Episode 10 - Riot Acts

In this week's Fate of the Union Episode, host Franklin Shelby takes a look at the new charges facing Officer Derek Chauvin and the other Minneapolis responding officers in connection with the death of George Floyd. He also points out some potential hurdles for the prosecution to make its case.

Nest, Franklin covers the riots enveloping protests across the country, and the partisan shielding of all the damage and injuries inflicted by the rioters on these cities. We also take a look at #blackouttuesday slacktivism and the immense backlash directed at Drew Brees for his comments regarding potential NFL kneeling protests.

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Transcript

Welcome to the 10th episode of Fate of the Union. As always, I am your host Franklin Joseph. If you go back and listen to last week’s episode, if you haven’t already, you’ll see that we discussed the video depicting the killing of George Floyd in Minnesota after being suffocated under the knee of officer Derek Chauvin. This episode will cover the protests and riots that have ensued across the country in the days since last episode. However, we first must review a development in the charges facing the officers.

As of the recording of last week’s episode, Officer Chauvin was charged with third degree murder in connection with the death of George Floyd. As a review, third degree murder in Minnesota is covered by

609.195 MURDER IN THE THIRD DEGREE.

(a) Whoever, without intent to effect the death of any person, causes the death of another by perpetrating an act eminently dangerous to others and evincing a depraved mind, without regard for human life, is guilty of murder in the third degree and may be sentenced to imprisonment for not more than 25 years.

First, we see that this statute pertains to a defendant who caused the death of another person by acting in an eminently dangerous way or with a depraved mind, even though the defendant DID NOT intend to cause the death of the victim. Many states have similar laws. Sometimes they are referred to “depraved indifference” murder laws. Basically, these laws are reserves for defendants who had a reckless disregard for whether death may be a result of their actions, but still did not intend to kill anyone like a defendant convicted of premeditate first degree murder would have. Commentary on the law summarizes it like this: “Minnesota also has a third-degree murder statute between second-degree murder and the two levels of manslaughter. This type of murder is not intentional and therefore is not as severely punished as first and some second-degree murder killings. However, the behavior is so atrocious that it isn’t mitigated or lowered to manslaughter in the first or second degree.”

On Wednesday June 3rd, it was revealed that court documents show that the three officers on the scene besides Chauvin were now being charged as aiding and abetting second-degree unintentional murder, as well as aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter. 

Also, Chauvin’s charges now included second degree murder as well. He still faces third degree murder and second degree manslaughter charges as well. Minneapolis’ local CBS affiliate notes that “Minnesota’s sentencing guidelines indicate two different possibilities for intentional second-degree murder and unintentional second-degree murder. The former sentencing guideline calls for, upon conviction, 25 and a half years in prison, whereas the latter calls for 12 and a half years.”

The second degree murder charges will be examined under the law’s section regarding unintentional killings for a similar reason that Chauvin was not initially charged with first degree murder. 

The second degree murder charge has two ways to convict someone for an unintentional killing. Similar to the third degree charge, the first way is that defendant must have been committing a felony that resulted in the victim’s death. While the third degree charge calls for simply reckless indifference to life (presumably general negligence or recklessness for others’ well being), this charge requires the defendant’s actions leading up to the victim’s death to actually be a felony.

The second way is when the defendant causes the death of a human being without intent to effect the death of any person, while intentionally inflicting or attempting to inflict bodily harm upon the victim, when the perpetrator is restrained under an order for protection and the victim is a person designated to receive protection under the order.

I know I just hit you with a lot of legalese, so let’s break it down. The new second degree murder charge may be problematic for the state to prove for a few reasons. First, the so-called “order of protection” section of the law does not expressly mention an arrest or detainment as qualifying as “orders” as it’s mentioned in the law. The other thorny issue here for the prosecution, pertaining to the first section, is that they would also have to prove that Officer Chauvin was committing a felony leading up to Floyd’s death. Although these two sections of the second degree murder statute, the felony resulting in murder part and the order of protection part, are not both needed for a conviction (it can be one situation or the other, or both), there are hurdles that the state has with proving both. In my opinion, it’s crucial that the third degree murder charge has remained active in this case. The state is necessarily tying the proof of another felony into the first portion of this charge, and an argument liking the arrest of George Floyd to what the law says is an “order of protection” in the other part. If they cannot sustain this burden, then the most serious charge remaining would be that third degree murder charge.

I will keep you all updated on the developments with this case. Now, let’s shift our discussion to the growing riots that are enveloping peaceful protests in many US cities. What started as an ugly segment of the protests last week has since grown exponentially to result in several curfew orders in cities across the country. As a result of the immense damage and injuries inflicted by the rioters in recent days, there are curfews standing in the following cities: NYC, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, among others. New York State Governor, Andrew Cuomo, had the brilliant idea of announcing the curfew at 11pm at night on the night he wished the curfew to begin. That was obviously not effective. None of these orders, or the police presence in these cities, have completely prevented the carnage from the rioters, but has only succeeded to various degree in limiting it.

This led to an all out mainstream media protectionism of the rioting. CNN’s Chris Cuomo toed the company line in equating rioting with passionate protesting. In doing so, Cuomo justified the rioting by claiming that no change could be effected if the protesting was non-peaceful. Such was the case in the past. However, what Cuomo and others on the left are doing, knowingly, is giving cover for the crimes of those in the streets. Protesting by its very nature can become very uncomfortable for those not participating; it can even be non-peaceful in the sense that while it falls short of calling for violence, it nevertheless casts its opponents in biting terms, making no apologies for the tone and tenor of their words. Legal and legitimate protesting does not include setting fire to buildings and destroying property, virtually all of which belongs to other blacks or other racial minority groups.

We also saw the return of online so-called “slacktivism” on Tuesday. It was termed #blackouttuesday and was meant to show solidarity with those on the racially motivated left. In doing so, a social media members would post a solid black photo as their profile picture on various social media pages, along with the hashtag. However, as is so often the case with celebritized, vapid online activism, the wheels fell off the movement almost immediately. White celebrities and influencers spent much of the day being lectured to by the racist left on how they did not tailor their social media posts exactly the way their betters instructed them to. Confusion with the proper hashtags and inclusion of personal messages from white users was met with leftist rage for the duration of their day in solidarity.

Dave Portnoy, founder of Barstool Sports, summarized this type of slacktivism as follows: 

“Let me be very clear… we have to get to a place in this country where it doesn’t matter the color of your skin,” Portnoy said in a video post. “If you see a police officer walking down the street, you don’t think you’re going to be treated differently because you’re black or white. We have to get there.”

High-profile celebrities and large companies flooded their profile pictures with black boxes on Tuesday. According to Portnoy, it was an empty gesture that does nothing to bring about progress, arguing that people should be more focused on the riots destroying American cities.

“But does that box on your profile today get you any closer? Everybody is already hyperfocused on racism right now in the U.S,” said Portnoy. “There are riots basically every single night. You couldn’t be paying more attention to these issues at this precise moment if your life depended on it, so what does the black box do?”