We first wrote about the shooting of Tony Robinson (black) by Police Officer Matt Kenny (white) way back in March of this year.
Back then our angle on the story was to shine the light of reality on the increasingly popular meme of “white cop shoots unarmed young black man for no damn good reason” and noting how quickly the narrative was imploding in the case of Robinson.
Today the district attorney declined to bring charges against Kenny:
For the gritty details, see that prior post Analyzing Wisconsin police shooting of unarmed Black teen. But for those of you short on time, here’s a taste for how the “narrative” began wildly unwinding within a day of the police shooting of Robinson:
The unarmed Wisconsin teenager who was shot to death last night during a confrontation with a Madison cop pleaded guilty last year to armed robbery and recently began serving a three-year probation term for that felony conviction, court records show.
ABC news reports that Dane County District Attorney Ismael Ozanne announced that he would not be criminally charging Officer Kenny in the matter, stating:
My decision is not based on emotion. Rather this decision is based on the facts as they have been investigated and reported to me.
The ABC news story also notes that:
Ozanne said that it was understood that Robinson was believed to be unarmed when he broke into the apartment building, though they believed at the time that Robinson had taken hallucinogenic mushrooms or some other drug. Toxicology tests determined that he had mushrooms, THC or marijuana and Xanax in his bloodstream, Ozanne said.During Kenny’s interview with investigators, he said that he began to lose his balance when he came face to face with Robinson in the building’s stairwell, and he feared that “his firearm would be taken and used to shoot him and possibly the other person in the apartment,” Ozanne said.
Will the professional rabble rousers, looters, and rioters travel to Madison?
–Andrew, @LawSelfDefense
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Andrew F. Branca is an MA lawyer and the author of the seminal book “The Law of Self Defense, 2nd Edition,” available at the Law of Self Defense blog (autographed copies available) and Amazon.com (paperback and Kindle). He also holds Law of Self Defense Seminars around the country, and provides free online self-defense law video lectures at the Law of Self Defense Institute and podcasts through iTunes, Stitcher, and elsewhere.
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