Baltimore City State's Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby says death of Freddie Gray gives her office probable cause to file criminal charges. Second degree murder, manslaughter, assault, false imprisonment, misconduct in office and more are charged.
The press conference this morning in Baltimore is here. It runs 21 minutes. Mosby's announcement of probable cause to charge homicide is at 02:45.
In her position only 3 months, Ms. Mosby is thrust into an international spotlight along with the family of Mr. Freddy Gray who is one of 392 victims of death by police in 2015 listed here.
Scathing massive charges are filed. Arrest warrants are out for the Baltimore Police Department officers. Police are to be arraigned today.
Barbara Morrill has put up a diary that shows a complete list of charges below the orange thingy.
This mayhem must stop!
Police officers in "The Thin Blue Line" (a colloquial term for police forces) must stop using the "kin police" model of policing to cover their own a***s. People who consider themselves responsible for their ”kin” (relatives) and follow the adage, ”I am my brother’s keeper” may be real noble and all but they are not doing a fine job of policing in a nation of over 330 million people who are not all in for the 1829 Parliament-passed London Metropolitan Police Act, which established a paid, full-time, uniformed police force with the primary purpose of patrolling the city that was mimicked in New York (1845) as it adopted the English 1829 model.
We might go back to paired police officers with better pay who walk a beat in all types of weather for only two to four hours of an eight-hour day, and are held in reserve six to four hours back in the "barracks"/"station". That might reduce stress-related episodes they must endure and allow them "prep." time for reflection, practice to improve their own best practices and get adequate face-to-face direct supervision. Communication and transit technology is now ubiquitous so the Sgts., Lts., etc. can easily supervise and respond to needs of the beat. Training officers would also benefit from such force structure. Citizens can easily be more humanized in the minds of any and all police officers.
In any event, people like Mr. Gray on his neighborhood sidewalk should under no circumstances be treated by police as a "target" of anything like a "signature strike" no matter how popular such attacks on civilians may become. Police departments are responsible for supporting their staffers through the difficult frustrations presented by the work of policing today. Police unions and the like should be demanding far more robust support to "The Thin Blue Line" than an irritated POTUS (Governor, Mayor, Council rep., police "chief", etc.) demonizing as "thugs" the civilians who have lived under threat of such strikes.