police brutality

Following the unanimous triple-guilty pronouncement that a Minneapolis jury handed former police officer Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd, President Joe Biden spoke to the country. “Such a verdict is,” he said earnestly and with empathy, “much too rare.” Biden’s assessment contains a crucial detail about why racism is so persistently intractable.

Dallas police chief Renee Hall looked perplexed at her news conference, fielding questions about the slaying of Botham Jean in his own apartment by then unnamed and unidentified Dallas police officer. That was the first problem. Just who was the cop who killed Jean?

Now is the best time for activists to increase efforts to change the culture of the police. Last week a jury in Dallas County Texas convicted a police officer for killing a 15-year-old unarmed black boy, and they sentenced former officer Roy Oliver to 15 years in prison.

If former Balch Springs, Texas police officer Roy Oliver was stunned when he was found guilty of murder in the slaying of 15-year-old Jordan Edwards, there was good reason. He was the rarest of rare breeds. That is a cop who wantonly kills an unarmed civilian and then is prosecuted, let alone convicted.