I keep thinking tonight about how I would feel if that was my daughter who died in the chokehold case in New York City. The officer involved is asking the family of Eric Garner to “accept my personal condolences.” He released a statement after the Grand Jury decided not to indict him. Officer Daniel Pantaleo said: “I became a police officer to help people and to protect those who can’t protect themselves. It is never my intention to harm anyone and I feel very bad about the death of Mr. Garner. My family and I include him and his family in our prayers and I hope that they will accept my personal condolences for their loss.” I wonder if I would be able to accept Officer Pantaleo’s condolences? Honestly I’m not sure. Eric Garner’s wife sure wasn’t impressed. That’s her in the second picture. She was furious after seeing the officers statement. She said: “No I don’t accept his apology! I could care less about his condolences! (Officer Pantaleo) is still working, hes still getting a paycheck, hes still feeding his kids, and my husband is six feet under and I’m looking for a way to feed MY kids. (My husband) should be here celebrating Christmas and everything else with his children and grandchildren. And he cant. Why? Because a cop did wrong. Somebody who gets paid to do right, did wrong. The time for remorse would have been when my husband was saying he couldn’t breathe. That would have been the time to show some type of care for another human being.” The sad fact is that Eric Garner is gone. There is nothing that can bring him back. But maybe this case, and the case in Ferguson, will help get a “real” conversation going. I’ve said in the past that based on my life experiences, police have always been the “good guys” to me. And I know that there are a lot of very good officers out there. But there are also a lot of people who don’t trust the police, precisely because of what happened in New York City and Ferguson. And right now it feels like we are at a tipping point. I hope, for the sake of all of us, that something good comes out of this, before it’s too late. I recognize that this is a difficult post to like. I will assume that if you do want to hit like, it means that you feel for Eric Garners wife and that you also hope something good comes out of his death.
Posted on: Fri, 05 Dec 2014 04:40:15 +0000
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