Defendant Amber Guyger. Inset: Botham Jean
I’d heard about this case some time ago and rushed to
judgment. If you asked me about it then,
I would have sounded like the prosecutor. Police officer Amber Guyger comes
home from work, parks on the wrong floor of the parking garage, goes to a
fourth floor apartment instead of her own third floor apartment and shoots dead
the man who lives there. You couldn’t
believe such a thing was a mistake. This
was a murder.
Only recently did I pay attention to the story. CBSN and other news outlets televised some of
the trial. I also read several of the
articles about it. Now I don’t know what
I think. There are times when the very
nature of justice is called into question and must be defined again. This is one of those times.
First of all, it’s an incomprehensible horror for the man,
his family, and the community. The people who loved him should not have to
suffer this. The man should be
alive. I
understand the family would be bitter. I understand how they would file a
federal lawsuit against Dallas.
Amber Guyger got
fired about two weeks after the shooting happened. Then she was charged with manslaughter, which
seems to fit.
But then the case is sent to a grand jury which decides a murder charge
is the apt and only way forward. Is
that a political decision?
Murder means you want to kill. Murder is something you run away from. Amber Guyger didn’t run away as we know from
her anguished phone call to the dispatcher at her Dallas precinct. Clearly hysterical, she pieces it together as
well as she can. Listen to the audio and
you’ll see she flipped her bird, struggling to hold herself together, desperate
to get fellow cops on the scene.
I understand from reading that Botham
Jean was still alive while Amber was on the phone and waiting for police and
ambulance to arrive. Does anyone think she was capable of giving mouth to mouth
resuscitation when Jean took one through the heart? She did the only thing she could do — she
lost her shit and begged for help.
