Oakland Riots Break Out After Police Found Guilty in the Murder of Oscar Grant
Apparently after enjoying his New Year's Eve evening with friends, Oscar Grant hopped on an Oakland Train Platform and ended up becoming detained by Mehserle, along with other people on the train platform detained by other police officers.
According to several eye-witnesses and video tapes, which can be viewed on YouTube, Grant was following the officer's orders by staying still on the ground. In the video tape you do not see Oscar Grant resisting arrest in anyway. However, Mehserle used resisting arrest as a form of defense for this case. After holding Grant on the ground for several minutes, Mehserle opens fire on the young man for no apparent reason fatally wounding him.
Officer Mehserle was then taken into custody awaiting his fate until yesterday, July 9, 2010. Mehserle was charged with a lesser verdict than originally sought by the opposing party. Mehserle was given a charge of involuntary manslaughter because according to his defense he accidentally took out his gun while thinking he had his taser out instead. When he fired at the young man, he was expected to tase him, not fatally shoot him.
However, despite the verdict, Oaklanders were not convinced. After several historical accounts of the city's police violence, as with the Rodney King Trial and other incidents, several protesters in the city began to riot in the streets of downtown Oakland; causing damages to a least a dozen businesses, including a Footlocker and a jewelry store. More than 80 people were arrested for rioting.
Not only were the people of Oakland enraged, a police car in the state of Washington was reportedly damaged by having the windows smashed out and spray paint writing, "Oscar Grant was Here."
Despite the verdict, The U.S. Department of Justice's civil rights division is planning on investigating the officer accused of killing unarmed Oscar Grant.
Published by Celin Childs
Born in Milwaukee in 1981, Celin Childs is a unique writer that has attended two historically black colleges and two community colleges. She is currently a Muslim who wants to persue her dreams of becoming a... View profile
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2 Comments
Post a CommentGood article! just wanted to say that he was NOT found guilty of murder. That's the problem. They found him guilty of manslaughter. Although, he is seen on video murdering Oscar execution style, whipping out his gun and shooting him in the back after he was cuffed. These guys were all stopped at random - illegally, incidentally. There is no case for resistance because they were just walking along minding their own business when they were first accosted and harassed by police. If the cop had been found guilty of murder, we might be able to sleep better at night, but that was not the case. Hence the protests.
I was mostly against the riots when i started reading these Oscar Grant stories, but now I'm kind of okay with them.