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This story is sick and heart-breaking and I hope the shooter gets every ounce of justice the law can mete out to him, but the coverage of this attack and these statements are in no way accurate or helpful. Much like the bile I see all over social media and public forums blaming BLM for the Dallas atrocities, this kind of dog whistle racism (and that's EXACTLY what it is) has no place in the mouths of public officials or police.
Cowardly and viciously attacked? Yes.
Hideous illegal shooting? Yes.
An insult to men and women who wear a uniform and honestly 'protect and serve'? ABSOLUTELY!
But "ambushed"? No.
The shooter was completely wrong, but to believe it was an ambush you have to believe he got his gun, got into the car and started speeding up and down city streets in broad daylight with the intent of being stopped and then firing on the officer. Now, if the shooter had pulled up alongside the officer's squad car and shot at him without warning; or approached him from behind and fired at his turned back; or hid in a shooting positions and fired at the officer in his squad car...THOSE are ambushes.
Getting pulled over, for speeding in a residential area; and shooting an officer, then fleeing the scene before eventually fleeing on foot before being taken into custody? That seems a lot less "planned" than an ambush would suggest. It seems like something less nefarious than a planned 'ambush' of police and more like a heinous attempt to avoid justice. It also seems no coincidence that we get a police chief, in a racially roiling community like St. Louis, invoking words and images that would bring to mind Dallas in the immediate aftermath of the crimes there the night before. The intentional act here is to conflate a criminal act during a traffic stop to somehow be indicative of a wider, perverse trend of targeting officers.
Chief Belmar (for some perspective, Ballwin is an overwhelmingly white, and much more affluent than the other areas, part of St. Louis) chose to use dog whistle terminology in his statement.
He could have steered clear of any connotations that would invoke Dallas-style targeting of police.
But he did not.
He could have sought to calm the public and isolate the criminal act and criminal perpetrator.
But he did not.
Were his words political and self-serving?
Yes, but in no way helpful to tamp down passions, or to relieve pressure from this already deeply divisive issue in St. Louis.
*EDIT....wrong photo linked initially*
The black population of St. Louis is marginalized, segregated and trampled under foot on an alarmingly regular basis by police departments across the region. Everyone knows about Ferguson, but few outside of St. Louis care beyond that now "old" story with Michael Brown and the constant oppression of blacks in the St. Louis area. A year ago it was big news and everyone was shocked that such animosity exists...now? Oh, ho hum...another white police chief in St. Louis casually implying racist things in public statements....must be Friday.
That in no way excuses the shooter or his illegal and heinous actions, but what it DOES mean is that police officials, making public statements about racially sensitive incidents should take far greater care in their word choices and implied messages.
This does not surprise me in the least though; and is just as sad as the shooting of an officer, doing his job and being attacked by a rabid dog of a human being for it. The fact that another white police chief in St. Louis, Missouri opens his mouth, and proceeds to eat his foot down to the ankle, is a story in and of itself; but sadly, it is the one right in front of our faces that is NOT being discussed and NOT being digested or considered.
The question that needs an answer is why the chief of police feels that an attack on an officer during a traffic stop needs to be elevated to the status of an "ambush" and a deliberate, planned attempted killing instead of being treated as a criminal act by a vicious attacker in an attempt to flee or escape justice? Why stoke the flames of racial animosity? Why give cover to racists across the country who now point to this case as justification for why it is 'understandable' that all police everywhere should be fearful of their life in any encounter with a black man?
This is why words matter. The police chief paints a picture with his words here. He tells people that a black suspect is somehow worse than a garden variety criminal because in this case he was "definitely ambushing" white police.
The truth is not 100% known, but the idea that being pulled over for speeding was part of an ambush plan is not likely to be part of that eventual truth; and even if it is, the chief's non-discretionary use of the term 'ambush' in the aftermath of Dallas was no accident - it was intentional and it was prejudicial and in my mind it was a racial dog whistle that is fanning the flames of the hatred across the nation today and in recent days.
