(left to right) lead prosecutor- Michael Snipes, Jordan's stepmom- Charmaine Edwards, Jordan's dad- Odell Edwards, & Edwards family attorney- Daryl Washington, after sentencing
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Legal expert Pete Schulte on Roy Oliver's sentencing ... Thanx to WFAA
This posting will serve as Part 2 of "Jordan Edwards Killing", and Part 31 of the "Police Brutality" series for this journal/ blog. To try to make some sense of this, as far as what happened in the sentencing of Oliver, I chose legal expert Pete Schulte above to point out something of importance. It appears to look like they had to find "no guilt" on the aggravated assault cases to deliberate and find guilt on the murder one, all due technically to the differences between "intent" and "reckless", I just dont know, but something screwed up somewhere. And we wont know what happened in the sentencing, until one of the jurors comes public, which they can do, as long as they only talk about their decision, and not other jurors decisions, as instructed by the judge. I was asked about this case by several folks locally, as the trial was going down, for what I think, etc. When the guilty verdict came in of the trial phase, I immediately received a couple texts on my phone, from folks that were happy and excited about it. I went to media ... and media coast to coast was excited about this as a victory, for not just Jordan, but so many others across America that lost their lives like this. People were so excited and shocked, because for years in case after case across America, hearing of an officer convicted for murder is rare, and was shocking to some nationally, that it happened in Texas, of all places. I was happy, but not too excited for reasons of my own, which I will explain in my part below after the news link. I needed to hear the sentencing phase first, before posting on this, because I been following the trial with testimonies, including the defendant who took the stand, Oliver. Conviction is a plus, but sentencing is also importante. It appears this is not over, that there could be more to this case and to come, than what we see in mainstream media ... which could be sad for Jordan's familia too, as far as having to go through more. I also want to credit Dallas County DA Faith Johnson, for aggressively pursuing this quick indictment, the Balch Springs PD for immediately firing Officer Oliver, and all the work of the 7 member prosecution team, led by Mike Snipes, who really done a good job in prosecuting Oliver. This jury selection was done back in June, unusual too, because most are picked the week of/ or before the trial. Some news and video below, then my part at the bottom.
***** NBC5 DALLAS- FORT WORTH: Police Officer Convicted of Murder Sentenced to 15 Years in Prison ... (newsread/ video)
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***** PD/ RCJ: "JORDAN EDWARDS KILLING" ... PART 1
***** PD/ RCJ: "POLICE BRUTALITY" ... PART'S 30 THRU 1
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Thomas Hudson Pickering/ Ranch Chimp
A red flag in this went up for me, when the guilty verdict was being read off by the judge from the trial phase, I was like "what happened on the 2 felony aggravated assault charges? ... not guilty on them?, but guilty of first degree murder?", that there told me that something in the jury deliberation concluding the trial, was complicated and confusing ... confused the shit out of me ... that's for sure! I was thinking, that this was going to impact the sentencing, and it made it almost look like manslaughter or murder 2, after the sentence ... which is why I wanted to add Pete in the video on the top of the posting. Was the jury deliberating the sentencing as manslaughter?, basing sentence on 2 to 20 manslaughter, instead of the 5 to life, while throwing out the 2 agg assault charges, which made that 2- 20 decision, and applying the manslaughter sentence to murder one??*#! And why were the agg assault charges applied to a murder one case/ indictment, if it is intended to apply to "recklessness" in manslaughter only? You had a jury of 10 women and 2 men, some of the jurors broke into tears as well, during the trial, in compassion reaction to testimonies from Jordan's familia, teachers, and friends. But I would have liked to hear that deliberation between jurors, just to see, how the agg assault charges were tossed out ... that confused me, not unless they were basing it on officers training how to react to gun fire sound. It is true, that later after the shooting, police investigators say they found bullet casings from a gun unrelated to this incident, that was used in a previous homicide, that has not been solved ... I would like to see the evidence of that ... but. Also brought up at the trial, at the officers first response to the house where the party was, they were on good terms with the kids as far as officers Oliver and his partner, Tyler Gross. After the sound of shots, is when Oliver went into a defensive mode, his defense claims to save/ protect the kids at the party, perhaps thinking it was gang shooting. Video of the shooting from cams, clearly showed the Oliver lied, the car was not backing towards the officers, as Oliver claimed, but leaving the officers and scene. Officer Gross, said on the stand, that he never felt his life was in danger, but Oliver said his partner's life was in danger. The type of weapon Oliver used was clearly heavy hardware as I pointed out in part one, which I think was a tad too large to use, when at a kids party, especially where there was no crime, visible or found. These kids fled, because they were kids, and freaked out, being that cops actually showed up in this quiet suburban community ... I pointed out plenty on this in part one. For me, watching the cam, the force was beyond doubt, excessive ... and the way the shooting went down to me under the circumstances, was clear aggravated assault with murder, and for me, with intent to kill someone, at that range and with that type of firearm. The prosecution and Edwards familia asked the jury for 60 years on this, but would have been okay with 30 or 40 ... no one was asking for 99 or life here.
Oliver took the stand at the trial in his defense ... his defense asked all about his childhood and life of course, which ate up over an hour. He was basically painted as an underprivileged kid. Oliver talking about how he was raised in Fort Worth, by his single mother in Section 8 housing, and on food stamps. Dropping out of high school, wanting to help people, volunteering to be a firefighter, failing the test to get hired on, working general labour, getting a GED to enlist in the Army, to get some further education to pass a future public service test for fire department or whatever ... then being deployed to Iraq, serving, etc. He had those who painted him as great dad, guy, etc ... and some painting him as a lunatic, that flew off the handle too easy. During the sentencing phase, Oliver's defense brought in Oliver's common law wife, Ingrid Llerena, who pleaded with the jury for mercy, crying, she spoke in spanish with an interpreter by her side, not a word of english, which showed that Oliver must be bilingual, they had a fellow black officer who said he was great, not racist, etc ... the point of this, was to show he was not racist. Oliver has an autistic son, age 3, who his wife and familia said, can not make it without his dad ... of course Oliver's mom said he's great. Yet, Oliver's sister took the stand, and said her brother deserves life for what he done ... and not forgiveness, she obviously did not support her brother. There was plenty of testimony and recorded evidence/ history of Oliver, that Oliver was like what prosecutor Snipes called, a "ticking time bomb". Even the woman that had an almost wreck with Oliver in another incident and time earlier, took the stand, and stated how Oliver went berserk on her, while off duty, aggressively jumped out of his vehicle, came at her, and pulled his sidearm on her. Another case where he was kicked out of a Dallas County court, because he went off in the court on another case he had to appear at, and used profane language in anger, during the court proceedings. Some may say, like one lady I talked to, that he had PTSD ... I mean, I dont know, I'm not a bloody damn psychologist, or attorney ... but as I told this lady, there were red flags from here to sundown from past history, that this guy wasnt dealing with a full deck. Whatever the issue with Oliver, you cant have a guy like that in the field responding to calls like that, and should not be on the department either ... he should have been cut before he killed Jordan Edwards, just on his prior problems. And the jury tosses out both agg assault charges?, the felony agg assault charges, were meant to be applied to the murder one, not manslaughter ... basically acquitting Oliver of ANY recklessness on murder part?, so what was it, intentional? ... I mean, I'm confused on the sentencing. Even the lies of Oliver, cam footage proving it, falsifying police interdepartmental reports at the time of the shooting, as well as conflicting testimony against Oliver in the trial phase from Oliver's partner, Tyler Gross ... and this is the result?
Of course there is some victory in a case like this, and it is precedent for other cases in the future. But this is not over, there was immediate appeal filed by Oliver's defense, and said there are flaws that they want to point out. As far as folks saying he will do 15 years ... no, no, no ... he becomes eligible for parole in 7.5 years, and he would also get more credits, and I would bet, that he would do less time than that even ... and would definitely make parole on the first board hearing. His defense is going to work the Hell out of this, not just for Oliver, but probably pressure from the police unions too. The only advantage in this, is because he received more than 10 years, Texas law will not give him an appeal bond awaiting appeal, so he will have to do his wait in custody ... only sentences under 10 years in Texas allow for appeal bond request. That wait time, also comes off his sentence, he started serving the minute his sentence was handed down, and some of those days, if in county hold, may count as 3 for 1, even ... that's what the news is not saying. Can the dismissal by the jury of the 2 agg assault cases, throw this into another ballgame, as far as an appeal?, as Pete Schulte says though on the sentence, the court will probably just overlook it as "harmless error" ... Hell of an error in my view. I would be curious how the appellate court is even going to look at this, because of that, and what it may turn into, in another court. At first, Oliver's defense tried to get the trial out of town ... similar to the shit they pulled up in the SF Bay Area, when Oscar Grant was killed in a BART subway station, shifting the trial clear down to LA County, convicting the cop, Mehserle, and he ends up doing about a year or less in LA County, no prison time. The other tough part in this trial, yes, a "conviction" of Oliver, but look at what it took, and the kind of evidence and testimony it took to get that conviction. I mean, Jordan was spit and polish kid as you can get ... top honor roll student, promising college athlete, role model, etc ... unblemished to the max. How many victims have such a perfect background?, and a cop on trial with such a shaky history ... and the cop ONLY getting 15 years and a $10,000 fine ... on such a solid case? Plus you have 2 CRITICAL agg assaults, that in my view are critical, because in my view, it was a key component in securing murder one in the indictment and during the trial phase, regardless of finding guilt on murder one while tossing them out in deliberations. Sure, Oliver could appeal, and like anyone else, chance getting more time, since his case calls for 5 to life ... but how likely is that with the discrepancies that Oliver's defense is already pointing out the same day the sentence was handed down? ... I mean, they're ready to roll right now. No, the sentencing was weak, and my heart and thoughts go out to Jordan's mom and dad, they done everything right, and even thanked the jury for the verdict of guilty after ... I hate to have to see them go through more shit on this.
Word Out ....
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Jordan's parents relieved after the verdict of guilt is read ....
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***** RANCH CHIMP JOURNAL "WELCOME" POST
***** RCJ MUSIC/ ART'S HONOUR ROLL SOCIETY (my hand- selected music/ arts picks)
***** "THE RESISTANCE | PERILS OF THE POWER POSSE" ... ( a 2 part futuristic Ranch Chimp Journal dream to dream on )
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