Cops fired over violent, racist talk about Black people: We are going to 'start slaughtering them'

I wonder if John Hamilton will search his place for microphones now?

Three police officers in Wilmington, North Carolina, were fired after their department discovered patrol-car video of conversations containing violent, racist comments about Black people, officials announced Wednesday.

The Wilmington Police Department took the action on Tuesday against Cpl. Jessie Moore, and Officers Kevin Piner and Brian Gilmore. Each was accused of violating standards of conduct, criticism and use of inappropriate language.


Police Chief Donny Williams said at a news conference Wednesday that "with the concurrence of our City Council and at the direction of City Manager Sterling Cheatham" he was releasing a summary of the investigation.

"When I first learned of these conversations, I was shocked, saddened and disgusted," Williams said. "There is no place for this behavior in our agency or our city and it will not be tolerated."

The recorded conversations of Gilmore, Piner and Moore were discovered June 4 during a routine audit of Piner's in-car camera, according to documents released by the police department.

"The conversations included disrespectful language, hate-filled speech and referred to Black people as the N-word," the police chief said, adding that the officers also criticized him, several Black officers within the agency and made negative comments about individuals outside of the agency. Additionally, they made negative comments about the Black Lives Matter protests and were critical of the Wilmington Police Department's response, he said.

A sergeant reviewing the footage from Piner’s car, which were categorized as coming from "accidental activation" of the video recorder, initially noted "extremely racist comments" in a conversation between Piner and Moore. The remarks led the supervisor to make a closer examination of the video, which captured officers using the N-word and other racist language.

An internal investigation followed.

At the 46-minute mark of the video, Piner and Gilmore begin talking from their respective cars, the police summary says.

Their conversation turns to the topic of protests across the nation after George Floyd, a Black man, died in May after a white Minneapolis police officer put his knee on Floyd’s neck for several minutes.

Piner complains in an apparent reference to his own department that its only concern was “kneeling down with the Black folks."

About 30 minutes later, Piner receives a phone call from Moore, who in the call repeatedly refers to a Black female he arrested a day earlier as a "Negro" and then uses the N-word, the summary says. Moore also refers to a Black magistrate as a "f------ Negro magistrate."

Moore says, "Not all Black people are like that," according to the summary. Piner replies, "Most of 'em."

Piner tells Moore later in the phone conversation that a civil war is coming and that he is "ready."

Piner starts speaking about martial law and says: "We are just gonna go out and start slaughtering them f------ N-words. I can't wait. God, I can't wait."

Moore responds that he would not do that. Piner says, "I am ready," according to the summary.

Piner tells Moore that society needs a civil war to "wipe 'em off the f------ map. That'll put 'em back about four or five generations."

According to the investigation the officers were interviewed separately and admitted it was their voices on the video and did not deny any of the content.

Each officer denied being racist, the investigation summary said. The officers cited the stress of today's climate on law enforcement as a reason for their "venting."

Gilmore, 48, could not immediately be reached by phone for comment Thursday. Piner, 44, and Moore, 50, did not immediately return phone and email requests for comment Thursday.

On Wednesday afternoon, Wilmington Mayor Bill Saffo said the City Council unanimously agreed to release documentation of the officers' conversations despite such an action violating the privacy of personnel files.

“I can honestly say that I was sickened by the vile and destructive language used by these officers,” Saffo said.

Williams said in a statement Wednesday: "Normally, personnel laws allow only a very small amount of information to be made public. However, in exceptional cases, when it is essential to maintain public confidence in the administration of the City and the Police Department, more information may be released."

The police chief said this is the most exceptional and difficult case he has encountered in his career and that we must establish new reforms for policing here at home and throughout the country.

Williams said he will recommend the three officers not be rehired by notifying the North Carolina Criminal Justice Training and Standards Commission about their behavior. In addition to the officers' being fired, prior criminal cases involving the three officers will be reviewed by the district attorney’s office to determine if they committed any crimes in the conduct of those cases or showed bias toward defendants.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-new...-black-people-we-n1232072?cid=sm_npd_nn_fb_ma

 

It just seem to be non-stop one incident after another every single day. A few bad apples isn't cutting it anymore. We need serious police reform in this country and we need it now. For every "bad apple", there is an entire police department, police union, police run review board covering for these bad apples and that makes the entire barrel rotten. No organization that is in charge of investigating itself is ever going to be accountable nor does it have any reason to ever change it's own practices. The fix is in. We see the results every day. Something has got to change or we will all suffer under the corruption and the weight of an out of control policing system.

 

Bad apples . . . Get rid of them.

By the way, when and how did the word “negro” become socially unacceptable? Is this akin to liberal manipulation of the English language for political leverage, much like coining the term “systemic racism” or switching from “global warming” to “climate change”? My mom taught me that using the word negro is respectful, and she is a staunch liberal.

 

-Quite literally, using "negro" hasn't been acceptable since the 70's at least. So, about 50 years ago. Many African American leaders in the 60's and 70's opposed it's use for it's roots in segregation and slavery.

-The term "institional racism" (used interchangeably with "systemic racism") was first coined in the 1960's by authors Stokely Carmichael and Charles Hamilton.

-"global warming" was switched to "climate change" because dumb people kept saying "global warming is a lie, it's cold/snowing here"

 

Yeah, pick a convenient inconsequential tangent to go off on.

So your liberal mom taught you something like 30 years ago and you never updated that information? Well, how special.

 

Sorry, but I don't subscribe to the false notion that any who utter the word are necessarily racist. It still appeared on the US Census Form as recently as 2010. Just because you don't find something politically correct doesn't mean it isn't.

Institutional racism and systemic racism would be two entirely different things. I agree institutional racism exists . . . the KKK is a racist institution, as are the Black Panthers, and the Aryan and Muslim Brotherhoods.

Beth Medrash Govoha, Yeshiva University, Hampton University and Howard University all embody institutional racism in the educational sector.

Those are all private institutions and, as much as I think inclusiveness is fair and righteous, it cannot be mandated in our society.

Claims of systemic racism could only be justified if our society had consciously, and in coordinated fashion erected barriers against the upward mobility of a targeted group(s). It is a preposterous liberal sales pitch to those at the bottom of the social ladder that their station in life is someone else's fault, and not their own.

One can be born in this country with nothing at all and rise through sheer determination. The only one who can steal that away from you is yourself. Those are the words everyone should hear and embrace, not "Uncle Sam gives us unemployment (or welfare), food stamps, and a rent subsidy . . . why should I go work for $15 an hour and lose all of that free stuff?"

No . . . Global Warming was a unidirectional claim and, like racism, was too easily dis-proven. Liberals switched over to Climate Change because the climate is never standing still, ever-changing, first one direction and then the other. Never again could they be proven wrong in that regard. A clever ploy, but as transparent as it gets . . .

Pretty dumb really, repeatedly twisting and stretching the English language however needed to fit their agenda. The public has seen this before, and the pattern is becoming all too familiar.

 

they had to say climate change because dolts were astonished that snow still occurs

 

No, that's no it FD. We couldn't miss it, surrounded by snowflakes, as we are . . .

 

1. I didn't call you racist, but don't you think it should be up to the group being called something what is/isn't offensive?

2. Okay, you're not understanding institutional racism. The government is an institution, the DMV is an institution, and all the examples you gave are institution. What defines institutional racism according to those who coined the term is the subtle and systemic nature of it. Small additional hurdles that add up as you pass through life.

3. You totally misunderstand global warming and climate change. Climate change is caused by global warming (the average temperature of the globe is rising at unprecedented rates leading to more chaotic changes in climate). They really did switch over because too many people were calling out having snowy/cold weather. Speaking of, weather and climate are totally separate concepts as well.

 

Let's answer a question with another question . . . if that's your standard, how then can it be socially acceptable to apply the label "privileged racist whites" to folks who happen to be white, but were neither born into privileged circumstances nor are racist?

Oh, I get the point completely, and what I'm saying is that "those who coined the term" have concocted the whole "the system is against minorities" mindset, which liberals have co-opted to recruit and retain voters. As I've written before, Blacks, Latinos, Asians and Whites are all capable of improving their lot in life if they make it their mission. Those hurdles are not race-specific, so stop making them out to be.

Food is expensive, my wife's a drunk, lodging's expensive, I hate math, my husband's a womanizer, it's cold outside, the baby's screaming, transportation's expensive, it's sweltering inside, the neighbor's a jerk, college is expensive, I don't like rules, babysitter's are expensive, life is cruel, work is hard, the boss is demanding, the tax man cometh, I don't feel like shoveling the car out . . . we could all go on and on. We all make choices, consciously or not, to suck it up and do what it takes, or to not do it and wait for someone else to provide for us.

Those who choose not to tackle those obstacles themselves, who decide to lean on others when they could do it themselves, fall further behind each time they do so. It won't be long before that repetition turns into a lifestyle, and seems irreversible. That is the dependent class, and that slide into dependency doesn't discriminate based on the color of one's skin. This argument that the deck is stacked against minorities is pure, contrived bunk.

That did not escape me, but my point is that the pivot to Climate Change was calculated to not be on the losing side of arguments, ever.

 

I think at this point, the first 2 points are pretty tied together. Individuals of any background can certainly succeed, but there's unconscious racial bias that makes it less likely from the get go for certain people to succeed. Consider this graphic from a 2004 study.



In this study, 2 resumes were used: a low quality and high quality one. They were further split by changing the names between stereotypically white and African American names to make 4 groups.

Notice how the low quality white named resumes outperformed even the high quality African American resumes? That gap is exactly what people are referring to when they talk about white privilege. Again, any individual could succeed, but in many areas (this is just 1 example) it's significantly easier as a white person.

So no, it's not "contrived bunk" the numbers do not lie.


As for climate change/global warming, they never were on the "losing side" they just were faced with a public too dumb to understand they were right. I'm thankful climate change denial is dieing out. The only true "losing side" in that battle is when people ignore scientists

 

You study is 16 years old. You have had entire generation of people come into the workforce. You need to find something that is more recent to make your point.

 

I don't think that was too long ago, but if you insist... Here's a graphic from a 2020 meta analysis of studies like the 2004 one showing trends from 1989 to present:


Here's the full study if you're interested:

https://www.pnas.org/content/114/41/10870.short

 

You have socks and underwear older than that.

 

Not all studies are equal . . . http://datacolada.org/51

Note that there was actually a very small advantage given to African American sounding names in the latter study.

 

Please see the meta-analysis I posted above. Also, from the second study:

"We find no consistent pattern of differences in callback rates by race, unlike Bertrand
and Mullainathan (2004). The possible reasons include differing study settings, time
periods, labor markets, application processes, employers, and job quality. We do
find racial differences in the relative returns to resume quality, similar to Bertrand and
Mullainathan (2004)."

Finding differences in race was a secondary aim of this study, and yet they still discovered significant bias with race as it relates to resume quality.

 

More age bias from the our resident liberal bigot. One would think that you have better sense to that to post statements like, but you don't. That's why you so-called "open minded view of the world" is a joke. If you have been raised in the south with that attitude, you would be a full blown racist.

 

It's OK. I have socks and underwear older than 16 years too