KTVA Reporters Deserve Firing For Attempts to Rig Election

There is not more accurate way to describe this story. Reporters and news managers at CBS News affiliate KTVA have been captured plotting a string of so-called "October surprises." They expressly discuss ways to fabricate news stories they hope will damage the campaign of Senate candidate Joe Miller.

This is a morally reprehensible and indefensible act of conspiracy to defraud the viewers of KTVA and any other citizen that may pick up these vulgar fictions.

The entire news staff of KTVA should be investigated by the appropriate authorities to determine if state and federal laws have been as badly broken as has been the public's trust.

As a news outlet, KTVA is now hopelessly compromised. They've utterly destroyed their credibility. Thee is little choice for the station owner but to fire the entire news staff. None of them can be trusted.

And they have no one to blame but themselves.

The Good Earth and Dodged Bullets

From the ridiculously charming, smart and indispensable Michelle Malkin and the good folks at Hot Air comes a reminder that Progressives really are a separate--and dangerous--species. I speak, of course, of America’s sweetheart, Katie Couric, who has done so much to drive one of the formerly great network news organizations into the dumpster.

Hot Air reports: “Rick Kaplan, her executive producer, says that ‘when she’s on the road--in Iraq with David Petraeus--she has a great way with people. People like her and she likes them. There are anchors who consider being on the road a pain in the butt. She really looks for opportunities to feel the earth and touch people.’”

Let us, just to be kind, consider that Mr. Kaplan, and Ms. Couric, mean this in the best possible way. That said, who even thinks this way, let alone says it?! She has a great way with people? They like her and she likes them? It sounds like she’s talking about cute puppies. Of course, we all appreciate Ms. Couric’s sacrifice in actually, you know, traveling to do her job, the job for which she is compensated with untold millions. But how, pray tell, does one go about feeling the earth and touching people, particularly since Ms. Couric is among those instrumental in making earth touching a moral and criminal offense, to say nothing about touching a member of a protected, favored class. But of course, we earthy types in flyover country are certainly touched by Ms. Couric's concern and good intentions.

And now let us venture into dodged bullet territory. I speak, of course, of the man who nearly became president of the United States by running on the “I’m better and smarter than any thousand of you” ticket: Senator John Kerry. Thanks to Doug Powers at Hot Air who reported Mr. Kerry’s concerns for America in these dark hours:

“It’s absurd. We’ve lost our minds. We’re in a period of know-nothingism in the country, where truth and science and facts don’t weigh in. It’s all short-order, lowest common denominator, cheap seat politics.”

The Senator is referring to the great unwashed, the fearful God and gun clingers who hate those who aren’t like them who are on the verge of expelling large numbers of their betters from that most sacred, intellectual and moral institution: The United States Congress. Let’s see: The Europeans are trying to run away from socialism as fast as possible, global warming has been exposed as the most egregious scientific hoax of all time, Cap and Trade and Obama Care will bankrupt the nation, and the American public has recovered, with a vengeance, from an overdose of hopenchange, but Mr. Kerry can't imagine why we don't drool all over him and the polices of his progressive pals? What's not to love?

We dodged a huge bullet with Mr. Kerry. That was a close one.

Forward to the Past

The winners of the October, 2010 Louis Renault Award have been announced: Anyone who is shocked, shocked! to learn that NPR is a wholly owned propaganda arm of the Progressive (formerly Democrat Party.) And the runners up are: Anyone, particularly Juan Williams, who is shocked, shocked(!) to learn that conservatives are orders of magnitude more tolerant, caring and forgiving than progressives.

Louis Renault, for those who have never seen Casa Blanca, is the police Captain who accosts Rick--played by Humphrey Bogart--the proprietor of Rick’s, saying that he was shocked, shocked(!) to discover that gambling was going on in Rick’s place...moments before he was handed his gambling winnings.

I’ve long thought Mr. Williams to be among the more rational and least doctrinaire leftists. Occasionally he falls back into the fold, ignoring the facts, denying the obvious, gamely trying to defend the indefensible, but generally, Williams has been one of a very rare breed: A liberal who can discuss controversial topics without displaying the usual liberal traits of yelling insults, calling opponents racist, stupid or mentally defective, accusing opponents of plotting to starve children, knock the elderly out of their wheelchairs and do horrible things to small furry animals, running out of the room, exploding in raging anger, or if they can’t work up to the real thing, feigning righteous anger, playing the moral superiority card, or just turning red and sputtering. He’s the kind of man with whom I could easily enjoy a brisk, civil debate.

But I have to wonder. Williams spent a decade working for NPR. In all of that time in the progressive snake pit, didn’t he ever wonder what all the hissing was about? Didn’t he often see what appeared to be a duck, walking and quacking like a duck, and didn’t he realize that it actually was a duck? Didn’t he find himself regularly immersed in a tepid bucket of politically correct spit? He’s a smart man; why didn’t he see who and what his colleagues were?

I have been heartened to see a bit of light peeking through the progressive clouds, but the scales have yet to fall completely from Mr. Williams’ eyes (metaphor alert!). He has opined that maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t conservatives who were intolerant after all. Maybe, just maybe, it was, it was--gasp!--leftists all along. No doubt Mr. Williams has been encouraged to ponder this apparent paradox owing to several recent developments, among them his abrupt firing from NPR for the crime of speaking the truth about the existence of Islamic terrorists, a truth understood and shared by tens, even hundreds of millions of Americans; his subsequent immediate hiring--at a much higher salary--by the locus of all of the world’s evil: Fox News (Arizona is a close second); the fact that those who immediately jumped to his defense were almost entirely conservatives; the fact that those who selflessly defended and hired him did so because they were expressing loyalty to a friend, a friend who was also meritorious, which is of no small importance to conservatives, but is of little or no importance to progressives; and the fact that they were defending constitutional principles of free speech without concern for the political correctness of said speech.

I’ve little doubt that Mr. Williams is grateful, but I wonder if he--like far too many Congressional Republicans, has really learned the most important lessons of his experience. Considering that November 2 is fast approaching, this is not--like the details of Dr. Evil’s life--inconsequential.

Many Republicans such as Lindsay Graham and John Boehner have already begun to mutter about reaching across the aisle, compromising and cooperating with Democrats. There are many problems with this, but I’ll mention two just for fun: They haven’t taken control of either house of Congress as yet, and if they don’t they’ll be able to expect exactly the same cooperation, compromise, professionalism and human decency that Democrats have extended to them for the last two years: Not only none, but less than none. And even if they do win, as Rush Limbaugh put it, where’s the compromise with socialism, with policies that are designed to destroy freedom, democracy and the rule of law? Do we strike a deal to allow the Democrats to destroy the odd numbered articles and rights in the Constitution? The even?

To be completely fair, the Congress should be a place for honest and full debate, a body where no law is passed before the people have a chance to read it in full, where no bill is written like a blank check for future bureaucrats to fill out, where no bill can be more than 100 pages long, where everyone is treated with respect and dignity, but where everyone understands that they are temporary hired hands entrusted with the future of the last, best hope of mankind. To that end, everyone should be treated fairly and professionally, but when any one legislator ignores the Constitution, when they put themselves above the people, when they forget who they are and their temporary status as public servants, they deserve to be treated as the scoundrels they are and must, slowly and painfully, earn the full privileges of their positions. This is the current state of the Democrat party, a party dedicated to the destruction of America. Until every Democrat is once again dedicated to America and has proved that dedication beyond any doubt, they must be treated like the insidious danger they are.

Whether it is Juan Williams or Congressional Republicans, the problem is the same: A inability and/or stubborn unwillingness to recognize, embrace and act upon experience and reality. Sadly, I suspect that Mr. Williams will be far more likely to embrace reality than the Republicans. If this is the case, the Republicans may expect many more, and much more painful, lessons delivered by a public who can learn from experience and deal with reality. Living in the real world, rather than Washington D.C., tends to do that.

So, good luck to Juan Williams. Come on over to the good side of the Force, you know, the side that embraced and defended you when it mattered? And to Congressional Republicans: Nobody likes you. You are, for the moment, the lesser of two evils. You have a very, very long way to go before you have once again earned the trust of the American people. Start by defeating the immediate evil. We're watching.

Rally to Restore Corduroy Now Underway

Comedy Central Planning has tried to ban Pajamas Media from covering today's hoping-to-be-cooly-ironic spectacle on the National Mall today, showing the Obama-worshipping faux news hosts speaking at the event aren't much for coverage that doesn't involve a laugh track.

You can watch it live here if you so desire.

I'm "watching" the event on two computers with the sound off for as long as it lasts. After all, Comedy Central is paying for the bandwidth, right? I'll actually be watching college football on television.

For those of you on twitter, the #fearofsanity hashtag is providing some pretty funny material so far.

Big Government is live blogging.

NC Democrat Tim Spear's Mailer: You Always Want the Wehrmacht Covering Your Back

On the bright side, these were only WWII reenactors, not real German soldiers that the North Carolina Democratic Party wants to back. It's certainly a step up from the white supremacist unit they supported in the only successful military coup d'état in American history (via Big Government).

A Recognition of Evil

One of the most impassioned calls to crush the Democrats in next week's midterm elections comes from Kevin DuJan, a Democrat of more than three decades that has seen the monster his party had become.

Howard Dean, Donna Brazile, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Obama took the mask off the Democrat Party…and the Leftist gorgon that lurked beneath is something America-loving, middleclass, Jacksonian/Clintonian Democrats want nothing to do with.

As part of your "Reverse Operation Chaos", you really need to emphasize something the media just won't talk about — and that's the simple fact that even if you called yourself a Democrat for 32 years, the way I did, because everyone you grew up with and everyone in your family was a Democrat, that in 2010 it's time to ask yourselves what that really means.

Do you want to be in a party that calls people racists for stepping out of line and voicing opposition to the socialist lurch of the current administration?

Do you condone voter fraud and the shameless, undemocratic tactics employed by Democrats?

Do you wish to associate with the likes of ACORN, the SEIU, the Black Panthers, and all the other thugs, goons, and degenerates the Obama campaign and White House employ as the DNC's muscle on the ground?

It is crystal clear that being a patriotic American who loves this country is intellectually incompatible with being a Democrat. If you love America and want it to prosper, the Democrat Party is at absolute odds with everything we need for a thriving, successful economy.

I seriously suggest you read the entire entry, which takes the form of an open letter to Rush Limbaugh from the leader of what was one of the most prominent Hillary Clinton-supporting blogs in the 2008 primaries, HillBuzz.

Clinton Democrats learned first-hand the thuggish Alinsky tactics of the socialist "progressive" left. The Clinton-supporting Democrats of 2008 are largely what we would consider moderate to conservative Democrats, and they are being targeted for extinction by the radical left. Progressives can brook no dissent. Philosophically, dissent is impermissible, and as time goes on, the remaining Democrats are being squeezed towards representing ever more radical positions by the Marxists and socialists currently leading the Party.

It is this radical view—this fundamental misunderstanding of humanity and an arrogant presumption that enough force-fed government can somehow "perfect"mankind—that has infected what remains of the Democrat Party. It is this poisonous, quasi-religious fervor that was used to justify more than 100 million human beings being murdered in the name of progress in the last century alone, and the reason that the generation that now guides today's radicals coolly rationalized the deaths of 25 million Americans in concentration camps for the good of "their" country.

We've gotten so used to demonizing our opponents via hyperbole and brazen untruths that we seem numbed to the real threats to our way of life. We seem to have convinced ourselves that our nation's leaders can't also be our greatest enemies, despite the bloody battlefields and mass graves that have resulted, and which have been repeated time and again throughout the long history of humanity when self-styled "elites" determine that they, and they alone, know what is best for the citizens.

We should not wait for representative democracy to be plowed under by the evils of socialism and the racialism of a President that was mentored by communists, murderous terrorists, and radical racial separatists.

Nothing good has come as the result of the progressive domination of our current government. The regime has dramatically intruded into the private sector, awarded itself powers the Founders never intended, has massively increased the nation's debt, and undermines out individual liberties... all quite by design.

I'm quite sure that those on the left can rationalize and justify every constitutional infringement, every direct action, every harassment, even broken campaign office window, every false flag operation and every case of voter fraud, convinced that their actions are for the good of us all.

They don't mean to be evil. They think they are doing us a favor with every shuffling step towards totalitarianism. But that is how evil works in the real world. This is an evil that even lifelong Democrats like Kevin DuJan now recognize must be eradicated for the sake of the Republic. Progressive liberalism is a cancer, and it will try to infect this election as it seeks to spread over and envelope the nation.

We've already seen evidence of possible voter fraud in Florida, Utah, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina, all calculated to help incumbent Democrats loyal to the radical progressive movement fronted by Barack Obama.

Vigilance is necessary. Complacency is deadly. They will try to steal this election if they can to minimize their losses and keep their most devoted acolytes. Watch them carefully.

And make sure you vote for the good of the Republic, not the arrogance of the elites.

Paul Supporter Claims MoveOn.Org Activist Was a Threat

Let me use small words and short sentences so that the brain trust at firedoglake can't possibly twist this: the Rand Paul supporter that put his foot on a professional left wing activist outside the Paul-Conway debate was wrong to do so. Lauren Valle, the activist attempting to push her way through the crowd to get to Paul, had already been subdued and was on the ground.

But I will argue that Paul supporters had reason to believe that Valle was a potential threat based upon her earlier actions.

Police have summoned Tim Profitt to appear before a judge to face an assault charge after a scuffle was caught on tape outside the KET Studios in Lexington before Jack Conway and Rand Paul's debate Monday night.

Today, Profitt says he fears for his safety and has received numerous death threats after others have watched the incident on tape. He says his actions were misunderstood.

"I feared for his safety," Profitt explained.

In the video, it appears to some that 23-year-old Lauren Valle is wrestled down to the ground by Rand Paul Supporters and then stomped on.

But to Tim Profitt, the the situation is much different. He says what the video doesn't show is Valle's aggressive behavior. Profitt says she rushed Paul's car three different times; each time refusing to stop.

He says at the time, he didn't know what she was trying to do.

"We thought she was a danger; we didn't know what she was doing."

Profitt explained that he used his foot to try and keep her down because he can't bend over because of back problems. He also says police were alerted to watch her before Paul arrived because people in the crown recognized her as someone who may try and pull a stunt.

Anyone with a basic grasp of history knows that American leftists love to use women to do their dirty work. Obama friend and mentor Bill Ayers used women in his terrorist cell to plant bombs; his then-girlfriend was killed when killed in a Greenwich Village townhouse explosion when the bombs she was constructing to attack a dance at a nearby army base prematurely detonated. His wife, Bernadine Dohrn, is still the primary suspect in the bombing death of a California police officer.

And who could forget Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme (part of the Manson Family that Dohrn so admired she created forked finger salute in their honor celebrating Sharon Tate's murder) and her attempt to assassinate the President, or a similar attempt on President Ford's life by leftist Sara Jane Moore?

Erratic individuals, acting aggressively and attempting to push their way through the crowd can easily be viewed as a physical threat to a political candidate. I therefore find it quite plausible that the scenario at the Paul/Conway debate was such that Paul supporters thought subduing Valle was a rational response to a perceived threat.

Once she was down, however, and ceased to be a threat, it was wrong for Profitt to step on her shoulder in an attempt to pin her down. Others had the situation in hand.

Do his actions rise to the level of assault? I'll leave that for the legal system to determine.

I can tell you that any rational viewing of the videotape clearly shows he did not "stomp" on Valle's head, as the irrational members of the community-based reality trumpeted throughout the leftist blogosphere. He foot was clearly on her shoulder and back, and if he touched her head at all, it was incidental.

The Erik Scott Case: Update 7.2

So she got a few tickets. What’s the big deal? I refer, of course, to Samantha Sterner, Erik Scott’s girlfriend and arguably the most important witness in the upcoming civil trial regarding the metro police shooting of Scott on July 10, 2010. In Update 7 (the archive with all Erik Scott related posts and is available here.) I wrote of the fact that Sterner had recently received two traffic citations and several friends had been followed by the police for such distances that mere coincidence was not a credible explanation. The common factor was that all of the vehicles involved displayed a red, white and blue Erik Scott memorial ribbon on their rear surfaces.

Since that post, Sterner has received a third ticket. Bill Scott’s more detailed account of these recent developments can be found here. In brief, Sterner has received three tickets, two by Henderson officers, one by a Metro officer near her workplace, and as I mentioned in Update 7, others have been harassed--there is no other word for it--as well. So what’s the big deal? Lots of people get tickets, right?

That, precisely, is the big deal. We--society--lend the police an important and uniquely destructive power: The power to make arrests. But I’ve never been arrested! If you’ve ever received a traffic ticket, you have, in fact, been arrested.

An arrest occurs when a person is stopped and detained by the police and a reasonable person would believe that they were not free to go. An officer does not have to say the magic words--”You are under arrest”--in order for an arrest to occur.

With this in mind, consider the circumstances of a traffic stop. Virtually all legitimate traffic stops occur because officers have probable cause, facts and circumstances that would lead a reasonable police officer to believe that a crime has been committed and that a specific person has committed it. In other words, an officer sees a citizen running a stop sign, or tracks a citizen on radar exceeding the speed limit. He knows a crime has been committed and that the person he observed committed it, so he stops them and they are not, until he is done, free to go. They are under arrest.

If they’re arrested, why don’t the police take them to jail? Considering the sheer number of traffic tickets issued, it would be impractical, so almost everyone issued a citation is allowed to go on their way after signing a promise to appear in court, or otherwise take care of the citation before the court date. An officer can, if he believes it’s warranted, take a traffic violator into custody--remember, every traffic citation is an arrest--but he must be able to explain why, unlike with 98+% of all traffic violators, it was necessary.

Once again, what’s the big deal? Competent, honest police officers and agencies know it’s a very big deal indeed. For most of the population, traffic stops are the only personal contact they’ll ever have--apart from making a report of a crime--with their police. The police get only one chance to make a good impression with most of the public. If a citizen is ill-treated, that cancer will spread to everyone with whom they speak, and fair or not, most people are willing to believe the worst about the police.

Courtesy and professionalism, particularly in traffic stops, is considered so important in competent agencies that it is taught not only in basic training, but continually reinforced throughout an officer’s career. As a line supervisor and a field training officer (an experienced officer teaching, one-on-one, new officers on the street) I always told my officers to treat every citizen they met as they would want any officer to treat their mother or wife, a sort of policeman's Golden Rule. This attitude is the norm in professional agencies, as is a supervisor’s dressing down when officers forget or, God help them, become what competent police call “badge heavy,” taking themselves and their authority too seriously, even abusing it.

Norms for citations are established, formal and informal, in every agency. The public often thinks that officers have a quota, that they are required to write a given number of citations each month. While this is possible, reality is, for most agencies, much more mundane. Think about the last time you drove to a grocery store. How many traffic violations did you see? Now imagine that you’re a shift supervisor. If one of your officers hasn’t written a single traffic citation in three weeks, wouldn’t you wonder if he was actually awake on patrol? Wouldn’t you encourage him to pay greater attention to this aspect of his duties?

Even so, officers are expected to show good judgement in issuing citations (and all that they do). Anyone writing tickets for exceeding the speed limit by three to five MPH would be rightfully accused of writing “chickenshit” tickets, tickets within the margin of error, tickets that can be handed out like candy at any minute of the day to citizens who have no intention of violating the law. Who has not found themselves inadvertently traveling five or so MPH above or below the speed limit? The point is that officers should be issuing traffic citations only for substantive violations. It hurts the police and respect for the law in general if the police issue citations to people who are doing their best to obey the law. It’s unprofessional and stupid, for as much as the people need the police, the police need the support and good will of the people even more.

Professional officers generally won’t write chickenshit tickets, including a ticket for a red light run unless the light turned red before the car actually entered the plane of the intersection. They’ll write “red” lights, but not “pink” lights, because they know that sometimes people make honest mistakes, but if a pink light run, for example, resulted in an accident, that’s a different matter. Professionals know that understanding and acting upon common sense and human nature not only does not hurt their productivity, but ensures that few citizens will contest their citations. During my last stint on the street, I wrote more citations in a single year than an entire traffic division, yet I would never write a speeding ticket unless the driver was traveling 13 or more MPH over the limit. Who could reasonably argue that they did not know they were traveling 38+ in a 25 zone? My conviction rate was 100% because I never wrote a chickenshit ticket and was unfailingly polite and kind to drivers. Professional officers call it “selling the ticket.” At least 80% of all drivers thanked me when our contact was over. This too is common for professional officers. I also wrote far more warning citations than most. I received nearly 100% thanks for those.

As with far too much in the Erik Scott case, this behavior by the officers of two cooperating police agencies goes beyond mere coincidence. It is unprofessional. It is badge heavy; it is destructive to the community and to the officers and their agencies. Oh, and let's not forget that tampering with witnesses (Sterner will be a witness in the upcoming civil trial and the Police know this) is unethical and a crime. But beyond all of that, which is bad enough, it is cruel, inhumane and unworthy. Professional police officers pride themselves on being the guardians of the weak and helpless, on protecting those who need protection and on helping those who need help. At their best, they embody warrior virtues and honor, as old fashioned as that is, and as politically incorrect as such values may be, even the most ardent liberal discovers the value and necessity of those simple virtues when someone is breaking in their front door at 0300.

Here is what is known as this is written: Sterner’s traffic record has apparently been clear for years, yet in roughly two weeks she has been cited twice for failing to clear an intersection before a red light (which sounds like an incredibly lame pink light situation) and once for speeding approximately five MPH over the limit. In each case, she was reportedly merely keeping up with the flow of surrounding traffic, traffic which was also committing the same “violations” all around her. If we assume that all of this is correct, these are, at best, classic chickenshit tickets, ignoring who Sterner is and ignoring what has happened to her and what is happening to her. At worst, they are blatant, dishonorable harassment and cruelty.

In this case we have a young woman who experienced the unimaginable horror of seeing the man she knew and loved for years shot and killed within inches of her, shot and killed by the police. A honorable man (or woman) would want to ensure that such a woman was protected and kept safe from harm, was given time to heal and to build a new life, was not forced, inadvertently or purposely, to relive the horror. What kind of man smells vulnerability and exploits it? What kind of man takes pleasure in the misery of others, to say nothing of purposely causing such misery? Certainly not one who should be entrusted by the public with a badge. One of my past supervisors proposed a wonderful standard for police behavior: “If your mother would be ashamed of it, don’t do it.” God help the mother who would be proud of what these officers are doing.

Here is what should happen in a professional, honorable police agency, even if the officers involved acted completely without malice, having no idea who Sterner was, even if the citations are completely legitimate. Appearances matter to professional agencies and these citations, this behavior is plainly awful and harmful.

(1) Sterner and anyone involved in the case should be, absent an absolutely unavoidable necessity of police involvement, off limits to officers. They should leave her alone, not only because it’s the right thing to do, not only because it’s what honorable men and women do, but because such petty, cruel harassment is cumulative. It will harm the community and the police. Likewise, it's not the business of the police to care about the content of bumper stickers. Their oath to uphold and defend the Constitution covers this.

(2) Any supervisor receiving such citations from officers should invalidate them, immediately, for all of the reasons I’ve noted and because it is minimum professional supervisory practice. They should take all necessary disciplinary and corrective actions.

(3) Any higher ranking officer learning that such tickets were being written and such unprofessional harassment was taking place, and that first line supervisors were doing nothing should take appropriate action against all involved, which should include invalidating all tickets.

(4) The heads of the two agencies involved should immediately see that this harassment is stopped, that those involved are disciplined, and that it never, every happens again to anyone. The chief or sheriff of any professional agency should be horrified at the public relations damage of such cruel, degrading behavior on the part of their officers. They should take all necessary disciplinary and corrective actions.

(5) The prosecutors involved should immediately dismiss all citations and make it clear that they will cause outside state and federal investigations to occur if the behavior does not immediately cease.

(6) Should none of this happen, should the entire criminal justice system in Las Vegas be so hopelessly corrupt, any judge before whom these tickets come should dismiss them with prejudice and make it clear that the judiciary will not countenance any such behavior in the future.

There is no excuse. There is no explanation. The police are doing lasting damage to themselves and their community, damage that will have tragic consequences.

UPDATES AND CORRECTIONS:

It appears that it was Metro Det. Jensen, not Det. Calos, who testified that the bullet that struck Erik Scott in the thigh also struck the Ruger pistol supposedly concealed in his pocket. Should this be the case, as it now appears to be, I sincerely regret the inadvertent error and make correction here. There is no doubt, however, that the Police through their detectives, did present this testimony.

There also appears to be conflicting information relating to the existence of Police photographs depicting Erik Scott’s cell phone and .45 handgun in a single photograph. However, there seems to be little or no doubt that those two items did not appear together in the crime scene diagram that did depict the position of the .45. It was this diagram that Det. Calos explained had no position for the Blackberry because he picked it up, apparently preventing its accurate measurement and diagramming.

In previous updates, I have referred to Metro Officer “Start.” I am told, reliably, I believe, that the correct spelling of his last name is “Stark,” and have made those corrections in Update 7. This error was based on the incorrect spelling of his last name in local media, and I regret the inadvertent error. Should I still be in error, I welcome contact from Off. Stark in order to make the appropriate correction.

A commenter wondered if it was possible that Erik Scott carried his wallet, which his family described as very thick, and a Ruger .380 pistol in his right front pocket. While this is potentially physically possible, it is unlikely. It is unlikely first because it would be ridiculously uncomfortable. It is also unlikely because it would be tactically self-defeating. The handgun would be almost impossible to draw if necessary and would be prone to accidental discharge while being drawn. It would contradict the purpose and necessary utility of carrying a concealed handgun. Erik Scott was, by all accounts, more than tactically aware enough to avoid this. It is also unlikely because the best information available strongly suggests that he was not carrying that handgun at all.

LAST WORD:

One of the greatest difficulties and frustrations in this case is not being able to write with complete and accurate information. Even videotape and transcripts from the Inquest are far from accurate and complete--more than likely on purpose--and the Police are not releasing any additional, clarifying information to the media, and certainly not to a little known blogger in a distant state. One cannot expect such information from the Scott family either as their lawyers, as would any good lawyer, will certainly keep what they know under wraps until they are ready to use it in a civil trial.

As always, our goal is to provide analysis and background information that will help the public to better understand what has happened and what may be happening. As I have never been shy about saying, any theory or analysis is limited by that lack of complete factual information and may very well be incorrect in ways small or great. I have not, do not and will not present such analysis or theorizing as fact, and I will do my best to make corrections whenever better information becomes available. Metro officers or others having pertinent information are welcome to comment or to contact us directly, and we always appreciate the comments and insights of our astute readers.

A commenter, responding to Update 7, suggested that the theory of the case outlined therein was a “paranoid fantasy.” Tragically, I fear he is mistaken because not only is the theory possible, it’s probable. There are no known facts relating to time, people or any other variable that would invalidate it, and there are far too many unusual, difficult to explain actions and omissions on the part of the Police and other authorities that are well illuminated and explained by the theory. Occam’s Razor applies: The simplest, most direct explanation is likely to be correct. Perhaps additional facts will emerge that will allow portions or all of the theory to be altered, deconstructed or confirmed, but it is also likely that the entire truth will never be known. This leaves all of us, citizens in a free society, the employers of all of our elected officials and public servants, to ponder, discuss, and theorize in the hope that justice will be done, and that such tragedies never again occur. This, ultimately, is our hope and potential service, a service far from paranoia or fantasy.

Racial Slur of the Week

Mr. Obama is at it again. Only last week we learned that we're all too fearful and stupid to understand evidence and argument and science, and that we're going to be engaged in "hand to hand combat" with Democrats after the election. But Mr. Obama redeemed himself on Monday by inviting Republicans along on the Obama Magic Bus, with one proviso: We have to ride in the back.

Hope, change, progress, lunatic racial slurs...it's a brave new world.

Rand Paul Support Stomped Outside Paul/Conway Debate

The media and leftist blogosphere are all over the story of a moveon.org supporter that attempted to approach Rand Paul while wearing an obvious disguise. The young lady was assaulted, and charges should be pressed against her assailants.

At the same time, at the same rally, a Democrat supporting Jack Conway viciously stomped on the foot of a Rand Paul supporter who had recently gone through foot surgery, tearing open the incision.

The simple fact is that supporters on both sides acted like animals outside this debate, and it is disgusting to watch the media and leftist blogosphere provide such one-side coverage.

Dems Literally In Bed With Terrorists?

Oh Harry, is there anything else you can do to torpedo your campaign?

An aide to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid repeatedly lied to federal immigration and FBI agents and submitted false federal documents to the Department of Homeland Security to cover up her illegal seven-year marriage to a Lebanese national who was the subject of an Oklahoma City Joint Terror Task Force investigation, FoxNews.com has learned.

Diana Tejada, Reid's Hispanic Press Secretary, admitted to receiving payment for "some of her expenses" in exchange for fraudulently marrying Bassam Mahmoud Tarhini in 2003, strictly so he could obtain permanent U.S. residency, according to court documents.

She only fraudulently married him, so I guess the headline saying that this Democrat was in bed with terrorists is something of a cheap shot. I should have said that she was simply will to take money from a terrorism suspect in order to hide her willingness to take payments to compromise national security.

Tejada—a mouthpeice for La Raza as well&mdash:was only released from Reid's campaign last week, apparently when the Senate Majority Leader was alerted that Fox News was going to expose her and embarrass the campaign.

North Carolina May Add Governors' Wing to Central Prison

Or at least they may need to consider it, if both the current and former governors are as corrupt as some suspect:

Governor Beverly Perdue made her first public appearance Monday following Friday afternoon's announcement that federal investigators are probing her 2008 election campaign.

At a gathering of municipal government leaders Monday morning, she knew she'd face questions, but had little to say.

"It's an ongoing investigation. It would really be inappropriate for me to make any comment on this at all. I hope to be able to do that later, but right now I can't say anything," she told ABC11.

The State Board of Elections fined Perdue's campaign $30,000 in August for failing to report in a timely fashion private flights. A majority of the board found no deliberate effort to break the law.

And North Carolina's State Bureau of Investigation was already investigating Perdue after Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby said he had lingering questions about her campaign's airplane flights...

[snip]

While the feds aren't talking about the investigation, some speculate it may reach back to their ongoing investigation of former governor Mike Easley.

Ruffin Poole, a former top level aide to Easley, pleaded guilty in April to income tax evasion in a plea deal with federal prosecutors that included his cooperation.

The income tax charge was related to money Poole made from an investment with Lanny Wilson - one of the backers of a Carteret County development where Easley bought a lot at a heavily discounted price.

Now, North Carolina political watchdog Joe Sinsheimer speculates the feds could be focused on Perdue's relationship with Wilson - who was her campaign finance chairman.

North Carolina's Democrat Party has been murderously corrupt since Reconstruction, and so I don't expect either governor to do time. Their minions will take the fall, and the cycle will continue.

So Little Left To Say

I scanned through the news articles and blog entries posted on Memeorandum this morning and realized that I really don't have a lot to add to the painfully obvious.

Rabid liberals are still backing one of the most horrific human beings in Congress simply because he is a progressive. Another Democrat however, seems to be vying for the dishonor.

NPR is still getting flamed for their purge of Juan Williams.

Days from the midterm elections, Democrats are still making promises of sunshine and unicorns, even as 60 Minutes slips and admits that the real unemployment rate is so much worse than any leftist will admit. Republicans are still confidently predicting a November 2 route, while no doubt planning continues in the RNC to cut the assumed rise of the Tea Party Caucus on Capitol Hill. This will set up a nice split between the rising power of the fiscally-focused Tea Party and socially conservative Republicans in 2012, giving the trainwreck Democrats a chance of regaining power and re-electing Obama in 2012, at which point I think I'll buy a nice bunker somewhere.

Of course, I haven't had my coffee and it's Monday, so I could be wrong.

The Erik Scott Case, Update 7: Competence vs. Coverup

Update 6 (The Confederate Yankee Erik Scott archive with all previous articles and updates can be found here) revealed the irregular, arguably illegal behavior of the Clark County Public Administrator’s Office and the Metro Police in searching Erik Scott’s home and taking property from it after he had been shot and killed by Metro officers. That, as well as the most complete theory of what actually happened posited to date, will be revisited and explained shortly. It will be worthwhile to visit Bill Scott’s most recent post on the Erik Scott Memorial site. That post may be found here.

But first, it may be useful to understand what should happen following an officer involved shooting. It’s not like TV where independent crime investigation units staffed by young, attractive, brilliant technician/cops are housed in state of the art, gleaming glass and steel facilities with only the best and most recent equipment, and where their stunning, microscopic discoveries lead to dramatic confessions during confrontations with suspects.

PROCEDURES; THE REAL DEAL:

There is no situation requiring more adherence to procedure and more attention to detail than the investigation of an officer involved shooting. Television is correct in a few details. Detectives and crime scene investigators tend to be people who are very good at paying attention to the smallest detail. They tend to be meticulous, patient people, people who take their time to be sure that nothing is rushed or overlooked, people who are unable to leave anything unexplained. Police officers tend to be action oriented. They like to deal with situations quickly and correctly, tie them up into a neat package and move on to the next problem. Detectives and crime scene investigators exist, in part, to temper that tendency and to slow things down when necessary.

Generally, the moment an officer involved shooting has occurred, after the officers present have called in the shooting, called for medical help, rendered medical assistance to anyone injured, thoroughly searched and disarmed anyone who poses a potential danger, they must be immediately relieved of any further duties by a first line supervisor (usually a shift sergeant) or higher ranking officer (such as a lieutenant or captain). This is absolutely vital to prevent even the appearance of impropriety and to ensure that the investigation is conducted without the contamination of self-interest. Under no circumstance can an officer involved in a shooting, in even the most minor way, be allowed to participate in the aftermath of and/or the investigation of that shooting. Should this vital step not be taken, it is often an indicator of corruption.

The next step is for officers directed by that supervisor (and perhaps the supervisor himself) to protect and preserve the crime scene and to obtain medical treatment for anyone who needs it while simultaneously ensuring the minimum contamination of the scene. This means that he tells arriving officers and medical personnel where they can and can’t stand or walk and what they can and can’t touch. Simultaneously, he must use uninvolved officers to establish a secure perimeter around the scene to ensure no inadvertent or intentional contamination.

The supervisor--and other higher ranking officers--must never lose sight of the possibility that the officer or officers involved have made a mistake, a mistake that could constitute a crime. However, by paying strict attention to procedures and the law, he will ensure that due process is rendered to all, all evidence will be preserved and that the evidence will tell the story. The bodies of anyone shot are also evidence, particularly if they die, and officers must accompany them to medical and/or coroner facilities to take any additional potential evidence into custody including such things as bullets removed from their bodies as well as to ensure that the evidence--the bodies--are properly handled and securely stored.

The supervisor must also immediately locate and identify any potential witnesses, and to the greatest degree possible, segregate them to prevent contamination of their statements. He must also locate and identify any other forms of evidence such as video or audio tapes (including from all possible police sources) and immediately secure them, maintaining an unbroken chain of evidence. When this is not done, or when there is any possibility of tampering, it is often an indicator of corruption. Only when the detectives responsible for the case arrive will he relinquish command of the scene, turning it over to them, but first, he’ll brief them on everything known and all that he has done.

As soon as possible, the firearms and spare magazines of all involved officers must be taken into evidence and replacement firearms and magazines given to the officers. This is true even if an officer did not fire a shot. Police officers are issued approved ammunition and given only enough to fill their magazines and weapons. Replacing ammunition from other sources is commonly grounds for severe discipline. Most officers carry two spare magazines. If their magazines have a capacity of 15 rounds, an officer will be issued 46 rounds of ammunition: 15 per magazine and one for the chamber of his weapon. Whenever an officer fires their weapon, every bullet and every expended brass casing must be precisely documented and accounted for, and this includes rounds remaining in an officer’s weapon and magazines. If, for example, three casings are found but five rounds are missing from the officer’s weapon, there is much to be explained and investigated. It is assumed that every officer present fired until it can be proved otherwise. When all of this is not done, it is often an indicator of corruption.

If a related person, vehicle or residence must be searched, most agencies will obtain warrants rather than relying on exceptions to the warrant requirement, verbal consent or signed permission forms. This takes time, but is commonly done to avoid arguments over the admissibility of evidence and to avoid the problem of people who initially gave permission later claiming that they were coerced or were so in shock that the police took advantage of them and they didn’t realize what they were doing. In professional agencies, this is written into procedure. A properly written and obtained warrant essentially eliminates such problems or makes the actions of the police more easily defensible. When this is not done, it is often an indicator of corruption.

When crime scene technicians arrive, they are briefed by the detectives and meticulously identify and record each and every item that could possibly be of value as evidence. Not only are items precisely measured and diagrammed in relation to fixed objects that will be unlikely to be moved (or if they are moved, their positions can be reestablished), they are photographed from many angles before they are touched or moved, and when they are touched, they are immediately placed in a proper container and immediately entered into evidence. The person actually touching an item normally fills out a standard evidence form that particularly describes the item, the time it was collected and the place, as well as any number or other identifier assigned by technicians which includes the related case number (all police activities that require a report or the handling of any kind of property are assigned a unique, sequential case number with the current year being the usual prefix number). Similar documents are attached to each container. Each and every person who actually handles any piece of evidence, in or out of its container, must be recorded on the appropriate evidence custody forms which include the date and time, and the amount of time they had the item. Any breaks in this chain of evidence can render the evidence inadmissible in court and jeopardize the case. Samples of all liquids, blood, sperm, saliva, etc. are also taken after they are first recorded. If something absolutely must be moved for purposes of safety, or in the case of someone being rushed to a hospital, medical treatment, their exact position is marked--the infamous chalk outline--and/or photographed before they are moved. When all of this is not done, it is often an indicator of corruption.

Entire scenes are commonly guarded and preserved for days until detectives are absolutely sure, through examination of witnesses and other evidence, that nothing has been overlooked or inadvertently left undiscovered. Every technician handling evidence from such crime scenes is likewise meticulous, including medical examiners. In police involved shootings, determining and recording entry and exit wounds, bullet tracks, gunpowder residue (which indicate the distance of objects from the muzzle of a weapon when it was fired), and other related issues is vitally important. Likewise, precise identification of the weapon that fired each recovered bullet is mandatory. The police must be able to tell exactly who fired each bullet, where the ejected casing came to rest, exactly where they stood in relation to targets engaged, exactly what each bullet hit and where it came to rest. All of this must be reproduced in digital recreations. When all of this is not done, it is often an indicator of corruption.

It is here that the title of this update, Competence vs. Coverup, comes into play. Police work is a profession where each individual’s ability and performance are evaluated continually through each working day, not only by supervisors, but by each officer’s peers. Because lives are at stake, every competent, honest officer is careful to cultivate a reputation for competence and integrity. Anything less is not only dangerous, but likely to get them fired. In honest agencies, an officer’s greatest asset is his reputation for integrity. If his word is suspect, he’s essentially useless. Likewise, police agencies go to great lengths to avoid even the appearance of organizational incompetence. The potential consequences, in civil and criminal sanctions, of doing otherwise are real and great. When all of the procedures outlined here, and more, and not done properly, are done poorly or are omitted, it is so either because of incompetence, corruption or a mixture of the two.

This is why the Erik Scott case is so unusual. In many ways, virtually every public agency involved has taken unusual, difficult to understand and explain actions and apparently made fundamental, foolish, careless, inexplicable mistakes, mistakes that call into question their basic competence. Normally, the police and related agencies would regard this state of affairs with justified horror. Normally. The only exception commonly occurs when the potential consequences of appearing and/or being incompetent pale in comparison to the alternative. Only then will police officers and agencies commit and accept gross incompetence rather than admit the truth. Such behavior is always a potential indicator of a coverup. A coverup is always a potential indicator of criminal conspiracy on the part of the police and related authorities.

A THEORY OF THE CASE:

Early in the investigation of any incident, detectives develop a theory of the case. They try to understand exactly how and why it happened as a means of gaining a better picture of who did it and why. In a police involved shooting, identities and motives usually aren’t in question, but they still need to develop a working theory, a theory that they must continually alter and update as new evidence becomes available. If the police stick to a theory that is not supported by the evidence, this too is a potentially strong indicator of incompetence or of a coverup.

Please keep in mind, gentle reader, that I am supportive of the police because I understand through hard won experience exactly how difficult, dangerous and absolutely vital is the job. I reflexively give the police the benefit of the doubt as long as they are acting within the boundaries of the reasonable exercise of their professional authority and discretion. I differ from most citizens in that I know what those boundaries are and what the reasonable exercise of professional discretion is. I also know how and why things go wrong, how agencies become corrupt, gradually, little by little over time, and why that kind of corruption is deadly dangerous, not only for police officers, but for communities and society.

It is therefore difficult to write this current theory of the case, a theory that, like all such theories, may be incorrect in ways small or great. It’s a theory that is certainly liable to change when more and more accurate information becomes available. I do not present it as absolute truth, but as a reasonable, working theory that fits the facts as they are currently known. Also keep in mind that many of the actions and thought processes I ascribe to those involved can and do occur more or less simultaneously, in chaotic fashion, and within scant seconds or minutes of a shooting, therefore it is difficult to determine with certainty if thought A preceded or followed thought B which might or might not have precipitated action C, etc. It’s often difficult or impossible even for those who lived it. Read on; decide for yourself.

THE IDENTIFICATION:

Within mere seconds--as few as two--of recognizing Erik Scott as the man they were seeking, Officers Mosher, Stark and Mendiola began firing seven bullets into him, bullets that would mortally wound him. As the smoke cleared, the officers, still in a state of shock, their pulses pounding, their minds racing, began, as all officers do in such situations, to second guess themselves, to try to confirm that what they believed happened actually did happen as they perceived it. They had good reason to second guess themselves. Perhaps Off. Mosher thought he saw something in Scott’s hand, or more likely, the moment Scott’s arms began to move in response to frenzied, shouted conflicting commands, commands coming from three officers and two directions, he fired. He fired too soon with too little input. Officers Stark and Mendiola fired reflexively. Even if a shooting is absolutely, without question justified, shooting a man in the back, particularly if he is already face down on the ground, is a moral, public relations disaster. This would occur to them and the possible consequences, like every other image chaotically flashing through their minds, would be horrifying.

THE AFTERMATH (Circa 20 Seconds After Meeting Scott):

No doubt the three officers began to quickly ask each other what happened. Stark and Mendiola, if they had any common sense, quickly realized that Mosher’s shooting of Scott was iffy at best. It would be impossible to describe their state of mind to anyone who has not experienced a similar situation. “Horror stricken” is inadequate, but as good a description as any. As they became aware of the many bystanders who were beginning to pick themselves up off the ground or coming out from behind whatever cover they could find as the Police opened up--as they opened up--their anxiety would only have increased at the realization of how many citizens were in their direct line of fire. Only the happy discovery that they apparently, somehow miraculously avoided shooting any of them would have given even temporary relief, yet the nagging realization that they hadn’t even thought of a proper backstop before firing would weigh heavily on them as shock after shock, terrible possibility after terrible possibility flashed through their racing minds.

Despite the presence of higher ranking officers--a partial radio transcript suggests that a watch commander was there (normally at least a lieutenant or captain), and there would certainly be a variety of first line supervisors present, Mosher began issuing orders and took command of the scene. At the Inquest he testified that he did so because he was the senior officer at the scene. It is currently unknown how long this foolish state of affairs was allowed to continue, but the officers would have certainly begun to look for evidence and Off. Mosher almost immediately handcuffed Scott and would testify that as he handcuffed him, he believed him to be dead. However, Off. Mosher was still so in shock that he didn’t think to search him, and none of them thought to check his medical condition, not even bothering to try to find a pulse. Adrenaline will do that to you.

THE GUN PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS:

Mosher almost certainly began to frantically look for a gun on the ground, but found only, to his horror, a cell phone. He found only Scott’s cell phone because that was all that was there immediately after the shooting. There was no gun on the ground. For Off. Mosher, and Officers Stark and Mendiola, the realization that they shot a man who posed no imminent threat, who was brandishing only a cell phone, must have been the mother of all sinking feelings.

The ambulance was already in the area, staging (standing off, waiting for the officers to call--common when there is potential danger)---their records seem to indicate (time frames between agencies and information sources are still anything but synchronized) that they arrived at about the time the first shots were fired--and was able to pick up Scott and quickly leave. By the time the Officer’s frantic search was concluded and they were certain no gun was present, it was too late for an immediate solution to their nightmare. Scott, and his gun--if he actually had one; they had no way to be sure--were already on the way to the hospital. There could be no possible explanation for stopping or calling it back, even for a police department that recognized few, if any, restraints. By now, they had certainly consciously realized that they had not searched Scott, a necessity that is drummed into every officer at the most basic levels of training. This too would only contribute to their continuing shock and confusion.

Imagine fireman/medic Chris Thorpe’s surprise when he discovered Scott’s handgun, still holstered, and a spare magazine, as the ambulance, siren wailing and lights flashing, sped to the hospital. Thorpe’s written report would later strangely record words more or less identical to this: “weapon found to right pocket,” and “found clip to left pocket.” Thorpe turned these items over to the police officer--identity unknown--accompanying him in the ambulance.

Back at the scene of the shooting, detectives still had not arrived and would not arrive for about 45 minutes after the last shot was fired, but higher ranking officers were on the scene. Recognizing the suspicious nature of the shooting as any competent police supervisor or manager surely would, decisions had to be made and quickly. Conduct an honest investigation, even if the officers involved would likely suffer, or enter into a criminal conspiracy and coverup? Immediately relieve and suspend Mosher and the others and conduct a professional investigation or work with them to cover up mistakes?

It took no time at all to make the decision, even though plenty of time was available. Scott’s Kimber .45 which had been discovered on his body in the ambulance, would be quickly returned to the scene and stealthily positioned. It had to be that particular gun and holster; no other would do. Too many Costco employees had already seen it and might be able to identify it, and there may have been even more about whom the police did not yet know. Worse, some witnesses might be able to say that another gun was not the gun they saw Scott carrying. There was just no way to be certain.

But what about the fireman? He couldn’t be trusted to “forget” that he found a gun--the ambulance driver probably knew about it too--it was going to turn up, if not in the fireman’s official run report, certainly in around-the-ambulance-barn and around-the-emergency-room gossip, but he could probably be “convinced” to be imprecise in describing it and the situation. Salvation came with the discovery in Scott’s wallet of seven blue cards (firearm registration cards for concealed carry, required for each gun a licensee intends to possibly carry in Nevada), including a blue card for a Ruger .380 pistol. Second problem solved. This would become the non-specific, unspecified “weapon” and magazine the fireman “found” “to” Scott’s unspecified pockets.

Why this particular weapon when the Police had seven, possibly more, from which to choose? Because Scott was already carrying what would be considered a primary defensive handgun requiring a holster, he would certainly not carry another weapon of similar size--virtually no one would--particularly since his only means of concealment was a shirt. Remember that the Police understand what it means to carry concealed weapons in a hot climate. The weapon would have to fit easily into a normally sized pants pocket. In addition, a smaller gun might be more plausibly overlooked, making the Police look at least somewhat less incompetent. The Ruger fit these requirements

SEARCH PROBLEMS AND SOME DESPERATELY CLUMSY SOLUTIONS:

Panic again set in; where was the Ruger? The police quickly obtained a written permission to search Samantha Sterner’s car--the car in which she and Scott drove to the Costco, a car and its contents completely unrelated to events--but apparently seized nothing. They did not find the Ruger; it was not in the car. That would have made things so much neater and easier. One possibility remained: Scott’s home. The Ruger had to be at Scott’s home; if it wasn’t, everything could fall apart.

But there was a serious problem: The Police knew that Scott’s home had nothing to do with the events at the Costco and that they had no legitimate reason or authority to search it. No judge in his right mind would issue a search warrant for a fishing expedition. The only alternative would be to commit blatant perjury on a signed affidavit in order to trick a judge into authorizing a warrant. This would leave far too many literal and figurative fingerprints.

The solution? There is in Nevada an office that can, under some circumstances, take possession of homes and their contents. The Police involved the Public Administrator’s Office (links relating to this agency are available in Update 6 as is a complete analysis of their involvement), enlisting the help of Clark County Deputy PA Steve Grodin. But by this time, Sterner learned that Scott was dead, and her cooperation ended. Grodin and the Police knew that she was the joint tenant of Scott’s home, that with Scott dead, she had sole control of the home, but she refused them entrance.

This too was a major problem. The Public Administrator can’t take possession of a home if somewhere who lives there is alive and/or available. The clumsy, desperate solution was to ignore Sterner and pretend that no one was able to secure the home, thus involving the PA’s office. Frantic, repeated calls were made to Kevin Scott, Erik’s younger brother who lives out of state, to secure his permission to enter despite the irrefutable fact that he had no legal standing to give such permission. Kevin, unaware of Nevada law on the topic, nonetheless refused them and some six hours after the shooting, Grodin and at least one police officer used a locksmith to enter. They searched Erik’s home, finding and taking the Ruger and other items, items that they hoped might provide a plausible cover for being there in the first place. Of course, the Ruger would not, could not, appear on police evidence forms, nor could anything else taken from the home during an obviously illegal search. Grodin solved that problem by taking, and returning some, but not all, of the property. The property was not logged into the Police evidence system because that would have established irrefutable evidence of their improper, illegal search and seizure.

In the meantime, detectives arrived and took over the scene. At some point, lead Detective Peter Calos simply plucked Scott’s Blackberry from the ground, eliminating any possibility of that cell phone appearing in a photograph or a diagram.

Witnesses were interviewed and their statements were subtly--perhaps not so subtly--nudged in the right directions. Witnesses not sure of what they saw were encouraged to believe that Scott had a gun and pointed it at the Police, or at the very least, nothing was done to encourage them to clarify potentially mistaken assumptions, no matter how ill conceived. Witnesses whose recollections weren’t convenient or who could not be nudged were dismissed and would not be asked to testify at the Inquest. Even so, no witness would testify to seeing a gun and a cell phone on the ground, only a gun or something that might have been a gun or something that might have been in some way related to a gun.

Higher ups in agencies that would have to be involved in the case were either notified of what was expected of them, or perhaps no such notification was necessary in a city where police shootings are so common and where officer culpability is so rare as to make a mockery of probability. Everyone knows what’s happening but they don’t really want to know what’s happening, and plausible deniability is preserved (at least for higher ranking officers). Perhaps everyone simply followed what had become, over the years, informal, normal procedure for such matters. No real decisions needed to be made. The long established, off the books procedure for “handling” officer involved shootings clicked comfortably into place. Everyone knew their role and played it. At the Inquest, Officers and others would not commit blatant perjury, but their testimony would be partial, imprecise, fuzzy on details, non-specific and would not focus on what the shooters knew, what actually happened and the aftermath, but would focus on attacking Erik Scott. This case and all potential danger would, as it always had in the past, end with the Inquest. All everyone needed to do was hang together and support the official version, without being too specific, through the Inquest and everyone could relax, just as they always had. But this time, this shooting, the Police shot the wrong man. They enraged the wrong family, a military family, a family that runs toward the sound of gunfire, not away from it. This time, the case could not, would not be buried with the victim. The Police had no reason to suspect that this bad fortune would befall them. They would soon, to their growing discomfort and amazement, discover that it did.

A WORKING THEORY OF THE CASE: SUPPORTING EVIDENCE

(1) NEW SHOOTING INFORMATION: During his inquest testimony, Off. Mosher confirmed that he was caught off guard by Scott’s sudden appearance, the sudden appearance of a man and his girlfriend simply walking calmly out of the store. He testified that he was surprised because he was waiting for his superiors to come up with a tactical plan. This confirms our past analysis of his level of awareness and preparedness; he and Stark and Mendiola were utterly surprised and acted out of panic despite having, by police standards, a long time to plan and prepare.

Since the last update, some of the mechanics of the shooting have become clearer. It now appears that it was Off. Mosher who failed to recognize Scott as he walked past him out the front doors of the Costco. Costco Security guard Shai Lierley, who had been following Scott throughout the store, speaking to a police dispatcher by cell phone, frantically pointed Scott out to Mosher who, with Stark and Mendiola, immediately drew and pointed their weapons at Scott and began to yell conflicting commands. Scott turned 180° toward the first Officer, Mosher, who yelled at him, turning his back to the parking lot. When Mosher opened fire approximately two seconds later, his backstop was not pillars, but a parking lot full of Costco shoppers who were leaving the building at the command of the Police. In fact, many shoppers--the number may never be known with certainty--were standing within feet of the shooting, actually surrounding the Officers and Scott and Sterner, and were diving to the ground, throwing their bodies in front and on top of loved ones, and ducking for whatever cover they could find, many after the fact, so rapidly did the shooting begin and end.

What remains something of a mystery, even with the digital recreation of the shooting presented in the Inquest, is the exact positions of Stark and Mendiola. Their testimony suggests that they really had no idea who fired the first two shots or why; they reflexively fired in response to those shots, not because they truly perceived Scott as a deadly, imminent threat requiring that they fire five rounds into his back and armpit as he fell, face down, to the ground. Within a few minutes of the last shot, they certainly understood the wisdom of testifying that Scott was a deadly threat and did so at the Inquest. The possibility remains that at least some of their rounds were fired, essentially straight down into his back as they stood over him. Even the Medical Examiner, responding to the few questions from the Scott family and their attorney that were read into the record, provided an imprecise, fuzzy accounting of the rounds fired, their impact and resting places and their tracks through Scott’s body, including the shot into Scott’s armpit which remains the least documented and understood round to strike Scott. All of these issues should, by the time of the inquest nearly two months after the shooting, have been clearly determined, measured, catalogued, solidified and recreated with no room for error or argument, yet these issues, issues that could conclusively indicate guilt or innocence, malice or misfortune, remain unclear. This speaks of incompetence on the part of not only the Police but of the Medical Examiner. These individuals and their respective agencies seem willing to appear incompetent, likely because the alternative is worse, much worse.

The assertion of Metro Police Captain Patrick Neville that no civilian was ever endangered by police fire because the officers used a pillar (as in "one") as a backstop is surprisingly clumsy and transparent. The “pillars” in the area are actually huge support structures, integral steel and concrete portions of the building that are faced by irregularly sized and embedded stone. Not only would they be completely incapable of absorbing bullets, they would be, as was surmised in past updates, incredibly efficient random ricochet generators. Considering the number of innocent citizens within feet of the paths of police bullets, any ricochet would have been virtually certain to cause injury, even death.

Why would a police captain, a member of the upper management of the agency, make a statement so obviously false and so easily proved false by nothing more than the use of the human eye? It would not be unreasonable to believe that he did so because the upper management of the agency knew exactly what had happened. They knew about and approved of the cover up. As they had for years, they participated in deflecting blame and diverting attention, expecting no backlash, no consequences for misleading the public. But ultimately they were willing to get involved in this incredible way because they believed they’d never be questioned, or they were willing to appear to be incompetent, to be thought to be liars, because the alternative was worse.

(2) THE VANISHING CELL PHONE: It’s not known exactly how Scott’s Blackberry came to be on the ground near his body. This too, incredibly, the Inquest failed to clearly explain or resolve, perhaps for good reason. By far the most obvious, likely explanation is that it was in Scott’s hand when he was shot. There are witness statements in support of this contention. It is likewise probable that it was this Off. Mosher saw and misinterpreted as a gun, if he saw anything at all in Scott’s hand. It was likely this, not a gun, that some witnesses saw and believed to be a gun because everything that they heard and thought they saw would lead most people to believe that a gun must have been present, particularly if they were encouraged to make that interpretation, but there can be no doubt that the Blackberry was there: The Police testified that it was there.

Lead Detective Peter Calos did something incredible, something that defies proper police procedure, something that no officer investigating the scene of an officer involved shooting should ever do. He testified that he picked up the phone, which must have been before its position was recorded and measured. Whether he told crime scene technicians that it was ever there is unknown, but by removing it, he obliterated any possibility of its ever being photographed in place. It did not appear on the digital reconstruction of the scene. The Prosecution, of course, did not question one of the most questionable actions thus far known in this case. But the best--as in incompetent or corrupt--part of Calos’ explanation for what any competent detective would classify as a boneheaded rookie cop mistake is that he picked up the phone to try to identify Scott.

All available evidence suggests that this is less than accurate and forthcoming. By the time Calos and his team arrived some 45 minutes after the shooting, Samantha Sterner had been identified and questioned. She absolutely identified Scott to the Police. The alternative possibility is that the Police waited some 45 minutes before trying to discover the identity of a man they shot and killed. Even if Sterner had never existed, Erik Scott’s wallet had been found in his right front pocket by EMT personnel and handed to the Police before the ambulance left Costco, and his identify thereby discovered. The Public Administrator’s office had been enlisted to enter and search Erik Scott’s home, all the while ignoring the wishes of Sterner, his joint tenant, refusing entry. There can be no reasonable doubt that the Police knew exactly who Erik Scott was within minutes of the dying echos of the last police gunshots.

Two possibilities remain: Calos, the lead detective directing the investigation of an officer involved shooting, mindlessly made a mistake that would have caused a rookie cop making a similar mistake to suffer a lengthy suspension or be fired. Or Calos needed to remove the cell phone from the scene--and the possibility of memories of that phone from witnesses--to make way for a missing object, an object that would replace the cell phone. The Police needed to clear the way for the one, and only one, object they desperately needed to be there: Erik Scott’s Kimber .45, the same gun Sterner knew Scott was carrying, the same gun seen by Costco employees and found on his body, still holstered, in the ambulance on its way to the hospital by fireman/medic Chris Thorpe. Thus was an experienced detective apparently willing to blatantly violate crime scene protocol, to tamper with evidence, to appear to be incompetent, because the alternative was worse.

(3) THE ABORTIVE BLACKBERRY SEARCH: The police did, for some time, try to crack the password on Scott’s Blackberry, even asking his relatives for help, but were apparently not able to gain access to its data. Like the search of Scott’s home outlined in Update 6, this is yet another improper, unjustified search attempt by the Police, another illegal fishing expedition. If this theory of the case is correct--Scott had the cell phone in his hand before being shot--that, and its position on the pavement relative to his body were important pieces of evidence, evidence that had to be painstakingly measured, documented and photographed. But Det. Calos destroyed the usefulness of the phone as evidence of the shooting when he tampered with the scene by removing it. Under no conceivable circumstance were its contents related to the shooting; they should have been of no interest to the Police. Scott was dead. He could not be charged with any crime. They knew exactly who he was. There were no grounds to search his Blackberry though the Police clearly tried. It should not be forgotten that there was one powerful, though secondary, motive for this and every other search: The desire to find something, anything to use to smear Scott after his death in a desperate, ex post facto (Latin: "After the fact") attempt to justify an unjustifiable shooting.

(4) THE MISSING GUN: There was no gun on the ground near where Scott lay because Scott did not have sufficient time to respond to multiple, conflicting commands. He did not have sufficient time to remove his inside the waistband holster and handgun before he was shot and fell, face down, to the pavement. His gun remained where it was, holstered inside the waistband of his pants, under his shirt, and Off. Mosher, in his frenzied haste to handcuff Scott, did not find it nor did any other officer. Fireman/medic Chris Thorpe did, in the ambulance, on the way to the hospital and turned it over to the officer accompanying him. There was more than sufficient time for the weapon to be returned to the scene and stealthily positioned for diagramming and photography.

But a serious problem remained: What about Chris Thorpe? Could he be relied upon to keep his mouth shut? To falsify official records, to commit multiple crimes, to participate in an ongoing criminal conspiracy? What about the ambulance driver? For whatever reason, this was obviously too large a risk. Thorpe found a gun (and a magazine which will be explored shortly), the gun the Police needed back at the scene of the shooting to make the Officer’s shooting of Scott even remotely justifiable. Without it a strong, perhaps overpowering, case could be made that three Metro officers shot and killed a man who posed no threat to them or anyone else. With it, the issue could at least be muddied and, as had so often been done in the past, things might, with time, be forgotten and buried. Thorpe found a gun and that fact couldn’t be buried. Actually, his discovery of a gun was absolutely necessary to the hastily arranged plan that followed, but what if Thorpe found a second gun? Not the gun that Off. Mosher testified that Scott pointed at him--that gun had to be returned to and placed at the scene (Note: Every action described in this theory fits comfortably within known time frames). It could never be acknowledged that Thorpe found the .45 on Scott’s body. But another gun, a gun that through incredible, virtually unbelievable incompetence the Officers did not find on the man who had allegedly posed a lethal danger to them seconds earlier despite having the presence of mind and time to handcuff him could be found. It had to be found.

Yet again, the police were willing to appear to be incompetent, dangerously incompetent, something every officer fears and will go to great lengths to avoid. Something that every agency loathes and will take extraordinary measures to avoid even the appearance of, because the alternative was worse.

(5) THE SEARCH OF THE CAR: Shortly after Scott’s shooting but before Sterner knew that he was dead (he wasn’t officially pronounced dead until a few minutes after he arrived at the hospital), the Police asked for and received Sterner's written permission to search her car which was in the Costco parking lot. Scott was never placed under arrest or suspected of committing any crime in which that car or its contents could have possibly played a part (a Dispatcher did suggest to responding officers the possibility that Scott might have been shoplifting or trespassing, but never actually said that he was, and no witness testified that he shoplifted or trespassed by refusing to leave the store), yet the Police felt the need to search Sterner’s car. It is not known whether they removed anything from the car. No official records were revealed to that effect during the Inquest, and nothing is known to be missing, though it is possible.

Why did they need to search Sterner’s car? A car that could only have been involved if struck by a Police bullet (it was not)? Return to the ambulance bearing a dead or dying Erik Scott to the hospital. His Kimber .45 and a spare magazine were found and turned over to the police. Probably at about the same time, at the scene of the shooting, the Police were examining the contents of Scott’s wallet. In that freshly blood stained wallet, with his concealed carry permit, were seven “blue cards,” gun registration cards required by Nevada law, including one so new it had not yet been laminated, a blue card for a recently purchased Ruger .380 pistol.

Problem solved! The Police would still look incompetent for failing to find a gun on such a “dangerous” man, but perhaps a little less incompetent considering a small pistol like the Ruger. Thorpe could still be allowed to have found a pistol and magazine and put that fact in his report, but he’d have to be pretty fuzzy about the details. Firemen and medics, like police officers, must be exact in their reports. Details are important and particularly important when documenting an officer involved shooting, yet Thorpe, who according to spectators present in the courtroom during the Inquest appeared to be “very nervous,” failed to specifically identify the make, model and caliber of the weapon (all of which are molded or engraved into the frames or slides of modern semi automatic pistols), or to particularly identify exactly where the Ruger and its magazine were found in Scott’s clothing. On the witness stand his description was so vague that he could only offer that the gun he found fit in his hand. While the Ruger might do this somewhat more comfortably, Scott’s compact, custom .45 would also fit that description. The layman might imagine these to be important, even vital details, and they would imagine correctly.

Amazingly, when Thorpe testified, he was not shown or asked to identify the Ruger or the Kimber .45. Could this be because the Police and Prosecutor could not be sure which weapon Thorpe would identify, and because he had never seen the Ruger, would be very likely to identify the gun he did find, the Kimber .45? Both weapons had been displayed in court earlier during the week long run of the Inquest. In fact, Det. Calos later testified, to the surprise of everyone in the courtroom, apparently including the Prosecutors, that the Ruger had been “nicked” and damaged by the bullet that struck Scott in the thigh. This caused quite a stir--no such damage was apparent in photos taken of the weapon as it was displayed during the inquest, and no one present could recall seeing any obvious damage--and hasty, ill conceived assertions from the Prosecution that the guns were locked up and couldn’t easily be produced, but maybe could, possibly, if the jury reeeeallly want to see them... Failing to have the witness who discovered the handgun actually identify it is a rookie prosecutor mistake and could, in a real trial, lead to the disqualification of the evidence and all testimony and discoveries flowing from it. Again, those involved with the case were apparently willing to appear to be incompetent, because the alternative was worse.

(6) THE SEARCH OF THE HOME: Imagine the disappointment of the officers searching Sterner’s car when the Ruger was nowhere to be found. But all was not lost; the Ruger must be at Scott’s home. Why would the Police enlist the aid of an outside agency, enlarging the ever growing ranks of those who had direct knowledge of an ever growing conspiracy, people who could be hard, perhaps impossible to control? Why would they break into a home, search it and seize property knowing that the sole living resident of that home refused them entry and that their entry, search and seizure could not possibly be justified? Because the alternative was worse. The Ruger had to be found and taken into Police custody. If not, the entire justification for the shooting and everything that followed would fall apart. But wouldn’t that require the police to falsify evidence and other reports regarding when and where the Ruger was found and taken into evidence, and wouldn’t that be a serious crime in and of itself? Of course, but the alternative was worse.

If it is assumed that this theory is correct, wouldn’t it have been easier and quicker for the Police to produce a throw down gun, a gun untraceable to them, of the kind sometimes used by corrupt officers to cover a bad shoot? Impossible in this case. The Police had ample, blood stained evidence in their hands that Scott scrupulously obeyed Nevada firearms laws. Not only that, his multiple blue cards indicated that he owned only quality, expensive firearms. A cheap throw down would be too out of place, too hard to explain in a case already filling to the brim with hard to explain happenstances.

The authorities had yet another need. They had to keep Sterner out of her home until they could search it to ensure that the Ruger was there. They could not allow her to be present for the search as she might see what they were up to. When they left, their prize in hand, the locksmith they hired to enter the home changed the locks and the keys were not turned over to Sterner, but to Kevin Scott around mid-day of the following day, after he arrived from out of state. They locked Sterner out of the home Scott and she shared on the day she was forced, at point blank range, to watch the Police shoot and kill Scott. The fiction that she did not exist, that she was not in control of her own home, had to be maintained.

According to those who knew Scott best, including Sterner who lived with him, he never carried a second firearm, not the Ruger, not any other weapon. Is it therefore impossible that Scott could have been carrying the Ruger that day? No, but human beings are creatures of habit and discipline, particularly those who have been military officers, and there are other reasons that suggest this is quite unlikely. Scott always carried his wallet in his right front pants pocket. That wallet and its contents were stained with his blood, indicating clearly that it was in his right front pants pocket. Therefore, Det. Calos’ testimony that the Ruger was damaged by the bullet that struck Scott’s thigh is not likely to be factually based as the Ruger could only have been in his right rear pants pocket.

Those searching the home spent little time there. It was simply not necessary. The Ruger and its spare magazine were quickly found, but no Police document would ever record it as being found there and it would not surface again until the Inquest. Other items were, however, taken from the home: Several expensive watches, several checkbooks, A .40 S&W Sig handgun, a paintball gun and a ceremonial saber and sheath--sealed in a wall mounted display case(!)--given to Scott by his family upon his graduation from West Point. Those who have read Update 6 may recall that Deputy PA Grodin left a message for Kevin Scott which indicated that he intended to search Erik’s home for “weapons and valuables.” The items taken were cover, cover for the illegal but absolutely necessary seizure of the Ruger. All the “weapons” and a few paltry valuables that could be quickly and easily gathered up and taken to provide a transparent justification for a search that could not be justified were taken and kept by Grodin. No doubt the citizens of Las Vegas are resting easier these days upon discovering the efforts of their police to curb the paintball and wall decoration ceremonial saber scourges.

These items were soon returned to the Scott family, but not without some difficulty. Because he does not live in Nevada, the Sig .40 had to be sent to Erik's father, Bill Scott, by means of FFL dealers. Scott was contacted within a week of the seizure by the Las Vegas dealer enlisted by Grodin and told that it was highly unusual for the PA’s office to release such things so quickly as the process usually took months. Perhaps Mr. Grodin had a fit of conscience? Or perhaps he merely wanted to get rid of incriminating evidence as quickly as possible. When the Sig finally arrived, the slide was jammed open, intentional damage requiring repair, more money imposed on the Scott family by Las Vegas authorities. All of these items could have been returned directly to Sterner, incurring no expense for the Scott family, but Sterner had to remain, to the authorities, a non-person who had no interest in the home or its contents that she shared with Scott.

(7) THE CURIOUS CASE OF THE MISSING MAGAZINE: At the Inquest, both handguns were displayed, but only one spare magazine: The spare magazine of the Ruger pistol. The spare .45 magazine Scott always carried in his left front pants pocket was nowhere to be found. Yet, Thorpe did find that .45 magazine and turned it, and the .45, over to the officer in the ambulance. Scott always carried his wallet in his right front pants pocket and was doing just that on the day he was shot. This was confirmed by Scott’s blood on that wallet, blood from the thigh wound inflicted by Mosher, and ironically, the blue card for the Ruger.

Scott was right handed, so he carried his handgun in an inside the waistband holster behind his right hip so that the grip of the weapon would lay flat against his back to avoid imprinting through his clothing. He carried his wallet in his right front pocket--there can be no doubt of this--and his spare .45 magazine in his left front pocket where he could quickly reach it with his left hand. If he had worn these pants several times before July 10, 2010, the material would be worn in such a way as to confirm what he carried and where.

This makes Det. Calos’ testimony of the Ruger pistol damaged by the bullet that struck Scott in the thigh strange indeed. Such damage is unlikely at best because Scott would have had to have been carrying the Ruger in his right rear pocket. This too is unlikely. Few people find sitting on a handgun comfortable, and the Ruger would have been directly behind the holstered .45, making a thick, doubly uncomfortable, difficult to conceal package. In order for the bullet to have struck the Ruger in Scott’s right rear pocket, it, or at least a substantial fragment, must have entirely pierced his thigh. As Mosher was standing near Scott when he fired, the bullet must have been traveling at a sharp downward angle. Even if the bullet struck Scott in the very top of the thigh, and even if its path was exactly parallel to the ground, a pocketed Ruger would have been above the path of the bullet. If it was traveling on a downward path, as it surely must have been, the bullet would have exited Scott’s leg substantially below his right rear pocket unless it was deflected, upward, by Scott’s femur, and not only would the probability of such a deflection be vanishingly small, there is apparently no such testimony or evidence. Det. Calos’ testimony was apparently designed to reinforce the story that Scott was carrying a second gun, the Ruger, in his right front pocket. Remember Thorpe’s strangely worded, obscure report regarding finding a weapon and magazine and their locations. Or perhaps Calos was merely improvising on the stand. In any case, if the Ruger is ever seen again, it will almost certainly have acquired damage that might have been caused by a bullet. Either that, or Det. Calos will have to retract his testimony. Yet again, is this incompetence, or obfuscation necessary to avoid a worse alternative?

What happened to the .45 magazine? According to those who knew Scott intimately, including Sterner who lived with him, Scott never carried the Ruger. He kept it, and its spare magazine, in an easily accessible place as a home defense gun. When the police took that gun and magazine from Scott’s home, they had another problem. A spare .45 magazine would only confuse matters. No one at Costco said anything about it because it was in Scott’s left front pocket, invisible. Having it wouldn’t make things easier for the Police. In fact, it would certainly raise questions such as why anyone would carry two separate magazines for two very different weapons in the same pocket, making it very difficult to retrieve the correct magazine under pressure. Scott was certainly more than tactically schooled and aware enough to understand the foolishness of this. So the Ruger magazine would surface at the Inquest and the .45 magazine would not. Not all of the documents the Police have relating to this case have been produced, but the location of that magazine remains unknown. It would not be unreasonable to believe that it has been “lost” or destroyed.

TRAFFIC TICKETS AND POLICE SCRUTINY:

A particularly disturbing pattern has recently emerged. Sterner has, in the last two weeks (circa late October, 2010), received two traffic tickets from Metro Police, and several friends and supporters of Sterner and the Scott family have been followed, several for great distances, distances that would eliminate the possibility that such following was mere coincidence, by the Police. In each case, there was a common factor: Each vehicle displayed the distinctive red, white and blue remembrance ribbon distributed in memory of Erik Scott to the rear.

While it is possible that Ms. Sterner has merely had an unusual run of bad luck in her driving habits, this too, like so much about this case, is unusual, questionable. Most people can drive for many years, even decades, without a single citation. But the unusual has become the commonplace in this case. What is most disturbing about this Police behavior is that it is counter to common sense and to professional Police practice, again, as so many of their actions in this case seem to have been.

When a civil or criminal trial is pending, professional, honest police agencies will go out of their way to avoid even the appearance of undue interest, witness tampering or harassment. Competent Officers know, without being told, to avoid people who might be involved in the case, even if that means they might get to run the occasional stop sign or drive ten miles an hour over the speed limit. Officers who fail to listen will find themselves being smartly dressed down by more experienced officers or failing that, by their line supervisors. It rarely has to go higher than that level. This does not mean that officers will ignore gross violations of the law, but they’ll call officers completely unrelated to the case at hand should police intervention be unavoidable.

The behavior of the Metro Police suggests that they believe themselves to be unaccountable to the public. This is always a dangerous, destructive state of affairs. It causes Officers to believe themselves to be above the law, even a law unto themselves. If it goes on long enough, it allows the bad to outnumber, suppress and overpower the good among them. It leads to a police force that is distinguishable from criminals only in that the police wear identifiable uniforms. It breaks the bonds of trust between citizens and their police. It corrupts the corruptible and unfairly taints honest officers. It is the antithesis of, and dangerous to, democracy. LATE UPDATE: As of 10-23-10, Sterner has received an additional citation and now has been issued three in a bit over two weeks.

ADDITIONAL ISSUES:

There was a Police helicopter on the scene, including throughout the shooting. Police helicopters carry video cameras. Did the crew record the shooting? Even if they did not, competent police procedure requires that the tape or other recording media be preserved in evidence and made available for examination in any legal proceeding. The results will, no doubt, be interesting.

Much has been made by some of the fact that Samantha Sterner did not testify at the Inquest despite being subpoenaed. In fact, the subpoena was not served on Sterner, but was merely given to her brother. Under the law, she was never actually served. Her attorney, knowing full well the nature and outcome of the Inquest, advised her not to attend and not to testify. Considering the fact that the Prosecution savaged some of its own witnesses, this was wise advice.

Costco Security Employee Shai Lierley is reportedly hoping to become a member of the Metro Police. After his testimony at the Inquest, he sat and hung out with the Police in the Inquest for at least two additional days. It will be interesting to see if his steadfast devotion to the official story is rewarded.

A number of Costco witnesses, and Officer Mosher, have stated that Scott referred to himself as a “Green Beret,” and Mosher testified that he knew that Scott was skilled with weapons because he was a Green Beret. This is, at best, implausible for several reasons. No one in the Army uses the term “Green Beret,” saying instead “SF” or Special Forces. They really are quiet professionals. It is part of military culture never to claim membership in units in which you did not serve, never to claim to have been awarded medals you did not earn, and never to claim rank you did not earn. Those pitiful individuals who do are justly reviled by honest soldiers. Erik Scott’s service was entirely honorable. He was a West Point graduate, an officer of armor, and as such, like all his fellows, would have thought that honor, that assignment, enough. It would not occur to an honorable soldier to claim what they had not earned, and Scott was an honorable soldier. And of course, Mosher could not have known anything about Scott’s level of tactical accomplishment before, or in the two seconds before he shot him. His testimony had no bearing on his justification for the shooting as much as he and the Metro Police would like it to be so.

In Update 3, I wrote of Costco Cashier Arlene Houghton who testified that Scott actually fell on her checkout conveyor belt. However, the real story is quite different. Houghton actually testified that a man, who appeared to be drunk, fell on her conveyor belt some two hours before the shooting. Scott and Sterner were not in the store until much later. In fact, her “recognition” of Scott was only possible because she heard a description of the man who had been shot that day. She never saw a photograph of Scott until the day of the Inquest and said that he was better looking in pictures than in person. Houghton only thought that Scott was the man who fell on her conveyor belt, but Scott was not in the store when it happened. This is what passes for the truth when there is no opportunity for adversarial questioning in court. Ms. Houghton, no doubt, testified as honestly as she knew how, but she is, quite obviously, mistaken in her identification of Erik Scott. The larger problem is that the Prosecution must have known that Houghton was mistaken and that her testimony would be, at best, misleading, but they also knew that it would not be challenged. This does not speak well of their fundamental human decency or of their professional integrity.

Some commenters have inquired about Police testimony suggesting that Scott was committing a crime when he was shot. My reading of the relevant Nevada Revised Statutes is that there is no particular statute touching on the carrying of a backup weapon. That which is not prohibited is allowed. It’s my impression that the Police’s primary contention was that because Scott had drugs in his system, he was violating the law by carrying a gun. Again, my reading of the relevant statute is that it is illegal to carry a concealed weapon while drunk, or if addicted to drugs. The testimony of three physicians who treated Scott over several years was anything but clear on this point. Several expressed varying concerns over his use of drugs they prescribed for legitimate medical reasons, but none could have possibly testified that Scott was, on July 10, 2010, without doubt addicted to any given controlled substance. Again, the Police appear to be grasping at ex post facto straws to smear Scott.

UPDATE 7 FINAL THOUGHTS:

This has been a lengthy, but I hope informative, post. I have tried to construct a plausible working theory based on the available evidence. In this, because of my experience, I am probably better able than most to make accurate inferences to fill gaps in available evidence. This is the nature of experience. But I make that claim with the ever present understanding that I do not have all of the facts. I could be unintentionally mistaken in matters small or large, and when more of the facts become available, I will make appropriate corrections. To that end, I invite any Metro Officer or others having direct knowledge of this case to contact me or my co-blogger Bob Owens. I know that if my theory is correct, there are honest officers who want to see justice done, in their daily duties and in this. Likewise, I rely on the sharp wits and keen eyes of our readers to provide insights that I, like any single writer, could easily miss. One of the great strengths of the blogosphere is the fact that there are thousands of experienced, capable people who can rapidly bring enormous experience and knowledge to bear on any issue, as Dan Rather found out to his dismay in the Memogate affair.

Currently servicing police officers tend to be a bit dismissive of ex-police officers. Hardly a week goes by that someone doesn’t tell an officer that they too used to be cops. The reality of police work and its fast paced, immediate nature virtually dictates that if you are not actually working with a given group of cops on a daily basis, you really don’t exist unless they have to deal with you. Their focus must, of necessity, be elsewhere.

That said, I hope that I’ve provided a service, and will continue to provide a service for those honest officers who work hard to attain and maintain reputations for unblemished integrity. If they have been reading my updates, I suspect that those officers know exactly what I’m saying and why I have to say it. Given the same facts, they’d come to the same conclusions and develop the same theory. As I said in a past update, we honor no one when we allow corruption in the force, and when we don’t resist and root it out, we dishonor the honorable officers who know that they work for the people and that they truly do protect and serve.

I hope that my theory is wrong. I pray that it’s wrong. Sadly, I seriously doubt that it’s wrong. As with all conspiracies, sunlight remains the best disinfectant.

The Biscuit (Or Do We Really Want Democrats in Control of Nuclear Weapons?)

Ah, the good old days when Democrat leadership was riding high, when the economy was booming, basking in the post Cold War glow when America was respected and loved, when Yassir Arafat was the most frequent foreign sleepover guest in the White House (can’t you just imagine the pillow fights and related hijinks!), when terrorists were killing hundreds of Americans every year around the world, more or less unnoticed, and almost destroyed the World Trade Center, yet were treated as common criminals, and when Osama Bin Laden was offered, repeatedly, to Bill Clinton on a silver platter, a platter he declined. But above all, who can forget the trademarked Democrat foreign policy acumen and leadership displayed by the aforementioned President Bill I-feel-your-pain-and-other-assorted-parts Clinton when he lost, for several months, the “Biscuit,” the card on which was printed the nation’s nuclear access codes. That’s right, the POTUS actually lost the codes that he was required to carry with him 24/7/365, the codes without which he could not access America’s nuclear arsenal.

This was first reported seven years ago in Dereliction of Duty, Lt. Col. Robert “Buzz” Patterson’s (USAF Ret.) book about his years in the Clinton White House carrying the nuclear “football,” the briefcase carried by a military officer, always within reach of the POTUS, containing the means to authorize the release of nuclear weapons. The Biscuit allows access to the football. Without the codes written on the Biscuit, America is disarmed. The story has been recently resurrected by ABC News and other news outlets when it appeared in a recently published book, Without Hesitation: The Odyssey of an American Warrior, by former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Hugh Shelton. The best (as in most horrifically appalling) part, according to Patterson and Shelton, is that Clinton concealed the fact that the biscuit was missing for months, only grudgingly admitting to Patterson that he couldn’t remember the last time he saw it. Suffice it to say that Lt. Col. Patterson’s book, and his followup book Reckless Disregard, paint a picture both disgusting and frightening to those who care about America’s leadership and national security.

Anyone surprised that Democrats would prove themselves incapable of being trusted with national security surely deserve the Louis Renault Award. Louis Renault, for those who haven’t seen the Humphrey Bogart classic film Casa Blanca, was the Police Captain who approached Bogart’s Rick, the owner of Rick’s, and declared himself “Shocked, shocked!” to learn that gambling was taking place at Rick’s--moments before his gambling winnings were delivered to him.

This particular case has also resurrected a story from the administration of the greatest ex-president in American history, Jimmy Carter (if you don’t believe he’s the greatest ex-president, just ask him. Actually you don’t have to; he’s telling anyone who will listen). It seems that Mr. Carter too lost the Biscuit, sending it to the cleaners in his suit. “Hi. This is Joe at Joe’s One Hour Cleaning? I’d like to order a nuclear strike on my mother-in-law in Pittsburgh, please. What’s that? Oh yeah, I got the codes right here...” Whether this oversight was due to the stress of being the only President in history to have been attacked while in a rowboat by a swimming, kamikaze rabbit remains lost in the tides of time, or at least in the murky depths of the pond on Carter’s peanut farm where the traumatic rabbit attack took place.

Fast forward to the present where there is much speculation about President Barack Obama’s political fortunes. Clueless pundits wonder at endless length about his political flexibility should the Democrats find themselves slapped even more senseless than usual by the electorate on Nov. 2. You know, the electorate who are fearful, illogical, who can’t appreciate the miracles being worked on their behalf by Mr. Obama, the electorate who cling to God, guns and hate those who aren’t like them, like, you know, Democrats? That electorate?

The short answer is that Mr. Obama is fundamentally incapable of moderating because it would be a repudiation of everything he is: A doctrinaire Marxist. This is hardly news to those who have actually taken the time to research Mr. Obama’s past and who have paid attention to his statements and actions as President. No Louis Renault awards for them.

As exhibit “A” consider the latest in his many Marxist influenced foreign policy debacles: The Mid East peace process. According to Jackson Diehl writing for the Washington Post, it was Mr. Obama who sabotaged the newest round of talks between the Palestinians and Israel by independently demanding that Israel stop building homes in its settlements. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, during an interview on Israeli television October 17 said: “When Obama came to power, he is the one who announced that settlement activity must be stopped. If America says it and Europe says it and the whole world says it, you want me not to say it?” Abbas confirmed what has been suspected for a year: It was not Abbas or Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that demanded a settlement freeze that has derailed the talks, but Mr. Obama. Even Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayyad recently said that future settlement construction would have no effect on the talks or any potential Palestinian state. When the settlement moratorium imposed by Mr. Obama expired on Sept. 26, he called for its extension during his September address to the UN General Assembly. This made it impossible for Mr. Abbas to drop the issue and has likely doomed the peace talks.

It’s not hard to predict Mr. Obama’s complete lack of flexibility, but for those who might need a bit more evidence, let’s take a quick look at his overall foreign policy performance. While this list is by no means all inclusive, it betrays an alarming tendency toward supporting Marxists and terrorists, betraying and insulting allies, and acting against America’s interests.

(1) Among Mr. Obama’s first acts upon taking office was to return the bust of Winston Churchill that had graced the Oval Office since 9-11, a gift of the British Government.

(2) When Prime Minister Gordon Brown paid his first visit to Mr. Obama, the traditional diplomatic exchange of significant gifts was somewhat lopsided. The British provided a pen set made from the timbers of a vessel important in ending the slave trade. Mr. Obama provided a set of American movies of the kind one might find in any WalMart. But that’s not the best part. European DVD players use a different format than American players. The DVDs were not only cheap and tacky, they were useless.

(3) When Mr. Obama met the Queen of England, he provided a personal gift: An iPod. An iPod loaded with his speeches. We’re lucky to have avoided a declaration of war by the British.

(4) Mr. Obama’s serial bows to foreign leaders.

(5) When the Honduran Government and Supreme Court upheld their Constitution, democracy and the rule of law in ousting their president who violated Honduran law in the process of a Marxist takeover, President Obama sided with and supported...wait for it...the Marxists!

(6) Mr. Obama’s betrayal of our Eastern European allies regarding missile defense.

(7) Mr. Obama’s feckless threats and pleas to the Iranians to pretty please stop building nuclear weapons, or this time we’ll think harder about begging the UN for even more ineffective, meaningless sanctions. Really, if you don’t meet the next deadline, we mean it! Hey, quit laughing!

(8) Mr. Obama’s shabby treatment of Mr. Netanyahu at the White House when he walked out on him, essentially saying “If you change your mind, I’ll be around,” and did not serve him dinner. Horrendously bad relations with Israel were later explained away by White House spinners as a failure of “messaging.”

(9) Mr. Obama’s feckless, continuing arms concessions to Russia, whose leaders must be amazed at their good fortune to find at least a four year window where they can indulge their expansionist, totalitarian designs with no threat of American intervention.

(10) Mr. Obama’s insistence on returning to the good old days when terrorist murderers were treated as civilian criminals.

(11) Oh yes, let’s not forget Mr. Obama’s resolute prosecution of one of America’s most cruel and relentless enemies: Arizona.

Let’s round out a brief, incomplete list with Mr. Obama’s reflexive support of a terrorist government and its people who train their children to hate and kills Jews and celebrate their suicide bombing deaths, and his reflexive hostility toward one of America’s best allies and the only stable democracy in the Middle East, Israel.

To those who imagine that Mr. Obama possesses the ability, or the inclination, to moderate his views, views that branded him the most leftist Senator prior to his run for the presidency, perhaps a trip to Rick’s is in order. Like the good Captain Renault, they too can be shocked, shocked! when Obama leaves America’s rudder jammed firmly to the left after Nov. 2.

Americans are finally seeming to realize, in ever increasing numbers, what was once commonly understood and accepted: It’s never a good idea to put Democrats in charge of national security (or anything else, but that’s another article for another day).

Has anyone checked to see if Mr. Obama has misplaced the Biscuit? If he has, maybe that’s not such a bad thing after all. He might decide to use our arsenal against Arizona; he certainly won’t use it against our actual enemies.

Gun Nightmare in Carolina [Updated with Corrections]

Update: Corrections to the Pajamas Media article have been posted.

In the dark fantasies of comic books, villains with pathological intent maniacally plot to build super-weapons to decimate cities, countries, and even planets. In Hollywood movies, the corrupt and evil plot to build cop-killing firearms to bring anarchy and chaos to our streets.

Imagine, if you can, a convicted kidnapper with additional arrests for communicating threats and simple assault acquiring not just a weapon or two, but an entire gun company while the federal government stood idly by.

Imagine that this same felon then started another gun company from scratch, and then used that company to acquire a third company that was licensed to build machine guns. Imagine further he was given a concealed carry license, and that local law enforcement and federal agents turned a blind eye to everything.

This isn't the plot latest reboot of the RoboCop or Lethal Weapon movie franchises, but the extraordinary alleged real-life story of Lee Franklin Booth, 51, a Greensboro, North Carolina resident with an incredibly checkered past.

If you aren't scared, you aren't comprehending the implications of my latest investigative report at Pajamas Media.

Update: Well... look who stopped by for a visit on their way to Pajamas Media.

Something Wicked...

Sorry for the slim-to-nonexistent blogging for the last few days. I've been doing the legwork on an investigative report that will post over at Pajamas Media tomorrow that will knock your socks off.

Unless you wear Crocs.

And that's just sad.

Man Who Claimed the New Black Panther Party Was Created by Fox News Suddenly Seen As Credible Expert on Bigotry By MFM, Left Wing

The media spreads the lie that the Tea Party is racist based upon the activities of a half-dozen members nationwide in a movement number millions of people, and of course left wing blogs blogs join in as well. After all, the unrepresentative slur fit the narrative they've been working so hard to create.

I guess it would be more credible to the other 80% of the population if the primary messenger of the slur wasn't himself tied to a group that only can only exist if it finds boogeymen to fight against.

NAACP officials with their own history of racist rants could not be reached for comment.

Milbank: A Pissant Goes A-Sniping

Dana Milbank once used to be entertaining, back when... well, I'm sure he was, or he wouldn't have a job.

Unfortunately, whatever he was, what his is now is a shrill, whiny little man who reveals far more about his own prejudices than he hurts those he sallies forth against.

Take for example, the evil rich folks running against Dana's beloved progressive Democrats in this election.

Consider the candidates on the ballot next month who are getting Tea Party support. In the Connecticut Senate race, there's Linda McMahon, who with her husband has a billion-dollar pro-wrestling empire. The challenger to Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold in Wisconsin, Ron Johnson, is a millionaire manufacturing executive. The former head of Gateway computers, Rick Snyder, is spending generously from his fortune to win the Michigan governor's race.

In New York, the Republican gubernatorial candidate is developer Carl Paladino, with a net worth put at $150 million. And Rick Scott, running for governor in Florida, has a net worth of $219 million from his career as a health-care executive. Then there's California, where the Republican Senate nominee is former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Carly Fiorina and the gubernatorial candidate is former e-Bay boss Meg Whitman.

The McMahons turned a regional wrestling sideshow into a billion-dollar business empire. Ron Johnson, likewise, is a self-made entrepreneur in the plastics industry. Rick Snyder worked his way through the ranks of Coopers & Lybrand before joining Gateway computer. Rick Scott's dad was a truck driver and his mother worked as a clerk at J.C. Penney, and he worked his way to the top.

In each and every instance, the men and women Milbank reviles for the crime of being rich are self-starting, hard working individuals that created the wealth they now command. They are living examples of the American dream we were once taught to admire.

Not only did these individuals make themselves very wealthy, they created dozens or hundreds of jobs each, supporting thousands of family members. Like all successful entrepreneurs, they created wealth not just for themselves, but for everyone around them.

This, apparently, amounts to capital crime for someone like Milbank, a small man who can only generate scorn, not jobs.

Lots of Crazy Today

Sarah Palin and Christine O'Donnell seem to be driving progressive bloggers completely around the bend today.

I know the left is grabbing for some sort magic talisman to save their dream-turned-nightmare, but petty jibes—especially ones that turn out to be based upon their own ignorance—only makes them seem petty and desperate to voters.

Who to vote for in NC4

So, I don't normally do candidate endorsements... it simply isn't my thing. I prefer to talk policy and news and issues, and know readers will make their choice based upon who they think is best in their districts.

That noted, I feel rather strongly about defeating a couple of North Carolina's entrenched liberal incumbents, starting with David Price here in NC-4.

Price is my Congressman, and while he acts on stage like a North Carolinian, he votes to the left of my deranged former congressman in New York, Maurice Hinchey. After being in Congress 22 years, it is fair to say Price isn't a North Carolinian. He's a beltway insider, that slathers the folks back home in pork so that they keep electing him. I have to admit that strategy has been successful until now. But now the cost of all that largess is coming home.

The simple fact of the matter is that while Price has brought home research dollars for the universities in his district, he is one of the power-hungry progressives in Congress that has driven up the federal deficit and made it far more difficult for businesses to operate, even here in RTP.

Unless you are a university researcher and intend to stay on campus your entire career, David Price is a threat to your livelihood.

His opponent BJ Lawson is cut from an entirely different cloth. Lawson has never held public office, but instead left his medical residency to become a successful businessman after identifying a market for medical software. Having run a successful business and running headlong into the morass of innovation-stifling regulation Democrats have thrust upon the healthcare industry, Lawson is in an excellent position to provide the insights we need on Capitol Hill when we overturn Obamacare and develop health care legislation that lifts up all Americans, instead of dragging us all down to a minimal level of care.

On healthcare and healthcare alone Lawson deserves your vote, but Lawson also respects the Founders' intent for a small federal government.

Price has failed miserably in debates with Lawson, and has actually beaten himself quite convincingly.

David Price can't make a reasonable argument to extend his mediocre tenure in Washington, even to himself.

It's time we send the better man to Washington. BJ Lawson deserves your vote in NC-4.

The Fury of the J. Crew Anarchists

I've read some truly dour news story and blog entries concerning our economy during this recession. Much of it (it seems to me) has been superficial, in that though the impact to individuals and companies can indeed be traumatic, the underlying pillars of the economy was relatively solid.

The central pillar, of course, is the aggregate middle class.

But when the recent news came out that banks had been "robo-signing" mortgages and in many instances didn't even know where the physical paperwork was to the loans for many homes, it scared the crap out of me. As a result, banks have (temporarily) lost the power to foreclose and evict. This makes a bad situation worse.

It suddenly hit home that it was becoming increasingly possible that my fellow citizens in the middle class could simply say "screw it," stop paying their underwater mortgages, and essentially dare the banks to do anything about it.

The empty shell of a home across the street from me is a stark reminder of the impact that can have on the micro level. My neighbor—I should say, former neighbor—ignored payments on his home, neglected his yard to the point where erosion was washing topsoil into the street when it rained. He was the bum, and his house was the eyesore on our block. For years.

And at some point in the foreclosure process, he moved to a nicer home that cost less in the neighboring town, and in a more upscale neighborhood.

Think about that for a second. This family skirted the edges of neighborly decency, constantly ran afoul of HOA standards for minimal home and yard maintenance standards, refused to pay their mortgage, depressed property values for the rest of us who live here and their apparent "punishment" was a nicer home somewhere else.

What kind of message does that send to those of us that play by the rules, who pay our mortgages on time, and invest money into our homes, making improvements and enhancements? What good does out work do to our own homes, if our neighbors have no regard for the rest of the neighborhood and leave us with an eyesore that is now listed on the market for $40,000 less than it was worth when it was built 5 years ago?

Thanks Gerald, you asshole.

It sends a message that we don't have to play by the rules, or pay our bills. It tells me that I don't have to pay my mortgage or sell my home if I find a better one; I can abandon my current home and leave my neighbors to deal with what follows. And far better people than Gerald are considering it (via Instapundit).

It is a recipe for anarchy, and an economic collapse.

I've worried about individuals and individual families before, and in broad terms, thought the wider economy would take some hits but weather the storm.

Now I am not so certain, and I have no idea whatsoever what to do to prepare for it should the worst occur.

The Erik Scott Case: Update 6--Las Vegas Follies Redux

It was my intention to temporarily put this series to bed with Update 5, thinking that little would be of interest to readers until a civil suit was filed at some point in the future and discovery began as is common with such cases. But as I’ve noted in previous updates, there is much about this case that is unusual, so unusual as to raise reasonable suspicions about the actions of the Las Vegas authorities before, during and after the shooting of Erik Scott. This update will focus on the involvement of the Office of the Clark County Public Administrator, John J. Cahill. The PA’s website can be found here, and the section of the Nevada Revised Statutes (NRS 2009) that deals with Public Administrators can be found here. A You Tube rendition of a message left on Kevin Scott’s answering machine by Clark County Deputy Public Administrator Steve Grodin can be heard here.

The Office of the Public Administrator was established by the Nevada Legislature in 1922 and is an elected office with a four year term. A PA is authorized for each county. Public Administrators may appoint as many deputies as they consider necessary to do their jobs. Oversight of each PA Office is in the hands of the Commissioners of each county. Public Administrators are responsible for securing the estates of people who have died, leaving no family or relatives able to deal with that property. They deal with real estate, wills, trusts, bank accounts and similar, related matters. The relevant portion of the law is:

“NRS 253.0405  Circumstances under which public administrator may secure property of deceased.  Before the issuance of the letters of administration for an estate, before filing an affidavit to administer an estate pursuant to NRS 253.0403 or before petitioning to have an estate set aside pursuant to NRS 253.0425, the public administrator may secure the property of a deceased person if the administrator finds that:

1.  There are no relatives of the deceased who are able to protect the property; or

 Failure to do so could endanger the property.”

The statute makes clear that the PA may act to care for the estates of the deceased if no joint tenants or relatives exist to protect the property and if their failure to do so may endanger the property. Enter the Scott case.

Erik Scott was shot and killed by Metro Police Officers at approximately 1 PM on July 10, 2010. Shortly thereafter, deputies of the Clark County Public Administrator began calling Erik’s younger brother, Kevin to obtain permission to enter Erik’s Las Vegas condominium, ostensibly to secure it. Between three and four attempts were made to contact Kevin. The first was a message left on his answering machine telling Kevin that the PA’s office intended to enter Erik’s home and asking him to call back. Kevin, who was traveling on business by air, did return the call and spoke with PA Deputy Steve Grodin. Kevin, who had only just heard of Erik’s death at the hands of Metro Police, was trying to serve as the primary point of contact between the authorities and his family while in the midst of making airline connections. Grodin made plain to Kevin that he intended to enter Erik’s home, with or without Kevin’s permission, but was seeking his permission, which Kevin clearly refused to give, telling the Deputy that he was about to board an aircraft and accordingly, would not be reachable for some time.

Despite this warning, the PA’s office continued to call Kevin, leaving messages at 5:57 PM and again at 7:03 PM. It is the 7:03 PM call that appears on You Tube. In that call, Grodin makes clear his intention to enter Erik’s home, but remains intent on obtaining Kevin’s permission. In the message, Grodin identified himself by name as a Deputy with the Public Administrator’s Office. He said that he had already contacted a locksmith because he did not have a key to Erik’s home and that the locksmith was “enroute” to “change out the deadbolt.” Grodin said that he intended to secure “weapons and valuables.” Grodin, who clearly sounds frustrated, said that Erik’s “...girlfriend has been stonewalling me...” and telling him that she [Samantha Sterner] did not want him to enter the house. Grodin said that he knew that she lived there and that her clothing and other property was there. He said that Sterner told him that she had been in touch with Erik’s parents and their attorney, and both did not want him to enter the home, but he said that he did not believe her because he had not been able to contact them and that he had “full authority” to enter the house [It's unclear where Grodin got this idea as Scott's parents were unaware of his desire to enter Erik's home for some time]. He said that there was an open window and he could enter there. He again mentioned that a locksmith was coming and said something unintelligible regarding the “Metro Police,” but in the context of his comments, it’s clear he was saying that the Police were with him. Grodin was running a bluff. He demonstrably did not have authority, full or otherwise, to enter Erik’s home.

Neither Kevin, nor any other member of the Scott family, gave the PA’s Office permission to enter Erik’s home. Grodin’s recorded message made clear that he was told repeatedly not to enter by Sterner who was exercising her legitimate rights to the property, yet Grodin, accompanied by at least one Metro Police Officer, did indeed enter Erik’s home where they seized and took a number of items of Erik’s property, some of which were eventually returned to the family. However, there is reason to believe that other items were taken from the home, items that were not acknowledged and not returned to the Scott family and which may be important in the future.

How did the PA’s Office become aware of Erik Scott and his home and what were they doing there? Why was a PA deputy so desperate to enter Erik’s home? Did he have lawful authority to be there, to enter, and to conduct a search and to seize Erik’s property? And why were the police there with the PA Deputy? This is a good time to revisit the foundation of the state’s authority to conduct searches and to seize property: The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

This is significant in that Public Administrators and their deputies are not, under Nevada law, law enforcement officers (“Peace Officers” in NRS language). While the law could, under certain unusual and specific circumstances, confer certain temporary law enforcement powers on a PA or deputy, this would require appointment by a prosecuting attorney or other officer of the executive or judicial branch having the power to make such appointment. There is no known evidence of such an appointment in this case. Nevada law clearly intends that Public Administrators function as custodians of real property and estates, not as enforcers of criminal law. In fact, the law specifically prohibits them from administering certain estates. Pay particular attention to 2.(a):

“NRS 253.0415  Duties in administering estate; estates that administrator is not to administer.

1.  The public administrator shall: (a) Investigate:

(2) Whether there is any qualified person who is willing and able to serve as administrator of the estate of an intestate decedent to determine whether he or she is eligible to serve in that capacity.

2.  The public administrator shall not administer any estate:

(a) Held in joint tenancy unless all joint tenants are deceased;

NRS 253.042  Investigatory powers.  In connection with an investigation conducted pursuant to subsection 1 of NRS 253.0415, a public administrator may:

 Require any spouse, parent, child or other kindred of the decedent to give any information and to execute any written requests or authorizations necessary to provide the public administrator with access to records, otherwise confidential, needed to evaluate the public administrator’s eligibility to serve.”

I’ve reproduced the relevant portions of the law. Those interested in the portions I’ve omitted can satisfy themselves by accessing the link in the opening paragraph of this update, but will likely find them to be procedural rather than substantive.

It is clear that the PA has a duty--and the authority--to determine whether anyone is eligible and willing to serve as an estate administrator, to care for the property of someone who has died. It is also clear that he may compel relatives to provide information that will allow him to make that determination. However, the PA is SPECIFICALLY PROHIBITED from administering any estate “Held in joint tenancy unless all joint tenants are deceased.”

Let us return to our earlier questions:

(1) How did the PA’s Office become aware of Erik Scott and his home and what were they doing there? The unqualified answer is not currently known, however, since a police officer accompanied Grodin on the search of Erik’s home, it’s reasonable to believe that the Metro Police notified the PA and enlisted his help. It is important to understand that an employee of the PA’s office has admitted that it is unusual for police officers to accompany them. It is not known what the police told Grodin, but he was obviously willing to cooperate with the police or felt an obligation to cooperate based on what he was told. Exactly who ordered this contact and their motives in so doing are currently unknown, but some reasonable inferences can and will be drawn.

The law does allow a variety of individuals and entities to contact the PA’s Office and request their help. It is not unreasonable to believe that the Metro Police, from time to time, do just that and for the most altruistic of reasons. However, it is also likely that this is not something encountered daily by the average officer, and that it almost certainly does not occur within minutes of a police shooting. It would be interesting, in fact, for the Las Vegas media to determine if this had ever occurred in the course of any of the many police shootings in the decade leading up to the Scott shooting and if so, under which circumstances? Specifically, has a PA Deputy ever led the Metro Police on an entry and search of the property of someone they have shot and killed, and what property, if any, did they seize?

(2) What was the Public Administrator doing at Erik’s home? Remember that Public Administrators are specifically prohibited from being involved where one who holds “joint tenancy” exists. “Joint tenancy” is reasonably understood to mean someone who actually lives in a given home as opposed to a mere visitor, someone having authority to live there who has or shares responsibility for that home. Was there such a joint tenant?

Indeed: Samantha Sterner, Erik’s girlfriend who was with Erik at the Costco and standing with him when he was shot and killed. Sterner had, in fact, moved in with Erik a week before Erik’s shooting and had full access to and control of the condo, including a key. The Police knew this because Sterner told them during the taped interview they conducted with Sterner after the shooting. Grodin also knew this as his own admission on the recording clearly proves. He also knew that Sterner--the girlfriend who was “stonewalling” him--who had, by any reasonable understanding of the term, “joint tenancy,” repeatedly refused him permission to enter. Grodin’s message also indicates that he wanted to contact Erik’s parents but failed. In this case, the wishes of Kevin Scott and Scott’s parents would hold moral, but no legal force. Sterner’s wishes certainly did, yet Grodin ignored her and in so doing, the police and he likely violated the law--potentially many laws. By the clear language of Nevada law, the PA apparently had no authority whatsoever to be involved. Of course, this raises the question of whether the Police told the PA’s Office of Sterner’s joint tenancy independent of Sterner, and if they did not, why they withheld that information. Was it merely a lack of communication or was less innocent motivation involved?

Remember that Grodin said that he intended to search for “weapons and valuables.” If Grodin and the Police were not merely on a fishing expedition in the hope of finding something, anything that might be used to smear or incriminate Erik Scott, how did Grodin come to expect to find “weapons” in Scott’s home? Remember too that Scott died shortly after being shot. There is no need to gather evidence to prosecute the dead. Any evidence to be discovered and seized in his home would have been useful only as a means of justifying the actions of the authorities in shooting him and in providing cover--if the police believed that such cover was necessary.

It appears obvious that the Police wanted to enter and search Erik’s home and seize property therein. Even if Grodin was unaware of Fourth Amendment restrictions on search and seizure (to say nothing of the very laws that establish and limit his office), the Police can claim no such naivete. The Police deal with issues of joint tenancy every day. They know that people don’t carry copies of leases, deeds or other legal documents with them. Any rational police officer speaking to Sterner would surely have concluded that as she actually lived there and her clothing and property were there, she was a joint tenant in control of the home. The police know that if one legitimately in control of a property refuses them entrance, they have only one remaining legal option: Obtain a search warrant.

There is reason to believe that this is the last thing they wanted to do. Why? All warrants are accompanied by a return document on which the police are required to specify the property seized. This return must be returned to the judge and filed with all the related paperwork after the search is conducted. In addition, warrants come with time limits. They must commonly be executed within a day, two at the most, of the time of issuance unless an exception is specifically granted by a judge and such exception must also appear on the warrant. There may be reason to believe that the police wanted the least possible paper trail. There may be reason to believe that they hoped to find a weapon in Scott’s home, the right kind of weapon, a weapon they knew existed, and that they did find what they were looking for.

(3) Why was a PA deputy so desperate to enter Erik’s home? The most obvious answer to this question, absent testimony under oath, is that Grodin, on behalf of the police, was looking for something. Under the kindest possible interpretation, Grodin, unaware of Sterner, intended to search in good faith for the identities of and information about Erik’s relatives or joint tenants. But this is not credible as Grodin knew of Sterner and her refusal to grant entry. He already knew of Erik’s relatives, particularly Kevin, who told Grodin that he intended to be in Las Vegas the next day. What then were they seeking and why? Why did the Police--through Grodin--continually try for more than six hours to obtain Kevin’s permission to enter Erik’s home, knowing that he did not have joint tenancy and therefore, no legal standing to consent? Remember that Grodin and the Police knew that Sterner had joint tenancy and of course, lived in Las Vegas and was immediately available to secure and maintain that property, a property that was consequently in no danger whatever. They also knew that Kevin Scott and Erik’s parents lived out of state. And why did they try to bluff, to intimidate Kevin, asserting authority they must have known that they did not have? Remember, Kevin’s authority would have been worthless, no better, legally speaking, than asking a passerby for permission. Could it have been the intention of Grodin and the Police--and Grodin did allude to this in the 7:03 PM call to Kevin--to ignore Sterner’s lawful claim of joint tenancy and to provide cover for themselves by trying to establish a competing claim by Kevin Scott using the fact that he was out of state as a transparent justification for immediately taking control of Erik’s home?

(4) Did he have lawful authority to be there, to enter, and to conduct a search and to seize Erik’s property? And why were the police there with the PA Deputy? Consider that the PA and his deputies are not law enforcement officers. They have no authority to conduct searches and seizures, nor do they have the means, training, expertise and facilities to properly handle evidence. Of course, the Metro Officer (or officers) that accompanied him do have such authority and abilities. This being the case, why was the PA’s Office involved at all? This is where the Fourth Amendment figures prominently.

While there are specific emergency exceptions to the warrant requirement, none apply in this case. For a police officer to lawfully conduct a search and to seize property that will be admissible in court, they must file a signed affidavit, under oath, with the court that explains their authority and relation to the case at hand, and that specifically establishes probable cause to believe that the items they seek are at a specific address. They must specify this address and must specifically describe each and every item they seek, and they must specifically explain why each and every item is liable to be seized. This latter qualification is very important. In addition, the law relating to searches is very specific. If, for instance, the police are looking for stolen truck tires, they may search any place in the specified building where a truck tire could possibly be hidden, but may not, for example, search in a kitchen drawer, in a cookie jar or in a jewelry case.

Warrants are issued to allow the police to protect and preserve evidence, evidence that might prove that a crime has been committed and that a particular person has committed it, or evidence of the crime itself such as stolen property. “Fruits of a crime” may also be seized. If, for example a burglar fences stolen property, obtains cash and buys an expensive watch, that watch may be seized as a fruit of the crime. Again, remember that Erik Scott was dead. No charges could be brought against him. There was no need to seize any evidence of potential crime.

Warrants aren’t issued on mere suspicion--the police can’t legally conduct fishing expeditions in the uninformed, desperate hope of finding, something, anything they might use against a suspect--but only upon probable cause which is universally understood to be facts and circumstances that would lead a reasonable police officer to believe that a specific crime has been committed and that a specific person has committed it. Notice the requirement for very specific information, information which establishes probable cause. It is the judge who reads the affidavit, and if convinced that probable cause exists, authorizes the issuance of the actual warrant which specifies the place(s) to be searched and the property to be seized. No competent, honest judge will issue a warrant for a fishing expedition, or if any of the specific information required by the Constitution is unclear or missing from the affidavit.

Keep in mind too that in most police agencies of any size, patrol officers are not allowed to obtain warrants on their own. This is, for the most part, a matter of efficient resource allocation. Patrol officers are generally relegated to patrolling and taking initial reports of crimes, making only brief, on scene investigations with the aim of returning to the street as quickly as possible. Any report requiring more thorough investigation is routed to a detective responsible for that class of crime, such as car theft or residential burglary. It is detectives, officers of higher rank above and apart from patrol officers, who commonly obtain warrants when required. This does not mean that patrol officers never do so, but for most agencies this is uncommon. Patrol officers are adept at handling the forms they deal with every day, but most would not be familiar with the required documents and procedures involved in search warrants. I do not know the specific policies of the Metro Police in this regard, but suspect that it is in line with what I’ve represented here as it is throughout much of America. Also keep in mind that what is written in official police regulations and procedures and what officers actually do may be two different things. The real world often does not well agree with the world of paper and ink.

Erik’s home and the property within were substantially removed in time and location from the scene of the shooting. In fact when he was shot, Erik was not under arrest and the most serious crime of which the police could reasonably have suspected him was shoplifting or failing to leave the Costco (which would likely have been classified as trespassing), and both of these were incorrectly radioed to the responding officers by a dispatcher. In neither case could any evidence remotely related to such crimes have been at Erik’s home. Remember that no witness at the inquest testified that Erik shoplifted or was ever specifically asked to leave, hence, no crimes, no possible evidence of crimes, no lawful search.

The Police have asserted that the Ruger .380 ACP pistol reportedly found in Erik’s pocket by firefighter/medic Chris Thorpe constituted a crime, but the evidence of that “crime,” the pistol itself, was already in the hands of the police if their account of the incident is accurate. It may not be. All available evidence--to say nothing of common sense and constitutionally sound police procedure--indicates that Erik’s home had nothing whatever to do with any crime, nor did any of its contents. It was the home of a man the police shot and killed. That home was under the lawful control of Sterner, his joint tenant. The police knew this. Deputy Public Administrator Grodin knew this. The police had no lawful reason to enter or search Erik’s home or to take any property within. I am aware that I have repeated this point more than once. As Shakespeare said, there is method in my madness.

Experienced investigators listening to the voice of the PA Deputy Grodin on the You Tube recording would hear what I heard: A man running a bluff and running it badly. Unless he was incompetent (or under pressure?), Grodin would surely know the limits of his authority, and would also know, as has been admitted, that being accompanied by the police was unusual. He would have known that he had no authority to enter Erik’s home despite his bluff to the contrary, to say nothing of seizing his property, and would have understood that he could never, absent committing blatant perjury on an affidavit, have obtained a warrant. Realistically, he would likely have had no idea how to find and complete an affidavit to obtain a warrant as this is, in all probability, not a usual requirement of his daily duties.

The police would know how to obtain a warrant. They would know without a doubt that they had no legitimate reason and no lawful authority for a search and that obtaining a warrant would require a perjured affidavit, an original affidavit bearing their false assertions and an officer’s signature that would be on file with the court, difficult or impossible to control. In addition, as previously mentioned, the warrant return would have to specify each item seized which would then have to be entered into the police evidence system. All or any of these documents, if indicative of perjury or any other crime, would point directly at them and could lead to dismissal, prosecution and incarceration.

So why did the police contact the PA’s Office? Why did they enlist their aid? Why were they desperate to enter Erik’s home and seize property despite knowing that Sterner had joint tenancy and that they had no reason to be there and no lawful authority to conduct a search?

Part of the answer is suggested by the fact that after illegally searching the house and illegally removing property, they changed the locks and kept the key, locking Sterner out of her home until Kevin Scott was able to obtain the key at least a day later. The services of the PA’s office and the locksmith cost Erik’s family hundreds of dollars. Scott’s family were billed for the arguably illegal actions of PA Deputy Grodin and the Metro Police. Why did they believe it necessary to keep Sterner out of her home, to have unrestricted, unobserved time alone in that home before she was allowed to return to it?

It is interesting, and another potential irony in a case rife with ironies, that Nevada Law provides a direct and specific means of addressing at least part of what appears to be improper conduct by Clark county authorities:

     " NRS 253.091  Reports to and investigations by board of county commissioners.

      1.  The board of county commissioners shall:

      (a) Establish regulations for the form of any reports made by the public administrator.

      (b) Review reports submitted to the board by the public administrator.

      (c) Investigate any complaint received by the board against the public administrator.

      2.  The board of county commissioners may at any time investigate any estate for which the public administrator is serving as administrator.
      (Added to NRS by 1979, 992; A 2007, 2489)"

It would seem that apart from considering changes in the rules and procedures of Coroner’s Inquests, the Clark County Board of County Commissioners have the opportunity to investigate and clarify additional anomalies in a case that may come to embody the term. If they hope to limit the legal liability of Clark County, they may be wise to conduct a prompt, thorough and ethically pristine investigation.

In Update 7, which will be posted soon, we’ll provide analysis that may serve to explain why the Police were so anxious to search Erik’s Scott’s home. We’ll also analyze a number of other interesting, and troubling, developments.

Probably Too True To Be True, But...

When Dan Rather "broke" the story of George W. Bush's alleged malingering when he served as a Texas Air National Guard fighter pilot, the only thing Rather ultimately broke was his own career. His reputation for honesty and integrity had been broken long before. The story was, of course, false and the documents that were the sole basis for and proof of the story were proved by bloggers to be neophyte forgeries within hours. Within a few days, the entire story collapsed and CBS was forced to backtrack. However, Rather did do a public service (no, not by resigning, but that was surely a public service) by introducing an entirely new reporting standard: The documents were "fake but accurate." Relying on that well-established and much-revered Lamestream Media standard, we introduce the tale of the Cattle Guards.

This is a story making the rounds of the Net that is likely false, but humorous nonetheless. The story goes that a little while back, President Obama was reviewing a report regarding Colorado ranchers protesting his proposed changes in grazing policies. The report mentioned the "100,000 cattle guards" (as in the metal grates ubiquitous in the West that cattle will not cross) in Colorado. President Obama immediately ordered his Secretary of the Interior (apparently this took place in a cabinet meeting) to fire the offending people who were guarding the cattle! Vice President Biden is reported to have intervened, suggesting that before being fired, they should receive six months of retraining so that they could serve as Arizona border guards!

While those who live in the midwest and west and actually work for a living would have little trouble believing this, it very well may be false. President Obama would almost certainly have tried to unionize and federalize the "Cattle Guards," rather than fire them, and no one in the Obama Administration would have ever thought of doing anything that would actually increase border enforcement or in any way aid Arizona, the political entity considered most dangerous in the world by the Obama Administration. Still, the story does illustrate the very real disconnect between those who live on the coasts and those who live in flyover country. Fake but accurate indeed.

David Price Fiercely Campaigns Against... David Price

Via Randy's Right.

The race for NC-4 is heating up, as a recent debate between Democratic incumbent David Price and, uh... Democratic incumbent David Price... left Republican challenger Dr. BJ Lawson with little to do except cheer along with the audience. Price made his case for his own replacement, displaying time and again how hopelessly out of touch the pro-Obamacare, pro-stimulus, pro-amnesty liberal is with the district he is supposed to represent.

Watch for yourself, and marvel at how the clueless incumbent shows how out of step he is with the audience in this debate.

If the stakes weren't our nation's future, it would almost be funny. The emperor has no clothes, and Congressman David is a Price NC-4 can't afford.

Featured Salon.com Blogger Blames Tea Party for Rutgers Suicide, Hispanic Gang Rape

Now the featured story on Big Journalism.

Don't Let Facts Get In the Way of Your Racist Delusions

I've always found Salon to be one of the most informative web sites on the entire Internet...though not for the reasons you might think. Like many other sites that feature and attract progressives, Salon serves as a chronicle of the "liberal condition," collecting the insecurities and psychological projection of its writers and its intended audience.

And so I find myself gazing with sick fascination into the mind of someone named "Keka," a desperately frightened soul that warns us that a new age of White Supremacy, night riders, and lynchings are on the way, because she saw a bumper sticker at a fast food drive thru.

I wish I were exaggerating:

I saw it. But I couldn’t believe it.

There I was, in a fast food drive through, behind a man whose back window decal, in small white letters, sent me a message that sent a chill down my spine—just as he’d hoped it would, no doubt. It said:

THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT BY WHITE MEN WITH GUNS

Now, I was there because I needed something to eat badly. I’ve been tending a new puppy that behaves and has to be tended like a newborn, so you only get so much “break’ time if you’re keeping to your schedule. I had just enough to grab a bite, get some work done…and get ready for play time number…I’m not sure which.

But I lost my appetite entirely, when I saw that decal.

I’ve lost my appetite for America, period, to be honest—he’s just one of the many reasons. Forget that fact that if he really believes this, this guy must never have read a history book in his life—it’s the fact that he felt comfortable driving around with that ridiculous statement on his back window that galls me most. But I saw it comin'.

What a delicate, brittle flower of liberal womanhood is our poor friend Keka! A man with a historically debatable message on his vehicle has her all but ready to revoke her citizenship. My, oh my.

Her article, such as it is—White Men With Guns--Reconstruction Redux—is a sad mix of history, ignorance, and willful self-deception. The bumper sticker was just the thinnest excuse for her own ahistorical rant.

She uses civil rights-era violence from a half-century ago as the excuse to foist upon us one bigoted and extraneous stereotype after another. Keka's target is the Tea Party movement, which she is desperate to portray as the next coming of the Ku Klux Klan. For a child of the 60s she is quite limber, contorting reality this way and that in order to twist it into something of which she can be afraid.

She bases her arguments... actually, Keka doesn't both to concern herself with arguments.

Nor does she deem it important to cite facts, instances, actors, or events that justify her beliefs. Unfortunately, poisoned beliefs and bizarre assertions are all that Keka has.

She holds white Tea Partiers responsible for a gay Rutgers student Tyler Clementi committing suicide, because his Indian-American roommate and Asian-American girlfriend filmed him having sex and live-streamed it on the Internet. White people made them do it?.

A Hispanic gang in New York called the "Latin King Goonies" beat and sodomized a fellow Hispanic gang member they thought was gay. But Keka says white people made them do it.

Another white man that Keka most assuredly hates made a comment last week about some people being born to be slaves. He was of course talking about those suffering from the sort of mental bondage to which Keka has subjugated herself, a self-imposed prison from which no other person can set her free. She has made whites in general and Tea Party protesters in specific into boogeymen, responsible for all the evil she sees, facts be damned.

From her sequestered reality it was not doubt a simple matter to turn a blind eye to the eight years of near insanity shared by her fellow passengers (NSFW).

Utterly lacking self-awareness, she laments:

How can I connect these crimes to the Tea Party et al? Easily. Any country which has gotten to the point where it's president can be caricatured and spoken of as he has been in the graphics I've supplied, many of them brandished at Tea Party events...is in trouble. Free speech? You bet. But what that right is being used to say and do right now is a chilling statement about where we are as a nation right now.

It's not really just about Obama, you see. It's about me, my family and all of the black people of America—the world, really. Yes, there were pictures of Bush as all kinds of things—but they were "ideological." Much of the awful stuff being done to Obama's images is racial. Even if the image isn't, the "subtext" is.

She spoke exactly one fragment of truth, when she said "It's about me."

The images she culled from 4chan and photoshop contests are horrific, but signs of bigotry are inevitable on a world wide network, and the fact that she had to pull from the same sources to even prevent the handful of truly racist images she provides is a testament to just how much opposition to Obama has nothing to do with his race, and everything to do with his radical socialist ideology, as the most popular caricature of his image readily proves.

It is readily apparent that Keka's myopia is self-inflicted, her phobias generated from paranoia, her view of the entire outside world overshadowed by a pysche trapped in the worst part of 1955 Missippi.

Congratulations, Keka. You found 14 images on the Internet, and that was enough to validate your own prejudices and world view, and was a sentiment that Salon's editors thought was one your fellow progressives would recognize and share (and they were right).

As Salon so often does, they exposed a seething hatred, and let us see into the twisted minds ruining this nation.

Thanks for that.

I Guess He's Not The "Teabagger" Candidate After All

Carl Paladino is winning friends influencing people in the New York gubernatorial race with speeches like this:

Flame-throwing Republican Carl Paladino erupted again, declaring Sunday that being gay is "not the example that we should be showing our children."

"I don't want [children] brainwashed into thinking homosexuality is an equally valid and successful option - it isn't," Paladino said to applause at a meeting with Hasidic Jewish leaders in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

In a version of the speech distributed by a rabbi, the rant went further, charging there is "nothing to be proud of in being a dysfunctional homosexual."

Paladino, who's running for governor, winced as he got to this section of the text, and he never spoke the line.

His campaign later said it had days of discussions with Orthodox leaders about what Paladino would say, and the text distributed to some reporters was not produced by the campaign.

Unfortunately for Paladino, the voters he impressed the most were all from Westboro Baptist Church.

I can't quite understand how Paladino and his allies get it into their heads that being gay is an "option" like being between cloth or leather seats in a new car. You are attracted to who you are attracted to, and I find it baffling for him to suggest that being gay is a choice, because that also asserts that the vast majority of us choose to be straight.

At no point in my life was I handed a multiple choice test on this.

I like women, find them intoxicating. It simply isn't in my makeup to view men in the same way. But that doesn't mean that men who view other men (or women who view other women) as sexually desirable are evil, even if they are notably "deviant" from a statistical point of view. It just means they are different, not evil, and this sort of bigoted pandering isn't good for anyone.

Me? Own A Gun? -- Updated

This is the first in a series of articles exploring, in depth, the issues revolving around gun ownership. Whether you have never considered owning a gun, are thinking about it or own all you need but not as many as you would prefer, this series may provide some ideas, or possibly provoke the latest round in a lively debate that has been raging for millennia. Our first installment:

THE PHILOSOPHY OF GUN OWNERSHIP

Do human beings have an inalienable right to self defense? If you do not accept this, now would be a good time to be sure you have 911 on your speed dial. However, tragically, that will be cold comfort, as this series will reveal. In addition, if you truly do not accept this proposition, and you live your conviction, it’s possible you’re not around to read this, survival of the fittest being a rather inescapable and final proposition.

What, by the way, does "inalienable" mean? Most dictionaries would indicate that it means something like this: "Not transferrable to another," or "cannot be repudiated," but in the language of the Founders and of our founding documents, the word is most often coupled with an equally important word and is rendered as "inalienable rights." Inalienable rights are rights that are the inheritance of each human being by virtue of being born a human being. They are bestowed by our Creator. Because they are not granted by governments, they cannot be taken away by governments. The Declaration of Independence makes explicit only three "unalienable" rights: "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," but makes clear that these are not the only inalienable rights.

Notice that "Life" is the first of the three Thomas Jefferson chose to make explicit. This is important in that if there is no inalienable right to life, your life is forfeit to any government that chooses to take it. It should also be noted that even if the laws and legal traditions of the state do recognize a right to self defense, if the state denies citizens the most effective means to exercise that right, or so restricts its exercise as to make it impractical in application, there is little difference to the individual between that state and one that recognizes no right at all. In addition, if there is no right to self defense, no right to mere survival, your life is forfeit to the whims of those cruel and strong enough to take it. If this is the case, can any other right, inalienable or otherwise, truly be said to matter? Of course, it may reasonably be argued that if a right is not inalienable, it is merely a privilege to be granted and rescinded by the state, but do we really want the state to treat our lives with the caring, efficiency and humanity employed by the EPA, the IRS, or in the regulation of our privilege to drive?

These ideas did not originate with Jefferson in the late 1700's. Thomas Cahill, in his insightful book "The Gifts of the Jews," suggests that the paramount gift of the Jews, dating back to the time of Abraham, was the idea that each individual life has value and that each is precious and worthy of salvation. This idea is easily recognizable as one of the foundations of Christianity. However, ultimately all such discussions are about power and the proper balance of power between the individual and the state. John Locke (1632-1704) was a proponent of natural rights, which are rights established by nature--by nature's God--and are therefore inalienable. Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) tried to reconcile the inherent conflict between a society full of individuals possessed of competing, inalienable rights and the need of humans beings to live together in communities through the "Social Contract," the proposition that in order to live together, individuals must surrender some degree of absolute autonomy while still retaining certain inalienable rights, the most important of these being life, liberty and property. This is the balancing of power that truly democratic republics perform each day, and that, until recently when it took a sharp leftward turn toward totalitarian power, America performed far better than any other society.

The Social Contract is part of the foundation of our government. While we retain inalienable rights, they are not absolute, yet can only be infringed in limited fashion by due process of law under the rule of law. When the Founders made references to God, they were not merely expressing personal religious conviction, but participating in a debate millennia old over the nature of God and man and man's natural rights. They well knew the work of Locke and Rousseau and were certainly influenced by them, as are we all whether we know it or not.

This is, of necessity, a whirlwind tour of issues that have filled hundreds of volumes over the centuries. But without a basic understanding, it's difficult to appreciate the gravity of the question that began this essay: Do human beings have an inalienable right to self defense?

Let us add a second, related question: Does evil exist? The answer to this question represents a fundamental dividing line between conservatives and socialists (for that is what the contemporary Democratic Party has, sadly, become). Socialists believe that human beings are inherently racist, sexist, and a variety of other ists, but are perfectible. This perfection can be reached if only there is sufficient (absolute or near absolute) governmental power and the right kinds of laws and regulations to make people behave in appropriate ways, to perfect them for their own good. These laws and regulations will be composed and enforced by a small class of elite socialists who are already, by virtue of their education, sophistication, beliefs and highly attuned sense of social justice, perfected. Hence, the only true evil is resistance to their evolved social consciousness. Inalienable rights do not exist. The only rights are those allowed at any given moment by the state, and in this polity, rights actually exist not at all and are reduced to the reality and force of mere privileges. Religion, with its quaint, superstitious adherence to the doctrine of an eternal battle between good and evil, is just that, quaint and superstitious, and when it is politically useful, dangerous in its resistance to progressive socialist enlightenment, which is always ongoing because it can never be falsified. If perfection has not been reached, it is only because the unenlightened resist and because insufficient socialism has been applied. Because man is always in the necessary process of being perfected by his betters, neither inalienable rights nor adherence to a moldy, faded, yellowing document written by privileged white men centuries ago can be allowed to stand in the way of the brave, inevitable march of socialist progress. The greatest weakness of socialist thought and policy is always a fundamental misunderstanding, even willful ignorance, of human nature. That, and as Margaret Thatcher said, you always run out of other people's money.

Conservatives have no doubt of the existence of evil or of its eternal work in the world. They overwhelmingly embrace Christian theology and its fundamental understanding of men as fallen sinners who can never attain perfection on Earth. Mankind cannot be perfected, yet the social contract works best when he has the greatest possible freedom and autonomy, still consequences for misbehavior must be made swift and certain and must be justly applied while upholding the essential dignity and worth of the individual. Thus do Conservatives accept the necessity of the social contract, of the equality before the law of all men, of the rule of law, and of a supreme law of the land, the Constitution, which may not and should not change, as the Founders put it, for light and transient reasons, because the fundamental nature of human beings does not change. For conservatives, any balance of power that favors the state at the expense of the inalienable rights of the individual is illegitimate, tyrannical and must be resisted, and if necessary, overthrown. In this understanding, Conservatives are not at all radical and merely adopt the thinking of the Founders and the text and intent of the foundational documents of the Republic including The Federalist Papers, The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution. Socialists tend to reject all of these documents, or to so twist their clear intent and meaning as to render them self-contradictory and meaningless.

If there is no right to self defense, are you, gentle soul, truly willing to meekly surrender your life to anyone cruel enough to take it? Will you, sensitive, caring socialist, allow your life to be taken to fully live your convictions? Do you believe that right and sufficient law and regulation will eliminate any tendency toward human evil, and that the power of the state will protect you and those you hold dear? Would you truly do nothing to prevent the loss of your own life? The loss of the life of your spouse? Your children? Is your life of so little value and the value of the lives of evil brutes so great? Truly?

You may not believe that evil exists or that it can possibly interrupt your life, but to paraphrase an aphorism attributed to many, you may not be interested in evil, but evil is interested in you. As a student of history, as a veteran of nearly 20 years of service in police work, I have no doubt that evil exists and that any one of us may meet it, in human form, at any time as I so often have. Had I been unaware of its existence or unwilling to acknowledge it, I would not have survived. Hundreds of the wounded, maimed and dead with whom I have been involved would attest, if they could, to that reality. They would also attest to the fact that good intentions, a life lived virtuously and enlightened social consciousness are not proof against evil, but serve only to encourage its propagation.

But surely the police will protect me? It's their job and they are professionals. It is surely one of the great ironies of all time that socialists tend to hate the police, regarding them as barely literate, stupid, racist, sexist, (add your favorite "ist" here) brutalizers, resist paying them more, yet simultaneously expect them to protect their very lives and the lives of those they love. An even greater irony is that the police have no duty to protect any individual citizen. None.

In June, 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court announced its decision in Castle Rock v. Gonzales. Gonzales defied a restraining order and kidnapped his three daughters, ages 7-10, from his estranged wife. Gonzales killed the girls and committed suicide by cop by shooting up a police station. The police were called when the girls were kidnapped, but did nothing until they were forced to respond to Gonzales' gunfire, but by then the girls were dead. Gonzales followed not long after. Cold comfort may be found in such situations only in the belief that Gonzales' final destination was 180° different than that of his innocent children. In handing down this decision, the Court relied upon decades of precedence that holds that the police have a duty only to deter and investigate crime for the benefit of the public at large. They have no duty to protect the life or property of any individual. Even though they did nothing to assist Mrs. Gonzales who so piteously cried out to them for help, even though they did nothing to save the lives of her children, they could not and cannot be held liable.

This might seem outrageous and unjust, but it is rational and absolutely necessary. Most people would be utterly shocked to discover how few police officers are patrolling their community at any time of the night or day. It is practically impossible for the police to guarantee protection to anyone, and if they could be successfully sued for failure to render such protection, what city could possibly afford a police force? Who would volunteer to become a police officer knowing financial ruin awaited them at any moment? Police agencies are always understaffed, always. They staff their shifts with the most officers when most are needed: Evenings in general and Friday and Saturday nights in particular. In smaller communities across America, only two or three officers may be patrolling between 6 AM and 6 PM, often, fewer. In semi rural or rural areas, the nearest available officer may be an hour or more away at top, lights and siren, speed. The police love to catch bad guys in the act. They love to stop rapists, killers, child molesters, you name it, they love to stop and catch them, but there are very, very few police officers, more than enough bad guys to go around, and many, many of us. This is the nature of reality, of human beings.

Police officers all know several common axioms: "Call for the police, call for an ambulance and call for a pizza. See which one shows up first." They know that all too often, it won't be the police. In many urban areas, even 911 calls are often left unanswered or put on hold, so great is the volume of emergency calls and so few are the police. Police lore is full of true stories of citizen's panicked 911 calls that didn't get through, were hung up, were ignored, improperly dispatched or just couldn't be handled because of a lack of manpower, resulting in beatings, robbery, rape, mayhem, torture, even murder. The police have another common axiom, which, like the first, they know to be true, but which makes them cringe nonetheless: "When seconds count, the police are minutes away." This too is the nature of reality, of human beings. Ask any experienced police officer if evil exists, but not if you really don't want to hear the answer.

So. Evil exists. The police would love to protect you from it, but they can't and you can't sue them and win when, not if, they don't. What options remain? Gated communities? Locks? Alarm systems? If it's made by man, it can be defeated by man. Will you spend your life within that gated community, behind those locked doors with your security system engaged?

But I live in a good neighborhood! Consider the case of a car burglar I investigated. Responsible for hundreds of crimes, during his many and lengthy confessions, he told me of how he and two of his fellow burglars set out to steal the side view mirror of a vehicle by removing the entire door. As they set to work at 2 AM, the owner came home unexpectedly and they barely had time to scramble under the vehicle they had just begun to burglarize as his pickup truck pulled into the driveway, inches away. The door they intended to steal was standing open a few inches, but the man did not see it and went into his home, leaving the burglars to hastily complete their work and leave with the door.

This too, was a good neighborhood, but the story does not end here. The burglar had, only a half hour earlier, burglarized another car not far away and found, to his surprise and delight, a loaded and chambered 9mm semiautomatic handgun which he hastily stuffed into his pants, the better to play the role of the manly gangster/burglar. As the owner of the soon to be stolen car door stepped from his truck onto his driveway, mere inches away lay the burglar, hopped up on speed, the unfamiliar handgun tightly clutched in his sweating, shaking hand. The man lived only because he did not notice the open car door. The burglar was ready to shoot him; he would have shot him, a man who had no reason whatever to imagine, let alone expect, a 2 AM meeting in his own driveway with unthinking, irrational, doped up, stupid evil. Postscript: I put the burglar and many of his pals away for a long time and recovered the handgun and even the car door--absent the mirror--which I fished out of a creek near the bridge where he threw it. Sadly, it's not common for crimes of that kind to be solved and the property recovered, but that's a story for another post and another time. Evil is interested in you, and evil is always out there, watching and waiting. This too is the nature of reality and of human beings.

Even understanding all that I've presented here, at least intellectually, there will always be some portion of the public determined to cling to socialist philosophy in the expectation that their intellectual and moral superiority will, in some way, magically protect them. Or perhaps they merely have unshakeable faith in an all-powerful, benevolent state, even a state that manifestly cannot protect them, cares little or not at all for protecting any individual, and will never allow itself to be held accountable for failing to protect them. It is for these people that the term "prey" was created, and it is to them that a famous aphorism may someday apply: "A conservative is a liberal who has been robbed at gunpoint." Unfortunately, even that kind of intimate encounter with evil does not always suffice, but some are capable of reevaluating their philosophy when reality is visited upon them in ways that cannot be easily ignored.

If no inalienable right to self defense exists, what other right or privilege actually matters? What is the point of continuing education if one's life may be taken at any moment? If no right to self defense exists, there can be no crime of murder, as no life has value, value that compels society to impose the ultimate penalty for its unlawful taking. In such societies the ultimate penalty tends to be imposed for crimes against the state rather than crimes against individuals who are of value only in their utility to the state. How can anyone plan for the future if life is reduced to a state of nature where, as Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) said, life is "...solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short"?

Quite unlike Socialist orthodoxy, it is not an armed society, a society where the lawful, productive and decent have the most effective means immediately at hand to protect their lives and the lives of others that is lawless, violent and dangerous, but a society where only the government has power and where only the lawless, idle and evil are armed. Contemporary America provides myriad examples of the truth of this assertion. In those states where concealed carry is common, by any honest measure, citizens are safer. In those states and cities, particularly, where honest citizens are disarmed, it is quite the opposite. Cities such as Detroit and Washington DC are commonly more dangerous than active war zones, which they closely resemble.

But let us assume that this article has, at least, persuaded you to the point that you are willing to tentatively concede that an individual, inalienable right of self defense is probably necessary. What then? The next installment of the series explores the legal, moral and spiritual issues revolving around taking the life of another, legally and illegally.

Bob adds: Pick virtually any anti-gun organization, politician, or private citizen, and you will find them sharing a message that runs counter to the views of our Founders.

• They believe that firearms in the hands of private citizens are a threat to society.
• They believe that the government should have a monopoly on the use of force.
• They abdicate responsibility for their own self protection and the protection of their rights.

We know as a matter of historical record what results when such views are allowed to take root, and those views have filled mass graves with tens of millions of bodies in the last century alone.

I would go so far to suggest that it is the responsibility of able-bodied and psychologically fit citizens to both own arms and become proficient in both their use and their limitations. Would I support a Kennesaw-style law mandating firearm ownership? No, because laws mandating gun ownership are as contrary to freedom as the laws restricting gun ownership.

Ultimately, you have to determine the worth of your life, the life of your partner or spouse, your offspring, and your neighbors. If you determine that these lives have more worth than the lives of criminals or the desires of politicians and power brokers, then you should at least consider gun ownership.

If you believe the state should be the sole source of power, that citizens should not be have rights or responsibilities, well... perhaps your funds would be better spent on a ticket out of the country, or in a life insurance plan for survivors.

I Feel Sorry For John Amato

Perhaps the most aptly named excretion in the political blogosphere is Crooks and Liars, where John Amato and company do their very best to reinforce the group-think of their increasingly insular community-based reality.

Amato's latest attempt to bend the truth to fit with his ideology is this nearly humorous effort to call Rush Limbaugh a racist. What was the talk show host's offensive statement?

Why, this.

This is a tough thing to say, because a lot of people don't want to hear this, because it goes against everybody's desire that we all be the same, that there be no pain in life and that there be no suffering and that everybody do well and that everybody have what they want and so forth.

But there is no equality. You cannot guarantee that any two people will end up the same. And you can't legislate it, and you can't make it happen. You can try, under the guise of fairness and so forth, but some people are self-starters, and some people are born lazy. Some people are born victims. Some people are just born to be slaves. Some people are born to put up with somebody else making every decision for them.

Some people, on the other hand, are born and they're not going to take anything from anybody. They're going to be totally in charge of their lives. They're not going to sit around and wait for something. They're going to make it happen. You can see this throughout the American strata -- population.

Predictably, Amato got his quote from Media Matters for America, which shows he follows orders well.

But what, precisely, is wrong in what Limbaugh says?

But there is no equality. You cannot guarantee that any two people will end up the same.

Virtually no sane person will dispute that. There are variations in intelligence, education, physiology, and aptitude that differentiate us as individuals. It is part of what makes us such an interesting species. But perhaps it is the next line that infuriates the socialists and Marxists that are in the choir Amato to which Amato is preaching.

And you can't legislate it, and you can't make it happen. You can try, under the guise of fairness and so forth, but some people are self-starters, and some people are born lazy.

This truism—that you cannot pass enough laws to force equality and stamp out individualism—is what infuriates dedicated communists, for it undermines the entire premise of the ideology. It is a slap in the face of everything Amato and his fellow big government totalitarians believe. The next line—which is equally true—allows a reeling Amato to try and lash back with what appears to be the only weapon in the liberal arsenal, as he tries to claim the following words are somehow racist.

Some people are born victims. Some people are just born to be slaves. Some people are born to put up with somebody else making every decision for them.

No rational person can really dispute this comment, which merely speaks of the mindset some people have that keeps them from ever being able to prosper, not matter what advantages they are afforded. We all know of people like this, and acknowledge that it afflicts people in every segment and strata of society. Some people cannot be forced to succeed, just as other individuals cannot be keep down no matter the obstacles thrown in from of them.

But John Amato is neither a rational person, Nor an honest one. John Amato is a person so blinded with ideological hatred for moderates, independents, and conservatives that he is forced to lash out irrationally and disproportionately against any rational statement that threatens his carefully constructed and delicate view of the world. And so Amato does what modern American socialists do, and attempts to claim Limbaugh is racist, asserting bizarrely that his comment has something to do with the institution of slavery.

This mindset, simplified, is that whatever you say that I don't like is racist, and therefore, I win. It is their ultimate, catch-all defense mechanism, now worn to the point of toothlessness.

Limbaugh's commentary cannot in any way be twisted to mean what Amato wants to make it mean, and it is sad he even makes the attempt.

One must wonder if he knows how much he is embarrassing himself, or if he even cares. But he'll continue preaching to his choir, not matter how small it gets.

Some people are born victims. Some people are just born to be ideological slaves.

Among Jackals

If one studies the psychological disease known as the "Palestinian cause," revulsion is the only natural response. This is a culture that draws its entire premise for existence from plotting genocide against Jews and eradicating Israel from the map. If you think this is hyperbole you only need read the charters of the terrorist groups that run Palestinian life, sample some of the vile propaganda that they feel their children as television programming, or simply watch how they use their own poisoned young without regard to life or limb, as this video shows.

Watch it once, and you'll notice the rabid attack of a small car by a gang of Palestinian youths. They charge directly into traffic on a narrow street, and one of the junior terrorists is hurled through the air as the drive simply lacks the time to stop as the mob converges.

Watch the video a second time, and you'll note that the rock-throwing monsters are being directed and filmed by Palestinian adults including not less than a half-dozen "journalists" with high end digital still cameras and video cameras to capture the staged event from every angle.

Watch the video a third time, and you suddenly realize that the child getting hit was purposefully orchestrated... in fact, it was required. The Palestinian adults chose a bottleneck in the road where the driver had no room to avoid the children, and that the attack took place on a sharp curve, where he could not see the attack in advance and avoid it.

The children themselves converge from all directions, focused on a spot in front of the car. These Palestinian children were purposefully sent into traffic in the hopes that one or more of them would get hit by a car driven by an Israeli so that they could use the tightly cropped and controlled images to generate more anti-Israeli propaganda.

Think about the kind of people who would send their children into on-coming traffic in hopes they are struck down, and tell me that kind of mindset is something with which you can negotiate.

The Great Commode Flushing of 2010

“Don’t tax you, don’t tax me, tax that fellow behind the tree.” So goes the venerable old saw. The modern, progressive version, however, would most likely be: “Let’s tax you, let’s exclude me, and let’s tax every rich person behind every tree until we drive them and all of their assets to Switzerland with its scenic numbered Swiss accounts, and their businesses to China.”

Perhaps the best contemporary defining example of the respective economic philosophies of conservatives and socialists--for that is what the artists formerly know as “democrats” have become--is the battle over the renewal of the Bush Tax Cuts, as they are so euphemistically called. In a rather deranged sense, it’s fortuitous that Democrats are calling themselves Progressives as there is nothing whatever democratic about what they intend to do to America.

Do you ever find yourself sitting in front of the television, clenching your fists and yelling at the screen in amazement as the unarmed hero, pursued by a multitude of bloodthirsty, armed baddies deftly renders a bad guy unconscious, and immediately trots off without picking up his weapons and ammunition?! By the same token, do you find yourself yelling at the TV when a politician makes an absolutely outrageous assertion and the talking head is completely unable to see the obvious, common sense, devastating reply or the simple question that will lay waste their entire ideology?

Witness the recent progressive vacation exodus from Capitol Hill by those brave soles of the overwhelming majority, those demigods (demagogues?) of public virtue who inexplicably lack the ability or fortitude to pass a budget or to vote on the renewal of the aforementioned tax cuts prior to the upcoming Great Commode Flushing of 2010, or as it is less colorfully known, The Off Year Elections. If only their fortitude did not extend to definitions.

Who knew, for example, that the cost of a middling home in much of America was actually the dividing line between the middle class and the rich? While I’d love to experience the Olympian luxury and leisure of making $250,000 per year, I wouldn’t be foolish enough to imagine that it made me rich. Who could have imagined that our earnings were actually the rightful property of the elite Progressive class who know so much better than do we what to do with our money? Who could have known the mere existence of the rich was an impending apocalypse?

One of the great joys and wonders of Capitalism is that it is not a zero sum game. A dollar made by my neighbor is not a dollar unavailable to me. Nothing restrains me from starting a small business, building that better mousetrap, and attaining the unimaginable wealth of $250,000 but my own abilities, knowledge and determination (OK, OK, The Obama Socialist Laser Economic Death Ray would probably burn a hole right through me, my employees and my payroll, but play along...).

There was a time in America when coveting the possessions of others or shamelessly expressing jealousy of them was considered unseemly, a sign of bad upbringing and shabby character, yet such blatant covetousness has been adopted wholesale by President Obama and his followers. One wonders what mothers would say about those who extend such bad manners to include an entire, arbitrarily selected class of people.

If my neighbor is rich, it speaks as well of my character that I sincerely congratulate him on his industry and good fortune as when I clothe and feed the poor and hungry. His success should serve as nothing but inspiration to me and others to pursue what he has attained if we are so inclined, and in America, at least as it was PO (Pre-Obama), nothing would stand in our way. To paraphrase Thomas Jefferson on religion, his wealth neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg, and this particular rising tide does lift all boats, small and great.

The idea, often spouted with smug self assurance by socialists, that if Republicans (and not a few democrats who feel the torches of the enraged, pitchfork wielding villagers on their fleeing coattails) want to extend the Bush Tax Cuts, they must come up with a gazillion dollars to pay for the resulting loss to the Treasury is one of the more brazen economic lies ever created, yet it’s a useful lie. It’s useful in that it clearly reveals the heart and soul of the socialist economic philosophy: Your money is not yours, not only the money in your pocket, but any money you might potentially earn in the future. Neither is your property or liberty. You possess only that which the all knowing, all caring, all wise state deems you fit to possess. Did I mention that the state may also change the rules, all of them, at any time and without notice? Ask GM stockholders about that.

The Bush Tax Cuts are phantoms. They are potential, future taxes, inventions, wishes, ghosts, fairy dust, taxes that need never be levied by the Congress, a Congress that has arranged this particularly bit of legislative sleight of hand so that the taxes will be levied automatically if they do...nothing. In their present form, the BTC's exercise at least minimal restraint on a rapacious, never sated government, allowing citizens to keep more of their own earnings. They are not monies in the mythical Al Gore lockbox that will be stolen from hungry widows, orphans and the infirm elderly if heartless Republicans allow the evil rich to keep their ill gotten gains, gains that do not yet, and may never, exist.

There is no way to know precisely how much money any given new tax will bring in, but if the BTC’s are not extended, hopefully permanently, their expiration in January of 2011 will constitute the single largest tax increase in the history of the Republic. It is this fact, no doubt, that is overflowing the drool buckets of the Congressional Socialists. And will they use it to reduce the deficit? Balance the budget that they could not be bothered to write? Of course not. Even now many of them daydream about a lame-duck manifested second “Stimulus” such as the first that brought us “The Summer of Recovery,” thousands of legally mandated signs lauding shovel ready construction projects that weren’t, billions in government checks sent to the dead (presumably in Chicago and other Democrat strongholds, no doubt as payment for voting services rendered, past and future), and countless other economically brain dead pursuits.

It does seem more than likely, however, that the largest tax increase in history, coupled with an economy poised on the very brink of a double dip recession and 10%+ unemployment, will not only fail to bring in the anticipated drool-covered revenues, but will actually cause the Treasury to lose money. Those fabled laboratories of democracy, the states, have some significant recent experience with exactly that ugly state of affairs. Imagine that. Spend money you don’t have by mortgaging the country to China, vastly increase taxes on everyone, encourage the truly wealthy to shelter their assets and move themselves and their businesses out of the country, destroy all incentive for small business with punitive taxes (let’s not get into Obamacare, shall we?) and tax revenues decrease. As Yogi Berra said, “It’s deja vu all over again.”

Is it too late? Too late to take sincere pleasure in the good fortune and accomplishments of others? Too late to stop spending money we don’t have? Too late to stop drooling with the obscene hunger of spending other people’s money, money spent against their will, money they have yet to earn? Too late to write an honest budget? Too late to actually read bills before votes are cast? Or will we demand that those obvious, common sense replies be made, the questions asked, even if we have to do it ourselves? The answer may determine if, on November 2, that great maelstrom will flush away not only a brace of socialists, but our identity and future as the last, best hope of mankind as well.

Marxism, Socialism, Communism and Obama

“I don’t get it,” my friend said, shaking his head in confusion. “Obama is supposed to be so smart and such a brilliant politician...”

“Right,” I said. “So?”

“So everything he has done or wants to do is a disaster! It’s all opposed by the majority of the American people. Even Democrats are running away from him as fast as they can. If he’s such a great politician, why does he keep doing things most people hate? And that’s not the worst part. When people complain, he calls them too dumb to appreciate what he’s doing for them!”

Why indeed. The answer is deceptively simple:

Thus begins my exposition of Mr. Obama's background and motivation posted by the good folks at Pajamas Media. The entire article can be found here.

How Not to Be a Firearms Instructor

This more properly belongs at the gun blog, but the events contained are so extraordinarily dangerous they deserve an audience as wide as I can provide.

Front Sight is a firearms training school with a good reputation for their level of instruction, even if they have gotten in a bit of hot water over some of their off-range antics trying to establish a shooting-based resort.

Recently, an excellent shooter with very impressive shooting skills submitted a series of videos to Front Sight's director as a sort of visual resume.

You won't believe what this guy did. I highly suggest that if you ever come across someone like this, you find the most convenient exit possible, and take it.

Needless to say, the would-be instructor didn't get the job.

Erik Scott Case Archive Created

Mike has done such a phenomenal job researching and analyzing the available information surrounding this tragic and unnecessary death and the suspect investigation conducted by involved authorities that it only made sense to create a new archive dedicated to the case that is only just beginning. I've thrown in my few contributions and links to my Pajamas Media articles on the shooting as well.

Four Weeks -Remember November

Powerful Stuff.

Hey Joe, Where You Going with That Gun in Your...

Vice President Joe Biden has told Democrats at a Minnesota fundraiser that he'll "strangle" members of the GOP who complain about the federal budget.

I'm complaining, Joe. And like tens of millions of other Americans—Republican, Independent and Democrat—I'm a gun owner.

Good luck with that strangling thing.

The Erik Scott Case: Update 5 (The Future)

Erik Scott would likely be alive today if only one officer had used his most effective, dangerous weapon: His brain, in concert with his mouth. If the police had used proper, smart tactics, a single officer should have approached Scott at the right time and place and asked: ‘Pardon me Sir; could I have a word with you please?”

And so we arrive at this, likely the final update of the Erik Scott shooting for the foreseeable future. For those who have read the previous four updates, including update 3.2, my thanks. For those who have not but would like to, those updates can be found here:

Update 1
Update 2
Update 3
Update 3.2
Update 4

For those who would prefer to believe that the Las Vegas Police murdered Erik Scott in cold blood on July 10, 2010, that they have engaged in a coverup, that the Las Vegas Prosecutors were a part of the coverup, that the Coroner’s Inquest jury wrongfully found the three officers involved justified in shooting Scott, and that all police officers are potentially out of control killers, this series has likely been something of a disappointment. For those who have been seeking to understand what happened and potentially, why it happened, I hope this series has been useful. But as you, gentle readers, will see in this final update, the police are hardly blameless, and there is much to be done, yet there is hope that it can and will be done.

It seems clear that no local criminal charges will be brought against the officers or anyone else involved in Las Vegas. The finding of the Inquest jury does not absolutely preclude this, but considering the evidence presented by the Prosecutor’s Office and its apparent harmony with the police version of events, it seems exceedingly unlikely. This is not, however, the end of legal proceedings. William Scott, Erik’s father, has announced plans for a civil suit against the officers, Costco, the Las Vegas Police and possibly others involved. This is essential in that the discovery process will potentially allow all of the facts to come to light. The degree to which the police or other related parties resist discovery will serve to more accurately indicate to which degree, if any, they have anything to hide. No amount of money can compensate those who loved Erik for his loss, but sufficient compensatory and punitive damages can compel otherwise resistant bureaucrats and politicians to make changes they would not otherwise make. For the foreseeable future, there will be substantial institutional resistance to any change or alteration of procedure within the Metro Police as they will fear that such changes will be seen as an admission of guilt and culpability. However, as this is being written, the Clark County Commissioners seem willing to consider changes in Coroner’s Inquest rules to ensure that the truth is more likely to be revealed. More far reaching changes are in the hands of the citizens of Las Vegas.

Another legal possibility is the filing of federal charges for the violation of Scott’s civil rights. While this is possible, and may be undertaken by United States Attorney Daniel G. Bodgen for the district in which Las Vegas is located, politics is frequently a concern in such decisions. While leftists, and those currently in charge of the DOJ certainly fit that description, absolutely mistrust and often despise the police, considering them to be stupid, racist brutalizers, another more powerful consideration may be at work. Recent testimony from former Department of Justice Attorney J. Christopher Adams and current Attorney Christopher Coates has established that the Obama-Holder DOJ has an aggressive institutional bias against enforcing the law where whites are the victims. While their testimony focused on the DOJ division responsible for the enforcement of voting rights, there is little reason to believe that the DOJ as a whole does not share this institutional bias. Since Scott was a red-haired white man shot by two officers who were also white (and one Hispanic), this may mitigate against any federal involvement for the foreseeable future. However, a federal suit may have the best chance at getting to the truth as federal law establishes mere lying to the FBI as a crime in and of itself. In any case, either of these processes will take years, and resulting appeals, additional years.

The citizens of Las Vegas had better hope that President Obama doesn’t make any further off-the-teleprompter attempts to drive away business. They’re going to need a substantial tax base to pay the damages in future legal actions. It’s easy to make things go your way in a one sided hearing where all the rules are in your favor. However, in a civil suit the standard of proof is the preponderance of the evidence, or simply stated, 51%. By that standard, Costco, the Officers and the City of Las Vegas are in real trouble.

The Scott case will likely be studied and analyzed by police tacticians and will be used to train officers across the country for years to come. In many ways, it is a classic case of small errors compounding, one on the other, leading to a tragedy that would have been averted if just one link in the chain had been broken, if just one Officer had questioned the status quo or employed common sense. Yet the case is noteworthy because of its many unusual factors. Some examples are:

Officers across the country involved in shootings have an average hit rate of only about 25% of rounds fired, which means that some 75% of the officer’s rounds flew off in directions other than those intended by the officers. Consider that most officer involved shootings take place at shockingly short ranges. The Scott shooting also took place at close range, but the hit rate was 100% and every bullet remained in Scott’s body. There were no misses or complete penetrations acknowledged by the Police or Medical Examiner. This is not impossible, but is certainly unusual, so unusual that the police cooked up an outlandish tale to try to explain that the public was never in danger. Were more than seven rounds fired, and if so, where did they end up? There is no way to know at the moment.

Particularly bizarre is the Police and Costco story that the store’s sole means of recording video was broken for three days before, and the day that, Scott was shot. While such a coincidence is possible, it seems unlikely that a major chain retail store would allow its best defense against theft, robbery, fraud and meritless lawsuits to be broken for a day, let alone four. One wonders what the owner of the store would have said if this state of affairs was true and made known to him at the time. It will be interesting indeed to hear from Costco personnel why such an obviously incompetent state of affairs was allowed to occur, if indeed it did.

Here is a sampling of what a civil jury will likely hear from the Scott’s attorneys at the civil trial:

(1) Erik Scott did not have to die. He should have survived July 10, 2010. He should be alive today.

(2) Costco gave Scott, and every other customer, no notice that lawfully carried concealed weapons were not allowed. Anyone so armed entering any Costco store would have no reason to believe they were not welcome. Scott served his country, was willing to risk his life for it, and had every reason to believe that he was justified in exercising and defending a fundamental American right that day.

(3) Costco Security employee Shai Lierley was doing his best, but he was inexperienced, undertrained--perhaps even untrained--and overreacted. During his contact with the Dispatcher, his descriptions of Scott changed in a span of minutes from a man who was under the influence of drugs and wildly throwing merchandise about the store, to a man who might have been merely “hyperactive,” “dodgity,” “fidgity,” and finally, to a man who was merely walking normally in the store with his girlfriend calmly leaving with every other shopper when the order to evacuate was given. Lierley may have wanted to back down, to correct his early excitement and overreaction, but he didn’t know how, and the Dispatcher and police did not provide that option. Not only that, their subsequent actions have locked Lierley into a story he was clearly trying to disown. We will see that he has that opportunity.

(4) Other store employees, including the manager, also overreacted, yet, they had so little fear of Scott that they repeatedly approached and hectored him about his legally carried handgun. Despite all of this, they never actually asked him to leave the store, nor did anyone tell the Dispatcher or the Police that he had been asked to leave the store.

(5) The Dispatcher did her best, but asked strange, irrelevant questions, did not continually update Scott’s location with precise, understandable location information, and did not continually update Scott’s behavior. In fact, the Dispatcher only repeated old information and made transmissions to officers based not on what she was told by Lierley, but based on her own assumptions. These transmissions greatly increased the danger to Scott and the public by misinforming the responding officers and maintaining, even increasing, their belief in a high level of danger. As Lierley consistently ratcheted down Scott’s behavior, and therefore, the potential threat he represented to the public and the officers, the Dispatcher did not question Lierley and clarify the situation, but engaged in gossip with him.

(6) The responding officers merely took what was said by the Dispatcher at face value despite the sparse information she was providing. They did not ask basic, absolutely necessary questions about Scott, how he was behaving, where he was, whether he was threatening customers or Costco employees, his state of mind or any other basic, minimal information necessary to properly evaluate and handle the call. They were never, not for a minute, in control of events; events controlled them.

(7) An officer was given permission by the watch commander to carefully evacuate the store, yet a Costco employee made a general evacuation announcement, causing everyone, including Scott and his girlfriend Samantha Sterner, to leave the store at once. The Police failed in their duty to protect the public by separating and isolating Scott from the other customers, and when Scott himself was leaving the store, clearly intending to separate himself from the rest of the crowd, rather than allowing him to do just that and approaching him in a calm, non-threatening manner when it was safe, three Officers surrounded him, shouted confusing, contradictory commands, drew their guns, and within scarce seconds, began to shoot him seven times with themselves and the public as bullet stops.

(8) Two of the officers that shot Scott were posted at the front door of the Costco and watched Scott walk past them as he left. Despite the fact that he was probably the only customer in the store that day that matched the description they had been given, that of a red headed male, he appeared absolutely unremarkable to them, a far cry from the drug crazed maniac that was, only minutes earlier, laying waste to the store.

(9) Caught totally by surprise when a store employee pointed Scott out to them, the officers panicked, grossly overreacted to a non-existent threat, and within mere seconds of the start of their excited, confusing, contradictory commands coming from before and behind him, shot him, once in the chest, once in the thigh, once under the arm and four times in the back as he was falling, dead or dying, face down to the pavement. They paid no attention to the safety of the public that was all around them. They paid no attention to their own safety. They gave Erik Scott no time to respond to their confusing, contradictory commands and shot him without justification.

(10) Trying to cover their mistake, the Police have made the preposterous statement that the public were never in danger because the officers simultaneously choose a single pillar as a bullet backstop. It is not reasonable to believe this.

(11) After shooting Scott, the Officers were so in shock, so out of control, that they handcuffed him, yet did not check his medical condition and did not properly search him. It took a firefighter/medic to find his additional handgun and spare magazines in his pants pockets.

(11) The Police and Costco would have us believe that their means of video recording for their entire store had been broken since Wednesday, July 7th, their only means of protecting themselves from false charges, lawsuits, thefts and robbery, yet they did nothing about it for four days. It is not reasonable to believe this.

(12) Erik Scott did have drugs in his system, but drugs prescribed by physicians treating him for intractable pain caused by spinal damage incurred as a result not only of his distinguished military service, but of civilian accidents. Despite this debilitating pain, Erik Scott was a productive, upstanding member of society who worked at a demanding job more than 40 hours each week, and an athlete who strove to deal with the pain that was always with him. And do not forget that he was fully vetted by the State of Nevada which granted him a concealed carry license.

(13) Above all, the Officers and those involved in Scott’s death must be judged on what they knew at the time, not on vague supposition and attacks on the character and life of a dead man after the fact.

All of this, and more, the attorneys for Scott’s family will say, and knowing what I now know, and what I can reasonably infer from experience, I can only say that I would have to agree with them, and that a jury will agree with them too.

Did Officer Mosher and the other Officers lie? For the time being, there is insufficient information to make such a claim. They may well have testified to what they believed to be true, but that does not absolve them. The time frame of two seconds from the first shouted command to the firing of the first bullet was obtained without sophisticated equipment that will surely greatly refine all related time sequences, but let’s assume, for the sake of this scenario, that two seconds is correct. From the first shout of the officer directly in front of him, Scott would have been shocked--witnesses testified to this--by the sight of an officer, pointing his handgun at him at close range. He would also have been aware of two officers behind him shouting conflicting commands from short range. If Scott was a man possessed of average reflexes, it’s reasonable to assume that it would have taken him a minimum of half a second to actually be able to respond and to start to speak or move his arm, and easily as long as 8/10 of a second. With 1.2 to 1.5 seconds remaining before the first round was fired into his chest, Scott may not have had sufficient time to draw his weapon and point it at Officer Mosher as he testified.

This is so because inside the waistband holsters like that worn by Scott have the rough side of the leather outward to help the weapon stay in place, and to provide friction that tends to prevent the holster from being pulled up and out with the handgun when the weapon is drawn. In other words, it takes far more time to remove the weapon and the holster than only the weapon, and the Police have locked themselves into the story that this is what happened. In addition, in order to draw the weapon and holster, Scott had to first lift his shirt and hold it out of the way while drawing. This adds additional time. Even with a two second time frame, it may not have been physically possible for Scott to react to the confrontation, lift his shirt, remove the handgun and holster, swing it around to the front of his body, and point the handgun, still in the holster, directly at Officer Mosher before Mosher fired. If the actual time frame is less than 2 full seconds, it becomes even more unlikely that the Police scenario is possible. This is, of course, an interesting matter that will require proper analysis and experimentation.

Another issue is that of the perception of imminent danger by the Officers. Some would suggest that in this situation, any officer--if the Officer’s accounting of events is accurate--would have been justified in shooting Scott. However, thousands of citizens are alive today because officers across the nation took the extra fractions of a second necessary to be certain that the object in the hands of a suspect was actually a real gun rather than a billfold or some other object.

From my own experiences as an officer, I can recount many such situations. Some caused me to grasp, but not draw, my handgun. Some caused me to draw and go to ready. In a few, my finger was moving toward the trigger and my handgun rising on target. In a few, my finger was on the trigger and ready to fire, but in none of those encounters was it necessary to fire. My experience is not at all unusual.

On one occasion, I approached a drunk, a man I knew from previous encounters. As I greeted him and he noticed me, without a word, he reached into a back pocket, pulled out a large folding knife and thrust it toward me. I didn’t move or move my hand toward my handgun because I approached him properly, observing him for a few minutes before I did. I stood out of grabbing range, and knew that I could easily evade him. I also watched his body closely. His stance was not aggressive or practical for a knife attack. The speed and attitude of his hand and arm motions did not indicate an attack. That and the fact that the knife remained closed and he presented it palm up, with an open hand, convinced me that he was not a threat. I did berate him, told him never to do that to a police officer again lest he get himself shot, and asked why he did it. He replied that he was afraid I’d find it myself and get him in trouble. Could a less experienced officer have perceived deadly danger, seen a man pulling a knife from behind his back, shot him at the first moment he recognized, or thought he recognized, a knife and been justified? Perhaps. The point is that these situations are all different and must be judged by reasonable people upon careful consideration of all of the evidence. That full judgement has yet to be rendered in this case.

What was Scott’s culpability in this case? This too, is for a jury to judge and that judgement has yet to be rendered. The evidence presented in the Inquest was almost entirely one sided and focused on damaging Scott’s character and providing justification for the actions of the Officers. However, this ignores a significant reality: All that really matters is what the Officers could have known and reasonably inferred at the moment they met Scott and in the tiny span of seconds before they opened fire. They could not have known whether Scott was a devil or a saint. Their actions had to be based on what they had been told, which was almost certainly faulty, and on their observations which their own tactics limited to a few seconds. That said, all the available evidence indicates that when Scott walked out the front doors of Costco with Sterner, he was completely unremarkable, indistinguishable from the hundreds of others leaving at the same time. Some have suggested that if Scott did this, or didn’t do that, everything would have been different, but that’s beside the point and can never be determined or supported by evidence. The facts and circumstances surrounding the shooting can.

So what could have been done differently? I’ve gone into this in some detail in updates one through four, so I’ll not go over old ground, but merely add a few refinements, understanding clearly that hindsight is always 20-20.

All too often, Police officers have mere seconds to make decisions and act. This is not one of those cases. The Police had plentiful manpower and many minutes to watch, think and act, a truly luxurious spread of time in Police work, yet they did not use it effectively. They were never in control. They did not accomplish even the basics, let alone employ sophisticated tactics.

How could they have handled it? Obviously, they needed to identify and locate Scott as soon as possible while keeping uniformed officers out of his sight. Lierley was following Scott about the store with a cellphone, yet the Dispatcher not only apparently did not specifically tell this to the responding Officers, she didn’t provide timely, accurate updates regarding his location, direction of motion and state of mind/behavior, nor did the only radio transcript currently available indicate that the Officers asked for such updates. Had they done this, they would have quickly discovered that Scott was not a drug-crazed, raging madman ready to begin shooting at any second, but a man calmly shopping, a man who was so indistinguishable in appearance and behavior from the other shoppers that he walked within feet of two officers intently looking for someone matching his description without their notice.

Had the Police done this, they could have been reasonably sure that Scott posed no immediate danger and done what common sense dictated: Separate Scott from as many of the other shoppers as possible. They could have taken notice that he was calmly walking out of the store with the rest of the shoppers and allowed him to walk toward his car, in effect, separating himself from the other shoppers, while stealthily positioning Officers to keep Scott covered, just in case. And when Scott was in a position favorable to the Police, when back up officers had a clear field of fire, not a circular firing squad, and good backstops because they took the time to be sure of them, when other officers cleared away bystanders, because many other Officers were available at the scene, a single officer could have approached Scott with a smile on his face, and asked: “Pardon me Sir; could I have a word with you please?” And Erik Scott would probably be alive today.

I’ll watch the case as it unfolds and report new developments when warranted. Thanks to Confederate Yankee readers, Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit, and many other fine blogs for their links and interest in CY and this story.

The Long Gray Line Sets Its Sights on Las Vegas Metro PD Over Erik Scott Shooting

My latest article is up at Pajamas Media.

If I were a betting man, I'd take the Army.

50-Caliber. Hand-held. Full-Auto.

So... how was your Sunday?

In Attempt To Save Face For Ed Shultz, MSNBC Edits Crowd Size Out of AP Story On Today's Left-Wing Rally

The great thing about wire service copy is that news organizations can pick and choose which parts of the story they would like to include, and which parts they would like to cut. MSNBC made some interesting choices today in their coverage of a left wing rally in Washington DC today, one that was headed by one of their own on-air personalities, Ed Shultz.

What did they edit out?

For starters, they removed a veritable who's who of radical left wing bomb-throwers (in this instance, figurative) and their quotes, from AFL-CIO's Trumka to White House outcast and radical Van Jones, to chronic race baiter Al Sharpton.

But the most obvious thing that MSNBC chose to edit out of the story was the reporter's crowd size estimate... one that would embarrass Shultz, who had previously bragged he could draw a bigger crowd than that which attended Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" held on August 28th.

This is the embarrassing graph that never made it to MSNBC's site.

Organizers claimed they had as many participants as Beck's rally. But Saturday's crowds were less dense and didn't reach as far to the edges as they did during Beck's rally. The National Park Service stopped providing official crowd estimates in the 1990s.

It's almost as if MSNBC itself was embarrassed to admit the radicals and outcasts that showed up at the rally they championed, or the decidedly low turnout. But don't worry, liberals... there are always crooks and liars around to make your community-based reality seem more in-tune than America than it will actually ever be.

The Erik Scott Case: Update 4

Since Update 3.2, much has changed. The seven person Coroner’s Inquest jury deliberated only 90 minutes before unanimously finding the officers justified in shooting Erik Scott. Considering the unchallenged evidence presented by the prosecutors, there was no other reasonable verdict. Yet, in at least one instance, the public was treated to the bizarre spectacle of prosecutors trying to discredit one of their own witnesses whose testimony--perhaps coming as a surprise to prosecutors--did not adhere to prosecution theory.

We know more of the facts to at least some degree of certainty, but most of the evidence, and the most potentially accurate and telling evidence, has not yet been produced. It will doubtless take the discovery process of the civil trial Erik’s father, William Scott, has announced for a reasonable semblance of the complete story to unfold. It seems clear that the authorities are not going to provide more than has been made public unless they have no choice, and in the case of any potential videotape, perhaps not even then. More on this shortly.

Before we get into analysis of the 9-11 transcript (available here) and a partial transcript of police radio traffic (available here), we’ll address the concerns of Confederate Yankee commenters on Update 3.2 and add additional information.

A commenter asked why officers are allowed to keep their weapons when under suspicion in a shooting. Officers are citizens and are entitled to the presumption of innocence until they are proven guilty. In addition, in the daily pursuit of their duties, even the most competent, scrupulously honest officers make enemies, many of whom are not known to them, enemies who might be tempted to take revenge if they suspected an officer did not have the means to protect himself or his family. If a case is so clearly egregious that an officer is under arrest or likely to be arrested, their superiors may take possession of their weapon(s). This option is always open, but generally not used in any but the most obvious cases. Every police agency has its own internal policies and procedures, but the rationale I’ve outlined is quite common.

UPDATED TESTIMONY/EVIDENCE:

(1) Officer William Mosher fired first and believed he shot Scott twice in the chest, but Medical Examiner testimony placed one of his shots in Scott’s chest and another in Scott’s thigh, though which thigh is, at the moment, unclear. This pattern of shooting would be consistent with high stress shootings where the first shot is more or less on target and the second or subsequent shots are substantially lower as the officer “jerks” the trigger, thrusting the muzzle downward.

(2) Officer Thomas Mendiola fired four shots, reportedly all striking Scott in the back. Mediola testified that he believed that each shot was made necessary by the continuing danger posed by Scott. As analysis will establish, such “danger” was surpisingly brief. However, it has also been established, as mentioned in Update 3.2, that one of these rounds struck Scott in the buttocks and traveled upward through his torso coming to rest in his chest. With this updated information, a scenario that may be more accurate than any we’ve been able to propose before is now possible.

(3) Officer Joshua Start fired one shot, but where it struck is unclear. The ME testified that one round hit Scott in an armpit, apparently under an upraised arm, but it’s not clear whether Mendiola or Start fired that shot. It is unlikely that Mosher fired that particular shot for reasons that will be addressed shortly.

(4) Las Vegas Firefighter/EMT Chris Thorpe was among the first medical personnel to treat Scott. He found Scott facedown and handcuffed with no heartbeat and no breathing and asked the police to remove the cuffs. The officers complied and Scott was placed on a backboard and into an ambulance. While enroute to the hospital, Thorpe found a .380 Ruger semiautomatic handgun (which appeared to be an LCP model in a photograph of a Metro detective displaying it during the Inquest) in one of Scott’s pockets--presumably his pants pocket, and magazines in the other. He gave them to an officer who was accompanying them. While the LCP is a small handgun, missing the weapon and several magazines in Scott’s pants pocket does not speak well of the officers and may offer some insight into their post shooting states of mind.

(5) Officer Mosher testified that Scott was asked to leave by Costco employees and refused. In the transcript, Costco Security Employee Shai (pronounced “Shay”) Lierley told the dispatcher several times that Scott was told that weapons weren’t allowed, but did not tell the dispatcher that Scott was asked to leave, nor did the dispatcher ask that particular question. However, in the partial radio transcript, a dispatcher does tell responding officers that Scott was asked to leave, despite not being specifically told this by Lierley. Mosher also said that Costco told the police that Scott was showing signs of “ED” or “excited delerium.” The 9-11 transcript does not support this contention. Lierley was, as far as is currently known, the sole Costco employee providing information via cell phone to the police dispatcher as he followed Scott throughout the store. While Lierley did say that Scott was possibly under the influence of drugs, he also said that Scott “...may just be really hyperactive...” However, a dispatcher did tell responding officers “Male is possibly ED.” Apparently, the dispatcher made an assumption about this and used common police jargon, but in so doing, may, combined with telling the officers that Scott refused to leave, have unintentionally ratcheted up the degree of danger Scott represented in the minds of the responding officers. In this, Mosher testified truthfully about what he knew, but what he knew was likely false or at best, an unintentional misrepresentation.

(6) There is continuing confusion regarding the commands given by the officers prior to shooting Scott. A transcript of the 9-11 call introduced at trial indicates the following commands, all delivered in the space of a few seconds: “Put your hands up where I can see them, drop it, get on the ground, get on the ground.” Witnesses have testified to these commands (and more): “Don’t do that, don’t do that, get on the ground, drop it, get down, drop your weapon.” Listening to the 9-11 transcript, I could clearly hear “Get your hands where I can see them,” immediately followed by gunshots. I am unaware of any clear accounting of which officers spoke which of these commands, to say nothing of any others, in which order and in response to which actions by Scott--if any. However, the 9-11 transcript, difficult as it can be to understand (more on this in the analysis section), suggests that there were a number of conflicting commands delivered by more than one officer within the span of a few seconds, giving Scott little or no time to understand or respond.

(7) The police testified that the Costco video recording device was broken prior to the shooting and not repaired until thereafter, thus, absolutely no video of Scott’s actions inside the Costco store or of the shooting itself is available. Shai Lierley’s testimony supported the police account, stating that on July 7th, the Wednesday before Scott’s shooting on Saturday, July 10th, all store video was broken and was not repaired until after the shooting. That a major chain retail store in a major city would allow all of its security video to be out of service for even a day, let alone most of a week, beggars belief. Allowing their best source of defense against false claims and frivolous lawsuits to be out of order for one second longer than necessary suggests gross negligence on the part of Costco management. This is particularly true in Las Vegas, which has no shortage of state of the art video equipment and equipment suppliers, and even if this was not so, Los Angeles, where virtually any kind of related equipment can be had, is only a day trip (4 hours, 20 minutes according to Google Maps) away. Even if parts or equipment had to come from across the nation, virtually anything can be delivered overnight. The alternative explanation is substantially less innocent.

(8) Lierley also added interesting testimony that was apparently not echoed by any other witness. Remember that Lierley was following Scott while speaking to a dispatcher by cell phone. He was obviously close enough to the entrance to see the shooting (he told the dispatcher he was about ten feet away from Scott), but was just as obviously behind Scott. Lierley testified that an officer--presumably Mosher--touched Scott, who pushed his arm away. Lierley testified that Scott immediately raised his left hand above his shoulder while simultaneously going for his gun on his right side with his right hand. Lierley demonstrated these motions while testifying and his right hand went to his hip as if Scott’s holster was on his right hip. However, it is clear that Scott’s weapon was holstered at the small of his back under his shirt. The motion Lierley demonstrated could not have allowed Scott to reach that handgun. Nothing supporting this account is audible on the transcript.

(9) Howard Brooks, a public defender, testified that he saw Scott “walking normally” with all of the other customers leaving the store. Brooks said that Mosher yelled “drop it,” and fired instantly. Brooks testified that Scott began falling forward when two other officers (Mendiola and Start) approached and fired into Scott’s back. Brooks testified that he made a point of looking for a gun, but did not see one. Brooks is the witness that the prosecutors took pains to discredit, and considering his testimony, that’s understandable.

(10) Clayton Phillips, a Costco employee, testified that officers yelled “get down, drop your weapon” and that Scott reached for his gun, causing the officers to fire. His recollection of the commands issued differs significantly from the many differing versions in the recollections of others.

SHOOTING ANALYSIS:

I’ve suggested a possible shooting scenario in past updates. Then and now I am hampered by a lack of a complete Inquest transcript which may or may not answer all of the questions necessary to know with certainty what happened, particularly since no cross examination, which would have allowed much greater detail to emerge, was allowed. If no video of the shooting is ever produced, the task is not impossible, but much more difficult. What remains unknown (and please, gentle readers, if you know where to find this information, let me know) is the exact location of each officer throughout the encounter, the muzzle to impact distance of each round fired, the exact sequence of firing and location of impact of each round, their tracks through Scott’s body to their eventual resting places as well as many other pertinent factors. Accordingly, any analysis at this point may be incorrect in few or many ways, but there is value in trying to understand and reconcile conflicting testimonies. And there would be value for Scott’s parents in seeing that a competent, independent autopsy is conducted as soon as possible to conclusively gather this information. Hopefully, it has not deteriorated or been altered or destroyed. Known testimony does suggest a more narrow range of possibilities than those of a week ago.

It now seems virtually certain that Scott was directly facing Officer Mosher throughout the confrontation and that the range from his muzzle to Scott’s body was quite short which would have greatly aided his marksmanship if the police account of only seven rounds fired, all of which hit Scott, is accurate. Mosher’s first shot likely struck Scott in the chest, and his hurried second shot was “jerked,” by a heavy, reflexive pull of the trigger and squeezing of the grip of his handgun rather than a consistent, progressive squeeze of the trigger in insolation, downward, striking Scott in the thigh.

To this point, it has been unclear exactly how Scott came to be shot in the back, but all testimony to date seems to indicate that after being shot by Mosher, Scott fell immediately to his knees and from there, in one continuous motion, to his face on the ground. In other words, immediately after Mosher’s rounds hit Scott, he began falling forward, toward Mosher, ending up prostrate, face down on the ground, closer to Mosher than he was when Mosher opened fire.

Within a second, likely less, Officers Start and Mendiola opened fire, again probably from close range, and at least Officer Mendiola must have been firing from behind Scott as he fell to his knees and then forward onto his face. This would explain the round that struck Scott in the buttocks and tracked through his torso into his chest. This round was likely fired last, hitting Scott as his upper torso pitched forward while his knees remained in contact with the ground, leaving Scott’s torso momentarily a bit less than parallel with the ground, his head slightly below the level of his buttocks. Unless the officer who fired this shot was on or near the ground when he fired--and there appears to be no such testimony--this is the only rational explanation currently available to explain this shot. At this point, Scott’s back would have been extremely difficult to hit unless an officer was standing almost directly over Scott, pointing his weapon almost straight downward. This scenario also accounts for the tendency of repeated rounds often to track downward due to trigger jerking. Paradoxically, this would have prevented the Officers from shooting each other. Officer Mendiola, rather than calmly and with deliberate, expert trigger control, lowering his muzzle with each shot to track Scott's falling back, jerked shots two through four, driving the muzzle consistently downward and by chance (to say nothing of dumb luck), ensuring that those rounds would strike Scott rather than Mosher or bystanders. The rounds may have even assisted gravity in driving Scott’s upper body forward. If this scenario is correct, the bullet tracks for at least some of these rounds should have been angled upward, back to front, as Scott’s body pitched forward.

Still unexplained is the round that struck Scott in the armpit. This would have essentially required that Scott’s arm be raised, which would be particularly problematic for the police if the round struck Scott’s right armpit as it would indicate that his arm remained raised and was not, therefore, reaching for his handgun. This would also practically require that the officer, possibly Officer Start, was on Scott’s flank, perhaps toward his back, as he fired and not standing near Officers Mosher or Mendiola. It is also possible that Scott may have momentarily turned his side toward the officers behind him, but this too is currently not clear. The timing of this round, which was likely one of the two rounds that the ME testified struck Scott’s heart, is important in helping to determine Scott’s physical and mental capacities throughout the encounter, but is, as far as I can determine, still unknown, or at least has not been made public.

If the scenario took place as I have suggested, there are a number of additional problems for the police. The locations of bystanders and their exposure to police fire remains unknown. Were citizens standing between Officers Start and Mendiola and Scott? Could the Officers clearly see Scott and his every motion as he was confronted by Officer Mosher? From the beginning of the encounter until they ceased fired? Each of them? If Scott was in fact between Mendiola and Start and Mosher as would be required by the scenario I’ve suggested, the officers were essentially a circular firing squad, and Mosher was in the most immediate danger of being hit by friendly fire, particularly as Scott’s body dropped to the ground as his fellow officers poured fired into the rapidly diminishing target of his back. If this is indeed the case, and with what is known, it seems the most likely scenario, the three officers are fortunate indeed that they did not shoot themselves or innocent bystanders.

In Update 3.2, I noted Metro Captain Patrick Neville who assured the public that they were never in danger as the officers were careful to choose a pillar (as in one, single pillar) that supported a canopy as a bullet backstop. As I noted, for this to be even remotely plausible, all three officers must have been facing Scott and must have been closer than shoulder to shoulder so as to align their weapons in a direct line with the pillar as the termination point for any errant rounds, and with Scott’s body directly intersecting that straight line of fire. In addition, they would have had to have been capable of, within mere seconds of simultaneously realizing that they needed a backstop, seeing the pillar, recognizing its size and composition as appropriate to the task, and moving into position relative to Scott and the pillar to use it as a backstop. Absent this simultaneous thought process, we are apparently expected to believe that it was merely dumb luck that all of the stars, so to speak, aligned in a once-in-a-million-year happenstance. If the officers were not all facing Scott, Captain Neville’s assurance is rendered even more dubious as the officers were essentially using each other (and everything and everyone around them) as a backstop. A final major problem with the police version of supernatural attention to public safety is that unless the pillar was substantially wider than a human body and was made of materials that would absorb and hold, rather than deflect, incoming rounds, it would have served not as a backstop, but as a random ricochet generator. Most support pillars are made of concrete, structural steel, or some combination of these. Even rounds striking at a direct right angle in every plane would experience some degree of spatter (fragmentation of the lead core and copper jacketing of the bullets), potentially injuring those close by. At virtually any other angle, ricochets are a virtual certainty.

There remains one additional interesting item. The ME testified that she could not determine the distances of the Officer’s muzzles from the impact points on Scott’s body. Forensic scientists hired by Scott’s family should conduct gunpowder patterning and residue tests at varying distances using, if possible, the officer’s weapons and the same ammunition used during the shooting. If not, identical weapons and ammunition should be used. I do not suggest that the ME testified falsely, but at the ranges at which these rounds may have been fired, it seems unlikely that gunpowder tattooing was either not present or was so indistinct as to render any meaningful analysis impossible.

THE 9-11 AND PARTIAL DISPATCH TRANSCRIPTS:

In analyzing the 9-11 call, certain difficulties were apparent. The recording was taken from a recording of the original call, which was played on 09-23-10 in the Inquest and recorded on the spot by an unknown brand and model of video recorder in less than ideal acoustic conditions. While the voices of the dispatcher and Shai Lierley are consistently intelligible, there is substantial background noise of various kinds. While Lierley does not specify that he is speaking on a cell phone while following Scott throughout the store, the transcript strongly suggests that this is what he was doing. It is interesting that when the Dispatcher asked if and how Lierley was keeping Scott in sight (particularly asking if he was tracking Scott via camera), he said nothing at all about having no video capability, but only ”I’m full observation.” If no video was available, wouldn’t Lierley have told the Dispatcher? The sounds of people talking and of the kinds of hubbub one commonly hears in busy, warehouse sized retail stores like Costco on a Saturday are also continuously audible in the background.

What is odd is that what appears to be police and dispatcher radio traffic can also be, more or less continuously, heard in the background. Please keep in mind that I do not have sophisticated audio filtering equipment and am relying on the Mark I Human Ear, two each, listening to a recording of a recording. That said, this is particularly odd as dispatchers are commonly supplied with individual headsets which incorporate sensitive microphones that virtually eliminate any background noise, even when they have opened their microphones to speak. This is a necessity in a busy dispatch center where multiple dispatchers are answering phones, talking with each other, clacking computer keyboards and speaking with multiple officers by radio. There is no question about the background noise coming from Lierley’s side of the conversation as cell phones generally have continuously open microphones, but it is quite unusual to hear the amount of apparent background noise coming from the police side of the conversation. In fact, there are several points in the recording, which lasts approximately 14:40, when background noise becomes overwhelming and eliminates coherent speech for lengthy periods. I am unable to determine the cause of this with the methods available to me.

The time stamp that accompanies the transcript begins with “Las Vegas Police,” at approximately 1:08. While intelligible, portions of the tape are difficult to understand, and it is impossible to be accurate to the tenth of a second, so all time frames should be considered to be approximate rather than absolutely definitive. My best guess is that they’re accurate to +-1 second. The entire transcript is not reproduced here. Much of the transcript is the kind of routine information gathering common to such calls and has no particular bearing on our analysis. One of the most significant problems that certainly will have some effect on this analysis is that the 9-11 transcript lasts approximately 14:40 while the radio transcript, which is billed as a partial transcript, runs for more than 17 minutes. Radio transmissions and my comments will be enclosed in brackets and indented.

1:11 (Shai Lierley tells the Dispatcher): “Ah, we just approached him because he had firearms on himself, and we’re telling him he can’t have a firearm inside our store...”

1:22 (SL): NO, we’re--we approached him right now telling him he can’t have a firearm, and he’s just acting a little erratic about it, telling me he’s a Green Beret, and he has a right to carry.

2:09 (Dispatch): “Where does he actually have it that you see it? SL responds: “Ah, it’s on the back end of him...” The dispatcher inquires further and SL says the weapon is “...tucked in the back of his pants...”

[By this point, it is likely that another dispatcher has made the initial radio call to officers. The partial radio time stamp shows this as 6:53. “Units in V3, a 413--man with a gun--at Costco...The male is inside the business to the rear of, has a 413--gun--that’s tucked into the back of his pants. We’re still landline.” Multiple officers and a police helicopter immediately acknowledge and head for the Costco. The 9-11 and radio transcripts time stamps are not synchronized, however, police records should be synchronized, or can be synchronized with proper equipment.]

2:20 (D): “Right. And he didn’t threaten anybody with it or anything like that?”

2:22 (SL): “No. It’s just that he’s acting real erratic, and then, uh, just like ripping open our products...”

[By this point, Lierley is speaking very rapidly and his voice is in a higher register. He is obviously excited. He does become calmer late in the recording.]

3:09 (SL): “He, he he may be high. I mean he’s just real fast real dodgity so...” (interrupted by the dispatcher).

3:17 (D): “Um, he-s--he’s not removing clothing or anything?”

[This is an odd question. Absent a specific reason to believe that Scott was taking off his clothing, such as the crime being reported was indecent exposure or something similar, it’s difficult to imagine why the Dispatcher asks it.]

3:19 (SL): “No."

3:20 (D): “So would you say he’s being violent to merchandise?”

[This too is an odd question. Few people who think that someone in a store is throwing merchandise about would infer that they were being violent toward merchandise, toward inanimate objects. Because it is the only question of this type, and because it is so brief, perhaps the Dispatcher is hunting for reasons to continue her belief that Scott is a dangerous, continuing threat, perhaps it's a sort of unusually lengthy verbalized pause, or she may just be thinking out loud before fully forming those thoughts.]

3:22 (SL): “Ah, yes, just--just throwing it around, and then trying to put all these canteens into one small bag. And when a couple managers have approached him and asked him if they could help, he starts saying no, he wants a certain type.”

[Approximately 1:10 later, at 8:03 on the radio timestamp, the Dispatcher tells the responding officers: “The male inside the business is acting erratic, throwing merchandise around, possibly high on unknown type of 446-- narcotics or drugs.” Remember that the radio transcript is not continuous. It’s not possible to tell exactly when these radio calls went out, but it may be reasonable to assume that this particular call would not have been made until the Dispatcher received the information from Lierley.]

[Approximately 13 seconds later, at timestamp 8:16, Dispatch transmits: “...they are requesting CIT--Critical Incident Team--Male is possibly ED--experiencing “excited delerium.” Lierley did not say this, so it’s apparent that this is an assumption made by the Dispatcher using common police jargon/verbal shorthand. However, this would have immediately ratcheted up the internal danger level indicator, as would calling for the CIT, in every responding officer’s brain.]

4:15 (D): “Do you have somebody in the front that can direct us to this guy?

4:16 (SL): “Ah, yeah. I mean (unintelligible).”

[At 5:12 Lierley is telling someone, repeatedly, to meet the responding officers “up front.”]

5:19 (D): “Is it still tucked into his belt?”

5:20 (SL): “Yeah, it’s tucked into the back end and with--with a concealed holster.”

6:20 (SL): “But he may just be really hyperactive or what not.”

7:18 (D): “Okay. Just let me know when you see them. Are you watching him on a camera?”

7:20 (SL): “No, ah, I’m full observation.”

7:21 (D): Okay. How is he behaving right now?”

7:22 (SL): “Ah, the same. He’s just like fidgety. Now he’s kinda like, ah, talking loud to his girlfriend right now, saying he has the right to carry his firearm.”

[Notice that Lierley has moderated his initial characterization of Scott, who is now, perhaps merely “hyperactive, “dodgity,” or “fidgety.” Note too that Scott was not “talking loud” to Sterner, but was “kinda talking loud.” The Dispatcher does not inform the responding officers of what seems a significant change in Scott’s behavior, deescalating rather than escalating, as reported by Lierley.]

[Approximately 1:02 later, after the 8:16 transmission at 9:18, the Watch Commander transmits: “Have those units shut down code when they get close. Let’s not get this guy more excited than he already is.” This is obviously a wise decision. At 9:53, the Dispatcher transmits a description of Scott, which includes the location of his handgun.]

10:02 (D): “Right. Like if you would just let me know when where he goes until we get there.”

10:04 (SL): “Yeah. Yeah, yeah, no problem.”

10:16 (D): “...We have a unit that’s actually arriving, so let me know when you see them. And you have somebody waiting in front, right?”

[For approximately a minute at this point, there is loud static/background noise that makes understanding the 9-11 transcript virtually impossible.]

[Approximately 3:45 later, at 13:18, the Dispatcher radios: “It looks like the subject is still inside the business, argumentative with the manager who asked him to leave, telling him there’s no 413’s allowed inside the business, break (used on the radio when the person transmitting needs to stop for a second but intends to continue a longer transmission without interruption). The manager is a Green Beret and is allowed to carry a 413. He’s throwing merchandise around; he’s still in aisle 126 in the camping area, break. He appears to be fidgety. A female joined the male. She’s described as Hispanic, 30’s, black long hair, wearing black tank and blue jeans. Security’s going to be standing outside the business in front of, to wait for officers to direct, brea. He’s walking through the camping area towards the front of the business on the main aisle.”]

[Notice that the dispatcher has confused the manager with Scott, unless the manager was a Green Beret who was allowed to carry in the store. If this is the case, it’s possible that Scott was not calling himself a Green Beret, and Lierley and the Dispatcher were confused about that, but there appears to be no information clarifying this point. The Dispatcher also tells the officers that Scott has been asked to leave, but has refused. She did not get this information from Lierley, but apparently assumed it. “Throwing merchandise around,” was never clarified, but it’s reasonable to believe that the officers took it in its most threatening sense. And again, Scott was described as “fidgety.”]

10:21 (SL): “Yes.”

11:01 (D): “Do you see him yet, Shai?”

[By this point, an officer at the store has asked the Watch Commender for permission to “...start slowly evacuating people out of the business without alerting anybody...” and has received it. However, it appears that Costco simply made a PA announcement, without explanation, telling everyone to evacuate at once. The police interview of Samantha Sterner, made after the incident, revealed that when this announcement was made, she told Scott she thought he might be the cause, which surprised him. Nevertheless, they began calmly walking out of the store with all of the rest of the shoppers.]

11:02 (SL): “Ah, no ma’am.”

11:03 (D): “Yeah, they might be waiting for somebody else to get there. There’s actually quite a few units that are coming, Okay?”

11:13 (SL): “It was all like they had six big boys come in. And he ended up having a big old knife on him. We had one where another guy got stabbed.

11:17 (D): “Oh no.”

[This story, told by Lierley, may indicate a predispostion to overreact by local Costco security personnel based on recent incidents. The dispatcher’s “Oh no,” said with a tone of apparently genuine shock and surprise, is itself surprising as most Dispatchers in similar situations have no time for stories, embellishments, or ramblings by those to whom they are speaking, and rather than listen, tactfully redirect them.]

[At 14:06 on the radio time stamp, an officer, apparently at the store, transmits: “...manager says it’s escalating inside and he’s still talking loudly and destroying merchandise.” It is difficult to reconcile the 9-11 transcript with the radio transcript, so it is hard to determine where this information is coming from, possibly from a store manager who approached an officer with information that was, by then, outdated. It is apparently not from Lierley, but it would certainly have the effect of increasing the Officer’s sense of danger and urgency.]

11:18 (SL): “Henderson. Yeah, we were saying that we are playing it real safe on some of our shops now.”

11:21 (D): “Oh, heck yeah. You have to.

11:25 (D): “Which way is he walking?

12:01 (SL): “Um, up towards the front.”

12:02 (D): “And he’s walking fast?”

12:04 (SL): “Yeah, he’s...so...he, he’s lifting up his fire...well...he’s keeping it up but he’s keeping his hand on the firearm. Pulling up his pants.

12:07 (D): “He’s putting his hand on it?”

12:08 (SL): “Yeah, but he just took it back off. He was putting his hand on it. Pulling it up, but then...walking towards the front now...”

[What Lierley is observing is not at all threatening, and should be obvious to anyone who carries a concealed weapon, which will tend to pull one’s belt and pants continuously downward. Scott was merely readjusting his holstered handgun to ride more comfortably. In other words, he's trying to keep it concealed. Fortunately, it does not appear that this information was transmitted to the Officers, who, had they heard it, might have been even more nervous about the confrontation with Scott. At 15:45, an officer transmits “...we need units to clear these people out of here. We’re attempting to evacuate right now; get as many people out as possible.” At this point, none of the officers know who Scott is or where he is, yet they’re trying to evacuate the entire store. This is not good tactics.]

13:22 (D): “Is he walking out?”

13:23 (SL): “Yeah, are we are we...evacuating the building.”

14:03 (D): “Now are they, uh, is he walking outside now?”

[An Officer radios at 17:36: “We’ve got two officers here at the front doors watching everybody come out.” Seconds later, the Dispatcher transmits that she is still speaking with Lierley by phone and employees are still watching Scott “...due to him ripping open packages. They’re concerned of a 414A.” It appears that the Dispatcher is reiterating prior information as the 9-11 transcript indicates that Scott was opening packages some time earlier, but not at the time of this transmission. Adding that Scott is committing a “414A,” a petty thief, is strange at this point in the incident, considering the seriousness of the potential threat posed by Scott. Perhaps the Dispatcher realized she had not yet mentioned that possibility and decided to add it to be sure she covered all bases.]

14:05 (SL): “Yes, he’s about ten feet away. I see the officer standing at the door right now.”

14:07 (D): “Who is?”

14:08 (SL): “I see the officers right now.”

14:09 (D): “You see them?”

14:10 (SL): “Yes.”

14:11 (D): “And do they see him?”

14:12 (SL): “Ah, negative.”

14:13 (D): “Have they walked out the door right now? What is that guy doing right this...”

14:16 (Unidentified Officer’s Voice(s) in Background): “Put your hands where I see them now, drop it, get on the ground, get on the ground...”

[At 14:18, multiple, rapidly fired gunshots can be clearly heard in the background.]

[Officer call sign 2V16, probably Mosher, at 19:11, radios, and the transcript indicates he’s yelling: “2V16, we got shots fired, shots fired!” The Dispatcher asks if anyone is down and 2V16 does not directly reply, saying only “Roll medical.” Approximately 27 seconds later, 2V16 is asked if it is safe for others to enter the building. He does not respond to this question but blurts out: “He pulled a 413 and pointed it in my direction.” Is this an officer who is still unsettled by the shock of a shooting, or an officer trying to get information on the record that he knows will help him later? This was apparently not pursued at the Inquest.]

14:19 (D): “Shay. Hello. Shay.”

14:20 (SL): “He pulled a firearm. Yeah, I’m here, I’m here.”

14:22 (D): “Where is he?”

14:23 (SL): ...shots have been fired, shots have been fired.”

14:25 (D): “I just heard? You hear shots fired Shai?”

15:02 (SL): “Yes I did, shots have been fired.”

15:03 (D): “Who, who fired them?”

15:04 (SL): “The Officers...firearm. You have a man down.”

15:08 (D): “Shai, I’m gonna disconnect. Okay?”

[After about a minute of the loudest static and background noise in the entire transcript, the call abruptly stops, but at 15:15 another caller from Costco calls dispatch to report shots fired. The call lasts until 16:13 when the dispatcher disconnects and says “Oh my God.” The significance of this exclamation, and who made it, are unknown.]

[At 1957, AIR5, apparently transmitting from a police helicopter, radios: “They’ve got him out front, they’re taking him into custody. Hold the traffic.” Scott is apparently being handcuffed. The Dispatcher acknowledges and repeats this information. Other officers radio instructions to prevent anyone from leaving Costco so that they can find witnesses. The transcripts ends approximately 15 seconds later.]

ANALYSIS:

Because of the difficulty reconciling the transcripts, it’s difficult to be precise, however, a number of important issues have been, if not absolutely established as fact, at least, clarified.

(1) The frequent bursts of obscuring background noise, particularly at the end of the 9-11 tape, may be nothing more than technical glitches, but considering the real possibility of the Police mishandling other evidence, may be more sinister. It is, at this point, not possible to tell which.

(2) The Dispatcher’s comments about Scott’s actions and his physical state are only partially accurate. That, and their timing, almost certainly contributed to the continuing escalation of potential danger in the minds of the Officers.

(3) Lierley, is clearly following Scott and keeping him in sight while talking to the Dispatcher by cell phone. Having initially described Scott as being dangerously under the influence of drugs, his later observations sound like a man who is trying to “walk back” his initial observation without making himself seem like an inexperienced alarmist (police officers commonly look down on security guards, and all are aware of this). There is, after all, a substantial difference between someone who is out of control due to drugs, and someone who is only “hyperactive,” or then “dodgity” (whatever that means) and finally, “fidgety” (whatever that means). It seem likely that Lierley observed a man who was, after their initial contact, acting, if not absolutely normally at all times, perhaps a little unusually, but Lierley apparently did not know how to back down. Some of the dispatcher’s odd questions and comments remain inexplicable and did not help to deescalate the situation.

(4) The directions given by Lierley of Scott’s movements and locations are, at best, confusing and are never properly clarified by the Dispatcher. No responding officer would have a clue where “aisle 126” was, but if told that Scott was in the NW section of the building, or was 20 yards from the entrance doors, walking toward them, would have the information they needed. Dispatchers are trained to gather this kind of information, but apparently failed completely in this portion of her task. The result was that the officers were completely surprised by Scott’s abrupt appearance--and his identification--among them.

(5) The Radio transcript establishes that Officer call sign 2V16 said that two officers were at the Costco door. If 2V16 is Officer Mosher (and this is likely), it is probable that the two officers at the door were Start and Mendiola, which fits the shooting scenario I have suggested in this update. The transcript also indicates that what one officer hoped would be a controlled, low key evacuation, inadvertently turned into a simultaneous mass exodus with Scott, unaware of exactly what was happening, just another face in the crowd. The officers had no idea who Scott was, where he was, or what he was doing from minute to minute, and had no control of the situation. However, virtually every Dispatch update on Scott would have elevated the danger level on Officer’s internal threat displays.

(6) Neither transcript reveals which Costco employee identified Scott to the officers, but it is likely Lierley who, only seconds before the officers fired, told the Dispatcher that he could see Scott at the door and was only ten feet away.

(7) From the moment the Officer, probably Mosher, yelled “Get your hands where I can see them” until he fired two shots in rapid succession, only approximately two seconds elapse. The additional five shots are fired with a lapse between Mosher’s shots and theirs of only a fraction of a second, and the entire sequence of events, from Mosher’s yelled command and the final shot is only three to four seconds (from the first command until Lierley told the Dispatcher that shots had been fired, only seven seconds elapsed). It is also clear that a variety of confusing, contradictory commands were coming at Scott, from the Officer in front of him, and likely from two Officers behind him who he could not see, only adding to his shock and confusion.

The Officers were clearly caught by surprise to find Scott, a man who moments earlier walked past them and was obviously unremarkable, suddenly identified as the suspect, in their midst. Drawing down on him, their commands and responses were hasty, uncoordinated, and everyone in the immediate area including themselves was in danger, but not from Scott, from the Officers, who were likely pointing their weapons at each other with Scott between them (due to "tunnel vision" they would almost certainly have been unaware of the danger). Scott had, from the sound of the first command, only about two seconds to save his life. Witnesses testified that he was clearly “surprised”-- anyone would be--but given the time frame, he did not have sufficient time to respond to any command before being shot in the heart, and if he did, in fact, reach toward his right side, it may have been nothing more than a last ditch reaction to the surprise and stress, an attempt to disarm himself and defuse the situation. It was almost certainly not an attempt to shoot the Officers.

Officers did try to employ good tactics in evacuating the store, but did not pay attention to the details necessary to correctly implement those tactics, such as first establishing who Scott was and where he was so that the evacuation could isolate him, rather then compel him and every other shopper to leave en masse. In police work, Officers dealing with dangerous situations often have only seconds to think, decide and act. In this case, they had many minutes, by their usual standards a luxurious span of time. Yet the Officers did not use that time to observe Scott to form their own judgements of his behavior and intent. They did not use the time to positively locate his firearm. They made no affirmative attempt to separate him from the other shoppers. They did not have time for any concern for the positions of innocents before firing, or to consider safe backstops for their fire.

The Officers were never in control of the events; events controlled them, something that all Officers are taught is a worst possible outcome of any situation. Nor was Scott, who surely had no criminal intent, who almost certainly had no intention of harming anyone, in control of events. The sheer size and nature of the police response also contributed to the almost certain outcome.

(8) Officers overlook potential weapons on suspects every day of the week, however, all officers are taught to assume that if a suspect has one weapon, they have more. In this case, the officers had more than enough time and more than enough cause to search Scott thoroughly for an additional weapon. Their negligence in failing to find the .380 ACP Ruger pistol and its magazines, which any competent pat-down should have easily discovered, is disturbing and may speak to a variety of causes other than mere negligence, but insufficient evidence currently exists to venture a reasonable opinion. As the weapon was not a factor in this shooting, the police should be credited with bringing up an embarrassing detail in the Inquest, however, they may have done this primarily to more completely discredit Scott.

The analysis of this shooting is nearing an end. In the next, and likely final, update for the foreseeable future, we’ll explore where the case is, and what will likely happen in the next year or so. We will, of course, continue to provide updated information as it becomes available.

Pro-Depression Rally In DC Today

Of course that isn't what they are calling it, but how else do you characterize 400 left-wing groups that are coming together to protest for the policies of bailouts, takeovers, bullying and bigger government that has this nation spiraling deeper in debt and away from prosperity?

"This is certainly an opportunity to remind similarly aligned progressives what’s at stake in November," said Fred Sainz, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, which advocates for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. "Elections have consequences. There will be very few progressives who will prosper under a Republican Congress."

That's pretty much the point, Fred.

Americans are sick and tired of progressives prospering at the expense of our current economy, our nation's culture, and the future of our children. We don't was to see our nation decline into a second-rate nation so that you can file hate crimes charges at someone who turns up their nose just because you decide to prance down the street in high heels and a feather boa.

We're also tired of public officials raping the taxpayers at large to payoff narrow-minded and exclusive special interests and thuggish unions.

We want simple things: an America that allows Americans a chance to prosper, an opportunity to grow, and the room to dream. Progressive politics are constrictive, choking the life out of our republic.

Bus in your paid-for day laborers, freaks and thugs, your stoners and university Marxists, your limousine liberals, eco-fascists, and racial supremacist groups. It will not matter.

November is coming, and we remember what you have tried. We are of no specific color, age, creed, or nationality, but we remember what America once was, and what it will be again once you are defeated.

Cheerio! Eco-Fascist Greens Want You Dead

I'll let James Delingpole splatter you with the details, and instead, merely let the video stand on its own demerits.

True Believers—whether they follow Jim Jones, David Koresh, Che, or Mao— are one of mankind's greatest threats. When idealism is stripped of humanity and becomes zealotry, no number of lives is too many to purge to "embrace the change."

BTW, there is a political party here in the U.S. chock-full of eco-nuts just like these, and they are coming up for re-election in almost exactly a month, and will pursue economy-killing eco-fascism for the next two years if you don't show up Nov. 2 and vote them out.

No pressure.

CNN Provides Rick Sanchez the Opportunity to Do the Reich Thing

This whole thing happened so far I didn't ever get a chance to write the "whoa," much less the "gotta go."

Basically, one of CNN's lesser lights came out as a conspiracy-minded anti-Semite on a radio show yesterday afternoon, and was terminated today after the story got out.

I'd say I'm sorry to see him go, but quite frankly, he brought very little to the air in the first place.

Signs, Signs, Everywhere Signs!

What about that guy? You know, the guy at work who doesn’t have nearly enough to do? The supervisor or administrator who, when he comes to work every day, has no idea how he’ll fill eight hours, so he fills it dreaming up ways to make your work more difficult, costly and annoying?

If there was ever any doubt in your mind that Washington D.C. is overflowing with those guys, it should be dispelled now. The Federal Highway Administration has published an updated Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices and has decided that innumerable lives will be saved through improved readability if every traffic sign in America has capital letters on only the first letter of each word in every sign. Presumably this means that all “STOP” signs will, hereafter, read “Stop.”

According to New York City Officials, replacing all of their traffic signs, at about $110 per sign, will cost some $27.6 million dollars. NYC bureaucracy and union work rules being what they are, it will probably cost $276 million. One shudders to think of the national costs, but as Senator Everett Dirksen said, “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.” Of course to the Obamites, trillion is the new billion. Imagine the horror if they ever find out what comes after trillion.

This new regulation has been brought to you only indirectly by Congress which can’t be bothered to read the bills they write and vote for, or to pay attention to the enormously destructive powers they give unelected federal bureaucrats. This is the brave new hopenchange world of leftist bureaucrats unleashed to regulate every aspect of our lives, for our own good of course, because we’re so stupid that without lower case traffic signs, we’ll drive headlong into fixed objects.

As so much of the offal that issues from the Federal lower regions, this is clearly an example of a complete lack of common sense and real world experience. Only the Federal Government could decide that signs are easier to read at any distance with smaller, lower case letters, and that lives will thereby be saved. Credit is due, however, because they are, at least, being consistent. They also believe that we can get out of debt by--wait for it--going more deeply into debt! The next thing you know, they’ll be trying to convince the public that you can insure millions of people who don’t have insurance and it will cost less, or that under Obamacare, you can keep your insurance and doctor!

Obama "It took time to free the slaves."

I agree.

Another 32 days ought to do it.