Supreme Court Justice Slams Police For Shoot First, Think Later MentalityBy Carey Wedler The 2010 case involved Israel Leijas Jr., who had had been stopped by a Tulia, Texas, officer and informed he was wanted on a previously issued warrant. Leijas sped away, commencing a chase that reached speeds from 85 to over 100 miles per hour. As the chase began, the initial officer warned that Leijas might be intoxicated. Leijas reportedly called police multiple times from his cell phone during the chase to warn officers he had a gun and would fire at them if they attempted to capture him. Though officers planned to put spikes on the road at three different locations in an attempt to halt Leijas vehicle, Texas Department of Public Safety State Trooper Chad Mullenix wanted to shoot directly at the car to stop it. When he radioed his superior, Robert Byrd, to ask for permission, he was told to stand by until the car passed over spikes situated near an overpass where Mullenix was located. Byrd wanted to see if the spikes would effectively stop the vehicle before taking further action. Moments before the car reached the spikes, however, Mullenix began firing at the vehicle in direct defiance of Byrds orders. The car skidded into the spikes and flipped two and a half times. Though Leijas was killed in the vehicle, authorities determined he had not been killed by the crash, but by Mullenixs bullets. The officer shot six times, hitting Leijas in the upper body four times. Leijas family sued, arguing Mullenix used excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Mullenix argued he was entitled to the qualified immunity often granted to public officials when they act in the line of duty. Though Mullenix initially prevailed after several court battles, in 2014, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the prior ruling. Instead, it decided Mullenix was not entitled to immunity because the immediacy of the risk Leija posed was disputable. On Monday, the Supreme Court overturned that decision, finding Mullenix entitled to immunity and therefore exonerated of his charges. In its unsigned per curiam ruling, the court said, The doctrine of police immunity protects all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law, NBC reported, noting the court added its previous rulings have never said that the use of deadly force during a dangerous car chase is automatically a constitutional violation. That conclusion was likely all but decided before the case even reached the Supreme Court. The court ruled onMullenix v. Luna using only written briefings. It never heard verbal arguments or conducted a trial, which indicates a sign that a majority of the justices considered the issue so clear cut that further briefing and courtroom argument were unnecessary, NBC explained. Only one justice, Sonia Sotomayor, objected to the opinion and in doing so, indicted a philosophy that permeates police conduct in the United States. She first noted that Mullenix fired six rounds in the dark at a car traveling 85 miles per hour. He did so without any training in that tactic, against the wait order of his superior officers, and less than a second before the car hit spike strips deployed to stop it. She argued that had the majority on the court correctly interpreted the case, they would have been left with no choice but to conclude that Mullenix ignored the longstanding and well-settled Fourth Amendment rule that there must be a governmental interest not just in seizing a suspect, but in the level of force used to effectuate that seizure. Sotomayor concluded: By sanctioning a shoot first, think later approach to policing, the Court renders protections of the Fourth Amendment hollow. In spite of her captivating dissent, the Supreme Court ruling signals an ominous future for further police brutality cases brought before the nations highest court. This article (Supreme Court Justice Slams Cops For Shoot First, Think Later Mentality) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under aCreative Commons license with attribution to Carey Wedler and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org. Thats a terrible case for a precedent imo, except if it relates to high speed chases. If he hadnt been ordered to stand down, I wouldnt have much issue with this, plus I dont think the cop is in any way prosecutable in the first place, how this one made it to the supreme court is beyond me. If Leijas hadnt called in to say he had a gun and he wasnt going 100, different story. Would prefer the officer had followed orders and not been an adrenaline charged violent maniac, but too late for that. Yes, just one more reason why EVERYBODY should derail the entire legal system by exposing the fraud that it is based upon! The next time someone goes into a courtroom, what would happen if they were to present the so-called judge with a legally binding affidavit that at no time at all would they commit nor allow others to commit any kind of fraud? You see, the entire legal system is nothing but a fraud, so they would have to just dismiss the case! What judge, if he or she was really honest and unbiased, would refuse to sign such a document?? ONLY the criminals running a scam will not guarantee you that youre not going to be cheated and back up that promise with some kind of iron clad proof or recourse for you. They will move on to easier pickings every time. Randy But Isnt that affidavit or contract also only enforceable thru that same legal system? See how it is Oh good friggin grief!! Of COURSE it wouldnt get even one inch in the criminal legal system!! But thats not the point at all, cant you see that? The whole point is to get them between the rock of do they make a promise in the courtroom that they cannot possibly keep because the ENTIRE legal system is nothing but a fraud, and the hard place of admitting that they DO intend to commit fraud upon you!! Its sort of like if someone asks you to answer yes or no to the question Do you still beat your wife?. If you say yes, then you are admitting to currently being a wife beater, and if you answer no, then you are admitting that you used to beat your wife. Either way, you will lose status in the eyes of many people for beating your wife. Unless you subscribe to certain religions where men are required to beat their wife into submission. So you have to say (if its true that is) I have never struck my wife at any time, or something like that. Randy Okay, A) I was being facetious with my reply because I didnt realize your idea was like some super serious plan, B) youre idea is f*cking retarded. The when did you stop beating your wife thing is called the loaded question fallacy. Youre presuming the person is guilty. So your master plan is to get them to sign a document BASED on a logical fallacy which apparently you dont even know to call it that. Really? Thats enough right there to just say forget it. Because thats stupid. But, since you decided to insult me Ill continue tearing down your absolutely ridiculous, non-starter of a terrible infantile idea to shreds. Just because. How about procedure. Have you researched this? At what point should you submit it? And so on. You cant just invent a document and force a judge to sign it or throw the case out. It just doesnt work that way. You have no power to do that. Doesnt matter what it says it asks, thats insane. I dont know how else to put it. You have zero power to force the judge to sign an autograph much less a document. Then, finally, theres the fact that every judge, and lawyer too, they ALREADY have to expressly promise that they wont commit fraud, or any crime, in the course of their duties. Like a witness swears an oath, they more or less take an oath to even attain their positions. I believe theres an extra layer of oaths for a judge. If they do commit fraud, they get disbarred. If its bad enough, and its proven, they go to jail. Think of the one in Pennsylvania, taking kickbacks from a private prison. Many many years. But wait, how does a criminal go to jail if the entire system is based on fraud? No, it may not work very well, in fact it barely works at all for us non-millionaires. But the system is BASED on being a neutral arbiter of facts- tacitly speaking, fraud-free. And if the other side or the judge DOES commit fraud, you have to prove it anyway, even IF they signed your dumb document. Making it irrelevant, on top of useless, on top of nonsensical, on top of duplicative. And as far as being in the matrix, wow- Im not defending the system, Im just aware of how it actually works. You, however, might want to get out of the fantasy world where you can overcome this system and all the power it has with a piece of paper and a loaded question. Yeah, well DUH!! Of course its a loaded question, thats the whole point of it. Its loaded because its easy for anyone who is willing to look, to see the facts for themselves, that the legal system operators are all criminals ripping people off! And they ARE all guilty of committing fraud upon the court! Ever heard of that legal phrase before? Look it up sometime. Youre either a lieyer, some kind of shill/troll or an apologist for the totally corrupted legal system. Maybe all four! You need to read my treatise The Scam of the Legal System sometime, or The Holes in the Legal System. WHERE is the logical fallacy? Have you ever read The Seven Elements of Jurisdiction? How about the definition of the words contract or fraud in a law dictionary? And if youre really in the mood for an education in law, read The Maxims of Law sometime. My deceased friend Kent told me several years ago about a lieyer he had known, who won every single case he ever took on by just getting them dismissed! How did he do it? All hed do is see which maxims of law were being violated, point them out to the so-called judge, and that would be that! But Im sure youll say thats impossible, without explaining why. Let me tell you this right now, the legal system CANNOT and MUST NOT be exposed as violating its own rules, regulations and procedures. If it does, then their fraud is exposed and it stands completely naked. From WHERE does our obligation to be defrauded come from?? If we have no obligation to endure someones fraud, then we are IMMUNE from it. Savvy? From where do you get that crap about the maggots in the legal system having already promised that they will not commit fraud? Talk about total delusions! Ever read section 14 of the Corpus Juris Secondum, where it talks about the relationship between the attorney and the client? Yeah, tell me that theres no fraud at all going on there, Bub. These so-called judges NEVER swear a proper oath of office, so theyre committing fraud before they hear even their very first case! The system is NOT based upon some noble, but false idea of being a neutral arbiter of facts! If it was, inconvenient evidence would never be suppressed at trial. Jury nullification would be a perfectly acceptable means for people to be found innocent, Mr. Perry Mason wannabe. I dont have to prove fraud was committed except by merely showing that it happened! Again, your ignorance of the meaning of the word fraud shows just how little you really do know about law. Think about this now; ANY alleged contract can be vacated for fraud, threat, duress, coercion, mistake, illegality, impossibility, insanity, immorality or minority of age. If even just ONE of the five essential elements of a contract are violated, to any degree at all, then the whole thing is void ab initio. Randy shoot first, think later (we should say nerver) is a US mentality. See what dummy Obombomb do! Dont get to excited. If it had been a fed shed have ruled the other way. 