A gay man was knifed after allegedly being called a homophobic slur. The Maricopa County Attorney said it’s not enough to charge his attacker.
A Brutal Attack. A Failed Prosecution. And a Warning for Queer Arizonans.
Red states are becoming very scary places
Sherman should've executed all slaveowners.
You won't hear me argue against that.
Project Fucking 2025!
Joe Arpaio's old county. They're keeping the traditions alive, I see.
"The man should be given honors for doing the reich the favor of disposing of the untermensch, even if it did fail."
(The cops had been ignoring his family begging them to check in for months.)
from the wiki article on the murder
Assistant DA Kelly Wolford said, "A hate crime would make this charge about Sam’s gender or about Sam’s race, and it’s so much bigger. To limit us to a hate crime would be an injustice to Sam. Sam was beaten, assaulted, sexually abused, starved, held captive. And we cannot make sense of that. We cannot put that on his gender, and we cannot put that on his race"
like what are you talking about
Once she got a cop who raped a kid weekend sentences.
Here’s what happened to Sam by the way - I’m sure this was just a regular murder and none of these actions were motivated by transphobic hate.
He was also denied proper nutrition and hydration, forced to eat feces, forced to drink urine and chew spit, Wolford said. He was physically restrained, forced to obey commands like a dog, covered in the face with towels and shirts, duct taped and had bleach poured on him by the defendants, she said.
He was repeatedly struck with numerous objects including sticks, dog toys, rope, bottles, belts, canes and wooden boards, according to court documents.
Edit: anyone remember why Norm McDonald got fired from SNL? Was it OJ or was it what he said about Brandon Teena?
Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait...
The title made me think the attacker couldn't be charged with a HATE crime... Which is dumb and shitty and makes me want to revolt.
But they aren't charging him with ANY CRIME.
What in the actual fuck
Gays don’t have rights per fatheads who think a fairy tale is reality. Remember these people think they are going to heaven.
We should wall off America, and treat it like some cursed, forbidden land.
A self invented reward that they argue over. I think when you die you're dead and that's it, so to me it's just people making up bizarre ways to congratulate themselves on following their own cancerous code of ethics. Like sure whatever it takes, man. Just... Maybe your ethics are fucked up and wrong and you're in a cult.
Get strapped, the law isn’t going to protect us and seems to be used to harass us
"Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect."
Rules for thee, but not for me
Armed minorities are harder to oppress.
Organized armed minorities make governments afraid.
Make no mistake, this is yet another message, "we do not care about you or your struggles". Listen when they tell you they won't protect you.
So if I call Trump a slur in AZ, stab him, and run off that's cool, right?
No. Because he is wealthy.
But if you say Donald was gay, maybe?
Wait wait wait, you said it was a gay man that was stabbed? Sorry, my hands are tied. Playbook says gay guys can't get stabbed.
It's illegal for gay people to be stabbed why did he do that?
The body has a way of shutting that whole thing down.
He probably asked the knife to penetrate him, it's what the gays do, you know. - Detective Brownbeater
Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives
just in case anyone thinks this is just about it being designated as a hate crime. No they did not charge anything despite this guy having massive injuries and the other guy having nothing to show for it. If you luigi, do it in arizona with no cameras:
But the county attorney’s office ultimately viewed the case as a “he said, he said” scenario, with Lawton claiming he acted in self-defense. According to the police report, Lawton told investigators that while slowing down the vehicle, he was “punched in the back of the head and on the side of his body so many times that he saw stars.”
No witnesses corroborated Lawton’s account, and it's unclear how much the county attorney's office leaned on his story. But without video footage of the attack—Uber allows drivers to install them but does not require it—the evidence collected would appear to focus heavily only on eye witnesses.
“I don’t understand how it could be deemed self-defense or why it was turned down,” Almaraz said. “I was unarmed, he had multiple weapons in the car—it just didn’t make any sense. It was heartbreaking. I was completely assaulted and violated. I could have lost my life.”
It should be noted that AZ self defense law requires you to use the same type of weapon as your attacker. For instance, if you shot someone attacking you with a bat, it would likely not be self defense.
It has been broadened recently since it used to require exactly the same weapon, so if someone was attacking you with an uzi, you couldn't defend yourself with your shotgun. However I'm fairly certain it still won't let you stab someone trying to fistfight you.
with Lawton claiming he acted in self-defense.
Ah, the gay panic defense.
Now not just for cops!
“punched in the back of the head and on the side of his body so many times that he saw stars.”
Surely there would be bruises or medical records if this were the case.
The left really needs to get over their weapon aversion. There's no alternative anymore.
How well did that turn out for the black panthers?
Well, they did get gun regulations on the books...
You should probably look up Marx's idea about workers arming themselves. The left has no issue with rming themselves, you're thinking of liberals.
The left has no issue with rming themselves
The last decade of the left withdrawing to their own spheres of niche ideology-sub-spectrums has resulted in nobody, even the left themselves, really knowing what "the left" is for or against anymore on a broad level. This is why there's so much infighting and disagreement and confusion about who believes in what, and of course all the endless purity testing and tribalism that comes with it. Some of this is because of deliberate social sabotage by paid agents, some of this is because of sociology and the nature of our brains. Either way it needs to be identified and understood as an obstacle to unified action.
I don't give two shits what specific brand of marxism you believe in, or if you're just a working liberal who wants things to go back to normal, or if you're some deeply sheltered and naive pacifist who genuinely thinks we're going to have some idealistic solarpunk future if we just did X, Y and Z. You all need to get armed and get prepared and probably do a lot of things you're either emotionally or ideologically uncomfortable with. Such is the nature of conflict.
If things somehow get better all around for everyone, then having done all this will only have made you and your life and outcomes better.
Gotta get in that divisive jab. Can't just say a thing.
.....liberals are on the left. And I believe they're talking about the ones in the states today, not in 1850, Germany.
thinking of liberals
The ones that enabled us into this mess.
But at least they saved us from universal healthcare and economic equity. Dodged a real bullet there.
Liberals are the left. You’re think of the far left. Essentially they are the left’s equivalent of the far right, just as obnoxious and every bit as easily conned by propaganda.
That's liberals that don't want people armed, mostly because they don't like not being in control. Leftists are usually already armed.
Your country has 500,000,000 privately owned firearms and your solution is more?
I am not American. And the overwhelming majority of those 500 million weapons are with people that think Trump's fascist America is cool.
Im broadly anti gun but i have reasoning and am not blind to their purpose.
The reality right now is that those weapons aren't going anywhere, everything is heating up and nobody (including, increasingly, law enforcement) can be arbitrarily trusted.
So yes, as a last ditch hail mary attempt at self defense i'd recommend arming yourself because that is where the US is at.
Guess which political ideology holds the vast majority of them?
Maricopa County Sheriff's Office has been a rolling human rights disaster for years. It needs to be torn the fuck down.
Frankly sheriff's offices in general need to be abolished. It's a relic of the frontier colonial era and, surprise, they never gave up their power willingly. They often have the lowest training standards in the profession, and are the face of partisan politics in law enforcement, to the benefit of conservatives 99% of the time. A lot of the time I hear about some flagrant abuse of power from cops it's from a sheriff's deputy.
EDIT: doesn't seem like the sheriffs were involved here, just the county prosecutor and Phoenix police. What you get from scrolling at work and not reading articles.
The sheriff's office has managed to keep itself out of the news since Arpaio was defeated.
Doesn't mean you're wrong though. Your comment is still very relevant.
They often have the lowest training standards in the profession
Law enforcement isn't a "profession." Practitioners of real "professions," such as medicine, law, and engineering, have "professed an oath" (that's where the word comes from) to act in the public interest (i.e. to protect the public) and abide by a code of ethics. That includes things like acting against their own interests and refusing orders from people with power over them, if necessary. In contrast, the courts have ruled in Warren v. District of Columbia that law enforcement officers explicitly have no such obligation.
On one hand I like how the sheriff's office decentralizes police power and gives the community a direct say. In the other hand that's been a disaster
Dude... he was fucking stabbed? That is assault with a deadly weapon and/or attempted murder/manslaughter at least.
Yes, but look at what they where wearing.... Also that baby was being kinda a dick.
So we are allowed to stab people if there’s no cameras?
Billionaires don't like this simple trick.
Neither do judges
Sounds like someone should find that attacker and do the exact same thing to them, seeing as it’s non-chargeable behavior.
I used to drive thru Arizona several times a year. It was tradition for me and my dog, once we were in Arizona, to pull over and take the biggest, greasiest shit we could, on Arizona. Like it deserved.
Presumably you also take big greasy shits in your home state, so this is real dumb. People gotta poop. Arizona has a lot of beautiful areas and good people.
I use a toilet. Except for on Arizona. And occasionally Texas.
Absolutely gorgeous landscapes and the native tribes are very kind to tourists, all things considered.
Maricopa County Attorney rules there is enough evidence to lay charges on the victim. However the victim had not show up to their scheduled court date, allegedly detained by ICE in the lobby of the court, on the day of the hearing. /s
Times are going to get very hard for gay people soon. If history keeps rhyming the way it is, gay people have a tough road coming up and we need to be prepared for it.
Was... Knifed?
Unfortunately relevant Desaparecidos song