For Breonna Taylor
Re “No charges in Taylor’s killing,” Sept. 24
Iam not an attorney, a police officer or anyone with real expertise on the criminal justice system. I am simply a random citizen and reader of the Los Angeles Times, and I am appalled at the police killing of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Ky., in March, and the aftermath. Taylor’s senseless death, in my opinion, is such a colossal systemic failure that it somehow reminds me of the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger in 1986. The combination of misinformation, incompetence and poor oversight is beyond my feeble comprehension. It seems obvious that if people were to break down your door in the middle of the night, as the Louisville police did with Taylor and her boyfriend, you would treat them as mortal threats and defend yourself.
As much as I would love to see the police officers do a perp walk and have their mug shots taken, I understand why this will not happen. There is no jury that would find an officer guilty of murder or manslaughter when he can reasonably claim that he was acting in self- defense. If those officers are arrested and prosecuted, it would be the Rodney King trial all over again. The officers would be acquitted, and there would be rioting.
In fact, sending these officers to prison wouldn’t be enough. We as a society must prevent this from ever happening again. That means ending “no- knock” raids. It means ending the war on drugs. Sending police to prison may feel like justice in this moment, but doing the hard work of reforming our society in tribute to Taylor and her family is simply what she, and all innocent bystanders in an endless drug war, deserve.
Mark Rogers,
South El Monte