A Tulsa pig fatally shoots an unarmed black man named Terrence Crutcher who had his hands up.. Smh..

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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...artment-of-justice-investigate-shooting-death

Tulsa police ask department of justice to help investigate shooting death

Tulsa police have asked the federal department of justice to help investigate the shooting death of a man by an officer.

Police chief Chuck Jordan contacted the department through the US attorney’s office in Tulsa and will work with the agency to investigate Friday night’s shooting death of 40-year-old Terrence Crutcher, according to a news release from police.

Spokesmen for police and the justice department did not immediately return phone calls for additional comment.

Police spokeswoman Jeanne MacKenzie has said the shooting occurred after an officer stopped to investigate an SUV stopped in the middle of a street and Crutcher approached two officers who arrived to assist.

MacKenzie said Crutcher refused orders to put up his hands and was shot when he reached inside the SUV, which was his.

Police said one officer fired a stun gun, then the second officer fired his gun, striking Crutcher, who died later at a hospital.

Police have not said whether a weapon was found. Officials said information, along with audio and video of the incident, will be released Monday.

Crutcher’s twin sister, Tiffany Crutcher, told reporters on Saturday the family is heartbroken and she does not believe Crutcher was carrying a gun.

“We just want answers,” she said. “We want to know what happened, there’s a lot of speculation, but there is one thing, one fact that I do know is that my brother was unarmed.”

She said her brother had left a class at Tulsa Community College when his SUV stalled in the street.
 
http://www.tulsaworld.com/homepagel...cle_018f546d-4c86-514d-a2c1-353a24dc5088.html

UPDATE: TPD releases names of officers involved in fatal shooting; Attorneys for family ask for transparency

An attorney for the family of a man who was fatally shot by a Tulsa Police officer Friday night called for the police department to “immediately” release any video footage it has from the incident.

Benjamin Crump, who also represented the family of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin, and Damario Solomon-Simmons held a press conference Saturday afternoon at the home of 40-year-old Terence Crutcher, where they asked that the agency be transparent about the actions that led up to an unidentified officer shooting Crutcher near 36th Street North and Lewis Avenue.

Police have not said whether Crutcher had a weapon at the time of the shooting, but his sister, Tiffany Crutcher, maintains he was unarmed. When asked about the matter Saturday afternoon, Tulsa Police Officer Jeanne MacKenzie told the Tulsa World, “I do not know that information.”

Chief Chuck Jordan and the department have scheduled a press conference about the shooting at 1:30 p.m. Monday, when they also plan to release all unedited audio and video of the shooting.

Police staff are working over the weekend to ready the files for the conference, and an earlier conference will be scheduled if the files are ready before Monday, the department announced in a news release Saturday night.

The department also announced Jordan contacted the Department of Justice through the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Northern District of Oklahoma, and Tulsa Police will work with the department during the investigation.

MacKenzie said the officer, who is on paid administrative leave pending an investigation, fired after Crutcher reportedly reached into his vehicle, which had stalled in the middle of the road, instead of complying with officers’ demands.

She said an officer who was en route to an unrelated call spotted Crutcher and his stalled sport utility vehicle around 7:40 p.m. The officer called for backup, then approached the vehicle when the second officer arrived. That is when Crutcher approached the officers from the side of the road, MacKenzie said.

“From that point, I do not know what occurred. We have no idea, and that’s what is so difficult for us and the family,” Solomon-Simmons, a longtime friend of the Crutcher family, said Saturday. “Terence was tragically taken away from his family ... but we don’t have any answers. That’s our job, to try to get answers for this family as they’re mourning.”

MacKenzie said the officers ordered Crutcher to put up his hands multiple times, but he did not comply and instead reached into the vehicle. One officer deployed a Taser at Crutcher, and the other officer fired a single shot shortly afterward.

When asked whether the officer followed protocol by firing at Crutcher, MacKenzie said there aren’t step-by-step procedures for how to deal with such situations.

“It’s a fast-moving situation,” she said. “We don’t go: ‘This is step one. This is step two. This is step three.’”

Records indicate Crutcher had more than a dozen contacts with various law enforcement agencies in the Tulsa area, primarily for motor vehicle-related violations, and spent time in state prison for drug-related charges. But MacKenzie said Saturday that Crutcher’s background with police did not have a role in why officers approached him.

“Officers did not know anything in reference to the individual prior to their contact,” she said.

The Tulsa County District Attorney’s Office will rule on whether the officer’s use of deadly force was justified. District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler said Saturday that his administration has made it a priority to request that law enforcement allow one of his investigators to observe crime scene investigations related to police shootings.

“It’s a high-profile event, and I need to be made aware of some of the relevant facts,” he said.

Kunzweiler did not comment about Crutcher’s case, saying he wants “to respect the integrity of the investigative process,” but provided information about what his office evaluates.

“In any officer-involved shooting, we’re going to evaluate all witness statements, any information from the medical examiner’s office (and) any relevant physical evidence that might relate to the shooting and apply that to the law,” he said. “As with any case involving a criminal investigation, we’re evaluating the facts as applied to the law to determine whether a crime was committed and/or whether there is a particular defense that is relevant for the evaluation.”

The Tulsa World has filed an Open Records Act request for all available video footage related to the shooting. MacKenzie said there is no timetable on when the videos, if they exist, will be released.

Update: Tulsa police on Sunday released the names of the two police officers involved in the fatal officer-involved shooting on Friday night.

Officer Betty Shelby is the officer who discharged her duty weapon during the incident, police said. Her date of hire was Dec. 1, 2011. Shelby has been placed on routine administrative leave with pay.
 
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/loca...cle_5b449b2b-d722-563e-b6db-1777a5d2d881.html

Family, north Tulsa leaders view fatal shooting video; pastor expects outrage but says 'let justice take its course'

Tulsa police released video clips and audio files from Friday’s fatal shooting of Terence Crutcher to local community leaders on Sunday prior to their scheduled release to the public at a news conference Monday afternoon.

A pastor who saw the videos said he was appalled after seeing them
but said the public should respond with reason and not violence. The local president of the NAACP also said he expects the public’s reaction to be “level-headed.”

Crutcher’s family also saw the files.

“We wanted them to see it before it was released so they wouldn’t be blindsided by it,” Tulsa Police Sgt. Shane Tuell said. “We wanted to be able to have that intimate time with them, with their attorney, to see if they had any questions or concerns.

“With something of this magnitude, we’re trying an approach that we believe is necessary to further that transparency,” Tuell said.

Among the group that saw the early release of the videos and audio was state Rep. Regina Goodwin, state Sen. Kevin Matthews, and a mixture of ministers and community activists.

The files are set to be released to the public at a news conference at 1:30 p.m. Monday.

Meanwhile, Tulsa police on Sunday released the names of the two officers involved in the shooting.

Officer Betty Shelby is the officer who discharged her duty weapon during the incident, police said. She was hired Dec. 1, 2011. Shelby has been placed on routine administrative leave with pay.

Officer Tyler Turnbough is the officer who deployed his Taser during the incident. He was hired Jan. 5, 2009.

Messages to a police spokeswoman regarding additional information about Shelby and Turnbough were not returned on Sunday.

Rodney Goss, a pastor at the Morning Star Baptist Church in north Tulsa, said he expects public outrage after seeing the videos.

“His hands were in the air from all views,” Goss said.

Goss and others were shown three videos: dash camera footage from two of the responding officers’ vehicles and footage from the police department’s helicopter camera.

From Goss’ perspective, he said, Crutcher failed to exhibit behavior that would potentially warrant being shot by a police officer.

The footage show’s Crutcher’s SUV parked in the middle of the road because it had broken down, Goss said. Crutcher is seen walking toward officers, seemingly seeking help. The videos later show Crutcher walking toward his vehicle, after which he was Tasered by one police officer and subsequently shot by another officer’s gun.

However, Goss said, Crutcher did not reach into his vehicle — he moves toward it without any apparent sudden movement.

“It was not apparent at any angle from any point that he lunged, came toward, aggressively attacked, or made any sudden movements that would have been considered a threat or life-threatening toward the officer,” Goss said.

Crutcher did not appear to have a weapon, Goss said.

Crutcher was Tasered and shot almost simultaneously, Goss said.

“It wasn’t a matter of minutes, it was a matter of moments, where as quick as the officer released the Taser from his hand, Terence was falling to the ground having already been shot,” he said.

However, the most disturbing part of the footage, Goss said, is not Crutcher being shot, but rather the moments directly after.

“After having been shot, a couple minutes it appears, but it seemed like a lifetime, went by before anyone actually checked with him as far as pulse — as far as whatever the case may be,” Goss said.

Goss said it was unclear if Crutcher fully heard or understood the officers’ commands to stop as he was walking toward his vehicle.

Police also released audio from the shooting. Goss said one of the men in the police helicopter can be heard clearly stating that Crutcher’s hands were up.

Goss said a man in the police helicopter can also be heard saying that Crutcher looked like “one bad dude.”

“There was a perception problem before there was ever a shooting,” Goss said.

Goss said he was shocked after seeing the videos.

“If he was simply seeking help, then why was there such an aggressive approach to him as if he had done something wrong?” he said. “We don’t have all the nuances and all the details, but to this point, there appears to be no negative connotations that would have warranted any aggression on the behalf of the police officers.”


Goss said he doesn’t know if any Tulsa Police Department policies or protocols were violated, because he does not know what that constitutes.

However, he said, there are still many questions to be answered.

Pleas Thompson, NAACP president, was also shown the videos, but did not go into detail about how he perceived the situation.

However, he expects the public’s reaction to be “level-headed” upon the release of the videos and audio at Monday’s news conference.

“I think the justice system will work here in Tulsa, because we’ve seen it work before,” Thompson said, referencing to the outcomes of the trial of former Tulsa County reserve deputy Robert Bates.

Goss commended the department’s efforts toward transparency. However, he feels, it may be too little, too late.

“It’s still after the fact,” Goss said. “It’s almost as if you feel like you’re being called in so that you can help clean up a mess that was made.”

The most important thing right now, Goss said, is to focus on enacting change to prevent these situations from happening in the future.

“It’s difficult to tell your people that it’s OK because the police department has it under control, when the police department in the eyes of much of the community are the proprietors of such an event,” Goss said.


But the answer is not violence, Goss said.

“We have to let justice take its course,” he said. “We have some who want to see the best come out of a bad situation. We have others who are simply looking for a reason to act bad. And then we have some who are so angry that they want this to be just affirmation that every negative opinion that they have of our justice system is confirmed.

“You can’t corral everyone when you have so many varying agendas and mindsets,” Goss said. “The only thing you can attempt to do is be the voice of reason and put something in place that will help your people vent, and that is safe and in a practical way that will hopefully help them deal with a situation that is very painful for the African-American community.”

“I’m pushing for not only a march or a meeting, I’m pushing for a seat at the table,” he said, “where we can affect change in the policies and the culture of the police versus the community.”

Damario Soloman-Simmons, attorney for the family of Terence Crutcher, did not return a request for a comment about the videos.

Update, 8:26 a.m.: About a dozen people have gathered outside the Tulsa County Courthouse today to protest the shooting. Mareo Johnson, pastor at Seeking the Kingdom Ministries, said the local Black Lives Matter group is organizing the protest.

The protesters are chanting "Hands up. Don't shoot."

 
"He looks like a bad dude, too. Could be on something!"

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Got damn!!

Everybody using us as target practice now.

Now we got white cracka cave bitches popping us.........This can't be life.

Black men. We are under attack by the state. Even when video is produced showing us unarmed, hands up they still get off.

And these cacs want us to salute their flag??

I'll wipe my ass with that muhfucka.

 

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