I’m going to try to avoid editorializing as much as possible, but, can you guess why this is a big story?
(WRAL) A Raleigh police officer killed a drug suspect fleeing arrest Monday afternoon, Police Chief Cassandra Deck-Brown said.
An officer, whose name hasn’t been released, was chasing a man on foot who was wanted on a felony drug charge and ended up shooting him, Deck-Brown said. The shooting occurred shortly after noon near the intersection of Bragg and East streets.
A gun was found “in close proximity to” the dead man, the chief said.
Police haven’t released the name of the shooting victim, but Rolanda Byrd told WRAL News that it was her 24-year-old son, Akiel Denkins, who had an outstanding warrant.
That’s right, he was Black, the officer was white. Denkins had a long, long rap sheet, including illegally carrying a concealed firearm. There’s a peaceful vigil for this paragon of virtue (which in no means he should have been shot unless he pointed a gun at the officer), which includes
https://twitter.com/diasporadical_z/status/704459488980561922
Pleasant. And everyone is saying what a great guy this father of 2 was
Too bad the community didn't care about #AkielDenkins when he was selling crack to kids. https://t.co/q5ZiIRVRfV
— Bob Owens (@bob_owens) March 1, 2016
https://twitter.com/HEPennypacker84/status/704468920921681920
Regardless, as I’ve been saying in comments at articles, everyone needs to take a deep breath and wait for the results of the investigation. Neither the Raleigh PD, the State PD, internal investigations, nor the SBI are going to discuss anything till they have the facts. Unfortunately, that leaves lots of time for people and the media to create their own narrative, which often ends up being at odds with the facts, but, by that time, the Narrative has been established, such as “hands up don’t shoot”. If the cop did wrong, he should be charged and tried. One thing you can surely guarantee, Raleigh will be national news for a few days, and we’ll probably have the same race inciters here by tomorrow.
