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Samuel Dubose; The Cincinnati Police Shooting: An Analysis of the Facts.

July 31, 2015 by  
Filed under News, Opinion, Weekly Columns

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(ThyBlackMan.com) As a former detective and firearms instructor, I would like to share an analysis of the facts with you regarding the shooting of an unarmed black man in Cincinnati. But first, I need to say this is quite different from the Sandra Bland case and her case should not be simply thrown into a pile with this one. Regarding the Cincinnati shooting of Samuel Dubose in July of 2015 by University of Cincinnati Police Officer Ray Tensing, as shown on the officer’s bodycam, it was simply murder and there is no excuses for it.

This article is to look at what went wrong and what can be done to avoid this happening again. Therefore, if you do not agree (and you don’t have to), I ask you to realize that other readers do want to understand what happened – not just to get angry and ignore all of the facts. So if you are going to make negative comments or insults, you need to know this is not the time and thus such is very inappropriate. Negativity helps nothing and you can be a part of the problem or a part of the solution. I will not even dignify negative comments with a response.

As a current family counselor, mediator and life coach, I am trained to look at every side and angle of a problem or encounter. I do not take sides. I stand with the facts and the evidence then offer real solutions that help people survive. I have done just that in dozens of seminars and workshops for both youths and adults in the African American community.

Get the FREE EBOOK ON POLICE BRUTALITY and what you can do about it.                                                                      

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Now to an analysis of what happened. Know that I deal in facts, laws and hard evidence, even if it is unpopular. Officer Tensing shot Dubose at point blank range and killed him with one shot to the head. And I have to say NOTHING WARRANTS OR JUSTIFIES THE OFFICER’S BEHAVIOR. However let’s take a look at what likely went wrong and how others can avoid that happening.

The video is here so watch it then come back to this article.                                        

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/university-cincinnati-police-officer-indicted-murder-death-samuel-dubose-n400511

Officer Tensing stops Samuel Dubose on a traffic stop he is authorized to make for a missing front license plate. Tensing is authorized to make the stop and the stop is legal. He asks Dubose for his driver’s license. Dubose starts reaching for the glovebox and the officer tells him that he does not have to. He says “you don’t have to reach for it, that’s o.k.” But Dubose reaches anyway. PEOPLE NEVER, EVER REACH FOR ANYTHING IN A TRAFFIC STOP UNLESS SPECIFICALLY INSTRUCTED TO DO SO. dubose-tensing-2015Most men carry their licenses in their wallets so to an officer, that is a scary thing. Mostly all police officers are taught that domestic violence calls and traffic stops are potentially the mostly dangerous encounters. I am not casting blame, I am telling you what makes an officer nervous because I know. And these are the facts, not a criticism.

Get the FREE EBOOK ON POLICE BRUTALITY and what you can do about it.                                                                      

Email your request to brainstormonline@yahoo.com

College Campus police officers usually do not undergo much training. For example, in Georgia they mostly go through 10 weeks, whereas the major city police go through 6 months. Huge difference. Couple that with the current racial tensions, a traffic stop, a 25 year old white officer and a black man with dreads and all types of racial stereotypes begin to fly. In such case, everybody is on edge and the encounter is volatile from the beginning. Still, the stop was legal but it went bad, very bad. Fortunately, the officer has been indicted and charged with murder but that may not be enough.

The officer sees a bottle labeled “Gin” on the floor of the car and asks Dubose what it is. Again Samuel Dubose reaches, this time for a bottle labeled Gin. DO NOT REACH FOR ANYTHING UNLESS INSTRUCTED TO DO SO period. My recommendation is not about blaming the victim. It is about keeping you from getting shot at the hands of an untrained and/or racist officer.

Get the FREE EBOOK ON POLICE BRUTALITY and what you can do about it.                                                                      

Email your request to brainstormonline@yahoo.com

As for whether the murder was racially motivated or not, we do not know. In light of so many other obvious cases, you are probably thinking it must be racially motivated. But having been a detective, I see things differently because I have a different skill set to use for analyzing this encounter. I do not excuse the officer who murdered Dubose, but let me tell you what my trained eye sees. I see a 25 year old inexperienced officer who likely has very little training for making traffic stops off campus.

The officer should never have been authorized to make traffic stops off campus because that requires a lot more training. I also see a fearful white officer engaged in an encounter with an older black male who keeps reaching for things. My educated guess is that the officer is already nervous and not prepared to handle that traffic stop. Again, campus police should only be assigned to the campus and not have jurisdiction outside of it.

Officer Tensing, who was wearing a bodycam, lied and said that he was dragged by the car so he had to shoot. The video does not validate his story of being dragged. However, because he did wear a bodycam, it is unlikely that Officer Tensing was intending to murder Dubose. It is too easy to prove the officer at fault because original complete videos do not lie. In my trained opinion, Tensing temporarily lost it. Still no excuse.

While I have your attention, I wish the African American community would be even more outraged at “black on black crime”. Most crimes against us are by our own people and nobody seems to want to march, protest or riot over that. So I have to ask, have we set a low value on black life and others are following suit?   You may not want to hear this and it is no excuses for what the officer did, but we need to face ALL of the facts about the struggles we face. Present day, we kill more of each other than ever police department around today, yet we keep avoiding that problem.

Finally, recounting the video footage, we can see that Samuel Dubose tries to distract the officer with his left hand while cranking up the car with his right hand. Samuel Dubose is attempting to drive off when he is shot in the head by Officer Tensing. The car then goes towards the curb and another officer approaches.

Sometimes the only good thing about a tragedy is what the living can learn from it so it does not have to happen again. I must stress again, if you are stopped by the police, DO NOT REACH FOR ANYTHING. Keep both hands on the wheel in plain view and wait for instructions. Do not lie. Do not argue. Do not try to drive off. Turn down the music. Comply with what you are asked to do, even if you disagree with what is asked of you. There are many legal ways to deal with the police later but you have to be around to do so. There are good and bad police officers out here, and unless you can tell one from the other, simply be still, comply and make your objective to leave unharmed. Wisdom can go a long way.

To the family of Samuel Dubose, our prayers are with you and do not let this matter go. To the rest of you, teach your children and spread the word about the things I have shared with you today. Print, reprint and email this article to others. Educate our people and save a life. But whatever you do, make sure your actions NEVER play into the hands of those who want to take you down. Good luck!

Get the FREE EBOOK ON POLICE BRUTALITY and what you can do about it.

Email your request to brainstormonline@yahoo.com.

Staff Writer; Marque-Anthony 

 


Comments

14 Responses to “Samuel Dubose; The Cincinnati Police Shooting: An Analysis of the Facts.”
  1. Marque Anthony says:

    To All The Genuinely Concerned Readers,

    The point of this article is to examine the facts and offer real solutions that help our people survive encounters with law enforcement. The article is also to expose the wrong doing by the police officer and to provide the Free Ebook with legal options that help our people fight in the right way while minimizing risk to themselves and their safety.

    All those people like jDean and Rasil who are responding with immature foolishness are those people who are a part of the problem in our community. Their attitude and their thinking make it hard on all of you because we are stereotyped as being like these two people.

  2. Marque Anthony says:

    To jdean and Rasil,
    First of all, don’t you both get tired of being wrong? I do not select he pictures that are posed for my articles, the site does. But again you go by assumptions instead of facts. You only do yourself a disservice when you do that.

    Egos are not the point. The law, the evidence, the facts and personal responsibility for our actions are the real points. Nice try at shifting the focus so you can steer people down a road of denial, but these readers are too smart to fall for that.

    They are looking for reasons, answers and solutions – you give none so your comments do the black community no good. Clearly I point out the facts which can be checked with experts. You attack me, my experience or my track record then when I shut down your errors and expose your inaccuracies, you say its my ego. Let’s grow up a little.

  3. Marque Anthony says:

    To jdgwisd,

    What you say is a large part of it and very correct in many cases. The officer should never have been allowed to patrol the streets because he was not trained for it. Lack of training tends to cause fear or uncertainty in the officer. These result in dumb decisions. Most veteran police officers agree. Then combine that with his adrenaline and a 25 year old’s hormones, a stereotype of black people and a black man who will not comply but instead is reaching then cranking up the car, you have a very volatile situation.

  4. Marque Anthony says:

    To Barnard,

    Ii agree with you. Sandra Bland was much more important than the lion. But the problems she had are problems many black women have and we can never fix those by sugar coating them or sweeping them under the rug.

    What is sad is that a black criminal wrote an article on this site just to attack me instead of maturely attacking the problem. And over 140 people liked his article. He gave no solutions, no facts, no laws and no evidence. All he did was tune up the bandwagon of anger and denial.

  5. Marque Anthony says:

    To Aila,

    Are we that upset when a black person kills another black person? No. In those cases, there are no marches, no protests, no rallies and no riots. The black community as a whole appears to think white people should treat us better than we treat each other.

    I overstand the anger but anger is no excuses for denial of personal responsibility for our actions. Sandra Bland broke 3 Texas laws. Sandra Bland was unstable. Look up Keppra Rage online. She was taking Keppra. She had tried to commit suicide in the last year. She was full of THC,, the addictive element in weed. And she neither knew the law nor her rights. She played right into the opposition’s hands and put herself in a bear trap.

    Now many of our people want to blame everybody but her. Wisdom says put out your cigarette when you are ASKED NICELY TO DO SO, sign the freakin WARNING and leave the matter behind.

  6. Barnard Greg says:

    Giraffe death in Dallas zoo more important than Ohio cop shooting innocent black man in the head & #sti740 youth’s voices their thoughts on DO BALCK LIVES REALLY MATTER https://youtu.be/BTdnMZULRFU

  7. Aila Jenkins says:

    I am sorry, but I don’t know any black person who is not upset when a black person is killed no matter what race the killer is. Secondly black leaders as well as the black community are actively addressing the issue of violence among our people. People have marched, held prayer vigils, started neighborhood watch programs, and after school programs. What about white on white? More white people are killed by other white people than any other race also. I think as a “writer” you need to do more research before you post your unfounded opinions and try to dress them up as facts.

  8. jdgwisd says:

    So it seems that many in America’s police services are poorly trained….or, they are reacting exactly the way they have been trained. What Mr. Anthony has revealed is that many law enforcement officers are taught to react-not analyze and respond. Or, in other words, unlimited rules of engagement based on the subjective nature of the officer. Reach down at the wrong time…Boom!! I’ve found that a member of an infantry battalion has more Rules of Engagement in a war zone than an American law enforcement officer(exhibit 1: The urban battles in Mosul and Bagdad. The soldiers oftentimes could not shoot unless their lives were in potential danger. Sometimes that was too late). Instead of getting mad at Mr. Anthony, pity his logic. What he’s advocating is suppression of African American civil liberties. Sadly, name calling is only going to embolden him and his point of view. Leave the name calling out of it. He is misguided, banking on his years of law enforcement training. He’s blind to the suppression of Civil Rights. Let the blind lead their blind.

  9. rasil says:

    jdean…You are right on point. Folk are sick of this steppin fletcher and now under pretense he is trying to offer helpful info. Note, he posted a pic of the bottle of Gin. I was informed a while back that the police department went on a mass recruitment for KKK members and military. I fully believe this and it did not just start. It is just being recorded. Don’t continue to waste time or energy on this traitorous Negro. His id, ego, and super ego are all severely flawed. Your commentaries will be better served elsewhere. When a person has the Stockholme Syndrome, they are blinded, ignorant, and worship the man. he is a waste of everything. Wish they’d remove him from this blog bc he is a danger to our people.

  10. Marque Anthony says:

    There are several solutions to dealing with law enforcement in this article. Readers can also find my other articles on How To Handle The Police, Rogue Officers etc on this site.

    The free Ebook on Police Brutality is also full of solutions. But to reach those solutions, you first have to survive the encounter. The Ebook and my seminars also cover that as well.

  11. Marque Anthony says:

    Update: According to new information,

    “On Friday, a grand jury declined to charge Officers David Lindenschmidt and Phillip Kidd – who were at the scene as backup – with lying about what happened.

    Hamilton County Prosecutor Joseph T. Deters, who has criticized Tensing’s handling of the stop, said there was “confusion” in an initial incident report that implied the other two officers saw Tensing being dragged.”

    The District Attorney should be charging both officers who lied for Officer Tensing. Giving false information to law enforcement is a crime in any state, even if you are an officer as well. All the more reason both officers should be fired because their lies mean they have violated their oaths of officer and none of their reports can be trusted any longer. They have soiled the already volatile relationship the police have with the community in that city and made it bad for decent officers.

  12. Marque Anthony says:

    jDea stop. You are dishonoring the memory of Samuel Dubose with your foolishness. People reading this article clearly do not believe what you say. Grow up and help our people or be honorable enough to be quiet.

  13. jdean says:

    Yeah I know you are trying to find fault in the black man to justify this murder. The tape says it all. As far as outrage I showed you three anti- violence videos of people protesting in Chicago so why continue to spread lies. Thats a FOX news line you continue to repeat despite the facts I give you. Its never racially motivated to you. White people love us blacks and can do no wrong according to you. The officer opened his door without any reason and he closed the door and turned on the ignition now he is dead. There has to be a better solution then your simpleton response of COMPLY They were wrong . Point . Blank. Period and both officers lied to cover it up. The solution is that there should be a nationwide investigation of the KKK takeover of the police department and modern day lynching of blacks. There should be budget cuts in police appropriations when a joint inspection audits these negative findings and abuse of power. A police Review Board that Takes Action with Rules and Guidelines. What more do you need to see. He shot him execution style. Im beginning to think you are blind Thomas.

  14. Marque Anthony says:

    Note to Readers From The Author:

    It appears this story is evolving and the background of thee two officers who lied for Officer Tensing is very suspect. I will keep you updated so revisit this article and share it with everyone.

    Thanks

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