.
.
.
1
Well, it took burning down one police station in Minneapolis (the 3rd precinct), but they’ve finally charged Officer Derek Chauvin for 3rd-degree murder and manslaughter. There were three other cops who helped Chauvin murder Floyd. How many Minneapolis police stations are left?
Right now Minnesota Prosecutor Mike Freeman is speaking defensively about how QUICKLY (4 days) this cop was charged and arrested. The Mayor’s been saying for a couple of days that if you or I, or he, had murdered someone on public video the way Chauvin did, we would have been arrested immediately. But Minnesota prosecutors say they had to look at a LOT of evidence before acting.
It woulda been nice if George Floyd had a fraction of that amount of time to determine whether he should have been arrested and killed for trying to pass a counterfeit $20. I did the same thing once years ago, by accident. The bank had given me a counterfeit, the store wouldn’t take it, I went back to the bank and complained, they apologized and gave me a new, good bill. Nobody called the police on me, and I’m still alive. But then I don’t look like George Floyd.
2
Guess what our OC Sheriff Department decided was a good idea yesterday? Right in the middle of the worldwide outrage over the Floyd murder and so many others? They raised up one of those “thin blue line” flags, right underneath Old Glory, on the same rope even.
This flag, which symbolizes supporting our police officers NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO, is already, I’ve always thought, a gross disfigurement of the US flag, obscuring it with an actually-kinda-fat “thin blue line” that celebrates the mutually protective bond of secrecy between cops.
To raise it NOW is obviously a statement of our Sheriff’s solidarity with Floyd’s murderers.
One OCSD defender responded no, this has nothing to do with George Floyd, it’s part of an annual “Peace Officers’ Memorial and Candlelight Vigil” planned for May 28.
NICE TRY. The annual Peace Officers’ Memorial Day was already on MAY 15. They did this on purpose.
[Hat-tip Benjamin Vasquez.]
Oh, and never forget to thank Lou Correa and Tom Daly for giving us Sheriff Don Barnes.
.
Update Friday night –
they postponed the “vigil” and took down the flag.
(See Francesca comment below.) Good.
But as far as we can tell they didn’t have this “vigil” planned or announced till Wednesday, the 27th,
so it’s hard to imagine an innocent intention.
3
A good friend texted me last night: “You know all this George Floyd stuff kind of pisses me off. I remember you and a bunch of advocates raising hell about Vincent Valenzuela and nobody gave a shit. And the Valenzuela video is just as bad as the Floyd video, the news media and everyone else did not give a shit.”
Well, it’s true that there have been thousands of police killings here and everywhere that more people should have “given a shit” about. But the first obvious difference is that we saw the Floyd killing right away, because people were thankfully FILMING THE POLICE; while it took two years for us to be allowed to see the police video of the Valenzuela killing… and one thing that happens from the delay, by design, is that people say, “Oh how horrible, that happened two years ago, thank God that doesn’t happen any more.”
But hey – maybe spring 2020 is also different from other times because of the virus, maybe right now with “all of us in the same storm,” Americans are starting to see folks of other colors as not so different from them after all? I’m probably wrong…
That reminds me, even HERE at the OJ Blog, we have been hearing about Anaheim police killings years after they happen, and we just this week learned about another apparently unjustifiable one in 2018, making SWAT Team Officer Nick “Buckshot” Bennalack’s FOURTH fatal shooting (three of them questionable or worse.) Now we have to update our list AGAIN:
APD Fatalities in the 2010’s.

4-time killer APD SWAT team Officer Nick Bennalack. Calls himself “Buckshot,” we call him “Backshot.”
- Marcel Cejas, 2011.
- David Raya, 2011.
- Roscoe Cambridge, 2012.
- Bernie Villegas, killed by Bennalack, 2012.
- Martin Hernandez, 2012.
- Manuel Diaz, killed by Bennalack, 2012.
- Joel Acevedo, 2012.
- Robert Moreno, 2014.
- Steen Thomas Parker, killed by Bennalack, 2014.
- Paul Anthony Anderson, 2015.
- Rene Garcia, 2015.
- Monique Deckard, 2015.
- Gustavo Najera, 2016.
- Danny Rendon, 2016.
- Jennifer Anne Aiello, 2016(arrested by APD for shopping cart warrant, died in jail)
- Vincent Valenzuela, 2016.
- Tiffini Tobe, 2016.
- Adalid Flores, 2016.
- Chris Eisinger, 2018.
- Peter Muntean, 2018.
- Ian Tompko, 2018.
- [Kenneth Yamashita – not killed but paralyzed, 2018 – article coming]
- Eliud Penaloza Nava, 2018.
- Lisa Olivares Martinez, 2018 (arrested by APD for shopping cart warrant, died in jail)
- Daniel Ramirez, 2019 – 4th Bennalack killing.
- Justin Perkins, 2018.
- Taveonte Art “Johnny” Emmanuel, 2019.
Apologies to the friends and families of those killed by the APD in the decade BEFORE 2010 – Caesar Cruz, Julian Alexander, Joe Whitehouse, Adolfo Sanchez, Barry King, Justin Hertl, Brian Drummond and so many more – we had to draw the line somewhere.
4
Yesterday my wife Donna Acevedo-Nelson wrote:
“Listening to the statement from the Minneapolis Chief of Police made my innards feel knotted. He talked about trauma and needing to heal in the community. He said people will be out helping with that.
“It made me think about when my own son, Joey Acevedo, was executed while handcuffed by an Anaheim police officer. That was the day after another young man, Manuel Diaz, was executed by another Anaheim killer cop. Within days there was an outpouring of “trauma healers.” From Rusty Kennedy & the Human Relations to other non profits. From the politicians and their photo-op peace vigils. The “TONE SETTERS.”
“How can anyone expect peace when no one is ever held accountable for these murders? And the cops keep on killing. I am angry. I have nothing against love and peace and kindness. But that shit doesnt stop the murders. There was a time when I had conflicting feelings about riots. Not anymore. It seems like the only time Anaheim officials were afraid of the people is when we had protests here that got too close to the moneymaking Disneyland.
“The only peace that ever happens is when we stop making noise. Kind of like when George Floyd took his last breath. The cop that killed him looked at peace.”
5 Update Sat. morning
You ever have this frustration like I have, when you can tell you’re the only person who correctly heard the guy on TV, and the host and other guests didn’t? NAACP’s Ben Jealous was talking about the problem of provocateurs (some of them cops, some of them anarchists) and said that when protesters see someone starting fires, breaking things, trying to hurt people, they should take their protest elsewhere so order can be restored. Then he had to get off to do something else. Alex Witt apparently thought he said the POLICE should leave, and politely disagreed; and the other guests went along with her mishearing. But Ben’s advice was good. Although I’d like to get some of these provocateurs on video, and maybe even overpower them if possible. Again some are cops being paid to do this, and some are “anarchists” who just love chaos.
ANYWAY there are at least three other protests planned in Orange County this weekend, besides the one we’re going to at Kelly’s Corner at 4. First, in Orange at 1pm. I wish they’d have named some of our local victims instead of the ones famous from recent TV… but there wouldn’t have been enough room. Oh yeah, “Orange Plaza Square Park” is the official name for what everybody else calls the ORANGE CIRCLE. That’s kinda lame, calling a circle a square.
Next, in Santa Ana, at 4pm (we’ll be at Kelly’s Corner.) Nothing scary here except the word “Revolution” which sounds like Bernie Sanders now. Don’t forget your hand-held snacks!
Now THIS one looks like trouble, and many of us think it’s organized by police to trap “troublemakers.” Really, “bring homies?” “HEY! YOU TWO aren’t supposed to be together. Get over here!” Skip this one:
And tomorrow in Huntington Beach at noon. Well, that should be interesting – especially with that name, “Black Lives Matter.” My old home town is full of obnoxious morons who purposely refuse to understand the meaning of that sentence, “Black lives matter.” All they can come back with is, “What? Does that mean WHITE LIVES DON’T MATTER??? Racists! And what about Yellow and Red Lives? And especially BLUE LIVES!!! Don’t Police MATTER any more????”
Remember last time people tried to have a protest in honor of police victims in HB? Chris Epting and his son showed up. Oh well, he seems to be keeping a lower profile lately, maybe it’ll be okay…
I think we need a federal police registry, we need a review of police tactics, we need collective punishment of police agencies where all the officers have to get pay cuts if a settlement is payed out. If they lose 2-4% of their wages because of having to reimburse their agency because a police officer co-worker did some brutality there would be accountability.
Newly discovered – Floyd tries to talk black youth away from gun violence.
Hm… I guess if you want to see this New York Post video you have to refresh, because it continuously runs other goofy videos.
Thank you very much Vern another great article. In Minneapolis the protesters burnt a police station and looted stores to the point the National Guard is being called in. However the police officer who on the Video killed George Floyd is under arrest. The question is how do we get Justice short of burning Anaheim down. We have some work to do.
Hi, Vern,
Thanks for the super-informative article. Regarding the OC Peace Officers’ Memorial Ceremony, there are a few dates now: May 15 is Peace Officers Memorial Day, an annual national observance; May 28 was the date set for the OC Sheriff’s Dept to recognize that day – an event of some kind, apparently. That event was postponed.
What timing that I came across your article after reading about the Sheriff’s memorial ceremony!
Here’s where I found the info:
OC Sheriff: https://www.facebook.com/pg/OCSheriff/posts/
Peace Officers Memorial Day: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_Officers_Memorial_Day
Thanks for the info. So… they don’t say why they postponed it from last night, but that’s a good call… I assume they took down that flag for a while?
You can see how it looked to those of us who think about these things.
They did take down the flag (and hopefully the other one we know about on the Eckhoff Street Sheriff Substation in Orange, and whatever ones we don’t know about.)
But we can find no evidence that this “Peace Officers Vigil” justifying the flag was planned or announced anytime before Wednesday the 27th. So it’s hard not to believe the original intention was to show solidarity with George Floyd’s killers, and that later Barnes realized he’d gone too far.
So there’s a protest at 4pm at the Fullerton Transit Center (for those who aren’t familiar with the term “Kelly’s Corner.” Where else? Is there one in Santa Ana? Where/when?
Just added in four others. Of various repute.
While I cannot join you, health concerns, I support you. I’ll send you a picture of me to hold up….I do think that there is an added federal charge that should be added…there is something personal in this murder as the off duty work connection has been exposed. This smells of intent, an element that I don’t believe is a part of 3rd degree murder and manslaughter…What about “under cover of authority”?
I changed my title to George “Last Straw” Floyd. There have been SO many others just as bad.
*Now you see…you can only hold the top on the pressure cooker closed
just so long. The endless nonsense and ridiculous killings going on around this country cannot continue. It all started with Travon Martin,Then Ferguson, Missouri and of course Fullerton, California…….white, black, grey, brown, yellow or pink albinos….who really cares? The Floyd deal is really dirty……this is called a Dirty Cop Hit…..Derek and George worked together at some club and suddenly he gets busted for trying to pass a bogus $20 dollar bill? Yeah, and the deal with the guy selling cigarettes….that too was unacceptable…. “Trouble Makers”? “Guys that couldn’t be caught legally?” “Choir boys”? “Serpico”? All we need is to just call in the FBI and put the Department under a “Consent Decree” for five years…….and dump the Chief….. We need to send a message at least every now and then. Even,The Brick Bellied Sheriffs in the South can only serve one four year term. The greed and dirt has to be washed off, from time to time. We cannot solve all of them and probably it wouldn’t be a good idea to do so……but when stupidity raises its ugly head….or by chance illegal conduct is noted …..publicly….as in the case of George Floyd…well…..”caught with your pants down law applies without discrimination”! But then, the same for the Military, Government Agencies and all Local Governments. Otherwise, we are facing the 1960’s all over again.
Great – until it’s not.
What’s third degree murder?…and police brutality.
I received this communication from my congress representative:
” Moving Forward, Together.
Friends,
As I have watched these past few days unfold, I have been overwhelmed by sadness. George Floyd was murdered. That is unforgivable. For many people of color, enough is enough.
We have worked for decades to build trust among law enforcement agencies, and minority and immigrant communities. People should not fear the men and women sworn to protect them.
As we begin charting our path forward, we must acknowledge that our officers and our elected leaders must do better. Sadly, this not a new problem. It is up to all of us to demand action and make change.
Over the coming weeks, I will be working with my colleagues on the House Judiciary Committee to find real solutions that our nation can rally behind. Only together can we move past this point in our history and come together as one community.
Let’s get busy.
Lou Correa
Member of Congress”
I am sending him this article, written according to the magazine below, by a civil rights lawyer and fiscal policy researcher currently in residence at Yale Law School:
https://prospect.org/justice/defund-our-punishment-bureaucracy/
Lou was never good on this before.
But deviancy gets defined downwards.
I know. He wants to find real solutions now. Probably the alternative to defund the current police apparatus is not going to be a ” solution that our nation can rally behind” for him.
Almost like he’s afraid of a police union taking political action against him.
Gee. I wonder why.
Get over with your negative obsession with the unions. Your Koch vision of society has created the monsters we are facing, including corrupt union leaders.
POLICE UNIONS. Not just your everyday union, they exist to protect and reward thugs.
Ricardo,
None of that makes any sense and certainly doesn’t apply to me.
You have a bias problem. Might want to check it.
Rick, please identify one police union that hasn’t made it their duty to feather their member’s nests while simultaneously dodging responsibility for their behavior. Then tell us if you really think this is a union-based issue or not.
It is.
David,
My point is that the Police has been given immunity that allows them to exercise a kind of disgusting behaviour. Their Union responds as an institution based on the powers granted to them. To solely focus on their union as the main reason not to pursue alternatives,it is giving politicians like Lou Correa another way out.
The question is how to substantially reform the police. The Conan interview between 10:08 and 11:12 has a good exposition of one of the areas to be reformed, the immunity aspect.
Defunding or reducing the budget for police is being raised in Santa Ana and LA.
Many proposals are being presented, some of them by former presidential candidates like Julian Castro :
-Passing a federal ban on chokeholds by police
-Stopping the transfer of military gear to local police
-Setting up national use-of-force best practices
-Holding officers accountable for misconduct
I have not heard back from Lou Correa’s office. They must be very busy handling all the suggestions they may be receiving. I am going to contact the entire county’s congresssional team . Wish me good luck.
(Ricardo asked me to move this comment so that it’s in response to David. I wouldn’t bother mentioning this except for the telltale AVATARS – VN)
Ryan,
My apologies for using such a broad brush in my response to your comment. I think we all have biases and the challenge is to recognize them and be reasonable. I consider myself a pragmatic guy (not in the sense of Greg’s “pragmatism” regarding homeless, which is a pending discussion with him).
I guess I am feeling frustrated with conservatives not speaking up against Trump and enablers. Your biased post supporting Shawn Nelson for congress is still hurting.
You should be frustrated. It’s been pitiful.
That post was from a long time ago in terms of political evolution since 2016.
I will highlight that Mr Nelson is still better than the individual who secured the Republican nomination that year and this year.
Just to add to Dave’s point, I’m not aware of one single police union who have condemned the officers involved in the initial murder or any other officers involved in the dozens and dozens of brutality events at murder related protests.
No resolutions, no statements. Nothing.
That silence should speak loudly.
This comment is a follow up to Ryan’s comment on Dave’s point:
The silence of the Police Unions speak loudly.
It does. There is a petition to remove one of their most racist leaders:
https://sign.moveon.org/petitions/bob-kroll-leader-of-mpls-police-union-is-violent-and-racist-he-has-to-go-1?akid=265722.4752346.4TBE5B&rd=1&source=mo&t=6
I am making this post for anyone wondering how they can hide their identity from being harassed by the police for protesting..we should all be using vpn at this point, as police is using data collected from protestor’s phones to track others. NordVPN is the one I use personally, and don’t forget to turn your location off too:
https://nordvpn.com/coupon/deal/?coupon=specialcoupon
Probably not. Nice try though.
*Have we seen this picture before? You betcha! It started with the Watts Riots in 1965! Moving on from there it got really bad in ’92 with the Rodney King moment. But well, in between was 1968-1969-1970 and beyond. This is such a boring story….of disenfranchisement of Hispanics, Blacks and poor whites. So many years ago, we had to name them…..Shanty Town, Little Italy, Zoot Suits, Wrong side of the tracks, N – – – – – Town and of course naming the poor…today they call them Homeless, before they called them Hobos! Selective Law enforcement has been around since the earliest days of this country. From British Soldiers, being harbored in Private Houses, to Martial Law declared which it seems “The Trumpster” wants immediately! All we had to do was fix the broken window, repaint the graffiti walls, pick up the trash in an open field, We need to bring cookies to a shut in old person. We need the milk of human kindness, but then would those 1% actually be able to live sequestered behind gated communities? In the old days, the rich folks lived either on the top of the hill or on their Plantation Estates. Today, three generations of Hispanics may have to live in a two bedroom apartment in Santa Ana or Anaheim. Sad, that because the ricos cannot be inconvenienced from their daily treks to day care and Whole Foods…..to even look into these problems or issues…while going to church on Sunday? George Floyd was a Black Man. He had faults like all of us. He had the opportunity for Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness according to our laws. The parchment states:”Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed”.”Whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the people, to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government”….”insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the General Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity”
This is the 8th day of uprisings in these United States. Based on our history as a Nation, this is probably not going to abate for quite some time. Not until, change comes to our Nation and our communities. Equal Rights also demand Equal Responsibility! Having the Right to Bear Arms….still does not give anyone the right to take a life without consequences! Let us demand that our Congress be forced to read aloud the entirety of the Declaration of Independence on C-Span…..every day until Social Justice has been achieved in this country.
*Corona Del Mar…..lock down….boarded up and in a state of Siege! Whoa, could not believe it. Every Store and Business in Corona Del Mar was Plywood City! The parking
lot below the CDM Library closed and protected by police vehicles. This was all at 11am
this morning. This event is not stopping at any city borders. The rich people are being
inconvenienced and the ladies in their gated communities along the Newport Coast are freaking.
Too many protests coming up to menton ’em all, so I’ll just post the one I’m helping organize…
TOMORROW AT 5! An old tradition returns! This time let’s demand the firing of all Anaheim’s killer cops, and an end to the carotid and other chokeholds – that’d be a start. Bring your signs and your stories, we’ve got the music!
*George Floyd was put down like a bad dog! Murdered in front of our very eyes. He and Derek worked at the same night club as bouncers. Derek was an abuser that loved to mace people. Derek was a bad cop. Plain and simple…..just like they have bad Doctors, Lawyers and Indian Chiefs…. He got his three pals to join his team. They were willing co-conspirators. This was premised on some very definite antipathy for George by Derek. Why? Who knows? Was he hitting on the same cocktail waitress? Did George tell him to stop using the Mace? Was George too popular with the locals? Stupid reasons for stupid people cause stupid results. Are these tactics being used around the country? Of course! Yet, what is the genesis of the problem to begin with?
Rich and “The Poor” – “The Poor” can’t buy expensive Lawyers! “The Poor” do not pay enough in taxes to keep the various PD’s and Sheriff’s Offices in business. “The Poor” can’t pay $500,000 dollars to send their daughters to USC, let alone keep them safe from drug charges or other minor offenses….which the rich and the connected can have simply ….go away! “Equal Justice Under the Law”……not so much! Maybe, we can just ramp back some of these inequities..a little? “The Poor Families” …tell their kids to go out and get a job, rob a liquor store, join a gang and make money. The Rich pay off computer experts to hack into school data bases and change their kids grades so they can get into a prestigious school. Some rich people just pay off teachers directly, or school administrators. These are the truths that cause social unrest. It will be interesting to see what “Corrective Action” may occur in the days to follow.
I like to say that black people been protesting since 1960s. Since then anytime a Issue came up they protested about it? Martin Luther King Jr crowd all protested in a good legal quiet peaceful manner ? Since that time protestors go from peaceful to violent then break into ___ ( businesses) break windows n such? My question is this since black men have been officiers since 1960s if a black cop shot a white man what would system do / what would the white society do? If your answer is he’d be reprimanded maybe job taken away temp /permanently? Do you think protestors are wise not to wear mask,not do social distancing & hygiene wash hands ?