Another histrionic article from Shaun King at the New York Daily Snooze today. As is the case with almost everything he writes, he either hasn't researched or he is deliberately throwing false flags to incite his low information twitter following. Today was no exception.
San Francisco Tanks Racist Cop Investigation
King: After at least a dozen officers from the San Francisco Police Department were discovered in 2012-2013 to have sent scores of overtly racist and violent text messages about African-Americans amongst [sic] themselves,Facts: There were scores of racist text messages from Ian Furminger to SFPD officers, his wife, and other individuals. Furringer has been convicted and sentenced to prison on corruption charges - his and the other reprehensible text messages stemmed from his criminal case. The following are the remaining text messages sent by four officers from their personal cell phones, most are replies to Furringer. One of the officers, Michael Robinson, resigned in March.
King: "...the case against them has completely crumbled — making it nearly impossible to prosecute or terminate the officers for their actions. From the outside looking in, it appears that officials within the department knowingly tanked the case against their own officers."Facts: Prosecutors instructed SFPD officials to wait until after their case against the worst and most vile offender, Ian Furringer, was completed. Due to no fault of the SFPD, that wait exceeded the "statute of limitations" referenced by King, . To state as fact, as King did in his article, that prosecutors purposefully stalled and covered for four officers with approx seven racist tweets between them, is beyond irresponsible, but who's surprised?.
King:"So, even though these officers were found to have openly said things like "all n-----s must f--king hang" and "Get ur pocket gun. Keep it available in case the monkey returns to his roots. It's not against the law to put an animal down," and called Sgt. Yulanda Williams, a black woman who is head of an advocacy organization for African American officers, a "n----r b---h," it's now too late, according to the judge and the rules the department agreed to, to do anything about this."Facts:
1. None of these things were "openly said", they were text messages.
2. The officer whose comments are in bold/blue has resigned
3. The officer whose comments are in bold/red has been sentenced to over 3 yrs in prison
I applaud the Prosecutor's office for convicting Ian Furringer. As regards the other four officers, racists texts, in and of themselves, are not actionable; they are, at most, grounds for termination if they violate a company's policies and procedures. King making a federal case over the fact prosecutors chose to safeguard their case against Furrier is illogical. Their's was unquestionably the correct route. Hopefully the officers responsible for the remainder of the racist and homophobic tweets will do the right thing and make different career choices (sans public service), immediately.
I would also remind Shaun King of his oft repeated use of the "n" word.
