It looks like we will see the usual suspects throw another fit. This time, it's because a Border Patrol agent is being charged with murder. An earlier article explains why: The agent's story is apprently contradicted by physical evidence - as well as some eyewitnesses, including a surveillance camera.
So, we're going to have to go to trial in order to have this explained. If this agent is guilty of misusing deadly force, then he needs to go to jail, just as Ramos and Compean have.
Corbett is innocent until proven guilty. Should the charges stick, then he needs to pay the penalty. Now, a number of conservatives have recently been coming out in defense of those agents. They don't even think that there should be a trial. They are wrong - and worse, they are undermining the rule of law.
Any use of force by law enforcment needs to be accounted for. Ramos and Compean tried to deny us the accounting we, their employers, deserved. That alone must force us to take an extremely skeptical look at the incident they were involved in. If their shooting of the man was clean, why did they tamper with the scene?
If we turn a blind eye to the misuse of force, particularly deadly force, by law enforcement officers, then we are going to see a lot of people distrust cops. That's not just bad for the cops, it's bad for all of us, because people will try to mete out justice themselves, and that never works.
We need to get the accounting for this matter - and if the cop messed up, he needs to be penalized. Otherwise, the law means nothing.
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I would love to say something sarcastic, but what's the use? I find the irony of the anti-immigration far right rather bemusing at times. On one hand they are adament against excessive use of force when it comes to "natural born Americans" but when it comes to illegals, 'let 'em have it'. Seems to me you can't have it both ways and maintain any intellectual legitimacy.
SJ Reidhead
The Pink Flamingo
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