SongsForGrownups

All this morning, the more I thought about it, the madder I was getting.  I’m calmer now.  But here is a hypothesis.  An eyewitness reports having watched a Nez Perce tribal policeman being beaten up by a couple of unarmed white men on private property outside Tribal jurisdiction.   He asserts further that the officer pulled out his service pistol and shot both of them, one fatally.  What do you think happens next?

I can guarantee that if you ask this question to anyone with brown skin in Lapwai, Kamiah or Lewiston, they will answer that the cop would be brought up on charges within hours, and his name would be broadcast over all the media within a day.  We must hope never to have to test this hypothesis.

I understand that the FBI is now conducting a criminal investigation (according to the Lewiston Tribune).  I understand that ISP is conducting an internal administrative investigation to discern whether the (unnamed) state trooper “followed proper procedures”.

This I also understand: people on The Rez are afraid to drive on their own highways for fear that they too could be pursued and possibly harmed or even killed by a policeman who might be just looking for a reason.  Is this fear unjustified?  Maybe, maybe not.  But I believe there is only one way that it is even possible for any good to come out of this affair.  The unnamed Idaho State Policeman who killed Randall Vernon Ellenwood and gravely wounded Ricardo Daniel Rodriguez must be named as defendant in a criminal trial.  There are eyewitnesses.  There is evidence.  (If the police didn’t irrevocably compromise the scene tramping all over it while they waited for the Feds, that is.)  Yes, the witnesses will be less than objective.  I doubt anyone connected to this case is objective.  But even if the ISP finds the trooper did not “follow proper procedures” and just carries out an “internal” disciplinary action, never naming the officer or publicly stating their findings (in other words, buries it), or if the FBI finds “insufficient evidence” and rides off, we will never get the whole story.  Let him have his day in court.  Let the families of these men know that everything has been done to find the truth about their ordeal.   Let this community know that its authorities believe in equal treatment under the law.  Let every officer of the law know that there will be consequences for use of deadly force against unarmed defendants, and they’d better be very sure of their boundaries.  Let everyone in a position of power be certain that they will not get away with abusing it.

I don’t know.  That looks pretty close to impossible to me.  I’m not sure I believe, for instance, that our authorities do believe in equal treatment.  I think some are a bit more equal than others in the eyes of too many of our appointed guardians.  The rest?  Prove it, and prove all of us wrong.  I promise I’ll be delighted to admit it.