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Not Guilty, Cops Walk In Sean Bell Killing

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Elano:
Sean Bell's furious father made a graveside vow to "shut this city down" Friday after a judge cleared the three cops who killed his son in a 50-bullet barrage.

"The judge spit in my damn face, but I knew it was coming," a bitter William Bell told the Rev. Al Sharpton beside Bell's grave at the Nassau Knolls Cemetery and Memorial Park in Port Washington, L.I.

"Now we're going to shut this city down. We're going to shut down Queens; we're going to shut down Wall Street."

Calling the Bell verdict "an abortion of justice," Sharpton later vowed to hit New Yorkers "in the pocketbook" and said he was looking for volunteers ready to "go to jail" if necessary.

"They expect us to react in traditional ways; they will not get that," he said on his radio show in Harlem. "We are going to engage in economic withdrawal. We are going to engage in nonviolent civil disobedience."

More than 100 blocks away in lower Manhattan, Michael Palladino, the president of the Detectives' Endowment Association, praised the verdict while Detectives Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora and Marc Cooper spoke publicly for the first time since the Nov. 25, 2006, shooting.

Cooper apologized to the Bell family "for the tragedy."

In other developments:

The Justice Department said it would review the case to see if Bell's civil rights were violated when he was killed on his wedding day. The three cops remain on modified duty and have surrendered their guns.
Weeping shooting survivor Trent Benefield called the verdict "unfair" and vowed to keep fighting. "They should have gotten what they deserve. If I did it, I'd be doing 25 to life."
Mayor Bloomberg, who took a lot of heat from cop groups for saying the shooting appeared to be "excessive," said, "There are no winners and losers in a trial like this."
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, who mobilized hundreds of extra cops in case there was trouble Friday, appealed for calm. "Some people were disappointed with the verdict and we understand that," he said.
Tears of rage and joy flowed in the Queens courtroom after Supreme Court Justice Arthur Cooperman read his verdict a little after 9 a.m.

Bell's fiancée, Nicole Paultre Bell, ran crying out of the courtroon while Benefield broke down in tears. William and Valerie Bell, Sean's parents, sat in stunned silence while Bell supporters swore under their breaths.

On the other side of the tense courtroom, Oliver appeared to be weeping with relief as he and the other acquitted detectives were hustled out through a back door.

Outside Queens Supreme Court, small scuffles broke out after Bell supporters walked out, some of them yelling, "Murderers! Murderers!" and "KKK!" The hundreds of police officers standing watch quickly intervened and there were no other outbursts.

Bell, a 23-year-old father of two, was sitting in his car with two pals, Benefield and Joseph Guzman, when he was killed. They had just been at the Kalua Cabaret, a strip joint in Jamaica, Queens, for Bell's bachelor party.

Isnora, Cooper and Oliver were carrying out an undercover sting operation at the club. When the shooting was over, Bell was dead and Benefield and Guzmanwere badly wounded.

In reaching his verdict, Cooperman had to consider two simple-yet-competing arguments - either the police were reckless and overreacted or the victims were acting like drunken thugs and brought it on themselves.

Defense lawyers said the detectives fired on Bell's car in self-defense because they believed Guzman was reaching for a gun. No gun was found.

Cooperman said the prosecution's case was undermined by "prior inconsistent statements." He said he didn't believe their star witnesses - Benefield and Guzman.

Benefield's testimony, in particular, "eviscerated the credibility of those prosecution witnesses," the judge said. "At times, the testimony just didn't make sense."

Before wrapping up its case, the defense played a tape of Benefield right after the shooting in which he said a man - who never identified himself as a detective - suddenly fired on Bell's car.

Prosecutors were perplexed at the time, but the defense insisted the tape contradicted what Benefield said in court, and the judge agreed.

"His credibility was seriously impeached," he said.

Cooperman said Guzman's angry turn on the stand hurt the prosecution's case. He also was swayed by defense arguments that the survivors might have tailored their testimony to win a $50 million civil suit against the city.

Noting that Bell, Benefield and Guzman all had criminal records, Cooperman questioned why they chose for Bell's bachelor party a strip club "known as venues that create criminal activity . . . such as prostitution."

Cooperman insisted the court "did not view the victims or the NYPD as having been on trial here," but "the burden was on the people to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt."

Justification was used as a defense, so Cooperman said he had to consider the "mindset of the defendants, not the victims. What the victims did was more important to resolve the issues at hand than what was in their minds."

Cooperman said he believed cops' claims that Guzman threatened to fetch a gun after Bell got into a squabble with a stranger outside the club.

"The confrontation that took place in front of the club was heated," the judge said.

"The court finds another threat was made by Joseph Guzman."

Cooperman was silent on what many considered a key issue in the case - whether the undercover cops identified themselves before they opened fire.

"The incident lasted just seconds," the judge said. Despite "the unfortunate circumstances of their conduct, the actions of the defendants was not proved to be criminal."

Cooperman delivered his verdict in a stern voice, interrupting his monologue only once when Benefield's baby began crying in court. "I'm not going to continue unless the child is removed," he said.

Benefield's girlfriend, Nyla Page Walthrus, quickly walked out with the 16-month-old boy.

Cooperman's verdict closed the book on a closely watched eight-week trial during which NYPD procedures were put under the microscope and the reputations of Bell and his wounded buddies were dragged through the mud.

Oliver, who fired 31 times and reloaded once, and Isnora, who fired 11 times, had been charged with manslaughter, felony assault and reckless endangerment. They faced up to 25 years in prison if convicted on all charges.

Cooper, who fired four times, faced up to a year in jail if convicted of reckless endangerment.

None of the detectives testified, although their grand jury testimony was read aloud at the trial.

Like Guzman and Benefield, Bell was black. Race didn't figure as prominently in the case because Cooper, 40, and Isnora, 29, are black, and Oliver, 36, is of Lebanese descent.

Elano:
Seventeen months to the day since the November 25, 2006 shooting of Sean Bell, a queens judge found three undercover detectives involved not guilty on all charges today (April 24).

Detectives Michael Oliver and Gescard Isnora who faced the most charges, were both acquitted on first and second degree manslaughter, which carries a possible sentence of 25 years in prison.

They were also acquitted of first and second degree felony assault, and reckless endangerment. Detective Marc Cooper was also acquitted on the two counts of reckless endangerment he was charged with.

"The Hip-Hop Summit Action Network expressed today its profound dismay in the wake of the not guilty verdicts for the New York City police officers who were involved in the killing of Sean Bell," HSAN President and CEO Dr. Benjamin Chavis told AllHipHop.com. "Hip-Hop is an inclusive cultural phenomenon that represents the highest aspirations of all youth of the human family. The injustice that is so evident in the case of Sean Bell reminds us of the old America at a time when millions of young people are raising their voices and votes for a new America. Police brutality is not a new phenomenon, but unfortunately, the system of justice, particularly in New York City, appears to be incapable of rendering equal justice without the taint of racial bias and prejudice."

The verdict came in just after 9:00 am, after nearly two weeks of deliberation.

The detectives opted out of a trial by jury and instead the seven weeks of testimony was heard by State Supreme Court Justice Arthur J Cooperman.

"This case was not about justice. This case was about the police officers having the right to act above the law... Justice was not here today. This court is obviously bankrupt of justice when it comes to people of color," added Leroy Gadsden of the NAACP.

According to Judge Cooperman, he had a hard time finding the testimony of the victims credible. "The people have not proved beyond a reasonable doubt that each defendant was not justified" in shooting the victims, Cooperman said.

"What happened in that case is a f***ing travesty," outspoken Atlanta rapper Killer Mike told AllHipHop.com. "What is the police trying to force the underclass to do? The police maintain jobs when they have something to police. By agitating the people you just create a bigger need for police. So instead of the police protecting and serving the community, the community becomes a commodity for the police force."

Steele of pioneering Hip-Hop duo Smif-N-Wessun expressed his anger with the verdict, as well as the police.

"There's a war against us waged by the so-called powers that be and their first infantry are these murderous pigs they use to keep us in place by harassment and murder," Steele said. "We must stand together and defend ourselves and be smart. We are all under surveillance. It's time to stand up."

Sean Bell, 23, was killed in the early morning hours of November 25, 2006 after leaving Kalua, a Queens strip club where he'd just wrapped up his bachelor party.

An NYPD undercover investigation unit looking to make arrests in their prostitution case witnessed an argument between one of Bells friends and another man.

Detective Isnora told the grand jury that he believed that Bells friend Joseph Guzman was going to get a gun out of Bells car.

That's when he followed the men and called for back up. Bell, along with his two friends Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield got into his Nissan Altima.

Then with Bell behind the wheel, officers approached the car and drew their weapons without identifying themselves as police, according to the testimony of Guzman and Benefield.

Detective Oliver was the only one who reloaded his 9mm semi automatic weapon firing 31 shots, while Detective Isnora let off 11 shots, and Detective Cooper fired 4.

No gun was found in Bells car. Dr. Chavis urged the Hip-Hop community to remain calm and channel any anger into positive, constructive energy to bring forth change.

"The anger and disgust that the Hip-Hop community certainly feels today should not be permitted to develop into anything negative, as a response," Dr. Chavis noted. "Sean Bell's death will not be in vain, to the extent to which millions of youth work even harder to demand equal justice, and to fundamentally change the current system of injustice."

Elano:
It's been a minute since I've blogged on this site, and those of you around during the infancy stages of DX blogging will recognize the screenname (note to all: I haven't gone anywhere, I just write under my government now: Anthony Springer, Jr.)

I can't recall the last time I shed a tear over too much of anything in the news, not 9/11, not Jena, Darfur. The Sean Bell verdict did what an act of terrorism and a genocide could not: move me to tears. My heart hurts for the Bell family, his wife, and the two daughters that will grow up without a father. But most of all, I hurt for everybody who's ever been killed or maimed at the hands of overzealous, cowardly and crooked officers.

To continue saying "fuck the police," at this point in time is counterproductive, and gets us nowhere. Sure, it makes us feel good (go on and say it now, you know you want to), but at the end of the day, we've wasted emotions and black and brown men everywhere will still be getting shot across the country and we'll be left feeling powerless to do anything about it.

My blogging brethren J. Burnett  issued a call to action, and if that was the alley oop, I hope this post is the dunk that hits home with somebody out there in cyberspace.

Barack Obama commented on the verdict today, saying, "Well, look, obviously there was a tragedy in New York. I said at the time, without benefit of all the facts before me, that it looked like a possible case of excessive force. The judge has made his ruling, and we're a nation of laws, so we respect the verdict that came down."

I don't expect Obama to take a real controversial stance on the issue, and while his statement was, to say the least, disappointing, there's a gem in there that we need to heed.

In a nation of lawless police, we are a nation of laws, which means that we can't be content to march in the streets and we can't resort to random acts of violence against law enforcement. We need to lobby our elected officials to change our laws.

"Dollars and change," in the words of the late Johnnie Cochran.There's no amount of money that will bring Mr. Bell back, but if the people who fund the police are made to pay EVERY time some rogue cop acts a fool, the police may think twice before drawing a weapon. And we need to lobby for changes to the court system. Expecting the police to police themselves is ridiculous; expecting the local district attorney—who's success DEPENDS on a good working relationship with the police—is equally ridiculous. Cases involving police misconduct should be investigated, at worst, by an independent body and at best by the FBI or Justice Department.

The three officers in the Bell case were likely acquitted because they opted for a trial by judge instead of a jury. This needs to change as well. Trials involving police misconduct should be MANDATORY jury trials, in a venue close to the location of the incident in question.

Bullshit rolls down, real change is an uphill battle, who's willing to push the wagon for justice and equality? I seldom agree with Al Sharpton, but justice was aborted today. Let's not allow Mr. Bell's death to be in vain.

herpes:
I don't believe in god and all that bull shit but if its real when those cops die they will get whats coming to them.  Especially Michael Oliver the one that let off 31 of the 51 shots.

WestCoasta:
oh shit that nigga Al Sharpton

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