An offense just as outrageous in Conn.

The world is horrified at the video of police officer Derek Chauvin killing George Floyd by suffocating him in Minneapolis. For five minutes the officer used his weight to crush Floyd with his knee ignoring his plea, “I can’t breathe.” Yet the killing in West Haven of Mubarak Soulemane in January was nearly as brutal and just as wrong.

On Jan. 15, New Haven resident Mubarak Soulemane drove a car he had allegedly stolen at knifepoint off I-95 and onto Campbell Avenue. We know from body cams that within a minute the car was surrounded by police vehicles of the State Police and West Haven police. A few seconds later a trooper drew his gun and demanded that Soulemane get out of the car. Soulemane remained in the driver’s seat with the windows up. Within a half-minute the trooper told someone on the other side of the car to shoot the 19-year-old with a taser. Someone (it’s unclear if it was a state trooper or West Haven policeman) broke the passenger side window and a taser was shot. Within seconds Soulemane was shot seven times with live fire by State Trooper Brian North.

If the facts alleged are true, Soulemane committed criminal acts, but by the time the car had been surrounded he was helpless. He had nowhere to go. Why the indecent haste? Why not let him sit for some minutes until he gave up? Why not speak to him from a distance and offer to have him speak to a parent or member of the clergy? Why immediately bust a window and then shoot him dead? Contrast his treatment to what happened in an incident 2014 when West Haven police officers chased a man in a truck armed with a gun or guns who police say assaulted a police officer. The man was ultimately arrested on several counts without any gun being fired.

Now compare the quite different ways elected officials treated the killings of Floyd and of Soulemane. The mayor of Minneapolis, Jacob Frey, took no time in condemning what he saw on video. He connected it up with race and said, “Being black in America should not be a death sentence.” The policeman who killed Floyd and the three other police officers who stood around during the choking were all fired. Mayor Frey called for Chauvin’s arrest.

In Connecticut it was quite different. In four months, Gov. Lamont has said nothing about the killing of Soulemane by a member of the state trooper force that he oversees. Mayor Nancy Rossi of West Haven has not criticized any member of the police or state troopers. Whatever investigation West Haven police made about the incident has not been made public. The West Haven City Council has made no resolution about the matter and launched no investigation. Only one member of the council has criticized publicly what happened. City police refuse to say whether proper procedure was followed or what proper procedure even is in this kind of case. We don’t know if any member of either police force has been disciplined over the matter. We don’t even know the names of the other troopers or of the West Haven police officers involved in the incident. Finally, the city lawyer at a City Council meeting advised elected officials to say nothing about the matter.

Is this West Haven, Conn., 2020 or a town in Alabama 1952?