Price Waterhouse analyst murdered in his home by police

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Being tired is an explanation of how she could have overlooked being on the wrong floor, it shouldn't get her off. It might be a reason to change police policies, though, and thus certainly should be looked at. We've recognized that truckers driving too long is a safety hazard, it's about time we recognize that other professions where people are making life and death decisions should limit work hours.

And there's a reason for take-home cars and uniforms:

1) There's a public safety benefit. The presence of a cop is a crime deterrent, the bad guy doesn't know if they're on duty or not. (My wife once worked at a place that explicitly stated on the menu that cops in uniform got free drinks. (They didn't serve alcohol, that wasn't an issue.) They decided getting cops to stop in for a drink was worth giving them away.)

2) By having them take home it makes it easier when the shit hits the fan and you need everyone on duty.

Yeah, I worked in a place where cops got free cans of coffee to take to the station house to make coffee. And also were always present in the parking lot when I closed the place up at night. I wasn't ungrateful by any means.


I understand that shit hits the fan but I don't understand cops carrying loaded service firearms to and from their residence to work. It isn't safe. Period.

Do I know it happens? Yes. Do I know of cases in my own town where someone died because of this? Yes, I do. It's dangerous.

Some cops have to file a report anytime they even unsnap the retainer on their holster, let alone draw their gun.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

A good guy with a gun is a threat to no one except bad people... except if that good person is an idiot... then you could be fucked.

Yes, well Dana Loesch says it would have been better if Botham Shem Jean had been armed and killed the police officer.

OMFG! Imagine the LP hypotheticals as to why the black tenant shot her because he was hiding something.

 

[ruby sparks]

Interesting article (albeit it from 2016) on the general issue:

Police Kill Too Many People—White and Black
http://time.com/4404987/police-violence/

"This list of whites dying at the hands of cops must inform how we go forward in grappling with the issues. Hillary Clinton and President Obama have suggested that the time has come to revive a national conversation on race. Many might reasonably assume that on the topic of the police, the purpose of this conversation will be to inform white America of the role that racist bias plays in these lethal encounters. However, might we open up to the possibility that the conversation will also include black people learning that racist bias may play much less of a role in these cases than one might think?"

 

[ruby sparks]

One thing that disturbs me about the OP case is that the officer's account of events has changed, perhaps more than once. I read that she initially said that she struggled to open the locked door with keys, later that she said the door was closed but not locked (apparently not possible with the type of locks used here) and later again that the door was ajar.

Also, the courtesy extended to her of being allowed to go home and not be charged for 3 days seems......dubious.

My guess is that the facts are too clear here and that she will, after all the speculation and preliminaries are over, be found guilty of manslaughter. Some experts are apparently calling for murder, but unless something more turns up about premeditation or something new and relevant of that ilk, then it seems manslaughter would be appropriate. Negligence may also enter into it although there is then the issue of whether being on or off duty makes a difference to that, legally. In everyday, non-technically legal terms, I'd be of the view that she was negligent.

But in the meantime, the Police Department do at least appear to be 'protecting' (or giving special allowances to) 'one of their own'.


I might add that the door being ajar while the occupant is in seems somewhat unusual. Let's perhaps say low probability. So what are the odds that a door was left ajar in this case just when someone happens to be mistaken about that particular apartment. Normally, all things being equal, we would multiply the probability of each and get a much smaller probability of both happening at the same time.

At this point, her struggling with the keys seems more plausible. I'm assuming there's no hidden story here about her knowing the guy well enough to have had a set of keys, etc.

I'm not even sure why the door being ajar would make a whole lot of difference.

One wonders if 'he advanced towards me in a way that made me feel my life was under threat' will emerge. I also read of reports which say she issued instructions, and other reports which do not say this (and imply that she shot quickly and instinctively).

Hopefully it will all come out in the wash. Or enough will.

 

[blastula]

Does she live with someone in her apartment? Why would she be saying, "let me in?"

 

[Loren Pechtel]

To be fair, Loren is describing what was going through the cop's mind.

Which is how a self defense case must be evaluated. Nothing not known to the shooter at the time matters. The standard is whether a reasonable person facing the same situation would consider it a threat to their life or of serious bodily harm.

That's not the standard, Loren. This was an off duty police officer who was trained and sworn to serve and protect, not act as some vigilante. And FFS, he OPENED THE DOOR TO HIS OWN APARTMENT!!!!! It would have been negligence if she had been shooting at someone else and hit him by mistake. She was ENTIRELY in the wrong from start to finish!

We expect people who drink or take drugs or medications that might compromise their ability to reasonably operate machinery and automobiles to refrain from doing that in the name of public safety.

Why can we not also expect that TRAINED POLICE OFFICERS who might be over-tired or stressed after a long shift also refrain from using their firearms?

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2725895
(I'm just referring to the linked abstract, I don't think there is even a paper behind it)
(Yes, this isn't the USA but it works the same)

For the force to be justified, the 2011 Act requires that it be “only such as is reasonable in the circumstances as [the person using force] believes them to be”.

Key point: As the person using the force believes the circumstances to be.

The big picture matters for civil matters but the criminal side is judged on what they actually knew.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Police seem to be considering her account as fact as opposed to just claims. For example, her whole claim that he moved toward her seems contrived.

Actually, it makes sense--he didn't realize what the situation was.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Police seem to be considering her account as fact as opposed to just claims. For example, her whole claim that he moved toward her seems contrived.

Actually, it makes sense--he didn't realize what the situation was.

So if you were black, you would move toward a cop with a gun pointed at your chest telling you to freeze??

 

[RavenSky]

And the character assassination begins?

One article says:

The list includes fired cartridge casings, a laptop, a black backpack with police equipment and paperwork, a little more than ten grams of marijuana, a metal marijuana grinder, two radio frequency ID keys and two used packages of medical aid.

and

The warrant does not indicate who owned which items.

https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2018/09/13/search-warrant-botham-jean-apartment/

But the FauxNews headline says: "Search warrant: Marijuana found in Botham Jean's apartment..."

 

[RavenSky]

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/cri...uygers-account-shot-across-room-officials-say

This really doesn't make sense

Crime-scene evidence from Botham Jean’s apartment supports Dallas police Officer Amber Guyger’s account that she shot Jean from across the room as she stood inside his apartment door,

So he didn't answer the door? How did she get in?

The two shell casings were found just inside the door, indicating that's where Guyger stood when she fired her gun, one official said.

That official said there was no blood by the door to indicate that's where Jean was shot...

The same official said Jean was 12 to 15 feet away from the door when first responders arrived.

“That is where he stood when he was shot and where he fell,” that law enforcement official said...

The apartment was dark and when she saw "a large silhouette," Guyger thought she was being burglarized, the arrest warrant affidavit says. She drew her gun, "gave verbal commands that were ignored" by the man Guyger believed to be a burglar and fired twice, investigators wrote.

So we are supposed to believe that he was standing in his kitchen rolling a joint in total darkness? Really?

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Why is the prosecution doing the defense's job, I mean other than that she's a cop?

 

[Toni]

One thing that disturbs me about the OP case is that the officer's account of events has changed, perhaps more than once. I read that she initially said that she struggled to open the locked door with keys, later that she said the door was closed but not locked (apparently not possible with the type of locks used here) and later again that the door was ajar.

Also, the courtesy extended to her of being allowed to go home and not be charged for 3 days seems......dubious.

My guess is that the facts are too clear here and that she will, after all the speculation and preliminaries are over, be found guilty of manslaughter. Some experts are apparently calling for murder, but unless something more turns up about premeditation or something new and relevant of that ilk, then it seems manslaughter would be appropriate. Negligence may also enter into it although there is then the issue of whether being on or off duty makes a difference to that, legally. In everyday, non-technically legal terms, I'd be of the view that she was negligent.

But in the meantime, the Police Department do at least appear to be 'protecting' (or giving special allowances to) 'one of their own'.


I might add that the door being ajar while the occupant is in seems somewhat unusual. Let's perhaps say low probability. So what are the odds that a door was left ajar in this case just when someone happens to be mistaken about that particular apartment. Normally, all things being equal, we would multiply the probability of each and get a much smaller probability of both happening at the same time.

At this point, her struggling with the keys seems more plausible. I'm assuming there's no hidden story here about her knowing the guy well enough to have had a set of keys, etc.

I'm not even sure why the door being ajar would make a whole lot of difference.

One wonders if 'he advanced towards me in a way that made me feel my life was under threat' will emerge. I also read of reports which say she issued instructions, and other reports which do not say this (and imply that she shot quickly and instinctively).

Hopefully it will all come out in the wash. Or enough will.

It’s not surprising that her story has changed. Certainly this was traumatic for her—pales in comparison to it being fatal for him. I doubt that she started off looking to kill anyone. It is not surprising if her memory fills in details, forgets other details. Happens to all of us, although rarely in such tragic and traumatic circumstances. At the very least, events must have been very disorienting after she fired her weapon. Memory gaps would be expected as would her mind trying to make sense if this senseless terrible shooting. Her brain knows she would never shoot someone without just cause—so it ‘remembers’ details that might make the shooting seem somehow justifiable. But it’s not justifiable. It’s tragic, senseless, almost certainly accidental in some respects. Certainly she did not mean to kill a man minding his own business in his ow home. But that’s what she did. And that is a crime.

It is totally believable that she was over tired and made a mistake about being at the wrong department. That does not change the fact that she killed a man in his own apartment— for doing absolutely nothing wrong. It doesn’t matter how tired she was or that she was mistaken about the apartment. If she was more apprehensive because she saw a black man—then shame on her, shame on her police department training, shame on society for treating persons of color as being more dangerous. He did nothing wrong. Nothing. A white woman wasafraid and killed a black man. That’s not just a senseless tragedy— that’s a crime.

 

[Derec]

And the character assassination begins?

It lists what they found. Not more, not less.

The list includes fired cartridge casings, a laptop, a black backpack with police equipment and paperwork, a little more than ten grams of marijuana, a metal marijuana grinder, two radio frequency ID keys and two used packages of medical aid.

What's "medical aid"?

The warrant does not indicate who owned which items.

But the article does say the items were found in his apartment. Unlikely she would be carrying 10g of marijuana and a grinder home from work.

But the FauxNews headline says: "Search warrant: Marijuana found in Botham Jean's apartment..."

Well, it was.
From your other link you posted:

Court records obtained Thursday show Dallas police also found, among other things, two spent cartridge casings and 10.4 grams of marijuana in the apartment. The law enforcement officials said the marijuana was on the kitchen counter.

The weed was his, fwiw.

 

[Derec]

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/cri...uygers-account-shot-across-room-officials-say
This really doesn't make sense

It is getting curiouser and curiouser, I agree.

So he didn't answer the door? How did she get in?

Maybe the door was indeed ajar or at least unlocked.

So we are supposed to believe that he was standing in his kitchen rolling a joint in total darkness? Really?

Maybe it's like this, only for stoners?

That said, I don't think his weed habit had anything to do with the shooting one way or another.
But don't large companies like Waterhouse drug test?

 

[J842P]

It is getting curiouser and curiouser, I agree.


Maybe the door was indeed ajar or at least unlocked.

So we are supposed to believe that he was standing in his kitchen rolling a joint in total darkness? Really?

Maybe it's like this, only for stoners?

That said, I don't think his weed habit had anything to do with the shooting one way or another.
But don't large companies like Waterhouse drug test?

A large accounting firm probably drug tests on hiring.


But of course Fox News is using it as a smear. Please don't pretend it is merely "reporting facts" when this totally irrelevant detail is included in the headline.

 

[Derec]

Accepting such things as true, which I don't necessarily, an alternative narrative to Guyger's is that she was a feuding neighbor with him over noise. That she just got back from a long shift, tried to sleep, but was all anxious from her tough job. The little noises made her extra irritable. So she decided to go upstairs to intimidate the allegedly noisy neighbor into shutting up. He let her in which I think the original police report said, too. [Texas Ranger affidavit is different than story she said initially]. She then escalated a situation where she mistook his movements for an attack...following her saying "why did you have to do that." Maybe???

You should not. The source for the claim is by Lee Merritt, citing anonymous witnesses. Merritt is a known blatant liar. For example, in the case of Darius Smith from last year.

"Darius Smith was executed,” Merritt said in an interview with ABC 7 News. “He was not in the midst of a robbery. He was shot twice in the legs first. [He fell] and his shooter got over him and shot him three times in the chest. That's murder. That's not subduing the robbery.”

That's the claim.

But based on witnesses accounts and video from surveillance cameras at the train station and nearby businesses and homes, Corina said, Merritt’s version of the incident “is totally fake.”

The patchwork of videos, which haven’t been made public, showed the boys and officer on the train, then the boys following the officer out of the station and north on 1st Avenue, Corina said. The officer was listening to music through ear buds and told investigators he was unaware there were people behind him, Corina said.
About half a block south of Colorado Boulevard, in a dark residential area, the video “shows the subjects running up on the victim where the robbery and shooting occurred,” Corina said. It also showed Smith and the other 15-year-old running away and the officer staying at the scene with his gun on the 14-year-old boy, who was lying in the street with gunshot wounds.

The homicide report: Darius Smith, 15
Literally nothing Merritt said was true.
And just like in this case, he refers to nameless, faceless alleged witnesses only he knows about.

Lee Merritt, attorney for Darius’ family, says that after reviewing the case and speaking with the boys who survived the shooting, the victims’ families and an eyewitness who has not come forward publicly, he is sure that Darius was executed.

“Despite multiple shots from the killer, not one shot was fired from the gun allegedly carried by these boys (the reports are a toy gun was found near the scene),” Merritt wrote in a Facebook post. “While he was emptying his clip they appeared to be running for their lives.”

#DariusSmith: 15-Year-Old Boy Fatally Shot by Customs Agent; Family Demands Answers

So yeah, I would take whatever Merritt says with one of these.

He is worse even than Crump.

And speaking of shysters, why are Crump and Merritt hearse chasing across state lines? Are they members of all 50 bars? 51 if we include American Samoa?

 

[Derec]

A large accounting firm probably drug tests on hiring.

Maybe.

But of course Fox News is using it as a smear.

Ravensky posted a story mentioning the weed from CBS News and Dallas Morning News. Where did Fox News come into the discussion? It's like an obsession with you people!

Please don't pretend it is merely "reporting facts" when this totally irrelevant detail is included in the headline.

It's part of what was found in the apartment.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

You should not. The source for the claim is by Lee Merritt, citing anonymous witnesses. Merritt is a known blatant liar. For example, in the case of Darius Smith from last year.

That's the claim.

But based on witnesses accounts and video from surveillance cameras at the train station and nearby businesses and homes, Corina said, Merritt’s version of the incident “is totally fake.”

The patchwork of videos, which haven’t been made public, showed the boys and officer on the train, then the boys following the officer out of the station and north on 1st Avenue, Corina said. The officer was listening to music through ear buds and told investigators he was unaware there were people behind him, Corina said.
About half a block south of Colorado Boulevard, in a dark residential area, the video “shows the subjects running up on the victim where the robbery and shooting occurred,” Corina said. It also showed Smith and the other 15-year-old running away and the officer staying at the scene with his gun on the 14-year-old boy, who was lying in the street with gunshot wounds.

The homicide report: Darius Smith, 15
Literally nothing Merritt said was true.
And just like in this case, he refers to nameless, faceless alleged witnesses only he knows about.

Lee Merritt, attorney for Darius’ family, says that after reviewing the case and speaking with the boys who survived the shooting, the victims’ families and an eyewitness who has not come forward publicly, he is sure that Darius was executed.

“Despite multiple shots from the killer, not one shot was fired from the gun allegedly carried by these boys (the reports are a toy gun was found near the scene),” Merritt wrote in a Facebook post. “While he was emptying his clip they appeared to be running for their lives.”

#DariusSmith: 15-Year-Old Boy Fatally Shot by Customs Agent; Family Demands Answers

So yeah, I would take whatever Merritt says with one of these.

He is worse even than Crump.

And speaking of shysters, why are Crump and Merritt hearse chasing across state lines? Are they members of all 50 bars? 51 if we include American Samoa?

Even if I accepted that this guy lied before, which I don't without doing a ton of information gathering independently myself, it doesn't mean he's lying now. What it comes down to is that most of the narrative is convenient with the crux of things centered around her unnecessarily killing him. In the latest narrative her side is pushing, Both was 15 feet from her when she killed him. 15 feet. It is not necessary to kill a burglar 15 feet away, let alone an innocent person.

 

[jladam]

It lists what they found. Not more, not less.

Do you know what's missing from the list? What they found in Guyger's apartment. Or even if they bothered to search it. After all, she's the perp here. not him.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

And the character assassination begins?

One article says:

The list includes fired cartridge casings, a laptop, a black backpack with police equipment and paperwork, a little more than ten grams of marijuana, a metal marijuana grinder, two radio frequency ID keys and two used packages of medical aid.

and

The warrant does not indicate who owned which items.

https://dfw.cbslocal.com/2018/09/13/search-warrant-botham-jean-apartment/

But the FauxNews headline says: "Search warrant: Marijuana found in Botham Jean's apartment..."

Why doesn't this include what was in his fridge. Any sex toys in his bedroom?