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Excon said:Deflection noted.
No deflection. Your response was unclear, which was more or less my point.
Excon said:Stop with the absurdity.
Why do you think it's absurd? What specific reason should I have to think it's absurd?
Excon said:No the video doesn't say otherwise,
Yeah it does. The video shows no evidence of a drawn weapon, and if Castile had drawn his weapon, it'd probably be in his hand or near his hand, and frames from the video show his lap pretty clearly. No gun.
The video also shows the immediate reactions of the people who were right there. The officer's reaction is immediately defensive--and why would he be offering excuses for why he shot Castile unless he knew he had done something wrong? Castile was in the car with his girlfriend and her four-year-old daughter. The notion that Castile would reach for his pistol under such circumstances is not logically impossible, but it's unlikely, which means the standard of proof of the counter-claim (i.e. that Castile was reaching for his weapon) has to be pretty high. But there's no evidence to back the counter-claim.
Excon said:and she lying ioon video doesnt; make her a credible witness.
I can't tell exactly what you're saying, since "ioon" isn't a word (do you mean "ion"? "loon"? "lion"?), and since your unusual use of a semicolon appears to split a principle verb. I assume you're trying to say Castile's girlfriend is somehow not credible. Her reaction looks genuine to me. I've had the misfortune of seeing people in the moments when they learn they've just lost someone violently, and her reaction is in line with my experiences and what I know of the psychology of shock.
Excon said:The Officer clearly told him not to reach for it and then told him to get his hand off it.
No one disputes that the officer told him not to reach for his gun. What is in question is whether Castile actually did reach for his gun.
Excon said:We can then see in the video that the gun ended up on his lap and then fell outside the vehicle when they took Castile out for medical attention.
Can we? Prove it. I've reviewed the video frame-by-frame. There's no gun anywhere. The video doesn't show Castile being taken out for medical treatment. Furthermore, the Times article disagrees:
NY Times said:Paramedics eventually found the weapon, a .40-caliber semiautomatic handgun, in the pocket of his shorts as they were positioning him on a backboard. There was no round in the chamber.
Excon said:And the Officer made it clear he was responding to the "presence" of the gun he saw "displayed".
Of course he would say that. And perhaps he is even telling the truth...in which case, he will have the chance to tell his side at trial.
Excon said:Did the Officer tell him to take his hand off it? Of course he did.
That's hardly proof. That's not even evidence. That's your claim, and even if it's true, it's irrelevant, since Yanez' telling Castile to take his hand off his gun doesn't mean Castile's hand was anywhere near his gun, or even that Yanez thought it was. So again: provide some evidence for your claims. The burden of proof is on the side of the shooter, not the victim.
Excon said:Why would a police officer hear a man say "I carry a gun, it's legal," and more or less "please don't kill me sir" and promptly kill him.
I can think of any number of reasons. Maybe Yanez was unusually angry. Maybe he was genuninely scared. Maybe he was hallucinating. Maybe he's a sociopath who thought he could get away with shooting a man in cold blood in front of his family. Plenty of people make reasonable remarks to their murderers right before they are killed. Nice words won't stop deadly malice.
I've known plenty of cops. Many of them are as moral as anyone else--that is, they're reasonably nice (I can't say I've ever known a police officer who was a paragon of moral behavior). Some of them are absolute psycho scoundrels who live for the day they can draw their weapons and squeeze off a few rounds at a live target, and who in the meantime revel in their power and authority over others.
Excon said:It was the girlfriend who said he was licensed to carry, not Castile. The Officer told the guy not to reach for it and then told him to get his hand off it.
I don't know whether any of that is true or not. Suppose it is. So what?