LONG OVERDUE BACKLASH :

Killing of White Deputy Quiets Protests Over Police Shootings of 2 Blacks (TIMOTHY EGAN, July 13, 2002, NY Times)

After the fatal shooting of a black man by a white police officer last spring, community leaders here planned a chain of demonstrations to follow a rush-hour shutdown of the freeway through downtown.

The aim of these "surprise strategic strikes," the organizers said, was to change the way the police treated African-Americans in Seattle. At the same time, city leaders were preparing new regulations for police officers, intended to determine whether race was a factor in whom they stopped and arrested.

But the protests and the regulations were abruptly put on hold by the killing three weeks ago of a white King County sheriff's deputy by a black man who had a history of run-ins with law enforcement. The deputy, Richard Herzog, was shot after he tried to restrain the man, who had been running naked in traffic. Deputy Herzog used pepper spray, but he was knocked to the ground, lost his weapon to the man and was repeatedly shot in front of nearly 50 people.

The killing has generated a backlash against efforts to make officers more sensitive to race, with officers saying they feel inhibited from fully protecting themselves because of fears of racial recriminations.

So called civil rights activists have gotten an awful lot of mileage out of the Rodney King incident. Unfortunately, it is one of the most misreported stories of modern times : OFFICIAL NEGLIGENCE : Lou Cannon dissects the Rodney King case and the LA riots. (Online Newshour, April 7, 1998). Posted by Orrin Judd at July 13, 2002 8:43 AM