Category: Criminal Justice

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Harris County Cop Accused Of Robbing Local Asian Businesses While in Uniform

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Harris County Precinct 4 Deputy Constable Bobby Espinoza running away from KPRC2 Reporters in what appears to be an industrial Tyvek suit(04/16/22)

A shocking report by Houston’s KPRC2 TV station(04/16/22) says a Deputy Constable with the Harris County Precinct 4 Constable’s office, was arrested and charged with felony theft over a months-long scheme(09/2021-03/2022) that involved him harassing and robbing four local Vietnamese businesses. What has shocked Houston residents even more, is the fact that he is alleged to have committed these crimes while in his uniform, and using his patrol unit–all reasonable indicators of a hardened criminal.

KPRC2 reporter Bill Barajas specifically said: “Not only is Bobby Espinosa alleged to have taken thousands from area businesses, he is alleged to have done it while in uniform and in his patrol unit…Espinosa, a Deputy Constable with the Harris County Precinct 4 Constable’s office, was arrested and charged with felony theft…He has bonded out on a $30,000 bond…Espinosa, wearing a mask and in all white, was quiet. He refused to answer my questions before disappearing underneath a nearby bridge. Court documents obtained by KPRC say Espinosa was with the Harris County Precinct 4 Constable’s office for seven and a half years. He is accused of demanding a total of $5,700 from four Vietnamese businesses in our area, the scheme allegedly starting in September of 2021, and lasting through March of this year. A probable cause court judge said Espinosa would make customers at the businesses leave, unplug surveillance cameras, and force employees to open up the cash register. He is also alleged to have pried open a game machine.”

Reasonable people will agree that given the fact that this was a months-long scheme, plus done while in his official uniform, there is reason to believe deputy constable Espinosa may have engaged in other criminal conduct during his seven year tenure at Harris County Pct4. It also raises some serious questions about the state of affairs at the Harris County Precinct 4 Constable’s office. Often times shocking stories like these involving police officers, are usually symptoms of much bigger problems at the police department. Did his peers, for example, know what he was doing, but chose to look the other way? Prior to these criminal charges, was Espinosa ever the subject of a complaint from the public and/or disciplinary action? Was it for similar conduct?

Bottom line folks, these are questions that need to be raised with the Harris County Constable’s office as this shocking case plays out in the courts. Yours Truly, a resident of Precinct 4, will certainly keep up with this shocking case to make sure that Deputy Constable Espinosa is not a symptom of much bigger problems at the Harris County Precinct 4 Constable’s office. And if it turns out that he is, then other heads need to roll.

**Updated on 04/19/22 to include formal response by Harris County Precinct 4 Constable Mark Herman, to the news of Bobby Espinosa’s arrest**

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Trump Wanted To Sic Active Duty Military On Civil Rights Protesters

George Floyd Protest at Lafayette Square in Washington DC (June 1, 2020)

Pulitzer-winning investigative journalist Carol Leonnig dropped a bombshell on CBS’ Face The Nation (07/25/21), when she told host John Dickerson that during the height of the civil rights protests in the Summer of 2020, former President Trump wanted to “sic U.S. active duty military on civil rights protesters.” Leonnig and co-author Philip Rucker, who appeared on the show to discuss their new book “I alone can fix it”, said senior Trump administration officials were afraid to quit because they feared he would replace them with sycophants, who would support his every move, including unleashing active duty military on civil rights protesters.

The full Face The Nation segment featuring Leonnig and Rucker is available here, but the relevant clip is below.

Carol Leonnig told host John Dickerson: “There’s another thing Phil and I learned that sort of made our jaws drop, which is that–we didn’t know this in real time, or we would have told the American people–many people who were the most ardent supporters of the president, were afraid to counter him because they were afraid who would replace them. Would it be worse? Would there be no bulwark at all against orders to vaccinate people before the vaccine was ready? Would there be a loyalist installed at the defense department who would do what President Trump wanted all of 2020, which was to sic U.S. active duty military on civil rights protesters during the Black Lives Matter Summer.”

Philip Rucker added, “He [Trump] said it was his only regret from the year 2020. He has no regrets, according to what he told Carol and me, about how he handled the pandemic, about the hundreds of thousands of lives lost on his watch. His one regret was that he didn’t send active duty U.S. military troops into Portland, into Seattle, into Minneapolis, into Washington[DC], to go after the Black Lives Matter protesters. These were people demonstrating [against] injustice in the law enforcement system here in this country, and Trump wanted a show of force. He wanted to send the military into the streets to silence them.”

Trump’s abuse of the military remains one of the most underreported stories by the mainstream media, something Yours Truly has repeatedly lamented.

Hopefully now that MSM A-Listers Leonnig and Rucker are raising the military abuse issue, others in the media will dig deeper into what Trump’s Defense Department (DOD) did with anti-Trump protesters generally, and Black Lives Matter(BLM) activists in particular. Were there orders for the military to go after BLM from 2017-2021? Did former President Trump enlist super-Trumper GOP Governors like Greg Abbott(TX), Ron DeSantis(FL), et al, to use their National Guard troops on BLM? If Trump did indeed abuse the military for his political ends, are the officials who effected the abuse still at DOD? Are those anti-BLM military operations still going on under the Biden administration? All these are questions journalists should be confronting Biden’s DOD with.

Bottom line folks, there have been extensive media reports on Trump administration’s politicization of DOJ & DHS, but not even a single one on DOD. It’s about time the mainstream media did a deep dive into Trump’s politicization of the military, so that the public does not lose confidence in this still highly revered American institution. Simply put, it is not only important that our military remains apolitical, but that the public also views it as such.

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From George Floyd To Ronald Greene;The Epidemic Of Lying In Police Reports

George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police on 05/25/2020, will go down in history as one of the seminole moments in the push for policing reform, not just in the United States, but globally. It was one of those rare occasions where people on both sides of the police reform debate, after viewing video footage of the incident, agreed that there needs to be changes in the way police officials interract with people of color, and especially, Black people.

Another major takeaway from the George Floyd incident, that rarely gets it’s deserved mainstream media coverage, was the stark difference between how the Minneapolis Police Department(MPD) characterized the event in their police report, and what the public actually saw on the video footage. Simply put, but for the cell phone video footage from a teenage girl, the world would never know what really happened to George Floyd on that fateful day, even after going through the MPD incident report. Police Departments lying on police reports is a very serious issue, so it’s very encouraging to see the mainstream media beginning to address it as such, a good example being this CNN piece by Josh Campbell.

Josh Campbell’s piece highlights the cases of George Floyd, Walter Scott, Laquan McDonald, Breonna Taylor and Ronald Greene, all Black victims whose deaths at the hands of police, resulted in very stark differences between the narratives in the initial police reports, and video footage of the events. The initial police reports basically lied about what actually led to the deaths of these Black suspects in their custody, a sad state of affairs indeed. Naturally, this has raised two elephant-in-the-room questions among members of the public; (1) What else do police lie about? and (2) Is lying in police reports more prevalent than we think?

The latest incident involving Ronald Greene, where Louisiana State Patrol officers put out outright lies in their police report about the circumstances of Greene’s death, will certainly lead any reasonable person to conclude that lying in police reports, is probably more prevalent than the public wishes to admit. Think about that, Louisiana State Patrol officers had video footage of the event, yet continued lying to the public for two years. The truth about the incident only came out after a reporter dug into the story, forcing the release of the video footage. There is nothing to suggest that Louisiana State Patrol officers would have ultimately done the right thing, and told the public the truth about Ronald Greene’s death, absent the dogged journalism by this reporter. This just goes to show the very crucial part good journalism plays in not only the fight for police reform, but also good governance generally.

Yours Truly has raised this “good journalism” issue before, with mainstream media taboo topics like “targeted individuals” and “gangstalking”. For those of you not familiar with these terms(not sure what rock you live under), there are growing complaints from individuals in the United States, believing to have been watchlisted, claiming that they are often the targets of abuse by various U.S. law enforcement agencies. Among the most common abuses cited by these people is “organized stalking” or “gangstalking”, conduct if proven to be true, would constitute torture(violation of Geneva Conventions). Despite the seriousness of these allegations, the mainstream media has chosen to totally ignore them, choosing instead to characterize people who make such claims as paranoid nutjobs, or dismissing them as “conspiracy theorists”.

With the rising epidemic of lying in police reports about the circumstances of minorities dying in police custody, one has to wonder whether time has come for the mainstream media to lift it’s embargo on discussing targeted individuals, gangstalking, and many other taboo topics related to law enforcement. Given what we know now about police departments’ propensity to lie to cover up their injustices, can the mainstream media justify it’s embargo on discussing targeted individuals, gangstalking et al, any longer? What if targeted individuals have been telling the truth all along?

Bottom line folks, the number one lesson from George Floyd to Ronald Greene, is that there is an urgent need for policing reform in this country, and legislative fixes like the proposed George Floyd Justice In Policing Act will go a long way in achieving these desired reforms. True policing reform however, will only be achieved and sustained, if we have accompanying “media reform”, meaning, going back to our good old fashioned investigative journalism days, and ditching the present “access journalism”. Simply put, the media must go back to posing tough questions to law enforcement/government officials instead of always seeking ways to be liked by them for the sake of “access”.

Yours Truly has been consistent on the importance of good journalism, and so should you.

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Reps Al Green and Sheila Jackson-Lee Attend Houston Rally To Honor George Floyd & Slain HPD Sgt Preston

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner(L), Rep Sheila Jackson-Lee, Rep Al Green and HPD Chief Troy Finner March at the Stop The Violence Rally in Houston, Texas (05/15/2021)

Democratic members of Congress Al Green and Sheila Jackson-Lee, attended the Stop The Violence Rally in Houston(05/15/2021), in remembrance of George Floyd and slain Houston Polce Department Sgt Harold Preston. Attendants of the event, which was organized by Houston radio station 97.9 The Box, marched from Yates High School(Floyd’s school), to the Texas Southern University(TSU) football stadium, where the rally was held. At the rally, Congressman Green urged Congress to pass the George Floyd Justice In Policing Act to help reduce police violence

Congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee railed the reckless Texas “constitutional carry” bill currently being considered by the Texas legislature, and urged Congress to pass meaningful gun reforms so as to reduce gun violence. She also urged Congress to pass the George Floyd Justice In Policing Act so as to speed up much needed policing reforms. Other speakers at the event included HPD Chief Troy Finner, State Rep Ronald Reynolds, NAACP Houston President Bishop James Dixon, popular 97.9 The Box radio host Madd Hatta, among others.

One very notable presence at the rally was the legendary Reverend Bill Lawson, a famed civil rights activist and religious leader who marched with, and was a close friend of the Rev Martin Luther King Jr back in the 1960s. Speakers at the rally paid respect to the legendary Houstonian. Rep Al Green said about Rev Lawson, “I am here because Bill Lawson, William Alexander Lawson, after more than 90 years, is still in the fight. I am here because he has paved the way for me. He has made it possible for the Al Greens of the world to hold these titles and positions that we have.”

Legendary Rev Bill Lawson(93, in wheelchair), at the Stop The Violence Rally in Houston(5/15/2021)

This was the first Stop The Violence rally in Houston in honor of George Floyd, and organizers say they plan to make it a yearly event. See other images from the event in the gallery below.

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Images From The Stop The Violence Rally In Houston

These are the images from the Stop The Violence Rally in Houston, Texas(05/15/2021) in remembrance of George Floyd and slain HPD Sgt Harold Preston. Full story available here

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DC Police Arrested Five Times The Number Of BLM Protesters In One Day Last Summer, Than They Did On Jan 6th

In a recent interview on CNN Newsroom with Brianna Keilar, journalist Mara Schiavocampo made a startling revelation that in one day last Summer, DC Police arrested five times the number of Black Lives Matter protesters than they did on the super violent DC insurrection of January 6th 2021. Now, if this is not proof positive that we have a two-tier system of justice, I don’t know what is, because none of the Black Lives Matter protests we witnessed last Summer, come even close to the level of violence we witnessed on January 6th–a domestic terrorism event on live TV. It also raises serious questions as to why DC police was very well prepared for Black Lives Matter protests, but so woefully unprepared for the January 6th insurrection.

Mara Schiavocampo’s interview with CNN’s Brianna Keilar happened against the backdrop of news reports that a federal judge had allowed one of the insurrectionists, a former Army Captain named Gabriel Garcia, to remain free on bail awaiting trial. The federal judge’s decision was shocking because there were recordings of Garcia all over social media, showing him screaming for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, meaning his intent at the Capitol building was to cause harm to the Speaker. Additionally, after charges were filed against him, Garcia reportedly showed up for his first pretrial detention hearing with a knife. Reasonable people will agree that no similarly situated Black or Brown suspect would have been allowed to remain free on bail awaiting trial by any federal court, a sad testament to our two-tier system of justice.

Responding to host Brianna Keilar’s question regarding the federal judge’s decision to release Garcia from detention awaiting trial, Schiavocampo said, “This fits squarely with everything that we’ve seen with this insurrection. From the planning out in the open which so many people were able to see it coming, from the way that these insurrectionists were treated when they descended upon the Capitol…and now we’re seeing how it’s playing out in the court system, and we know if this was a Black Lives Matter protest, things would have ended differently. We know that because we saw that happen with the Black Lives Matter protests. These insurrectionists were literally by and large, allowed to storm the Capitol at lunch time, and be home in time for dinner. On one day at a Black Lives Matter protest this Summer, five times the amount of people were arrested by DC police than were arrested on January 6th, so we see these very clear contradictions.”

Schiavocampo then zeroed in on the the glaring disparities between how the bail system works when suspects are Black or Brown, as opposed to when they are White. She said, “The call for justice has never been about equal oppression, it’s been about equal freedom. It’s show us [Blacks and Browns] the same compassion that you are showing others…nobody wants to be judged by their worst actions, and by their worst days, but unfortunately that’s what we see over and over again when it comes to Black and Brown suspects, and when the suspects are not Black and Brown, we are talking about White suspects, they are shown a tremendous amount of leniency, compassion, mercy, and they are viewed through the lens of humanity, and that’s what’s lacking when it comes to minorities in the criminal justice system.”

Bottom line folks, complaints about our two-tier justice system predate the January 6th DC insurrection. The fact however, that DC insurrection has exposed this problem in such an irrefutable manner, means this is something the Biden-Harris administration will have to address head on. Simply put, we cannot have a system of justice that deals with Black and Brown suspects so harshly, but is exceptionally lenient to White suspects, even when the conduct involved is the most serious conduct imaginable–terrorism, overthrowing the government, murdering elected officials, etc. This is an issue that has to be addressed for the sake of the justice system’s credibility.

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