Description

I'm concerned about a rush to judgment in the recent police shootings. We need to protect our community while observing due process.

The history of cop murders of blacks is abominable; its frequent toleration is unforgivable.The public evidence I've read in this case sounds very bad for the cops. The need for accountability of public officials like cops is crucial. And all non-confidential material, like videos, should be made public as quickly as possible after an event, which I gather hasn't happened here. (I'm at the mercy of newspaper accounts, which we all know aren't always accurate.)

But bypassing due process has hurt progressives a lot more than the racists and assassins (not always white) and trigger-happy gun-owners in our culture. We must not be even metaphorical lynchers. Knowing the history of abuse of due process, we should be especially aware of these principles--and we should uphold due process just because it's right.

So I'd like to see the involved cops put into some kind of legal suspension while due process occurs. I don't know what's legal, but it should be a state in which they're not on the street, they're not armed, and if for some remote and as yet unknown reason they're not culpable here, they're eventually able to get back pay that may be suspended while this matter is adjudicated.

We should put our political principles where our mouths are at even the most difficult of times.

(Truth in advertising: I'm an ACLU member, and among other things I'm a Jew who supported the right of anti-semites to march in Skokie.)

Richard Yanowitz