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Amy Swearer Profile picture
@AmySwearer
Nov 19, 2021 • 22 tweets • 13 min read • Read on X
This idea that only white people are allowed to avail themselves of the claim of self-defense, or that they can largely just do whatever and get away with it by claiming self-defense, is absurd: a thread.
Jaleel Stallings was acquitted of multiple attempted murder charges related to him shooting at several St. Paul police officers last summer. He [reasonably] claimed self-defense and that he had no idea these guys were cops.

kstp.com/news/saint-pau…
It took the jury only four hours instead of four days to acquit Stephen Spencer of murder in a white man's death during a race-related dispute. Spencer claimed self-defense.

apnews.com/article/north-…
Timothy Simpkins, an 18-year-old who shot three people with an illegally possessed gun at a Texas high school, is literally out on bond right now and claiming he shot in self-defense. Honestly, he has a viable claim wrt to the intended target.

nypost.com/2021/10/07/sus…
Dolores White stabbed her daughter's boyfriend to death. Acquitted on the theory of self-defense.

goerie.com/story/news/cri…
Trey Adams stabbed a high school classmate to death. Acquitted for? You guessed it - acting in self-defense.

journalinquirer.com/crime_and_cour…
Jesus Lima. Prosecutors argued he was the aggressor who shot a man he'd previously threatened. The jury sided with Lima, who said he was attacked by the man and four others and tried to retreat.

mercurynews.com/2021/01/28/in-…
Tony Bristol, a nightclub security guard, was acquitted after claiming self-defense in the shooting deaths of two unarmed patrons.

clarksvillenow.com/local/verdict-…
Letoya Ramseure. Claimed self-defense in the fatal shooting of her boyfriend. Acquitted on all charges.

inquirer.com/news/philadelp…
I could go on and on.

Andre Roy. abc13.com/neiman-marcus-…

Kenneth Ray Smith. nondoc.com/2021/10/25/ken…

Nehemiah Martin. 10tv.com/article/news/l…

Literally Simone Biles' brother. nytimes.com/2021/06/16/us/…

Rapper Dababy. thefader.com/2019/03/30/cha…
And there are plenty of white people who have been convicted of super questionable offenses where I thought self-defense was a viable claim. Case in point, Michael Strickland: oregonlive.com/portland/2017/…

And Michael Drejka: washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/08…
tl;dr - your race-baiting narratives about self-defense claims in the American legal system are hot trash, all sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Literally today, at almost the same time as the Rittenhouse verdict:

wpbf.com/article/andrew…
But wait, there's more:

Naeem Davis. dnainfo.com/new-york/20170…

Alex Hughes. chicago.cbslocal.com/2019/11/17/wal…

Mychael Jenkins. daytondailynews.com/news/local/def…

James Nero. fox8live.com/2019/12/18/zur…

Darreonta Reynolds. roanoke.com/news/crime/rey…
I'm still on single digit pages of a basic Google search.

Ansumana Jadama. archive.sltrib.com/article.php?id…

Kyla Nundley. freep.com/story/news/loc…

Keith Luncheon. nydailynews.com/new-york/brook…

Tearri Richard. mercurynews.com/2017/01/27/rar…

Naquann Ware. cantonrep.com/story/news/202…
Marcus Weldon. detroitnews.com/story/news/loc…

Tabias Davis. southbendtribune.com/story/news/cri…

Rodney West. firststateupdate.com/2019/11/towne-…

Tyshawn Plowden, dailygazette.com/2018/11/02/man…

Gabriel Chavez. elpasotimes.com/story/news/cri…
Did we think I was done because I'm really not.

Sangsouriyanh Maniphonh. syracuse.com/crime/2017/06/…

Enrique Quiniones. kget.com/news/crime-wat…

Saeve Evans. washingtonpost.com/local/public-s…

Odell Allen. al.com/news/birmingha…

Wayne Isaacs. abc7ny.com/east-new-york-…
How about some where charges were dropped before trial based on self-defense?

Joshua Walker. fox8.com/news/murder-ch…

Justin Golson. tennessean.com/story/news/201…

Ajay Alvarez. tampabay.com/news/st-peters…

Sheyland Barnett. reviewjournal.com/crime/courts/c…

Michael Jones. greenbaypressgazette.com/story/news/201…
I'm bored tonight and Google is endless. More dropped charges:

Terrell Cole. richmond.com/news/local/cri…

Mamadou Diallo. cbsnews.com/news/mamadou-d…

Stacey Gordon. abc3340.com/news/local/mur…

Shaneisha Heath. cincinnati.com/story/news/cri…

Kimario Rowland-Taylor. lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/loc…
Hear me out. Cases of self-defense where a person of color *wasn't even charged because it was so obvious*

[This guy has a go-fund-me FYI] fox6now.com/news/milwaukee…

From Omaha. wowt.com/2021/06/09/oma…

From Virginia [technically charged for like a day]. nbc12.com/2020/06/12/cha…
Oh man, the amount of goalpost moving happening in response to this tweet is FUN. Like I'm very glad *you, specifically* have more nuanced arguments than "this never happens for black defendants" but let me tell you a lot of well-followed Twitter blue checks absolutely don't.
"But Amy, these 50ish cases are just anecdotes that don't address very obvious racial disparities in the system" like NO YOU DUNDERHEADS I know I literally have multiple threads on this thanks for refuting an argument I'm not making by supporting a premise I'm not debating.

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More from @AmySwearer

Amy Swearer Profile picture
Jan 18
I'm reading through the DOJ's scathing report on the disastrous Uvalde response so that you don't have to.

Here's what sticks out: 🧵

static.texastribune.org/media/files/17…
The investigation "identified several critical failures and other breakdowns" during the response and refers to "cascading failures of leadership, decision-making, tactics, policy, and training that contributed to those failures and breakdowns."
The most significant failure? First responders treated a clear active shooter scenario--where generally accepted practice is to "immediately engage the subject...if necessary, bypassing injured victims and placing themselves in harm's way"--as a barricaded subject scenario.
Read 16 tweets
Amy Swearer Profile picture
Aug 14, 2023
Can we take a minute to appreciate how many women have protected themselves and others with firearms in the last two or so weeks? It's basically a highlight real of just how important the right to keep and bear arms is for us, too. Tip of the DGU iceberg, but important:

📜📜📜
Aug. 11, Tucson (AZ) - A woman living by herself fatally shot a would-be intruder who kept trying to break into her home despite knowing she was armed.

kold.com/2023/08/12/pcs…
Aug. 11, Pottstown (PA) - A woman shot and wounded the father of her child after he assaulted her, leaving various injuries. He not only had an active restraining order against him, but also had active warrants for violating that restraining order.

archive.ph/mP2Rh
Read 15 tweets
Amy Swearer Profile picture
Jul 21, 2023
(1) She was 30 weeks pregnant, which would have been illegal in most states pre-Roe [and most of the world], and is 20 weeks past the FDA's approved usage timeline for abortion pills.

(2) She wasn't charged under the abortion law. She was charged with concealing the remains.
(3) Her mother is charged with *performing* the abortion after 20 weeks, as well as with performing the abortion without a medical license.

(4) Doctors lose their licenses all the time for far less egregious things than prescribing abortion pills at 30 weeks.
(5) Survival rates for babies born at 30 weeks are somewhere between 95-98% in developed countries. The baby has vocal chords, fingerprints, fully developed lungs, and even eyelashes. It can open its eyes and blink. It can grasp the umbilical cord with its tiny hands.
Read 4 tweets
Amy Swearer Profile picture
Jun 27, 2023
It's indisputable that an armed civilian stopped an active shooter last week.

You almost certainly haven't heard about it.

Why?

Because Las Vegas Police have gone out of their way to downplay it, while the media have shown basically zero interest.

THREAD.
Last Friday, LVPD responded to a shooting at a luxury condo just off the Las Vegas strip. The initial reporting on it looked generally like this:

Two people involved. One shot and injured.

That's it. Pretty standard crime, right?

8newsnow.com/news/local-new…
The next day, some follow up reports started hinting that something more complex may have happened.

We find out that a "gunman" fired shots into the apartment complex lobby, and was "stopped" by a hero employee.

ktnv.com/news/man-calle…
Read 20 tweets
Amy Swearer Profile picture
Jun 8, 2023
Example #1837 of why it's a horrible idea to only count defensive gun uses if they're confirmed in some publicly available media report.

Often, the public doesn't get updated if a shooting is later deemed justified unless it's suddenly relevant again.

wtvr.com/news/local-new…
Case in point - a Richmond teenager was fatally shot in Nov. 2021. Limited info, except for a March 2022 article detailing that his family was upset no arrests had been made. That could mean many things, including a lack of suspects.

nbc12.com/2022/03/22/tho…
But at some point between Nov. 2021 and today, the police determined this shooting was actually a justified homicide. They either told no one, or no one cared enough to report it. Can't find a public disclosure of that determination. If it exists, it flew under everyone's radar.
Read 6 tweets
Amy Swearer Profile picture
Jun 8, 2023
This is some Orwellian doublespeak. You don't "enshrine freedom" by literally limiting the scope of your existing freedoms, which are already enshrined. And you can't "leave the Second Amendment intact" while cutting out its heart and removing its soul.
The Second Amendment, like the rest of the Bill of Rights, protects what citizens may do by telling the government what it cannot do.

Newsome's amendment turns this on its head, mandating what government MUST do in order that peaceable citizens may NOT do certain things.
It's like saying "we're keeping the 1st Amendment intact" with a new one criminalizing unpopular speech, limiting freedom of religion to just The Big 5, and requiring those under 21 to get parental consent for internet use.

You're blatantly dismantling the whole thing.
Read 6 tweets

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