Earlier today Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne announced his decision not to issue criminal charges against Madison Police Officer Matt Kenny after Officer Kenny shot and killed Tony Robinson, who was unarmed at the time of his death. According to reports, Officer Kenny alleged Robinson attacked him shortly after Officer Kenny made contact, resulting in Officer Kenny firing 7 shots and killing Robinson.
So what do you think of DA Ozanne’s decision not to charge Officer Matt Kenny? Was it the right decision?
Again, the only testimony is that telling one side of the story. I still cannot understand how LE investigators from the DoJ are “outside,” investigators or independent in any fashion. Dontre Hamilton DoJ investigators were former Milwaukee detectives who had retired from Milwaukee after 30 and 35 year careers respectively and then joined DoJ for their new positions.
Facts not clear to me yet are how, when the second officer arrived on the scene, Mr Robinson was dead at the bottom of the stairs and there were no other individuals in the upstairs apartment. Who was Mr Robinson supposedly fighting with when Kenny arrived and entered the premises thinking a fight was in progress? Too many unanswered questions to convict the officer before a jury on murder, but this officer doesn’t deserve staying on the force. Lesser charges should come from the MPD internal investigation.
What lesser charges? He entered the apartment based on the 911 calls that were received. He was immediately set upon by someone who was HIGH on hallucinogenic shrooms. He was struck so hard in the head that he literally put a dent in the drywall. Tony Robinson was just given probation for an ARMED robbery and was in an apartment with a shotgun AND was HIGH ON HALLUCINOGENIC SHROOMS and POT. Both of those things are in violation of his probation.
Of course this was the RIGHT decision. I’m wondering what the officer SHOULD be charged with in your mind? He was doing his job and was set upon by a drugged crazed lunatic regardless of his color and he defended his life.
IF the officer doesn’t enter the apartment and someone is being raped or murdered by our drugged out criminal then the police are in trouble for not responding quickly enough (because you know he was black and cops don’t care about black’s).
If he doesn’t use whatever force is necessary to defend his life he could be DEAD like the two COPS in MISSISSIPPI. They were answering a simple traffic stop when they were gunned down by an individual who was HIGH on DRUGS.
Whatever… Doesn’t matter what I or anyone else says. You are locked into an opinion and can’t possibly see the facts as they are presented. The officer responding to 911 calls did NOT get up that day looking for a black man to kill. He certainly did not get up that day looking to have his very life threatened.
BLESS that officer, I’m glad that he defended his life, I’m glad that he will be defending the streets of Madison. I feel no sympathy for the deceased man. He was a repeat FELON who was ASSAULTING citizens and POLICE and he lost his life for the MANY CRIMINAL decisions that he made.
Now the mother of Robinson, I do feel sympathy for her loss as a mother. Too bad she couldn’t pull her son away from the drugs and crime that he enveloped himself in. Not that she should be expected to as ROBINSON WAS NOT A BOY HE WAS A MAN.
Internal investigation will tell us if was doing his job, “properly,” I’ll presume. The first fallacy in your argumemt. You place one *if* scenario on top of and depending on the first *if* scenario, toss in a red herring from Mississippi, and declare I am the one locked into an opinion.
Yet, I am unmistakeably stating all the facts don’t appear clear. But you are declaring certainty based on your suppositions and dead fish.
Only a truly racial bigot would be certain to declare color or race is NOT a matter considered in their attempted full exoneration of an LEO. Law enforcement here is still investigating its own, no matter how else you want to paint that and will always be a factor to consider.
If I made a mistake I should possibly have said “penalty,” like a demotion, a dismissal without retirement, instead of “charges.”
You demean/blame the victim of the shooting by emphasizing past behaviors and that very knowledge the officer likely had (another fact I am not sure of from the reporting), which should have been an absolute warning to officer Kenny to wait for backup as much as the way you play it, as the big unprovable claim in his story, his excuse to enter an apartment by himself.
Still batting a thousand in irrelevance and fact-less. Own it, b.
Only because I enormously enjoy reading your drivel do I care to respond to your latest remarks.
You sir do not know me or my background yet you outright call me or suggest that I’m a racist or a bigot. For shame.
And make no mistake I do blame the “victim”. 100% his actions that day led to his death. I don’t consider him black or white I consider him a criminal.
FURTHER, HIS actions that day and his prior actions are what define him as a person, nothing less, nothing more. I didn’t demean him by pointing out his HIS behavior.
So sad and completely unnecessary. And obviously part of a larger shameful pattern, both nationally and locally.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/12/police-officer-wisconsin-teenager-no-charges
So, since 2010 there’s been like maybe 25 homicides in Madison, and police have killed 7 people???
We clearly have some major intertwined problems here:
1) Systemic racism – both devaluing black lives and perceiving “threats” where none exist
2) Police way too quick to shoot first, and ask question later
3) Total lack of accountability for police on the back-end
Obviously all 3 are a damn shame and need to be addressed, but maybe the quickest way to save some lives is to do something about #2. Disarm the police, and start in Madison. Your odds of getting shot by a criminal in Madison are awfully close to your odds of getting shot by a police officer. So, take away the officers’ guns and reduce violence by a not-trivial amount.
They should be able to do their jobs with tasers, pepper spray, and other non-lethal means. (Keep a SWAT team for rare, actual tactical/stand-off situations.) If that seems too extreme, then have all officers still carry sidearms, but only randomly give 20% of them live ammo any given shift. Only they’ll know who actually has the ammo, and it will train them to resolve things non-lethally out of necessity. Or, maybe instill a culture change over time by only giving officers guns after a few years of service. Something to make them less quick to reach for their guns. This is a way for Madison PD to rebuild trust with the community, show other depts around the country that this can work, and maybe pay some small amount of respect to Tony Robinson and his family (and all the others who’ve died needlessly at the hands of police).
Disarm the police! What an absolute joke. Yes criminals need more advantages to menace society. Why don’t we have them carry around penalty cards! That idea works in soccer (most of the time) surely it would stop armed robbers and rapists and wife beaters.
Pay some small amount of respect to TONY ROBINSON????? What for, he was a multiple offender and was menacing his neighborhood. AND HE ASSAULTED A POLICE OFFICER during the commission of a CRIME. He deserves no amount of respect. TAKE away his color, make him a white man and this story would have hardly made the news. HE WAS GUILTY and was WRONG and a RED CARD was not stopping him.
Pay some small amount of respect to Tony Robinson, what an absolute joke.
lufthase,
You are correct, serious changes in LE policy need to be made and without further delay. Thanks for your thoughts. The absolutists and racial bigots will only accept the spilling of more blood as the solution to their fear and loathing of those people not like them in every matter and manner.
My thoughts. The guilt or innocence of the police is irrelevant. I think it was Rham Emmanuel who once said, “never waste an opportunity to destroy you’re own community.”
The reek of your early morning verbal flatulence. You can’t absolutely attribute a quote, you don’t include any context of perpetrator or victim to apply the quote to, and then leave it stinking on the page, pretending you’ve contributed some wisdom to the discussion. Stick to exploiting child labor, something you are familiar with, assuming you are the person behind the name.
This incident reveals once again the absolute need for body camera on all police.
Without it, there is no way to prove or disprove the testimony of the survivor and what led to the death or injury to the victim when there are no other observers or parties involved.