Earlier tonight, at 5:27 p.m., I was at the Markman Pumpkin Patch with my wife and kids when I got the news: The grand jury returned four felony charges against Jake Gardner, including manslaughter (carrying up to 20 years’ imprisonment), for shooting and killing James Scurlock during Omaha’s May 30 BLM protests.
Listening to Special Prosecutor Fred Franklin’s press conference through earbuds while pushing a wheelbarrow, I fell to my knees, clapped my work-gloved hands, screamed a guttural “YEEEESSSS” through clenched teeth, and began to sob.
More than three months ago, I reported on the prolific evidence of Jake Gardner’s racism and its relevance to assessing his shaky self-defense claim. You all shared it several-thousand times, helping it reach nearly one-million people. …
In October 2008, Neo-Nazis Paul Schlesselman and Daniel Cowart painted a swastika and the numbers “14” and “88” on the hood of their car before taking target practice at a Tennessee Baptist church — shooting out its front-door window.
They bragged about it; a tipster notified the sheriff; and they were arrested. Police seized a sawed-off shotgun, a rifle, and three pistols. Under interrogation, the men confessed their nascent plan to kill 88 African Americans — targeting a predominantly Black local school — and behead 14 of them, all in twisted tribute to white-supremacist lore: The Fourteen Words (“We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children”) and “88” (“Heil Hitler,” with “H” representing the 8th letter of the English alphabet). …
“If it bleeds, it leads,” goes local media’s mantra for news-coverage priorities. But is all spilt blood equal?
According to studies summarized by The Sentencing Project, today’s reporting “exaggerates crime rates and exhibits both quantitative and qualitative racial biases.”
Alleged black perpetrators are disproportionately likely to be shown in mug shots and under police custody than their white counterparts.
Black-on-white victimization constitutes just 10% of actual crime reports, but 42% of televised cases.
Statistically, the media at once “exaggerates black crime while downplaying black victimization,” among other troubling data-driven findings.
“Given that the public widely relies on mass media as its source of knowledge about crime and crime policy, these disparities have important consequences,” The Sentencing Project warns. …
On Tuesday, June 9, 2020, I called for murder charges against Jake Gardner, my racist former high school classmate, for shooting and killing a 22-year-old unarmed black man named James Scurlock during a May 30 Black Lives Matter protest in Omaha, Nebraska. My post went Facebook-viral, and at 12:15 a.m. that night I received a text from an unknown number. It was a long-time Gardner family member I’ll call “Taylor,” and it caught my attention: “This has been tearing me apart ever since James Scurlock was murdered by Jake, and I use that term because I have no doubt that both Jake and his father went downtown looking for trouble. From my experience with the family, they would love nothing more than to have an excuse to use their guns against any minority. …
Jake Gardner, who shot and killed James Scurlock last weekend during a Black Lives Matter protest, was my high school classmate. Until nine days ago, we were Facebook friends, and I assumed I’d see him at our 20-year reunion later this year.
Jenny Heineman — a mother, author, professor, and TEDx speaker — is Jake’s cousin. Last weekend, on a hot, muggy, wind-whipped Sunday afternoon, she and I marched for #JusticeForJames, Jake’s victim, and afterward we talked. …
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