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Discovering What Happened to Christian Taylor

Discovering What Happened to Christian Taylor

Discovering What Happened to Christian Taylor

Well, we find ourselves in a very familiar position; asking questions about what happened to cause an unarmed black man to be fatally shot by a white police officer. We are back at a place where we have far more questions than we have answers. Nearly a year after Mike Brown was fatally wounded by Darren Wilson in Ferguson, MO, Christian Taylor, a young black college athlete, was fatally wounded by 49-year-old Arlington Police rookie, Brad Miller.

Before I progress any further, I must warn the black collective that it is incumbent upon us all, not to allow this young man’s behavior prior to his death to be considered justification for his death. Although we must admit that he behavior placed him in that situation, and therefore, he must have some culpability in the matter, we must also hold the police officer, and the police department, accountable for a poor response, if that is what it turns out to be.

I will be the first to concede that Christian Taylor was wrong in his actions  leading up to the shooting, but breaking the law has never been an automatic death sentence, except when the perpetrator is a black male. We have had black men shot in the back while running away. We have black men shot in the back while being handcuffed lying prone on the ground. We have had black men shot multiple times while holding their hands up screaming, I am unarmed don’t shoot. I can go on almost indefinitely.

We must not abandon his family and his memory based on any mistakes that he has made. We owe it to him, his family, and all blacks, to tell his story in totality, for the purpose of bringing elucidation to the black narrative, so that we can effectively change it. We must also be willing to acknowledge his fixation on tying early, and how it may have played a role in his death. While it is easy to point the finger, most time with good reason, we must also be willing to admit that it is much easier to rid ourselves of the enemy within that control the enemy on the outside.

It has been a practice of a significant portion of the black collective to use non-compliance as the mechanism that underwrites their acceptance of the senseless killing of our men. Far too often, I hear blacks making comments like, “If he would have just complied, he would still be alive.” In the history of this nation, when has it ever been necessary to have a legitimate reason for a white man to take a black life?

I made the mistake of jumping out ahead of the facts in the Sandra Bland case, and I don’t want to make the mistake of doing that again here, so I will refrain from making absolute statements; however, I will say that in a case in which you have to officers, and an unarmed man, and the experienced officer pulled his taser, but the rookie used deadly force, all types of questions come to the surface.

What we must do here is refrain from our usual emotional reactions that are initiated with a bang, but fade quickly. We need to be level headed and calculative in engaging this situation. We need to learn how to take things away from every situation that will allow us to develop agendas and prepare strategies that will advance our agenda. We must be willing to rationally engage all of the facts with the mindset of understanding our dilemma better so that we can better prepare to elevate ourselves.

We are just getting started gathering the information surrounding this case, and we owe it to ourselves and the memory of Christian Taylor to be accurate in what we report and to present lucid interpretations of those facts. ~ Dr. Rick Wallace, Ph.D.

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Video shows Texas student at car dealership before officer fatally shot him
By Faith Karimi and Steve Almasy, CNN
Updated 7:26 AM ET, Sun August 9, 2015
| Video Source: KTVT

Christian TaylorChristian Taylor, 19, was shot multiple times at a car dealership in Texas
A security company called 911 early Friday after he allegedly drove his car through the front window

(CNN)An unarmed college football player who was fatally shot by an officer in Texas did not comply with initial calls to surrender, authorities said.

The officer involved was in the last stages of his field training when he shot Christian Taylor, 19, multiple times at a car dealership in Arlington, Police Chief Will Johnson said.

Footage released by a security company after the incident shows a man described as Taylor wandering around the dealership lot.

In the video, which has been edited, he kicks out the windshield of a car on the lot. Officers are shown walking onto the dealership’s parking lot a few moments later.

911 call

A security company called 911 about 1 a.m. Friday after Taylor allegedly drove his SUV through the front window of the dealership showroom, Johnson said.

The company monitored Taylor on surveillance cameras and reported a possible burglary in progress.

When officers arrived, Taylor was inside. They yelled at him from the other side of the glass to get on the ground but he ran away and tried to open a locked glass door, Johnson said.

Brad Miller, 49, and his training officer, a 19-year veteran, went inside to arrest Taylor. There was a confrontation in which Miller fired four times and the other officer used a Taser, the chief said.

More questions
The sequence of events and gunshots is unclear. Miller was not injured and has not been interviewed, but it is standard procedure to wait a few days before questioning an officer involved in a deadly shooting, the chief said.

Miller, who graduated from the police academy in March, is on routine administrative leave as authorities investigate the shooting. The officer was nearing the end of 16 weeks of field training, Johnson said.

Arlington police officials have invited the FBI to participate in the investigation and review the police department’s own investigation and findings.

“The facts available today do not answer all questions or alleviate all concerns,” Johnson said.

Surveillance video, police radio traffic and 911 calls will be released in about 10 days after all officers involved have talked to investigators, the chief said.

Taylor was black and Miller is white.

The deadly shooting came almost one year to the day after the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, led to protests nationwide and discussions about race and police shootings.

Father speaks out

Taylor played defensive back at Angelo State University. Last year’s roster listed him as a 5-foot-9, 180-pound freshman.

His father said while it appears his son did wrong, he shouldn’t have had to die.

“What he’d done, ain’t no way right,” Adrian Taylor told CNN affiliate KTVT. “But to shoot an unarmed man? You’re a police officer, you’re trained to take down men with your hands. You have your Tasers, you have your clubs, whatever there is. Unarmed, a 19-year-old — and you shoot to kill?”

Christian Taylor had “no real problems,” his father said. He said he often gave a helping hand to the homeless.

“A good dude, man,” the father told the station. “We’d be going over here to church and he’d pull over and give a homeless guy money, shoes if he needed and he’d have to go back home and get some more shoes because he gave his away. He was like that.”

The father didn’t know what could have prompted his son to allegedly drive his SUV into the dealership.

“You know, it could have been too much drinking, he could have been wrong place at the wrong time, he could have gotten something and he didn’t know what he was getting,” the father told the affiliate.

No body cam, no shooting video…
Miller wasn’t wearing a body camera because the department doesn’t use them, police said. The police department “is in the process of implementing a pilot program for body worn camera use,” authorities said in a statement.

He had no previous police experience prior to joining the Arlington force in September 2014. He has been in field training and working under the supervision of a police training officer since graduating from the academy, authorities said.

He has no disciplinary history or commendations, the department said.

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