Not satisfied with simply proving that our criminal justice system is not merely unjust, but completely broken by gaining acquittal for Officer Michael Brelo in the killing of Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams, Brelo’s defense attorney Pat D’Angelo scurrilously attempted to incite violence after the verdict was rendered.
It’s been widely suspected that a racist, reactionary element exists in America that relishes — and indeed encourages — violent uprisings by the oppressed, which they can then point to and cite as proof of lawlessness among minorities, thus justifying brutal police tactics. And D’Angelo, by his action at the conclusion of the trial, offers proof of such suspicions.
After the verdict the very able attorney castigated not only Prosecutor Tim McGinty, but other members of the legal profession as well, accusing civil rights lawyers of being moneygrubbers. This is from a man who, for decades, has made a handsome living indeed defending wrongdoing by cops. A case of the pot calling the kettle black.
Now comfortably semi-retired in Florida, some in the legal profession have suggested that his intemperate TV outburst was by calculated design; what he’s actually angling for is a legal commentator’s role on Fox News. They posit that he wants to become the “go to” guy that can offer up excuses whenever a rogue cop anywhere in America is brought up on charges of brutality.
After Judge John O’Donnell rendered the not guilty verdict (that I — and many others — predicted), Brelo and his defense team left the courtroom by a side door, a door that leads to elevators reserved for court personnel, which in turn leads to an underground passageway to a secured parking area. Once they are there everyone can safely access their vehicles and quietly leave the premises … which everyone but D’Angelo did. He came back.
As the crowd in front of the Justice Center was peacefully protesting the verdict, D’Angelo crossed Lakeside Avenue and purposefully walks through the group of understandably angry gathering, provoking the outrage he so direly wanted. The crowd followed him up to the doors of the building and some of them attempted to follow him inside, which caused the sheriff’s department to deploy deputies in full riot gear.
As the helmeted, baton-carrying deputies attempted to move the crowd backwards away from the door the media began salivating; the situation got tense. At last they were going to get the violence TV cameras so love and desire.
They had already focused their lenses on the distraught family members who, attempting to maximize their 15 seconds of fame, acted out for viewers as if they were bat-shit crazy— a spectacle that the public is all too eager to gorge themselves on: Someone else’s misery.
This kind of manufactured theater is about keeping eyeballs glued to the TV so that during commercials cell phones, laundry detergent and over-priced vacation packages can be sold to an all-too-willing and eager buying public. It’s really about entertainment and ratings, and TV anchors should stop pretending they’re real journalists — they’re not.
When one news anchor raised a question in regards to why D’Angelo would make such a provocative move, another commentator provided the excuse that since it was the weekend, the door he used was the only one that was open. But what about the door he came out of in the garage area? Certainly someone would have let him back in.
But in the end D’Angelo’s tactic didn’t work. There was no violence. The moment was lost.
It wasn’t long before the TV camera crews packed up and headed off to West Park where a demonstration and march to the home of County Prosecutor Tim McGinty’s residence was about to jump off. Some hotheaded racists had been threatening violence if protestors show up in their virtually lily-white neighborhood. Oh goody!
Maybe the talking TV heads will have better luck over there, but somehow I doubt it. The vultures will simply have to wait until another verdict is in on another tragic —unwarranted — death. But then, that’s what vultures do isn’t it? Wait for something or someone to die.
From Cool Cleveland correspondent Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com. Frazier’s From Behind The Wall: Commentary on Crime, Punishment, Race and the Underclass by a Prison Inmate is available again in hardback. Snag your copy and have it signed by the author by visiting http://NeighborhoodSolutionsInc.com.
3 Responses to “MANSFIELD: Attempting To Manufacture Violence”
Steve Merkel
Once on a jury for a violent rape case, it came time for a vote. We knew he did it, he was pond scum, but the evidence just didn’t support a guilty verdict and we found him not guilty of rape. That was facts and law superseding our emotion. When we convict on emotion rather that the facts and the law, we as a nation, a community, have become no better than the murderers and beheaders in the Middle East. What officer Brelo did was sickening. It was reprehensible. At a minimum he ought to be off the force and never get a job anywhere in law enforcement. But if the facts and the law did not support a criminal conviction on the charge, then so be it. If you or I were the one on trial, which would we want to judge us? Facts and law, or emotion?
Mansfield Frazier
I totally agree with you. But, in cases of police misconduct rarely do juries follow the facts. In case after case cops are acquitted despite the evidence. The system is broken … at least when it comes to treating minorities fairly.
Hank Wait
The powers that be will never/very rarely convict a cop. Cops are their enforcers so to speak. If they start busting cops for doing their enforcing then the cops might stop which the powers that be don’t want. Cynical? You bet your ass I’m cynical.