Liberal Activist Groups Condemn Killing of Black Man Who Attacked Cop During Traffic Stop
“Yeah, bitch. Yeah, bitch,” the man exclaimed while grabbing the sheriff deputy’s throat shortly before being shot.
Liberal activist groups were quick to condemn “anti-Blackness” in policing after the death of an unarmed black man at the hands of a sheriff’s deputy during a traffic stop on October 16. Dashcam footage released on October 18 shows the man, Leonard Cure, attacking the responding deputy, pinning him against the vehicle while grasping at the deputy’s throat and face.
Cure was previously imprisoned for armed robbery but exonerated in 2020. The Innocence Project of Florida (IPF) established Cure’s innocence and issued a statement after his death: “He and his family deserved better,” reads a statement on IPF’s homepage. “Lenny’s life mattered. We are completely devastated.”
“The video released yesterday does not change how we feel about this tragic incident,” IPF told Legal Insurrection in an email exchange. “The tragic events . . . serve as a chilling reminder of the lasting trauma that exonerees carry with them every single day.”
IPF instead blamed the officer’s “aggressive” decision to arrest Cure for reckless driving.
Ben Crump, who also represented the family of George Floyd, represents the Cure family. Crump stated his belief that Cure would be alive if he were white, a claim challenged by conservative commentator Jason Whitlock, who referred to Crump as “an agent of chaos” in light of the dashcam footage:
He got shot for grabbing the cop by the neck, squeezing his neck, and saying “yeah bi-ch” while strangling the cop. Ben Crump is an agent of chaos. pic.twitter.com/69Ery4dcWN
— Jason Whitlock (@WhitlockJason) October 22, 2023
The ACLU of Florida condemned the killing, which it framed as Cure having “his life snatched from him by a cop.” The ACLU chapter also took the opportunity to condemn policing in general as “rooted in slavery, and rotten to the core”:
Leonard Cure was incarcerated for a crime he didn’t commit for 16 years, before getting his life snatched from him by a cop.
Modern policing is rooted in slavery, and rotten to the core. https://t.co/ypcvXm2Rvt
— ACLU of Florida (@ACLUFL) October 18, 2023
The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) was “deeply saddened by the tragic loss of Leonard Cure” and called for a “transformation in policing” to end “anti-Blackness” and ensure respect for “every individual’s rights”:
SPLC is deeply saddened by the tragic loss of Leonard Cure in Camden County, GA. We urgently call for a transformation in policing that honors every individual's rights. The ongoing anti-Blackness in policing must end. Every leader must act for justice and accountability. pic.twitter.com/lNREN79EW9
— Southern Poverty Law Center (@splcenter) October 18, 2023
The ACLU of Florida and SPLC tweets received community notes providing some missing context:
“[Cure] was stopped while going upwards of 100mph. Once stopped, Leonard was uncooperative and grabbed the officers [sic] neck, being shot as a result,” read the community note on the ACLU of Florida tweet.
“Cure was shot after the officer attempted restraining Cure using 2 non-lethal devices & methods which ultimately proved to be ineffective, as Cure began choking the officer on the side of a highway,” read the community note on the SPLC tweet.
How it all started
The encounter began when Aldridge stopped Cure for speeding. Aldridge ordered Cure to exit the vehicle, which Cure did after some delay.
Cure initially refused to place his hands on the back of the vehicle but later complied. Aldridge then instructed Cure to place his hands behind his back.
Cure refused, and Aldridge warned Cure that he would tase him for non-compliance. After continued non-compliance, Aldridge tased Cure, which had minimal effect.
Cure then turned around and began swatting at Aldridge. A scuffle ensued, which saw Cure pin Aldridge to the back of the vehicle, with Cure’s hand at Aldridge’s throat and chin, bending Aldridge’s head backward.
Aldridge deployed his baton, striking Cure to no effect before unholstering his firearm and shooting Cure in the abdomen.
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Comments
Why is always criminals and thugs they come out to support?
Kindred spirits…
Not the usual “they”s involved. ACLU, Benjamin Crump, the SPLC…
Note… Edit button, please…
Give it a bit. It will take some time for everyone to agree on how to spin the video.
And to decide how much to sue/settle for.
when do the mostly peaceful protest start and they burn down a couple of cities.
Professional courtesy.
Because they’re the only ones getting shot by police.
As a direct result of their own actions.
Finished that for you…
Yes, that’s why they’re criminals and thugs. Keep up.
He clearly was not innocent this time, do stupid crap and win a Darwin award. I would like to see his rap sheet.
The Democratic Party is a criminal organization masquerading as a political party.
That explains everything.
Because the only thing that matters is the colors. Once you know it’s black versus white, you know who is wrong, and you know who is right, no matter what actually happened.
These people are the ultimate race essentialists.
Because normal people don’t drive 100 miles an hour and attempt to choke the officer who pulled them over. Weirdly, it is criminals and thugs who exhibit lawless and criminal behavior.
I have known of incidents in which law-abiding folks were abused or even killed by LEO, but these cases are not as appealing to the Leftist mob, probably because they are outside the parameters of Teh Narrative..
If you don’t want cops to use force, don’t attack the cops. If you don’t want cops using deadly force, don’t try to use deadly force on them. Nobody is just going to sit there and let you kill them.
“Crump stated his belief that Cure would be alive if he were white…”
Likely because if Cure were a white exonoree, he’d have gone on with his life, and not done what the black Cure did.
That’s unlikely. All Cure did was resist arrest, and a white person in his shoes would have been equally likely to do the same. It’s easy to understand why he did it, and therefore to feel sorry that it played out like this. But it’s not the cop’s fault.
Attempting to strangle a cop is attempted murder not resisting arrest. We should give people who kill criminals rewards for improving society.
No, running away is resisting arrest. He was violently attacking the officer.
Have you ever been in, or even seen, a real street fight? “Yeah Bitch! Yeah Bitch!” sounds to me like something a guy will say when he is in the midst of giving, or attempting to give, a violent beat down. It means “Yeah motherfu*ker you want to come at me? Well I’m going to f*ck you up and teach you a valuable lesson punk. You’ll learn never to fu*k with me again because I’m going to beat you within an inch of your life, and then if I feel like it I’m going to fu*k you when I’m done.” Or something very similar to that. It’s just easier to say when you’re in the midst of bashing somebody’s face into a pulp.
So no, he was not ‘resisting arrest’. He was violently assaulting the cop with intent to inflict grave bodily harm. Aggravated Assault at a minimum.
a white person in his shoes would have been equally likely to do the same
Maybe. But a white person doesn’t have an entire industry behind them, telling them their rage is justified and all the cops are out to get them, and so they should “resist!” SO I’m going to guess they would not be “equally likely.”
He’s got arms. If he didn’t have arms then he couldn’t have grabbed the deputy and made such a threat of himself.
According to years of FBI homicide statistics “Personal Weapons” (hands, feet, elbows, etc,) are more frequently the weapons used in homicides than either shotguns or rifles. Most (all?) years shotguns and rifles combined do not reach or exceed the number of homicides by Personal Weapons.
This cop did everything he could to not use his gun. He warned the guy several times and then had to tase him. That didn’t affect the thug so he tried to use his baton. After trying to strike him to no effect and in the meantime getting choked to death, he finally used his gun. What more could he have done other than to turn and run? If this attitude is representative of the black race, we are in trouble.
Note that several states would have required YOU to turn and run before shooting. Wonder why they don’t require cops to do that, too?
Those states are ruled by progressive fascists who don’t respect people’s civil rights so their unconstitutional laws are irrelevant. The fact is that the world is better off without that thug. We should reward the cop who killed him.
Conrad, what right do you have to call him a thug? How is the world better off without him? I think the world would be better off without people who say things like that about people without justification.
Looking at a video where he is folding a cop over seems to be enough qualification to call him a thug. Why do you feel the need to keep making excuses for thugs?
He was being arrested, after having spent 16 years inside through no fault of his own. How would you react if that happened to you? That doesn’t make him a thug. He and the cop are both victims, and I sympathize with both.
How would you react if that happened to you?
Well, I wouldn’t have been driving 100mph, recklessly changing lanes, and running from the police. So it’s a bit of a non sequitur, isn’t it?
That doesn’t make him a thug.
Yeah, actually, that sort of behavior is exactly what makes him a thug – regardless of home life or addictions or any other “reason” for him acting that way. He isn’t a victim because he chose to act in a thuggish way.
You’re trying to remove his agency and make him a victim. He’s not. He is accountable for his actions.
Milhouse the thug lover, don’t be like Milhouse.
So Milhouse, should those sixteen years forever immunize him from having to follow the law in the future?
Huh? What are you on about? How did you come up with that bizarre idea? Particularly how did you conclude that I thought that?
Now if he were to actually commit a crime, then at sentencing I think the judge should definitely take into account that society owed him 16 years that it had stolen from him, and that should weigh heavily for leniency. But it’s impossible to give someone a carte blanche, “Go commit a few crimes because you’ve already paid for them”! In any case, nothing I have written on this post could possibly be understood that way by anyone capable of reading simple English.
The fact remains that his reaction to being arrested is completely understandable, and you would have behaved the same way.
and you would have behaved the same way.
No, Milhouse, we wouldn’t have – most of us, anyway. That’s where a lot of the pushback is coming from.
What makes Cure a thug is that HE acted that way, where any of us would have most likely avoided trouble in the future, instead of looking for it.
(BTW, when he passed the police cruiser going 100+, the cop car was not hidden. It was in plain sight. He was either too stupid/high to notice or he didn’t care. And that does not speak to an act of someone afraid of going back to jail.)
Most of us, wouldn’t be going over 100 mph if we just got out of prison. Most of us aren’t that dumb.
Milhouse, I love your attempt here to be christ-like. Understanding that this violent, aggressive, resentful, dangerous man deserves some kindness simply for being a human, even if a broken one on a path of evil, is very charitable of you.
But understand, this man had a choice on how to react. He could have been filled with gratitude that he was eventually exonerated, ready to face the world with a new opportunity given to him. He could have been thankful for every moment he was outside of the bars.
Instead, he was filled with resentment and hatred. He was unable to find a path to redemption, and instead decided on a path of evil, anger, violence, and aggression. He decided to be a thug – even if he had good rational reasons.
And this is something, as an atheist, I’ve found to be generally true – people of the best faiths of the world, completely and totally irrationally seem to reduce their resentment, and increase their gratitude, no matter what the circumstance is. Even from a completely secular perspective, this practice makes the world better for everyone, based on total irrationality.
So was he a thug? Yes. Was it his choice? Yes. Could he have chosen a better path and given his life over to Christ with gratitude, and made the world a better place? Yes. Was it unfair that he was put in a situation where he was forced to expose his true character of resentment? Yes.
Is the whole world better off without him? In his final condition of anger and violence, yes. But one would hope that if he had survived, he could have found redemption, repented, and atoned for his sins, becoming a net benefit to the whole world.
It would have been great if George Floyd had survived, gotten clean, apologized to the pregnant lady he robbed at gunpoint, and become an upstanding pillar of the community. Low odds, but it could have happened in some alternate universe. Instead, he not only died, but died in a way that was co-opted by masses of resentful, violent, evil people, who tore a swath of destruction across the entire world in his name.
Let us hope the same doesn’t happen with the legacy of Cure. The best hope is that other people filled with resentment and hatred decide of their own free will that they can choose to comply, survive, and become a boon to this world, rather than remain a constant danger.
what right do you have to call him a thug?
Have you watched the video? Have you seen why he was pulled over?
Do you know that he had previous convictions for things like armed robbery?
he has a right to call him a “thug” because no one has presented evidence to the contrary, and what evidence there is clearly shows a thug.
You call people thugs when they do thuggish things, Milhouse.
And you call people pretentions preposterous twits when they engage in siuch twittery.
And damn, it’s like you were born for it.
Frankly, Milhouse, we don’t know if the behavior (driving recklessly, fleeing the police, failing to cooperate with the officer when stopped and then attacking the officer with apparent intent to inflict grave bodily harm or death i.e. choking) is caused by Cure’s incarceration or an innate (perhaps unthinking) determination to opt for illegal action vs. obeying the law. His actions call into question whether he actually was innocent, or just got lucky with the effort to free him. But there is no doubt that his actions label him a “thug” with no connotation of race or other attribute other than deciding to commit illegal actions.
Milhouse, have you forgotten about the thug’s *prior* felonies? The ones he was not exonerated for? He had a history of violence.
And now he drove at an extremely high speed on a two land blacktop with reckless lane changes, endangering citizens. And when pulled over, he displayed an ultra-aggressive “I can do whatever I want” attitude.
He was a thug with a history of thuggery.
And the world is better without such thugs.
That’s obvious. If cops had a duty to retreat there would be no law enforcement and we would have anarchy. Cops have a duty not to retreat, even in states where normal people have such a duty.
ConradCA, duty to retreat laws, in those states that have them, are perfectly constitutional. Nothing in the constitution gives you the right to use deadly force to protect yourself when you could retreat in perfect safety instead. And until recently almost all states did impose such a duty. This has changed not because of a new understanding of our rights, but because prosecutors were found to be abusing it, claiming to juries that defendants could have safely retreated when in fact they couldn’t, or at least it didn’t seem to them at the time that they could. So most states changed the law and abolished the duty altogether. That’s right and just and I support it, but the few states that haven’t are not violating the constitution.
“Cops have a duty not to retreat, even in states where normal people have such a duty.”
Like in Broward County and Uvalde? Yes, I see the wisdom of this.
“Perfect safety” is a unicorn :). You can argue that it’s constitutional to demand that the first man who touches the “perfect woman” always gets to marry her, so long as he is also the “perfect man” – since by definition, the “perfect woman” and “perfect man” will always want each other, but as you point out, the stretching of that definition, which is the only way for it ever to apply, is always a violation of rights.
Duty to retreat cannot be imposed without abusing the definitions, and it is that abuse which seems to violate the constitution.
You’re an atheist? With clear Christian thinking imho
Technically, you could call me a Metaphorical Mormon :). I go to LDS church every week, have several callings in the ward, read scripture, and pray daily. Both my daughters have gotten the dip, but me and my wife are “dry mormons”. I have nothing but respect for those people who believe literally, even if I don’t share that same perspective.
I guess I sorta believe that if Jesus could teach universal truths with parables, then Jesus could be a parable teaching parables too, and the universal truth would still be there.
And if most western atheists are honest, their idea of justice, liberty, and freedom all come from Judeo-christian roots. The amazing discovery that if you treat everyone as if they have universal worth, even if it is *obvious* from observation that they don’t, you end up with better civilizations for everyone, is something Christians can be very proud of.
@jhkrischel Didn’t they used to call that a “Jack Mormon”? I dated a Mormon girl in high school, but realized no matter what I did, I’d always be a Jack Mormon. Mostly I hated white shirts and riding bicycles. So I stuck with the Presbyterians.
And until recently almost all states did impose such a duty.
Actually, Milhouse, until the prevalence of “all violence is bad!” rhetoric and the punishment of those who fight back began that those sorts of things were imposed in the first place. In general, in all of history, where self-defense was allowed, it was allowed in any situation where you were someplace you were legally allowed to be.
Under Bruen‘s reasoning, ALL “duty to retreat” laws should be struck down. They may not be obviously unconstitutional, but they are horrifically immoral.
Some states have “duty to retreat” laws because they do not see ordinary, honest citizens as having a role in upholding the law. But even these agree on the principle that the law must not give way in the face of criminality, or else it is not the law – therefore police have no duty to retreat.
My duty to retreat disappeared when my people arrived here from England in 1632 and stopped being peasants. Little has changed since.
The best way to not being a victim is to stop behaving like one ahead of time. I frequently sit outside a coffee house at night after closing, and to the miscreants who hang out at the 7-11 down the street I at first appear to be an easy mark. At first they would head straight towards me, but often at about 25 yards it would dawn on them that they were on “my” radar, not the other way around, and they would suddenly veer right or left. Now they don’t even bother, and I am sure that the veteran feral humans tell the new guys to not even bother testing the waters.
I’m about the furthest thing in the world from a Back the Blue type, but I can’t see anything the cop did wrong. It escalated to the point where the taser, then the baton, didn’t work, and the cop was being strangled. To my view (as an evil oppressor white man of course) is that the shot was righteous.
If the cop is found to have followed procedure and the killing was justifiable, how big and how many riots will Crump and the other usual suspects start up? .
FAFO
Brave Officer.
“Don’t start none, won’t be none”, but never mind.
One misconception about “Project Innocence” is that it definitively proves innocence. It does not. It simply brings the conviction into question by introducing doubt – 15 years ago DNA evidence was new, wasn’t used for the trial, and most police departments didn’t understand the importance of maintaining the evidence “cleanly” after conviction against the chance of future testing.
The Project simply comes in and does DNA testing on evidence many years later by which time perhaps (?) a dozen- who knows (?) people may have deposited their DNA or the(no longer of evidential value except as modern DNA evidence may have been wiped clean after Fingerprint testing.
The resulting jumble of DNA (coulda been anybody!) or lack of any of the Convicted’s DNA are used to argue reasonable doubt, and it works.
Most courts don’t want the trouble and bad press of a retrial and hey! The guy has already done 15 years, why fight it? In the future the success rate of the project will sharply diminish as we enter the era where all evidence used for trial was immediately DNA tested… the “Second Guess Project” will draw to a close.
“Reasonable doubt for a reasonable price.” Criminal lawyer ad.
The Soviet justice inclination is that he probably did something else even if he didn’t do this.
This particular incident was triumph over police oppression asserting itself unwisely.
Hodge, not in all cases do they prove actual innocence. Reasonable doubt is all they need to prove, and that is enough to justify releasing the prisoner. But in this case they proved actual innocence. He did not do the robbery. It took place at 7:15 am; at 6:52 he was at an ATM 3 miles away, and by some time before 8:00 he was at work 7 miles away. He had no car, and got to work by bus. So it’s very unlikely that he did the robbery. He did raise the alibi at trial, but the jury didn’t buy it because the police witnesses lied, and because his first attorney neglected to get the ATM video before it was erased.
Notice that even with the facts you state, you get downticks.
Sadly, there is a tendency among many to find that if somone goes to jail it means the party in question is guilty. All it takes is a liar on the stand, or a cop twisting something you said into a whole new meaning, and you are off to the clink.
Because Cure was not acting like someone who knew the system could blow up in your face.
Cure was acting like someone who had gotten over –big time– on the system.
How many Innocence Project exonorees wind up later getting convicted of similar offenses to the one the Innocence Project got them released from?
Bet that’s a stat they don’t keep.
I cannot answer your question, but I have read of *some* Innocence Project exonorees who went on to commit more vicious crimes.
Last I checked, the Innocence Project website was lamenting the death of this “good man”. [ Rolls eyes ]
Georgia and Arkansas are serious about stopping speeders, and both states are states where nobody stops for cops, so the YouTube police chase collection in both states is huge.
This one is unusual in not reaching 130mph through towns before the guy is driven off the road into a tree but stopped eventually on his own, but too late not to be considered probably dangerous by default.
Watch some videos there before driving in Georgia or Arkansas with an inclination to sass the police.
His treatment as probably dangerous was very standard, by the way. They do that for everybody who flees police. Handcuff hands behind back, put him in the back seat of the cruiser, and search his car for drugs or guns. It’s nothing about black. Everybody gets the treatment if they flee.
Yes, and this is right and proper. But in this case it led to a very sad outcome. Had the cop known of the driver’s history and fragility he might have handled him differently. But he couldn’t be expected to know that.
Here is where you are looking at this from the wrong perspective. Tragic though his incarceration was, it does not give him license to break the law. His wanton disregard for others by speeding in excess of 100mph is prima facia that he is an immediate danger. His refusal to get out of the truck after pulling over is another warning for the officer. Refusal to be cuffed and resisting is a life threatening situation for the officer. Taser didn’t stop him, baton didn’t deter or stop him, officer being choked is life and death. Training dictates deadly force. Deadly force was used. Tragic for the defender.
The second issue in all of this is they got him out of prison. And they were right to do so. No innocent person should have to go through this, but it begs the question, you got him out, did you then help him get the counseling he needed? Did you follow up to make sure he was adjusting to life outside the walls? Or did they put a notch on the briefcase and walk away?
Good points. But given his other felonies, I doubt that counseling would have turned him into a good citizen.
I note the vehicle in question is a pickup truck. Regardless the engine size, most are governed to abouit 103 to 108 mph because of the tires fitted at the factory.
The governor is there as a form of lawyer-resistance. If the truck is driven too fast and a tire goes bang, the negligence of the operator is not questioned, it is the evil tire maker.
(I am speaking of ordinary workaday pickups, not the zoom-=zoom rumpa-rumpa hotrods, whether factory or aftermarket.)
By tires, I should have said the speed rating of the tires fitted at the factory. My 2001 Chevy came with tires rated for 112mph. It was governed to 103.
Don’t ask how I know.
;-{)}}}
The Byrdman cometh. Watching Arkansas po po dashcams is like watching NASCAR “and” there will be a decent crash. It helps me psychologically to survive in Portland knowing that at least somewhere justice is still being metered out.
God I will so pissed of that family takes in millions
But oh dear George Floyd, they will!
You know, I find it interesting that all of the shitlibs spewing out he was ‘incarcerated for a crime he didn’t commit for 16 years’, but have no actual knowledge of what crime that was, what the evidence was, or why he was released.
The actual facts of the case were that he had multiple convictions for robbery, and was found guilty by a jury of armed robbery (after a mistrial first). He was released because they claimed he had ‘solid alibis that were previously ignored’.
Then how did these supposed ‘solid alibis’ not come out in his defense during either of his trials? The entire thing smells fishy to me.
He did not do the robbery. The alibis were raised at trial, and improperly ignored. The police lied about him having a car, they lied about the evidence linking him to the robbery, and his first attorney was too incompetent to get the ATM video before it was erased; by the time he fired that attorney and got a new one it was too late.
Can’t find the source at the moment but he supposedly had an ATM receipt to show that he couldn’t have been there. After 16 years they find a receipt. I can’t even find the ones I had from last week.
Also, I didn’t see it mentioned here but he was compensated $800K for those 16 years. I am sure the family helped him spend it right quick. Now looking for another payout.
I suspect that these liberal activist groups also condemn Israel for responding violently to Hamas’ terrorism.
FOFO
I watched that guy try and asphyxiate the cop… He closed his nostrils while holding is mouth shut… It would not be any kind of story if he succeeded, just a quick headline about LEO fallen in the line of duty..
Seems to me that, same as I used to think, if a black dude gets aced by cops, he fully and completely deserved it and it shoulda happened sooner; exceptions too few to be more than noise. All BLDM has done is to enhance that feeling…
I would strongly recommend that no one imitate the actions of Mr Cure in pretty much any part of Alabama but especially not on a stretch of rural highway. Just be civil and polite, listen to and obey the lawful commands and you get a ticket, sometimes just a warning for speeding. For 100+mph though, you gonna get the whole show with a K9 and at least one other Agency riding to see the excitement so make your peace with that, be calm and cooperate.
And if you think your rights are being or about to be violated, make verbal protest. Let the officer know in no uncertain terms that you believe your rights are being violated.
But, unless you have very good reason to believe the cop is going to take you out in the field and make you kneel and execute you gangland style, do NOT actively resist anything he does. And at a certain point (once you have made your declaration) shut up – don’t back talk, don’t sass, don’t threaten.
They’re not wrong about this. It’s reasonable to argue that but for his traumatic experience of being falsely imprisoned he would not have resisted arrest, and thus the cop wouldn’t have had to shoot him. On that view his death is not the cop’s fault, but that of those responsible for his conviction all those years ago. They set him up for this.
And here’s where they go wrong. Perhaps if the cop had known that he had a legitimate reason to panic at being arrested he might have treated him more gently, but it’s unreasonable to expect him to have known that, let alone to treat all suspects as if they had such a legitimate phobia.
And that already puts them in the wrong. Any cause represented by Crump should automatically be presumed wrong. People with legitimate cases should be warned not to hire him.
Which is obvious bulldust.
More bulldust.
That would be right, if there were any, but there isn’t.
This shooting is a tragedy, but there are two victims: the guy who was shot, and the cop who was forced to shoot him. It’s unfortunate, but it doesn’t justify upending an entire law-enforcement system which, in this instance at least, functioned as it should.
Hmm… another individual who had apparently had a phobia about being arrested and put in a police car was named George Floyd.
The fact that some person has developed such a phobia neither requires a police officer to know that the person has a phobia about being arrested—or to treat that phobia as “legitimate.”
Boy George, also, was driving around while whacked out of his brain on a neo-speedball of meth and fentanyl, a clear danger to everyone on the road and walking around that day. It was just lucky that Boy George didn’t plow over a family of four crossing the street in his state. Same for this Cure dude tooling along at over 100 mph.
Technically, he was not “driving around.” He was sitting peacefully (sort of) in his vehicle after trying to commit a non-violent (for once) felony. I believe the vehicle was running, so it was legally “being operated.”
The cop could not have been expected to know about his phobia, but the phobia itself was completely legitimate. I bet you would have had the same phobia and reacted the same way. So would any of us. His resisting arrest was completely understandable, but it got him killed. The cop acted properly.
Why would you place such a bet? Many of us have decent impulse control, and also recognize that a man with a baton, taser, and a firearm should maybe be treated as a danger to a avoid, not a challenge to be fought.
So, I disagree with you here, but none of the downticks are mine.
Either you believe in free will, or you pretend you believe in free will. That’s the only way we can actually have a viable, working society.
I believe he had a choice, and chose a path of resentment and phobia, rather than gratitude. Perhaps the good choice was harder to make if he was high in trait neuroticism, and low in trait agreeableness – but it was still his choice, and his responsibility, no matter what the universe had done to him earlier.
To paraphrase Larry Elder’s father:
You get out of life what you put into it. You cannot control the outcome, but you are 100% in control of the effort. No matter how hard you work, how good you are, bad things will happen. How you respond to those bad things defines your character.
As judgmental as it may seem, some people have better character than others. Maybe the nicest way to say it is that some people’s good character is revealed earlier than others…and for some people, it takes longer than their lifetime.
and his responsibility
^^THIS^^
I bet you would have had the same phobia and reacted the same way.
I already have that fear*. And it’s partly (aside from being a law-abiding citizen) why I don’t attack cops and try to kill or maim them when they pull me over. So, I don’t give this guy any leeway, at all.
(* It’s only a phobia if it’s unjustified/irrational fear. You’re saying he was justified, so you shouldn’t call it a phobia.)
His fear was irrational, because the vast majority of people who are stopped by the cops and cooperate have a good outcome. What happened to him the previous time he was arrested was a fluke. He should not rationally have expected it to happen again. But it’s completely understandable that someone to whom it did happen would have an irrational fear of it happening again, and would freak out.
You are assuming without evidence that such a phobia existed in this case.
Clearly, it is not necessary to have such a “phobia” to behave in exactly the way this fellow did, since it is a not uncommon reaction by the underclass (of which he was certainly a member) to being stopped for lawbreaking.
And to assert that “any of us” would attempt to kill a cop over a traffic violation is just evidence of your own biases.
If he feared arrest to the point where he’d commit aggravated assault to avoid it, he shouldn’t have been speeding at over a hundred miles an hour, especially not in a place where the cops are vigorous about enforcing traffic laws.
If I feared heights enough to be violent, I wouldn’t climb ladders.
“The fact that some person has developed such a phobia neither requires a police officer to know that the person has a phobia about being arrested”
See, that’s why we ought to send social workers out to these calls instead of cops, like the purple-haired lefties insist. One, there are going to be a lot of sociology professors looking for work next month. Two, the outcome of this case would have been a live thug, a dead social worker/professor of sociology, and no income for Ben Crump. It’s not a perfect world, but it’s a good tradeoff.
No, in this case a social worker might have done some good. Had the cop known the circumstances and treated him more gently he might not have freaked out and needed killing. That doesn’t make the idea of sending social workers out on crime calls any less lunatic. In many cases the outcome would be exactly as you describe.
I agree that both are victims of circumstance in this case, but even if the officer had known, Cure would still have needed to go to jail for driving recklessly and endangering others. This was a no win situation.
While I am sympathetic to Cure and am angry at what he suffered. His own actions lead to this interaction and that should not be forgotten. He could have avoided all of this by not driving recklessly and that is a fact regardless of his history.
LOL.
Whose fault is it that made him drive at over 100 mph – 100 MPH!! (making him a danger to others on the road, we can say) which made his arrest probable? Do you think this was the only time he drove like that or do you think that he was generally driving like a maniac most of the time and was just lucky not to have killed anyone and not to have been arrested for speeding before??
A lot of people speed on the highway. That shouldn’t have led to his death, and it wouldn’t have if he hadn’t had that traumatic experience that caused him to have such a fear of being arrested as to panic and act suicidally.
That’s a ridiculous answer. ANd going 100 mph is not mere “speeding”.
And he did not act “suicidally”. He acted “homicidally”, which is why he got shot.
You are really grasping for straws on this one. I don’t know why you intentionally take these ridiculous sides on some of these issues. I understand that you just like to debate, and that is fine, but you really are not doing much of a job on this one.
So .. the guy was so traumatized that he had an insane phobia about being arrested … but he was just rocketing down the highway at 100 mph … I mean, why don’t you sit back and think for a few seconds about the silly position you have put yourself in with your argument?
Milhouse is playing the same part Ye was when Ye said that he loved Hitler. The point is that Christ’s love is infinite, and we strive towards that example.
If you read Milhouse carefully, he sees the situation clearly, and he’s simply adding in extreme compassion for the evil person in this encounter.
I’m not quite there with my own compassion, but I appreciate that there are some people that have it, even when I disagree with them.
I’m not big on compassion for evil people, but I don’t see this person as evil. Speeding doesn’t make him evil. And I think violently resisting arrest was the predictable result of what had unfortunately happened to him, and anyone with the same experience would have reacted the same way. I don’t think it was a rational decision to behave that way; I think at that point he was panicking and not in control of himself, and I understand why. Unfortunately that was a suicidal reaction, because he left the cop with no choice but to shoot him.
Nonsense!
Choking a cop led to his death. I figured someone as pedantic as you could surmise that.
You’re right! It shouldn’t have led to his death!
And, ironically, it didn’t. It simply led to what should have been an otherwise unremarkable encounter with a policeman who thinks the driver’s a danger. See, lots of other people who get pulled over for reckless endangerment/driving and speeding do NOT then violently attack the responding officer.
What led to his death? Having some perceived need to attack a police officer.
And you can’t blame any of that on other people. That’s his to own. Period.
You’re lumping all speeding together and you should know better. How fast you’re speeding makes a huge difference. A lot of people speed ten or even fifteen miles over the limit, to the point where I snark that there is a place for people who drive at the speed limit on American highways; it’s the right-hand lane. And that’s a matter of fines, maybe points on your license. Faster speeds than that are taken more seriously. Travelling thirty miles over the limit means you will almost certainly be arrested if you’re stopped. (Not necessarily true in Texas or other huge states in low population density areas, but pretty much true on the East Coast.)
If I had been traumatized by cops and were phobic about arrest, I would CERTAINLY not be going more than thirty miles over the limit.
Here you are just wrong Milhouse. He was not killed for speeding, yes it lead to the interaction, but that isn’t what lead to his death. The cop tried repeatedly to not move up the use of force scale, Cure is the one who prompted that due to his own personal trauma that caused him to make poor decisions.
I didn’t claim he was killed for speeding! Of course he wasn’t. But speeding led to his death. Speeding shouldn’t lead to someone’s death, and in 99.99% of cases it doesn’t. I believe that but for his experience and trauma it wouldn’t have led to his death either, because he wouldn’t have reacted as he did, and the cop wouldn’t have been forced to shoot him.
It’s reasonable to argue that but for his traumatic experience of being falsely imprisoned
How about the trauma he received from justly being jailed the first two times?
Wait–you’re talking about Leonard Cure, repeat offender?
Who’d done prison time for previous robberies just like the one he was ‘exonerated’ of?
THAT Leonard Cure?
The one you and the ADLU –and Ron DeSantis– seem to believe is committed to telling the entire truth always?
HE’S the one who sped from cops and then tried to kill the cop that caught him?
NO, really?
Duh, Milhouse. Duh.
Are you sure they don’t want you over at Vox? Maybe Slate–or TYT…..
Kind of seems like suicide by cop to me. Did he get any therapy for prison trauma?
“IPF instead blamed the officer’s “aggressive” decision to arrest Cure for reckless driving.”
The officer obviously violated the suspect’s Zeroeth Amendment to the US Constitution: “No Negro is required to submit to any LEO, if he doesn’t feel like it.”
One of the headlines:
It sounds like the criminal version of the lottery winner having to file for bankruptcy 3 years later.
It’s worth mentioning that Cure had received a life sentence for the armed robbery only because he already had an extensive rap sheet and convictions. Just sayin’ …
Given what happened to him at this trial, I have to wonder about the quality of his previous convictions. But even if they were on the up and up, the fact remains that he didn’t do this robbery, and there is nothing to indicate that he committed any crime since his last conviction. He appears to have straightened up his act, and yet all that came crashing down on him when some incompetent investigators decided he had done a robbery which he knew he hadn’t done. What do you imagine that can do to anyone, let alone a reformed criminal? It can certainly be expected to destroy any belief he may have had about a duty to obey the law, or an obligation to society. And it would definitely have made him panic on being arrested yet again; he could have no confidence whatsoever that he would get justice, so it’s understandable that he would resist.
None of which is the poor cop’s fault. He did what he had to do.
If you arguing that an bogus conviction destroyed ‘any belief he may had about a duty to obey the lawful or an obligation to society’ doesn’t that make him a danger to others? Either he is able to go about to daily life, including the occasional LEO interaction, without flipping out and becoming belligerent and violent or he needs to be locked away. People that respond with violence in routine, non exceptional circumstances are dangerously unstable.
He either does or doesn’t understand the consequences of attacking a badge.
Sixteen years in prison… did he ever attack a guard?
I don’t see how it’s understandable he would resist.
Except for the fact that he had NOT turned his life around, as evidenced by his incredibly reckless behavior behind the wheel. Also, a big reason he was convicted (aside from ineffectual counsel) was because he was in cahoots with the other people involved.
This is not an example of a life changed before a false conviction.
As to the point of how it will screw up your outlook and your life: maybe if we actually sent to prison those involved in falsely convicting someone (particularly false witnesses and people involved in hiding exonerating evidence) there would be some feeling of justice in these situations.
What are you talking about? What other people, and in what way was he in cahoots with them? This was a one-man robbery, and that one man was never caught. At the time Cure was either on the bus on his way to work, or had already arrived there. He had no connection to the crime whatsoever.
“and there is nothing to indicate that he committed any crime since his last conviction.”
This is incorrect. Driving at 100mph and weaving in and out of traffic, is in fact a crime. Regardless of the “everyone speeds” argument.
It’s dangerous for a society to mix IQs like this.
Ironically, Mr. Crump, it was the police officer who couldn’t breathe.
I agree. Let us re-imagine policing. Let us imagine a world where people follow police lawful instructions. Because one was wrongly convicted does not give one Carte Blanch assault police. Everyone, including police, have the right to defend themselves.
Cure was previously imprisoned for armed robbery but exonerated in 2020.
WRONG. He was previously imprisoned for a third offense and “exonerated”* for only that offense. He was not simply sent to prison for one crime. He was previously convicted for other crimes (violent ones, too). And he was not exonerated for any other crimes (which already showed him to be of a violent, criminal bent).
IPF instead blamed the officer’s “aggressive” decision to arrest Cure for reckless driving.
Yeah, no. It’s a perfectly normal decision to arrest someone for reckless driving of that nature. He was a danger to others and needs to be removed from the streets immediately.
(* I understand many things exonerating him were “technicalities”. I haven’t dug deeper into it, because it’s actually totally irrelevant to the matter at hand.)
Reading further, it is pretty clear he did not do
thethis crime.We talk a good deal in some quarters of society about the aspirational goal of viewing former convicts as having ‘paid their debt to society’ and the goal of viewing that as behind them.
Either we should do that which requires us to overlook a criminal past, outside sensitive positions, or we shouldn’t. So if a justified arrest, indictment, conviction and prison term are to be viewed as ‘in the past’ and irrelevant to what’s happening today so is the sad case of Mr Cure’s unjust conviction.
I concur to a point. We should aspire to give everyone the chance to prove themselves “rehabilitated” – or, at least, no longer willing to do the crime.
But we also have to provide an element of protection for society and those immediately around us.
It’s a balancing act, and one that society must attempt – but NOT the law. The law has a duty* to protect society from criminal behavior and to punish that criminal behavior when it occurs.
I find the balancing point is to give long enough and hard enough sentences (and require restitution) that the criminals either retire behind bars or decide that’s not really the life for them. Then parole actually observes whether they are rehabilitated or not – which is its function; NOT to give offenders an early out.
Which I know was only partly your point. You were making a specific observation here.
GWB,
No worries. My basic point is what occurred prior to that traffic stop is immaterial. Anyone injecting his personal history, other than in an attempt to seek to understand WHY he chose poorly that day, is a huckster. All that matters is WHAT he did that day.
Personally I work hard to go with the idea that a released prisoner who completed parole has paid their debt and they start fresh with a few obvious exceptions like a convicted paedophile trying to work in a daycare. Other than those until they eff up again I don’t worry too much about it, though I wouldn’t cut them one millimeter of slack until they prove themselves. I ain’t perfect but I do try to be a better version of myself everyday, sometimes I even succeed.
And that is exactly what I have been arguing. I think his history explains why he resisted arrest, and thus left the cop with no choice but to shoot him.
The entire exoneration hinges on timing.
He couldn’t be in the places he was in without a car, and even then, without possibly speeding.
We already know he likes to speed.
But he says he didn’t have a car.
He had a license.
Could he have been driving someone else’s car? Why yes, yes he could.
But he, the convicted felon on trial for his third strike says he didn’t have a car.
Is there any evidence that this is true?
No.
Not a drop.
But is IS enough to cause reasonable doubt year later.
Just like that weird ‘missing teeth’ digression
Is he missing teeth? Yes.
Can he look like he’s not? Also yes.
Yes, there is evidence that he didn’t have a car. His girlfriend’s testimony is evidence. Sure, she could have been lying, but there’s no reason to suspect her of it. That would only be justified if there were strong evidence that he did the robbery, and the timeline was merely a hitch that needed to be explained away.
The evidence about the teeth is important because the fact that he never removed his bridge except to sleep makes it very unlikely that the one time he would have removed it would be the day he committed a robbery. Again, if there were strong evidence against him, then we could explain the teeth by supposing that he deliberately removed his bridge in order to disguise his appearance; but it’s an unlikely supposition so it’s not justified without such strong evidence.
Is it some kind of rule that lefties have to huff glue or do some other hallucinogen before opening their mouths in public to speak? Sure seems like it.
Dangerously high speed.
Slow response times.
Taser – no impact.
Attacks cop.
Baton – no impact.
Tox screen is going to be positive, maybe for multiple substances.
Probably but that’s a pretty big dude with lots of mass to absorb compliance strikes and a taser.
I am betting on anabolic steroids being present.
It’s my understanding that, since a cop has a gun that could be taken from him & used against him, a cop is not obliged to wrestle with a felon and can use lethal force to prevent that eventuality.
What are these leftist fools thinking? I trust the cop is not charged with any violation.