Slew of racist, violent memes and texts circulated by Wichita, Kansas cops leaked

In case you were wondering, there are some extremely bad apples in the Witchita Police Department. So many, in fact, that it may be time to defund the police. Just sayin’.

According to reporting from The Wichita Eagle, 11 officers were investigated after text messages found on one officer’s phone revealed a slew of racist memes and texts—many of which referred to civilians who’d been shot or killed by the police. 

RELATED STORY: Police union claims ‘dozens’ to resign over vaccine mandate, state says only one has so far

One of the texts found was sent by a white Wichita officer, Sgt. Jamie Crouch, showing a photoshopped image of Geroge Floyd’s murder but replacing the officer who killed Floyd, Derek Chauvin, with an image of a naked Black man sitting on Floyd’s head. 

A meme, sent by another Sedgwick County sheriff’s deputy, showed an image of the cartoon character Elmer Fudd, holding a shotgun, saying, “Be very very quiet, I’m hunting [racial slur].”

Another Sedgwick County deputy allegedly sent a meme to a group chat of officers, mocking the discovery of a noose found in the garage of Black NASCAR driver, Bubba Wallace. The meme showed cone-shaped cups with the caption: “Breaking news: KKK hoods found next to water cooler in Bubba Wallace’s garage.” This officer was eventually placed on paid suspension and, in September, retired.

One of the most terrifying texts was sent from Sedgwick County sheriff’s deputy, Sgt. Justin Maxfield, praising a colleague on the SWAT team for being one of the “ultimate de-escalators” who “permanently de-escalated people who needed permanent de-escalation.”

One of the three Wichita officers who responded to Maxfield’s message positively was officer Lee Foese, who was involved in two fatal shootings—one in 2012 and another in 2020. One of the shootings involved a Black man shot five times in the back as he ran from a bar shooting. Foese allegedly responded to Maxfield’s “de-escalated” message with Maxfield also “de-escalated people who needed it.”

Crouch, who sent the Floyd meme, also has a long history of civilian shootings, according to the Eagle. He shot a Black 17-year-old who he thought was involved in a double-murder. The teen turned out not to be the suspect police were looking for. 

Crouch was reprimanded, but not suspended, and remains employed by the Wichita Police Department. 

The messages were uncovered in April 2021, during an investigation into a domestic violence case involving Maxfield. The messages were shared with the Eagle by an unnamed source. 

Maxfield was arrested in April 2021 for allegedly stalking his ex-girlfriend. He was suspended without pay on the day of his arrest and was later convicted and placed on probation, according to The Daily Beast

Prior to his resignation, Maxfield allegedly shared another image of Floyd with the caption, “You’re telling me [racial slur] couldn’t breathe?” Arrows pointed to Floyd’s lips and nose, a source told the Eagle.

The three officers who commented on the “de-escalation” post were given “coaching and mentoring,” according to the Eagle.

Sedgwick County Sheriff Jeff Easter has called the texts and memes “a big deal,” and told The Daily Beast that three deputies have been fired over them and could “be impeached” if racial bias or deceitfulness is found. 

“By law, I had to notify the U.S. Attorney’s Office, because that’s potential information against these deputies, and also the District Attorney because that’s potential impeachment material,” he said.

Anderson Cooper Rips Trump Supporters – Says They Can’t Claim ‘They Are Lovers Of Law And Order’

CNN host Anderson Cooper went after supporters of former President Donald Trump on Tuesday night as he responded to the video that the House impeachment managers presented on Tuesday.

He went so far as to say that those who still stand by Trump can no longer claim to be “lovers of law and order.”

Cooper Attacks Trump Supporters

“Any watching of the video that was played just today in the Senate Chambers, after watching that, the president’s supporters who were attacking the Capitol, the former president of the United States cannot claim to be a law-and-order president when you have the crowds chanting ‘kill the blue,'” Cooper said.

“We saw them hurling insults and fists and objects and the American flag and hockey stick at officers,” he added. “As you said, gouging out an eye, an officer lost three fingers, and one officer was killed.”

“Two others have died by suicide,” Cooper concluded. “Any claim by them that they are lovers of law and order, it rings hollow, certainly after seeing that.”

Related: Anderson Cooper Unloads On Republicans For ‘Self-Licking Ice Cream Cone’ Of Election Conspiracies

Don Lemon Mocks Trump Supporters

Cooper’s CNN colleague Don Lemon had similar words for Trump supporters last night.

“Blue lives matter, huh?” he asked condescendingly, before. adding, “Law and order! Law and order! Blue lives matter! Respect the flags! Respect law enforcement! Why don’t you just comply!

“Don’t you dare even say that again if you can stand by after that video and give Donald Trump — of all people, Donald Trump — … and his mob a pass,” he added.

“If you can do that, I don’t ever want to hear that again. I don’t want to hear that from you,” Lemon said. “I don’t want to hear family values from you. I don’t want to hear respect police officers from you. Don’t wanna hear it. No moral high ground to stand on.”

Full Story: CNN’s Don Lemon Tells Trump Supporters They Can’t Support Trump And Demand Respect For Police

“Look whose on your side there. There have been alot of lies. We’ve been warning you about all the lies,” Lemon continued, adding that Trump “was a liar and is a liar” and that his “enablers” also told “lies” — and “even after the Capitol insurrection [they] tried to overturn the Electoral College vote.”

So much for unity and healing.

This piece was written by James Samson on February 10, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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CNN’s Don Lemon Tells Trump Supporters They Can’t Support Trump And Demand Respect For Police

On Tuesday, anti-Trump CNN host Don Lemon said that those who stand with former President Donald Trump have no right to tell others to respect the police.

Lemon made his comments on his CNN program “Tonight.”

Lemon Attacks Police-Supporting Trump Voters

After showing the video that was presented on Tuesday of the Capitol Hill attack by the House impeachment managers, Lemon said, “Blue Lives Matter, huh?”

The video showed some of the mob action as the protests turned violent. Police officers who tried to hold protesters back were injured as protesters tried to break police lines and access outer doors to the Capitol.

Seeming to talk to Trump supporters, Lemon continued, “Law and order, law and order, respect the flags, respect law enforcement. Why don’t you just comply?”

“Don’t you dare even say that again if you can stand by after that video and give Donald Trump, of all people, Donald Trump… and his mob a pass,” Lemon said.

RELATED: PBS’ Yamiche Alcindor Defends Democrat Double Standard On Impeachment – ‘Wasn’t Storming Of The Capitol’ After Maxine Waters’ Speech

The CNN host then implied anyone who supports Trump has no right to defend “law and order” and the police again.

“If you can do that, I don’t ever want to hear that again,” Lemon said. “I don’t want to hear that from you.”

“I don’t want to hear family values from you,” he went on. “I don’t want to hear respect police officers from you. I don’t want to hear it.”

Lemon: ‘No Moral High Ground To Stand On’

Lemon insisted that Trump backers lacked any moral standing to demand moral behavior of others.

“No moral high ground to stand on,” Lemon said. “Look who is on your side there. There have been a lot of lies.”

“We’ve been warning you about all the lies,” Lemon finished.

The “lies.”

Isn’t Don Lemon a personality on a cable outlet that spent years promoting the Russian collusion hoax?

CNN Spent Years Promoting Russian Collusion Conspiracy Theory

Journalist Glenn Greenwald reported in 2017, “Three prominent journalists resigned Monday night after the network was forced to retract and apologize for a story linking Trump ally Anthony Scaramucci to a Russian investment fund under congressional investigation.”

“That article — like so much Russia reporting from the U.S. media — was based on a single anonymous source, and now, the network cannot vouch for the accuracy of its central claims,” Greenwald noted.

RELATED: Lindsey Graham Rips Impeachment – ‘We’re Doing A Lot Of Damage To The Country Because People Hate Trump’

Don Lemon was part of the Trump-Russia conspiracy chorus for a very long time.

Greenwald observed of the 2017 CNN story, “Embarrassments of this sort are literally too numerous to count when it comes to hyped, viral U.S. media stories over the last year about the Russia Threat.”

Additionally, CNN was the subject of a massive lawsuit over their false reporting of Covington Catholic student Nick Sandmann.

Sandmann and his fellow students were blasted by the media for wearing MAGA hats at the 2019 March for Life rally in Washington, D.C., where they were confronted by counterprotesters. 

CNN personalities Don Lemon and Chris Cuomo blamed the students.

Lemon stated, “The MAGA hat carries a certain connotation that provokes a conditioned reaction from many people, especially from marginalized people… Their chaperones should be keenly aware of that. Those kids should know that. And let’s say that the kids didn’t because they are kids, their chaperones should be responsible enough to educate them.” 

Sandmann would subsequently sue CNN for $275 million dollars, and the network later settled for an undisclosed amount.

Don Lemon has no right or moral standing to correct other about “lies” or most anything else.

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GOP willing to overlook murder of police and desecration of Capitol to show their love for Trump

Conservative Republicans have tried to dismantle labor unions as long as there have been labor unions. On the other hand, Republicans also long ago made their bet as the “party of law and order,” a position that has glorified every aspect of policing. That combination meant that of all unions, police unions have flourished not just with Republican blessings, but bolstered by racism, anti-immigrant policies, and disdain for public service that defines the GOP. As a result, when police unions make the news, it’s often because they’re defending officers in the shooting of an unarmed Black person, or defending the use of violence against peaceful protesters.

But that’s not the case with a statement that came out from the Capitol Police union on Wednesday. The union isn’t concerned about protecting the actions of some “rogue cop.” They’re outraged over what they see as a betrayal by leadership—at the Capitol police, and in the Pentagon. Testimony by the acting chief of the Capitol Police before the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday, made it clear that leadership knew days in advance that Jan. 6 “would not be like any of the previous protests.” They knew that armed militia groups were coming. They knew white supremacist groups were answering Donald Trump’s call. They knew violence was likely and that Congress was the target.

They knew all that. They just failed to react in a way that would protect lawmakers, or police.

The statement makes it clear that the events of Jan. 6 took a huge toll on the Capitol police. “We have one officer who lost his life as a direct result of the insurrection. Another officer tragically took his own life. Between USCP and our colleagues at the Metropolitan Police Department, we have almost 140 officers injured. I have officers who were not issued helmets prior to the attack who have sustained brain injuries. One officer with two cracked ribs and two smashed spinal discs. One officer is going to lose his eye, and another was stabbed with a metal fence stake.” (On Wednesday, a member of the Metro D.C. Police who fought against insurgents on Jan. 6 also took his own life.)

Understandably, the fury of the union is directed mainly at their own leadership, including former Chief Steven Sund, acting Chief Yogananda Pittman, and Assistant Chief Chad Thomas all of whom it says were aware by Jan. 4 that Trump’s invitation for a “wild” event two days later was likely to result in mass violence. Even so, only 170 police were issued with riot gear and police were not given the chemical weapons or flash bangs that were used against peaceful protesters during Black Lives Matter protests over the summer.

Despite Pittman’s lengthy closed-door testimony on Wednesday, there continues to be confusion about events leading up to the insurgency in which police were overwhelmed by thousands of violent Trump supporters who forced their way into the Capitol. Sund had previously claimed, and Pittman testified, that police leadership requested permission from the police board to alert the National Guard. However, the only member of that board who has not resigned, Architect of the Capitol Brett Blanton, issued his own statement on Wednesday indicating that he was unaware of any such request and that there was no meeting of the police board on the date Pittman indicated. 

There are still dozens of unanswered questions about exactly why police failed to prepare for an event they knew was going to bring thousands of violent, armed extremists to Washington D.C. That’s not just true of actions by the Capitol Police. There are still no answers from Pentagon officials who both restricted the authority of the local guard commander and dithered for hours even as insurgents were hunting hostages in the halls of Congress.

And there’s the biggest question of all: Why was any of this necessary? Why did it take pleas from Washington’s mayor, from the police, and from National Guard leadership to get things moving? Why did the reports of the National Guard being authorized, when they finally came, include only the word that they had been supported by Mike Pence

The biggest unanswered question of Jan. 6 is what did Donald Trump do? The House has already impeached Trump for his actions in inciting the seditionists who marched on the Capitol, murdered a police officer, smashed their way into the building, and waged a war on democracy that included deploying pipe bombs and chemical spray. But why, when the images of this insurgency were being broadcast to the White House, did Trump not immediately order the military to provide support to the besieged police? 

Yes, police actions appear to have been confused. Yes, Pentagon officials appear to have weighed the “optics” of sending in forces in a way that’s completely inappropriate. Yes, the complex mess of D.C.’s unique status generated additional steps that made everything move more slowly. None of that should have mattered. Because the moment insurgents broke through the first police line, Donald Trump should have been on the phone to order more support for the badly outnumbered officers at the Capitol. 

He didn’t. He didn’t because, by all accounts, Trump was busy watching in approval. Trump took the time to step out of the White House and tell the people beating down police with thin blue line flags, "We love you, you’re very special.” He did not take the time to provide support to the police.

And that’s the man that the Republican Party didn’t just crown as its leader, it’s the man they are still defending. Still following. Still supporting. The party of law and order is now the party that is willing to “move on” from cop killers and seditionists. To move on from the greatest crime ever committed by any American official. Benghazi was worth no less than 33 hearings, even though none of those hearings ever surfaced a crime. Now, despite the seriousness of the event, Republicans just want to … let it go.

Not because they don’t realize the scale of that crime. But because they still worship that criminal.

There’s one thing that can both help ensure that protecting the nation’s capital isn’t hampered by shifting rules, and break the logjam in the Senate: Sign up to support D. C. statehood.

Maxine Waters Warns Trump May Want ‘Civil War’ – Wants Him ‘Stopped Dead In His Tracks, However We Do It’

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) spoke out on Friday to nonsensically warn that Donald Trump may try to start a “Civil War,” adding that he “has got to be stopped dead in his tracks,” whether it’s by impeachment or by invoking the 25th Amendment.

Waters Demands Investigation Into Capitol Police

Waters, who is chair of the House Financial Services Committee, has also called for an investigation to be launched into the U.S. Capitol Police’s failure to stop Wednesday’s riot at the Capitol building.

“There’s got to be prosecutions. There’s got to be accountability,” Waters said while appearing on “The Joe Madison Show” on SiriusXM.

“And of course, this president, who has lied his way all the way up, until this insurrection that he has caused, and the fact that we all, many of us believe he is trying to create a civil war, has got to be stopped dead in his tracks, however we can do it: whether it is Amendment 25 or whether it is a new way by bringing him up before the Congress,” Waters continued. 

The 25th Amendment allows for a president to be removed from office if the Vice President and the majority of the cabinet deem him incapable of carrying out the job, according to The Washington Times.

Related: Maxine Waters Outrageously Claims Trump Has Been ‘Compromised’ By Putin

Waters Doubles Down

Not stopping there, Waters also slammed U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, who has already handed in his resignation. She said that she had already specifically asked Sound about security.

“[Sund] was telling us that he had it all under control. It turned out he had nothing under control. Nothing under control. And we were overrun,” said Waters.

“The Capitol of the United States of America, one of the most supposedly secure buildings in the country, was breached, and with them climbing the wall it looked like a Third World country overtake of the government,” she added. 

Related: MSNBC’s Joy Reid Claims Capitol Police Went Easy On ‘White’ Protesters, Ignores Woman Killed

She went on to add that she was afraid of snipers, so she asked him about the top of the buildings.

“[Y]ou know what I was thinking about? I was thinking about John Kennedy and Martin Luther King in opposite buildings and windows near the top of those buildings, and how they target people and they snipe and they could kill people,” she said. “And that’s what really was on my mind. I asked him about all of that.”

This piece was written by James Samson on January 8, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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AOC Demands People Stop Asking ‘If’ White Supremacy Exists In Policing – Says They Need To Talk About How Bad It Is Instead

The radically liberal Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y) called on lawmakers to stop “asking if white supremacy in policing exists” and to instead accept that it does. She also wants them to focus on determining just how big of a problem white supremacy in policing is going forward.

Ocasio-Cortez Speaks Out On Policing

Ocasio-Cortez made these comments during a House Oversight and Reform hearing that was meant to focus on what the left described as the “pervasive” problem of white supremacists infiltrating the police departments in America. Law enforcement officers, legal experts, and even one former neo-Nazi  testified about their personal experiences with racist police officers.

Later in the hearing, Ocasio-Cortez was given the chance to speak, and she used her time to suggest that “far too much of the discussion around the issue of white supremacist infiltration of policing focuses on whether this problem exists.”

RELATED: Michael Rapaport Torches AOC For Ignoring NYC’s Surge In Shootings – ‘You Never Bring That Stuff Up’

“We have known for generations that it’s not a question about whether this problem is an issue, it’s a matter of how we have allowed it to sustain for so long,” she said. “Congress, as well, has been complicit, and our silence has allowed for more violence and continued generational trauma in our communities.”

“We have to stop asking if white supremacy in policing exists and I think we need to start figuring out how we can better determine the scale of this problem,” she added.

Police Officers Don’t Deserve These Attacks

This just goes to show that the level of hatred that Ocasio-Cortez and her fellow Democrats have for police has become so great that they see it as a foregone conclusion that police departments are “racist.”

It’s rhetoric like this from lawmakers like Ocasio-Cortez as well as from members of the media that have endangered the lives of American police officers all over the country like never before.

It should be noted that the FBI was asked to testify in the hearing, but refused. Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said “they have nothing to say because they have no evidence that this is a widespread problem demanding the FBI’s attention.”

We would have to agree with the FBI on this one.

RELATED: AOC, Pelosi Hint Impeachment Should Be Considered To Stop Trump Supreme Court Selection

This piece was written by James Samson on September 30, 2020. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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Maxine Waters On Trump Using Federal Law Enforcement In Portland: ‘Trial Run’ For When He Refuses To Accept Election Loss

Rep. Maxine Waters dipped her toes into the unhinged conspiracy theorist pool, suggesting the federal police response to violence in Portland is a “trial run” for when President Trump refuses to accept his election loss.

Waters (D-CA) made the claim during an interview with MSNBC’s Joy Reid Wednesday night.

It’s not to quell violence in these Democrat-run cities, you see, federal law enforcement is there as a plant to be ready for action come November.

“This is what you see in country’s that have dictators,” she claimed. “In third-world countries with dictators, they have paramilitary that they can call up against the people anytime they want.”

No, Mad Max, what you see in third-world countries is what you’re seeing on the streets of leftist-controlled cities – chaos, with no regard to law and order.

And that’s when she added an extra layer to her tinfoil hat …

RELATED: Maxine Waters Pulls Over And Confronts Police Who Stopped Black Driver

Untethered From Reality

Waters proceeded to engage in ridiculous speculation about President Trump not accepting the election results should he lose to Democrat Joe Biden.

You know, the same thing they claimed he would do in 2016. When it turned out it was Democrats who spent four years refusing to accept the election results. They act like we can’t remember what they said and did a mere four years ago.

“As a matter of fact, it has been suggested that this is a trial run for the president of the United States who may be organizing to not accept what happens when we have the election if he’s not elected,” she wildly asserted.

“Is he going to pull out his military? Is he going to engage us?” fretted Waters. “He has already alluded to there may be a civil war if he’s not re-elected. This is dangerous.”

To nobody’s surprise, Reid sat there nodding her head in agreement as Waters spewed the absurd claim.

RELATED: Hillary Clinton: Watching Trump You Have To Be Concerned About His Cognitive Abilities

The Suggestion

It isn’t that hard to find where the ‘suggestion’ came from.

MSNBC’s John Heilemann made similar allegations earlier this week, meaning a good portion of the network actually believes Trump would use the military and refuse to leave office if he loses the election.

“I don’t want to be overly alarmist about this,” Heilemann said. “But this is the time to be alarmist knowing where Donald Trump stands politically, understanding where we are headed in this election.”

“I think we are looking at potentially a trial run for … a genuine attempt to, through intimidation, and potentially through force, to try to steal this election.”

This is projection, pure and simple. It’s what a Democrat in the White House would be doing if they lost to Trump. You’ve already seen what they have done in trying to oust him – impeachment hoaxes, constant lying by the media, spying, planting fake news, insurance policies, and on and on.

Do you think for a moment that Antifa and other leftist rioters wouldn’t be burning the streets if they didn’t get their way? You’re seeing it right before your eyes!

Last month, Biden predicted the military would have to intervene should Trump lose to him in the 2020 election and refuse to leave office.

It’s not just MSNBC hacks and unhinged Auntie Maxine with these conspiracy theories. It’s gone mainstream to the man who could be sitting in the White House this time next year.

And that is scary.

The post Maxine Waters On Trump Using Federal Law Enforcement In Portland: ‘Trial Run’ For When He Refuses To Accept Election Loss appeared first on The Political Insider.

Oklahoma Cop Charged With Murder After Killing Active Shooter Who Was Shooting Up The Town

By Steve Pomper | February 6, 2020

At this moment, there is a decorated police officer in Blackwell, Oklahoma who, despite wide and passionate support, is likely feeling pretty damned alone right now. His wife and children, other family members, friends, colleagues, and supporters can commiserate and sympathize, but when you’re the one indicted for murder—for doing your job—no one feels it like you do. Your hell is a special one.

And this hell is made even worse because of the unique circumstances. This hero police officer was indicted after he’d protected his community by risking his life to stop an active shooter before she could kill anyone.

On May 20th, 2019, an armed 34-year-old woman, Michael Ann Godsey (pronounced Michelle), drove her pickup truck through Blackwell, firing a gun out the window at cars, people, and cops. And this was after she’d already shot at her mother.

Blackwell Police Department Lieutenant John Mitchell set his wellbeing aside and ended the danger that threatened the people he is sworn to protect, and he did it in a uniquely heroic way. While driving, he managed to deploy his rifle and fire through his patrol car’s windshield at the active shooter’s car, thereby stopping the rampage.

RELATED: CNN Ratings Continue to Struggle, Fox News Gets a Huge Boost From Impeachment Trial

By all accounts, from people who know him, Lt. Mitchell is a well-respected professional law enforcement officer and devoted family man who is both dedicated to his job and active in the Blackwell community. But with motives that defy rationality, a district attorney named Jason Hicks has, for mysterious reasons, after a seven-month delay and after having been cleared by an independent investigation, targeted the lieutenant.

During the incident, Lt. Mitchell fired some 60 rounds from his rifle attempting to stop the shooter. He also fired shots with his pistol before the suspect was no longer a threat. The D.A. did not indict another officer who’d only fired his service handgun.

It seems Hicks is hung up on the number of rounds Lt. Mitchell fired. Well, as I wrote in my first article on this story, “It was the number necessary to stop the shooter.” Is firing that many rounds a danger to the community? Sure. Firing one round at a suspect is dangerous. But who made so many rounds necessary? The suspect did by not surrendering and continuing to be a threat.

Should Lt. Mitchell have imposed on himself a bullet quota? How about 7, 13, or 23 bullets? But it didn’t take 7, 13, or 23 rounds to stop the threat; it took over 60. That’s how it went, and no one was killed or even seriously injured. Would people have been killed or wounded if Lt. Mitchell had stopped firing at 7, 13, or some other arbitrary number of rounds and allowed the suspect to continue driving and shooting?

I’d ask D.A. Hicks: aside from disengaging the suspect, what other options did Lt. Mitchell have? Maybe Hicks feels the officer should have, oh, I don’t know, rammed the suspect. But doesn’t that mean the officer would have had to get even closer to a suspect who is shooting at him? No tactical advantage in doing that.

Are there other ways this could have ended without innocent deaths or injuries? Probably. In a unique incident like this, individual officers will come up with different (not necessarily better or worse) tactics to stop the threat. But, for all of them, the mission will be the same: stop the threat.

Disengaging from an active shooter is not a viable option. That’s not what “active shooter” training teaches cops. In backing off, you’re betting that the suspect will deescalate if the you stop pursuing him or her. But remember what the Blackwell cops were chasing her for? She was already shooting! Bot her gun and her car were weapons. Lt. Mitchell did the only thing that was going to “deescalate” the situation: shoot back.

Consider how difficult it is for an officer to stop a shooter who is mobile and shooting at him or her. How can one get so bogged down with the number of rounds fired in such an unusual circumstance? How does Lt. Mitchell not deserve the benefit of the doubt? We can’t list the names of the victims who would have, without the cop’s actions, been injured or killed, to justify Lt. Mitchell’s actions. We can’t because, thanks to that brave officer, there were no victims injured or killed.

It’s not like Lt. Mitchell had a mental Rolodex of similar incidents to scroll through. Officers in these life and death situations have to make it up as they go along using their best judgement over the course of multiple split-second decisions. Considering the dynamic, life-threatening circumstances of this incident, the lack of the benefit of the doubt given to this officer by D.A. Hicks is confounding.

But, rather than D.A. Hicks hailing Lt. Mitchell for his heroics, after a bizarre, inexplicable seven-month delay, and well after the cop had been cleared following an investigation by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI), D.A. Hicks, reportedly using only evidence heavily weighted against Lt. Mitchell, got a grand jury to indict the veteran lawman, charging him with second degree murder.

And how is Lt. Mitchell to move forward from here after the charges are dropped or he is acquitted (as should happen)? Will he second-guess and hesitate if he’s involved in a similar situation? It would be unnatural not to under these circumstances.

In police work, hesitation can mean injury and death. And this is just a part of the damage D.A. Hicks has done to this community. Other cops in his jurisdiction will have to watch their backs too… not for criminals but for this county D.A.

Several years ago, I was a witness officer in a case where an officer, the victim of an assault at a stolen car collision scene, was charged federally for violating the suspects’ civil rights. I wrote about the incident in my book, De-Policing America. That officer did nothing wrong. In fact, the suspects had resisted arrest and assaulted him and other officers.

Long story short, they should have been charged with felonies for assaulting police officers, but they were only charged for misdemeanor assault in municipal court. A jury acquitted them, later saying they felt the defendants had “suffered enough” because one of them had been pepper-sprayed during the melee.

This acquittal encouraged their lawyers to pursue the federal charge mentioned above. That officer is probably the toughest cop I ever knew. During the course of the lengthy trial, he lost at least 20 pounds he couldn’t afford to lose, had trouble sleeping, and he was never again the proactive cop he’d always been. And this wasn’t a murder charge.

Now, people who say cops shouldn’t worry if they’ve done nothing wrong have their heads up their… umm, in the sand, these days. No less than the Obama/Holder DOJ found that Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson did nothing wrong during the Michael Brown incident. Yet, Wilson will likely never work as a police officer again. And that’s without being charged with any crime.

Ironically, during this legal hell, his community and professional associations have honored Lt. John Mitchell for his service as a police officer. In July 2019, he received a prestigious award for his work in rural drug enforcement. Most recently, in January 2020, John was selected by the readers of the Blackwell Journal-Tribune as the 2019 Best Law Enforcement Officer.

The important thing is for as many people as possible learn about what a county D.A. is doing to this stellar public servant. And then, hopefully, those people will let John know how they feel about his service and let him know they support him (information about how you can do that is provided at the end of this article).

John is supported not only by his community but also by the Oklahoma Fraternal Order of Police (OFOP), and by cops and civilians all over America. Under what must be the intense pressure of commonsense niggling at Hick’s conscience, the man continues this mockery of the American justice system and his attack on all law enforcers.

It isn’t known exactly what evidence Hicks included or omitted for the grand jury or how many mistakes were made, but consider this. One mistake was issuing a flawed subpoena intended for the Blackwell Police Chief Dewayne Wood. Instead, the subpoena went to a (likely bewildered) Duane Wood, who, dutifully, appeared before the grand jury instead.

The other thing to consider is after what you’ve read about the incident in just these brief descriptions, you’ve likely concluded what other lucid people have. That John acted bravely under the most harrowing of circumstances and prevented injuries and deaths.

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Now, just think about what evidence the D.A. had to exclude for the grand jury to arrive at the conclusion that “Mitchell’s actions were ‘imminently dangerous’ and were ‘without justifiable cause or excuse.” Especially, that last one. Sorry, shooting at someone who is shooting at you and other people seems a justifiable cause or excuse to put all the rounds on your target that you can until the target stops shooting.

As Jason Smith, president of the OFOP noted, “A grand jury indicted a Blackwell police lieutenant for murder for killing an active shooter, and the state’s police union is questioning why the district attorney held back evidence from the indictment.” He added, “I’ve yet to see in American history when an active shooter was taken out by a police officer or civilian who was then charged with murder—murder isn’t defined by that in America.”

There’s a more to this story, but it’s my intention just to keep his plight in the minds of John’s growing list of supporters, and to inform people who haven’t heard about this sham, as the preliminary hearing approaches. The hearing will be held at the Noble County Courthouse, Perry, Oklahoma on Feb. 18th, 2020.

If you’re interested in other aspects of the case, which are as curious as they are fascinating, I wrote a more in depth article last December and a brief follow up in January about John’s ordeal.

One bright note is the outpouring of affection and support for John from across the nation. Thousands of people have joined a Facebook page established to support John. Anyone interested in showing their support can go to the Facebook page: We Stand By John Mitchell. There you can post notes of encouragement for John and his family. You can also purchase t-shirts and stickers to demonstrate your support.

This piece originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

Read more at LifeZette:
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