I would like to hear from one person who can say honestly that they are surprised by this, who did not already know that if we heard anything at all about this case after the initial flurry of headlines, it would not be what we wanted to hear.
Personally, I am sick to my stomach; I want to cry, I want to rant, I want to blindly run outside and scream at the top of my lungs at how damn unfair it all is. I'm just so tired of this! They beat us up, they kill us, they run roughshod over our rights, our families, even our children, and nothing happens.
You know the saying that everything goes full circle?(i.e. clothing fashions like bell-bottom pants came back in style, haircuts that were once laughable are now worn proudly) Well, think about it, a few hundred years ago black people were treated like something white people scraped off their shoes after walking through the garden; how are they treating black people now? After all the advances this country has made (or we thought had been made) we now find out that we're not really welcome at the table after all. They're still trying to act like we don't exist, like we are not people, like black lives don't matter, and if they are confronted with a situation where they have to do something, what do they do? They go through a long, drawn-out farce in the judicial system, hoping that they can just ride it out till the furor subsides and everyone has forgotten about it; then they can just move on, life as usual. Of course there are those who don't forget, who keep the case alive and in the public eye, and in those cases what do they do? Read this article:
Ex-S.C. Cop Who Hurled Black Student Over Desk Won’t Face Criminal Charges
A report released on Friday noted that the officer’s behavior looked “worse in the video than it did in the classroom.”
The South Carolina police officer who was fired for violently dragging a young black girl across a classroom over use of a cell phone will not face criminal charges.
The New York Daily News reports that Richland County Solicitor Dan Johnson said in a 12-page court report Friday that he found no probable cause to charge the school resource officer in the dragging incident that sparked national outrage.
The report also notes that a witness statement saying the violent altercation between former Richland County police officer Ben Fields and a Spring Valley high school student “looked worse in the video than it did in the classroom.”
To the rest of us, the October video clearly shows that after the student refused to surrender her phone, Fields assaulted her. He wrapped his forearm around her neck, then flipped her and her desk backwards before dragging her along the classroom floor while keeping her in a tight headlock. Fields then cuffed the student as her classmates cried in horror.
Many across the country were besides themselves in anger, especially in light of another incident caught on video showing an officer throwing a young black girl in a swimsuit thrown down to the ground in Texas, more evidence of the violence that young people of color—girls, too—are regularly subjected to (that officer did not face charges either.)
Fields had no regrets about his actions, according to his statement in the report.
“I realized that I was going to have to physically remove the student from her seat to effectuate her arrest,” he said, adding that the desk only flipped over because the student locked her legs inside it.
Fields’ supervisor, Sheriff Leon Lott —said he wanted to “throw up” upon seeing the video —and fired Fields immediately.
Yet Johnson said Lott’s actions were hasty and may have hampered the case against Fields.
Yet Johnson said Lott’s actions were hasty and may have hampered the case against Fields.
“These administrative actions, taken prior to the completion of the investigation, have been injurious to the prosecution of the case,” Johnson said in the report (which leads one to believe that if the Sheriff didn’t take that action, Fields would still have a job in addition to no criminal charges.)
To add insult to injury, the girl who recorded the video, Niya Kenny, was also arrested after questioning Fields’ conduct.
Kenny and the student who was assaulted were charged with “disturbing schools” charges, which parents protested at the time.
Kenny and the student who was assaulted were charged with “disturbing schools” charges, which parents protested at the time.
Johnson noted that the charges against both students would be dropped as well.
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