I opened up my Saturday, March 20, 2010, Times-Standard newspaper to the headlines that said: "I could have been killed so quickly." That statement was made by Kris Coon, the man that attacked David Sequoia. In my book, David Sequoia was the one that was in the right to defend himself against Coon. David Sequoia did absolutely NOTHING to physically threaten Kris Coon and his "family" other than "look scared" and "lurk around" in the alley. The simple truth is the Eureka Police shot the wrong person. They had no way of knowing that the gun was Coon's and that Sequoia was himself fighting for his life. When your involved in that kind of life and death struggle there's no way to hear or recognize a police officer's orders. Both men had a grip on the gun. Coon couldn't drop the gun if he wanted to. The mind is too focused on survival to hear anything. For Chief Garr Nielsen to say, under these circumstances, that Sequoia was pointing the gun at the officers is absolute nonsense.
Coon says, "I was fighting him" WHY? "Because I was thinking he was stealing from my carport." "THINKING" absolutely does NOT justify putting your hands on someone let along FIGHT with that person. Obviously, he was not stealing, he was running for his life. Too bad, Sequoia thought the guy chasing him with a gun was threatening his life, when all the time the real threat was from the guy living on Summer Street that believed he had the right to attack him for lurking in his alley.
It seems there are many people in Eureka that believe they have the right to touch someone whenever they want. Kris Coon, the guy that got David Sequoia or David Barger killed Thursday afternoon in Eureka enforced that right, the right to "search" the young man "lurking around" in the alley near his carport. Coon says he thought Sequoia was trying to steal his tools and demanded the right to search him and his possessions. When Sequoia refused Coon jumped him and threw him to the ground. NO ONE HAS THAT RIGHT! At the least, Coon assaulted that man and at the most caused his untimely death.
Normally, I'd feel real sorry for the EPD officer or officers that shot and killed that boy under these circumstance. They were deprived of their legal right to deal with such issues in a controlled life-saving manner. Normally. Except for the simple truth that these police officers believe, act and enforce the fact that their defacto value superceeds ALL common citizens of this city, county, state or country. Why is it that, in the picture above, that officer is packing an assault rifle?
Not even the police have the right to just walk up and put their hands on someone unless they can prove in a court of law that they had probable cause to do so. Probable cause, in my book, means they have sufficient reason to arrest that person.
My wife and I walk the streets and alleyways of Eureka on a daily basis as do a lot of people, including school children. Does that mean we are all subject to being attacked by worried, paranoid people that simply “think” we are there to harm them? The question is, do we all need a gun and the trained expertise to use it to protect ourselves from our paranoid neighbor's and if so, who is going to protect us from the police that see all guns as a threat to them?
[Picture source]
--Joe
No comments:
Post a Comment