underestimate of 20 mph average speed in the first half second of travel, includes the speed of 0 mph at the start of that half second. For the average speed in that half second to be 20 mph, the speed at the half second mark would have to be close to 40 mph, requiring that he was driving a record breaking rocket car.
Which seems to me consistent with the car suddenly having its accelerator driven to the floor by the dead man's foot.
First, it isn't consistent with anything that is remotely possible with current auto technology, but also how does a dead man drive a gas pedal to the floor? He did not fall foward onto the pedal, and the mere weight of a dead foot (whose heel is already on the floorboard as when people drive) would barely get the car moving. Also, when Tensing was falling out, Dubose was still knocked back and to his left by the force of the bullet, which would move his momentum away from the pedal and not onto it. Any pressure on the pedal had to have been applied prior to him being shot.
Which is what we see in the video and what we hear in the audio: Tensing yells stop, followed by a tussle, followed by a gunshot, followed by the sound of the engine revving and Tensing falling over and rolling backwards.
Nope. What we see and hear is Dubose start the car, then the cops yells stop and reaches in while Dubose puts his hand back on the wheel to steer as it moves. We see a tussel as the cop pulls his gun and points it, at which point we see a direct camera shot through the drivers seat showing that is now parallel with the bushes on the other side of the road from where the altercation began. That means about 10 feet down the road prior to the shot. Then we see the shot and the cop falls backward and to the ground almost immediately, winding up 27 feet down the road, which is impossible if the car did not move prior to the shot.
Your alternate explanation is that Tensing ran alongside the car for two seconds while he was wrestling for control of the car. The struggle itself lasts about two seconds; if that motion alone accounts for Tensing's new position, then the car was moving at an average speed of about 5 mph, which is basically a brisk walking speed. But then that doesn't account for the car's burst of acceleration or Tensing falling backwards, which means it would have to have been moving slower than that, far less than 3mph.
My explanation (the only one consistent with the facts and the laws of physics and realities of car technology) is that Dubose stepped on the gas right after Tensing jumped in, putting .3 gs of force on Tensing. Being positions sideways the forward and to the left motion of the car forced Tensing to shuffle madly to the left and backward at a rate of 7mph just to keep his feet under him, making it extremely difficult to get out and free from the car without serious risk of injury or falling under the tires. Pankicked by that he fired right before he fell (as nearly all people would if trying to shuffle sideways and back at that rate of acceleration. This is required to account for him being even 15 let alone the more likely 25 feet down the road only 2-3 seconds after diving into the car. Continuing at about the same rate of acceleration, the cars ground speed sped up each second until it hit the object down the road.
Which means there are three possibilities:
1) The car was stationary when Tensing shot Dubose and the burst of acceleration knocked him on his ass (he hits the ground so hard that for a second the bodycam is pointed at his face).
That is not a possibility. It is made 100% impossible by the laws of physics, as I explained above. There is no possible way the car would gain the speed needed in that timeframe to pull Tensing more than a couple feet down the road, let alone 16, alone the actual 25 or so that he was pulled. Also, the still frame right before the shot shows a straight on shot through the drivers cabin out the passenger window and of the bushes on the SUV side of the sidestreet. That shot in impossible from where the car was prior to moving, and could only be taken if the car was about 10 feet forward from where it started.
2) The car was crawling at a fast walking pace and Tensing was leaning in, following along when he shot Dubose and the burst of acceleration caused him to fall over.
3) The car was crawling at a snail's pace and Tensing was leaning in, following along when he shot Dubose and the burst of acceleration startled him into loosing his balance.
Both 2 and 3 use "crawling" concepts rooted in your ignorance of physics and acceleration, as I already explained. The car had to be going at near full acceleration (again that is not max ground speed) for a full second to put Tensing that far down the road (even by your absurd 15 foot estimate). 7 mph after 1 second is as fast as most sedans can accelerate from a full stop. Also, you ignore that he is not "running" in any traditional sense, but rather shuffling his feet sideways and backwards just to keep them under him, which most people could not sustain at 7 mph. He fell because the constant acceleration applied prior to the shot meant an every increasing ground speed that exceeded what any human could keep up with.
But that, again, is a danger of his own making, a result of his choice to end Dubose's life rather than allow him to resist.
Dubose was not merely resisting arrest, he was a DUI suspect and thus a lethal threat to all others on or near the road. After Dubose showed clear intent to flee and put others in danger, Tensing dove in to stop him, at which point Dubose made the choice to hit the accelerator, which he definitely did a full second prior to being shot, and thereby put Tensing's life in danger. Tensing tried to maintain his balance for a second, then pulled the trigger and fell.
That is the rational, science-based analysis of the facts. They still leave room for recklessness and wrongdoing by Tensing, possibly even involuntary manslaughter, but not for murder. They don't leave much room for sympathy for DuBose, however, whose efforts to flee in a manner that people others at risk where a key necessary factor in the cause of his death.
Not to mention he was also now on the other side of the road from the car because the moving criminals car not only pulled him forward but pushed him backward due to the driver steering to his left to try and get around that white car as he tried to flee, all of which he did before being shot in the head.
We actually
see Dubose's steering wheel immediately before the shooting; it's
already turned slightly to the left, and Dubose never has a chance to touch it before he is shot in the head.
Dubose right hand is on the steering wheel during and prior to being shot. It has it there prior to Tensing trying to open the door, removes only for a second to turn the ignition on, then puts it right back and it stays there throughout the struggle and up to and during the shooting. Whether turned the wheel out prior to or after starting the car isn't very relevant. The fact is that the car was both going foward and to the left when the shot was fired, meaning Tensing was having to shuffle sideways and back at 7mph to maintain his balance and keep from having his feet fall out from under him and possible slide under the car.
And it bears repeating: Tensing PULLED FORWARD on Dubose's seatbelt, from a position slightly in front of him, close to the rearview mirror, immediately before he fired the shot. Whatever speed the car was moving at that point (anywhere between 0 and 5mph, we've determined) Tensing was moving faster.
More gross ignorance of basic physics. If you pull your seat back forward on an airplane, are you going faster than the plane? If you do it a bunch of times will you get to your destination before the plane does ? The fact that he can move part of his body forward relative to his center of gravity doesn't affect how fast he is going. Also, the fact that he could barely keep his feet under him for a second doesn't mean that he wasn't in serious danger.
