Rockaway Park NY * July 4, 2020 * in the 49th year of the Society * Salve Fullosia!
Blue Lines Matter
A Case of Deadly Force is the story of a civil rights case brought by a former Boston police officer turned
lawyer against his department. The movie is based upon a book by Lawrence O'Donnell, a Boston PO turned attorney.
One commentator, critical of the film, correctly observed that in a civil rights case, Attorney Lawrence O' Donnell
(Richard Crenna) stood alone as a beacon of integrity in the courtroom against notorious liars and hypocrites when
the former police officer daringly turned on his department in a wrongful death suit brought against former fellow
officers on behalf of a bereaved black mother.
The critic is correct in saying that the Made For TV movie A Case of Deadly Force is a bit one sided in that the saintly innocence of the injured party might have been somewhat inflated. Many people involved with violent encounters with police have less than pristine backgrounds. Whether that justifies police action is another question.
My evaluation of A Case of Deadly Force is generally favorable. Where the movie attains a degree of excellency,
it lies in the deadly accuracy of the dilemma and heart ache faced by a lawyer in a civil suit against the police.
Often advocating the rights of clients often with a checkered past, the lawyer stands alone facing a violent system
with a united unprincipled opposition: The Blue Wall.
This made for TV movie vividly exemplifies the mischief a determined police department is capable of:
violent beatings and arrests of members of Mr O'Donnell's family. All it takes is a wink and nod to bring
the entire department down on a civil rights lawyer. And many judges go along with this.
This no feel - good Perry Mason story.
Richard Crenna has grown up since his days as one of the Real Mc Coys. In A Case of Deadly Force, he
delivers a bravura performance. If there is a short coming in the film, it is given Mr O'Donnell's experience
as a police officer he did not anticipate the violence of the reprisal that his former friends were capable of.
The Blue and the Grey
The Blue Line sometimes wears tan, grey or chestnut brown down yonder in the Deep South.
The death of one of the conspirators Edgar Ray Killen in prison in 2018 has renewed interest in the Mississippi Burning case.
Lets turn the clock back half a century It's 1964. Three civil rights workers, a black man James Chaney from Meridian, Mississippi, and two whites Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner allegedly from New York City disappear after being briefly detained by local police in Philadelphia Mississippi. Enraged, President Johnson ordered the Navy to drain the alligator - infested swamps of Mississippi in search of the three Freedom Riders.
In Mississippi Burning (1988) the story of the investigation is brought to the silver screen. While the Navy up to its hips in sludge has been unable to locate the missing Freedom Riders, Johnson dispatches FBI agents, Alan Ward (Willem Dafoe) and Rupert Anderson (Gene Hackman), a local Mississippian and former sheriff to investigate. Chafing under Ward's Yankee micromanagement in a futile by - the - book approach, Anderson through seductive down - home charm develops an informant in Mrs Pell (Frances McDormand), the battered wife of Deputy Sheriff Clinton Pell (Brad Dourif). "This thing," Anderson growls at Ward, "must be blown apart from the inside."
Discovery of the bodies leads to a turning point in which Ward, acknowledging that the book has no answer, accedes to Anderson's irregular tactics: kidnapping glib and unbelievably cute Mayor Tilman and forcing him to describe the killings and reveal the culprits, cutting Deputy Pell with a razor blade in reprisal for beating Mrs Pell, luring Klansmen to a bogus meeting and burning a cross on Lester Cowen's lawn, and rescuing him from a faked attempt by the Klan to hang him. Under the erroneous belief that his fellow Klansmen intend to kill him, Lester spills the beans.
The thing was indeed pulled down from the inside.
Charged with civil rights violations, many conspirators including Deputy Pell are found guilty. Sherriff Stuckey is acquitted. Mayor Tilman commits suicide.
Gene Hackman plays the two - fisted Rebel Sherriff Anderson turned FBI agent with great aplomb. Sweet as sugar and mean as dog dung, Anderson can molt from as gentle as a new - born calf to as aggressive as a charging bull. Hackman's Pennsylvania accent does not creep into his Southron expressions or speech as it did in his depiction of a New York City Detective in the movie version of French Connection.
William Defoe plays the stamp pressed FBI agent, with the pressed dark suit and homburg in the sweltering heat of the deep South. True to his character, he'll get nowhere in the cozy world of the deep south.
Beyond the footlights, Andrew Goodman is described as a guy from New York City. That's not exactly true. He may have claimed to live in New York, NY to go to Queens College free. Actually, he lived in in Lawrence NY in Nassau County, an effete suburb just outside Rockaway and New York City limits and quite afew miles from Manhattan.
I recall the summer of 1964 that the involvement of a resident of nearby Lawrence NY in civil rights activism
was greeted with consternation. Could they not have protested the racism of Nassau County's Five Towns? Segregation in Mississippi pales to the duplicity of Nassau County.
When the incident in Mississippi occurred, a resident of Lawrence NY need not have travelled to Mississippi to bother irate rebels to fight racism. He could have opened his front door to rebuke neighbors who stand on white liberal principles and hide behind clever artifices and semblances when they call the Nassau County police because they saw a black person.
Apparently, the scriptwriters either never experienced the Nassau County police or chose to look the otherway.
In Nassau County, a black woman with her children in a park better have her driver's license with her; same is true for a white woman with mixed race children. One white woman producing a valid driver's license showing a Nassau residence, was nonetheless told by the Nassau police that she was on the wrong side of the line. To her protest that "I am a local resident," she was gruffly told, "That wasn't the line I was speaking of." Nassau County even today is more segregated today than the Rebel South ever was.
"The legal issues are simple"
Not all police are in league with Satan. In investigating the murder of civil rights ikon Medgar Evers, the Jackson Missippi Police deserve first class reviews.
Turn the clock back to the wee hours of June 12, 1963. President Kennedy had delivered a major Civil Rights Address.
Medgar Evers, a civil rights activist, was shot and killed in front of the door to his house. Though regularly tailed by FBI and
local police, Evers arrived home ominously without the usual escort. Arrested in connection with the murder, Byron De La Beckwith faced two all - white juries which deadlocked. The case went fallow for three decades.
Flash ahead to 1994 a new prosecutor and changed social circumstances ushered in a third re - trial. The movie overstates prosecutor's Bobby De Laughter's sudden conversion to the cause. In the movie version Myrlie Evers, Medgar Evers' widow, (Whoppi Goldberg) and Martin Dees make a persuasive case for re - examining the case that impels De Laughter to conclude that justice should be done.
Whoopi Goldberg portrays Medgar's widow with a natural dignity. A touch of humor conceals any lingering sadness. "I gave up hating De La Beckwith because it made no sense. The hate would eat me out and he wouldn't care."
Charged up with a quest for justice De Laughter (Alec Baldwin) sallies forth. In an alliance with Myrlie Evers, De Laughter resumes prosecution of De La Beckwith with vigor.
Actually, real life De Laughter, unlike St Paul, was not suddenly struck by a lightning bolt from Heaven. The real - life prosecutor Bobby De Laughter) from the time he joined the DA's office in 1987 agitated for the re - opening of the case. By 1989, a new investigation, at De Laughter's instigation, had begun.
Alec Baldwin's performance as the prosecutor won over to the cause of righteousness captures the elegance of Bobby DeLaughter's style as a trial attorney. The grand - eloquent, magnificent closing argument in the movie catches the gist of the one delivered in the real - life case.
The closing argument De Laughter delivered is regarded as a work of art. "The legal case is simple. A man was shot in the back on his doorstep." The master of understatement, De Laughter relying heavily on evidence coming on De La Beckwith's "big mouth," argued, "The other issues are more complex…" The closing argument won a place in the text Ladies and Gentleman of the Jury: Greatest Closing Arguments in Modern Law.
In the movie version, the prosecution of De Beckwith in 1994 sends De Laughter's marriage into Mississippi's white elite into a tailspin. In real life, De Laughter's commitment bringing the case to a conclusion came at a high personal price, his long - standing marriage became strained. Divorce followed three years before trial in 1991. The movie uses a certain poetic license.
The trial recounted in Ghosts is remarkable for its demonstration of the unexpected professionalism of the Jackson police in collecting and preserving forensic evidence. In spite of whispers and speculation of an official hand in the tragedy, the police did their job well in making a case against the arch - villain De La Beckwith.
The culprit De La Beckwith was played by James Woods who excels at portraying lunatics. Capturing the imperviousness who without remorse shot a man in the back, De La Beckwith boasted in the movie version that he would have had remorse over killing a deer.
The stage is set for the verdict which rights the wrong as far as that is possible.
Following the trial, DeLaughter, after a time as president of the Mississippi Prosecutor's Association, was appointed Hinds County judge and later elevated to Hinds County Circuit Court. His book Never Too Late: A Prosecutor's Story of Justice in the Medgar Evers Case went to press in 2001. Then De Laughter's ascendant star crashed to earth.
The FBI's investigation into famed tort lawyer Richard Scruggs, Senator Trent Lott's brother - in - law, led to information that Scruggs had used De Laughter's former boss in the DA's office to reach Judge DeLaughter. The connection was to have played a role in a $1 billion trade secret lawsuit in the Hinds County Circuit Court. The bait was the promise that DeLaughter would be recommended for a federal judgeship.
Indictments brought under the Federal Economic Espionage Act against the people who allegedly had stolen the trade secrets, were eventually dismissed.
Pleading guilty to obstruction of justice in Federal court, DeLaughter was sentenced to 18 months in jail. On hand wearing a grin was Byron De La Beckwith's son sporting a Confederate flag lapel pin. Standing by the civil rights ikon was Charles Evers, the brother of Medgar Evers.
Trapped in a culture where all is corrupt, Greetings Dean: The recent spat of violence and ikonoclasm in America has renewed interest in the words of the late Societal Hound Mo - Par at
Summer Solstice, three years past. I do miss her vigilance in presiding over telephonic meetings of the Society
listening attentively as the Dean slumbered through a Mentorial discourse. Three years ago, La Grande Chienne Sociétale published a MODEST PROPOSAL to abolish Independence Day and restore the monarchy in order to curb excessive disruptive noise and to recognize that tea is still taxed. I can't say I would agree with her statement that Democrats are Satanists. I think that the Society often confuses non mainline Judeo - Christianism with Satanism. This definition might exclude Thomas Paine, Jefferson and even George Washington. I look for a greater inclusiveness.
No matter the root cause of the disorders appears to originate in Garrity v New Jersey which made each Police Officer his own autonomous police department and abolished the chain of command by permitting police officers to refuse inquiries from his superiors about performance or activity in policing and Pierson v Ray which granted police officers a qualified immunity in responding to damages caused by their activities. To my shock and dismay these extraordinary protection for police come from the pens of the Warren Court.
Although I was a aware that many respected contemporary jurists, Justice Frankfurter among them, did not believe that a system of law could be based upon an idiosyncratic sense of fairness, I was always impressed with Earl Warren for his leadership in advocating fairness over stodgy legalisms and the dead hand of precedent. I hardly see it fair to allow the police to operate as a separate self - governing entity
outside of control. When I raised these matters with the legal Department of this our Great Society, I was gruffly referred to previous items jd collins: ethics and civil rights and His scholarship's monogramme on the Warren Court. Both of these items appeared in
Fullosia Press I'm sorry that I didn't take notice. I must have been checking my notes.
In ethics and civil rights the Lord Dean in a blistering critique of the ethics portion of a lecture on police brutality, agreed with His Scholarship's evaluation of the legacy of the Warren Court: "Instead of producing a beneficent era of mutual respect and regard for rights, we find far more contact of an adverse nature between police and citizens than ever before."
Prior to Garrity, a police officer who refused to answer official questions posed to him or cooperate with an investigation could be summarily fired. After Garrity, he was no longer required to respond. Under post - Garrity law, the officer who touched off nationwide tumult had survived a previous incident because he was not required to snitch on himself. The next incident just a few days ago led to the eruption of violence, spreading a grim swath of destruction in all major cities. Obviously, something is desperately wrong.
The unintended consequence of the Warren court's pursuit of fairness is a nation in flames. Why didn't Garrity and Pierson get washed away in the more conservative tides which followed the tsunami created by Warren Court? The answer appears to be most disconcerting: increasing violence in the late 1960s connected with the civil rights movement, increased drug enforcement and unionization of the police. In addition, expansion of the legal profession has resulted in the introduction of retired police onto the roll of attorneys. Thus, the clock once broken can no longer be turned back. The Warren court has left us with a violent, uncontrollable police freed from scrutiny and protected by the semblances of former police officers who fancy themselves attorneys.
On that somber note, I bid you a most Cheery Cheerio, Cheerio Dean Cheerio James Davies, DF,
RAYMOND GALLUCCI: BY THE TAIL
Cannot escape when no stairway leads up.
Laws without meaning except to oppress
Render you victim – no means of redress.
Russian society’s perfect at this:
Peons in ignorance, privileged in bliss.
Try to grasp onto Leviathan’s tail?
It’s just its reflex that throws you in jail.
Drowning your sorrows in vodka’s just fine
When, like poor Job, to your fate you’re resigned.
If there’s a God, to you gives not a damn.
He runs with wolves while condemns you to lambs.
Dr James Davies, DF, Lord Woodburry: SOLSTICE MENTORIAL: UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES
Lord Woodburry
MENTOR RPPS
Michael Levy
Author poet philosopher
POINT OF LIFE
John Amendall: “Political Trash Talk Shakespeare Style”
Don’t sell Shakespeare (1564-1618) short. For some time college and even high school English teachers have ignored or reduced the Bard’s influence in their classes replacing it with recent multicultural authors. While exposing students to a new generation of authors is a positive and stimulating contribution to teaching, it doesn’t have to coincidentally exclude the Bard’s value learning the English language.
Unfortunately the Bard is now considered no longer relevant, and like a character in one of his plays should exit center stage. Presumably any writer citing Shakespeare has become bereft of wit. But wait.
In sports and elsewhere (politics) trash talk involves orally insulting one’s opposition in a creative, sarcastic manner without resorting to fisticuffs. It takes little or no skill to insult some one. To do so skillfully is another matter. Because of their respective roles and responsibilities President Trump and House Majority Speaker Nancy Pelosi cross swords. In case you were never exposed to the Bard’s work, the man was a master insulter centuries ago. So! Grab a copy of his plays and let the good times role. Judge for yourself whether he deserves to be ranked irrelevant.
Trump might open up on Pelosi.
“Her blush is guiltiness not modesty,” Do you know the play containing this quote? No! Neither did I. Had to look ‘em all up. Much Ado About Nothing. Claudio-Leonato p. 584. Page numbers in The Oxford Shakespeare, Second Edition 2005.A highly indignant Pelosi might respond.1 “O tigers heart wrapt in a woman’s hide.” Henry VI, Part 3. York- Nothumberland p.99.
“Her benefits are mightily misplaced.” As You Like It. Rosalind-Celia p.658.
“I could say she were worse: thank you of a worse title, and I will fit her to it.” Much Ado About Nothing. Don John-Claudio p.581.
“Her only fault, and that is fact enough, is that she is intolerable curst, and shrewd. And so froward beyond all measure.” Taming of the Shrew. Hortensia-Petruccio p.32.
“You do advance your cunning more and more.” A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Helenia-Lysander p. 413.Former Republican congressman and unapologetic Morning Joe Scarbrough might have some choice words for POTUS.“You go so much backward when you fight.” All’s Well That Ends Well. Helen to Paroles p.1034.
“I am well acquainted with your manner of wrenching the true cause the false way.” Henry IV, Part 2 Chief Justice-Sir John p.545. “I do believe, induced by potent circumstances, that thou are mine enemy.” Henry VIII. Queen Katherine-Cardinal Wolsey p.1261.
“Teeth hadst thou in thy head when thou wast born, to signify thou camest to bite the world.” Henry VI, Part 3. King Henry-Richard p.122.
“God hath given you one face and you make yourselves another.” Hamlet. Ophelia –Hamlet p.698.
“Heaven truly knows that thou are as false as hell.” Othello. Othello-Desdemona p.898.
2 “Away, I condemn mine ears that have so long attended thee.” Cymbeline. Innogen-Giacomo. p.1193.
“Pray you stand farther from me.” Anthony and Cleopatra. Cleopatra-Antony p.999.
“You have some sick offence within your mind.” Julius Caesar. Portia-Brutus p.636.
“I must discontinue your company.” Much Ado About Nothing. Benedick-Don Pedro p.216.
“I have a mind to strike thee ere thou speakist.” Anthony and Cleopatra. Cleopatra-Messinger p.1006
“Let’s meet as little as we can.” As You Like It. Jaques-Orlando p.669.
“I will most humbly take my leave of you. You can not, sir, take from me anything that I will not more willingly part withal.” Hamlet. Polonius-Hamlet. P694.
“Unworthy though thou art, I’ll cope with thee.” Henry VI, Part 2. Warwick –King Henry. P.75.
“The empty vessel makes the greatest sound.” Henry V. Pistol-Boy p.617.Aggrieved and controversial Tara Reade, who believes Joe Biden should not be a presidential candidate, might’ve had this to say.“I told you, I, he was a frantic fool, hiding his bitter jests in blunt behavior.” Taming of the Shrew.” Katherine-Tranio p.40.
“We hold our time too precious to be spent with such a brabbler.” King John. Dauphin-Pandolf p.449.
3 “His forward voice now is to speak well of his friends; his backward voice is to utter foul speeches and to detract.” The Tempest. Stefano-Trinculo p.1232.
“Indeed; he is no less than a stuffed man.” Much Ado About Nothing. Beatrice-Leonato p.57.
“A very superficial, ignorant, unweighing, fellow.” Measure for Measure. Lucio-Duke p.858. “I was searching for a fool when I found you.” As You Like It. Jaques-Orlando p.669
“I will no more trust him when he leers than I will a serpent when he hisses.” Troilus and Cressida. Thersites-Diomed p.770.The distraught and nervous Democratic Party might’ve opined on Jared Kushner.“Thou art too base to be acknowledged.” The Winter’s Tale. Polixenes-Old Shepherd p.1143.
“Where I was his lady, I would poison that vile rascal.” All’s Well That Ends Well. Diana-Helen p.51.
“He is not the man that he would gladly make show to the world he is.” Henry V. Fluellen-Gower p.610.
“Are his wits safe? Is he not light of brain?” Othello. Lodovico-Iago p.898.Another one of Trump’s all time favorite Democrats (he has a rather big list) AOC might’ve expressed a few thoughts on the matter.“What you egg! Young fry of treachery” Macbeth. Murderer-Macduff p.987.
“Untutor’d lad thou art too malapert.” Henry VI, Part 3. Clarence-Prince Edward 4 p.121.
“What a fool art thou, a ramping fool, to brag and stamp and swear upon my party.” King John. Constance-Austria p.416.
“Your means are very slender, and your waste is great.” Henry IV, Part 2. Chief Justice-Sir John p.542.Trump might’ve shamed his favorite Democrat Joe Biden this way.“He takes false shadows for true substances.” Titus Andronicus. Marcus-Titus p.170.
“There’s many a man hath more hair than wit.” Comedy of Errors. Antipholus Dromio p.291.
Well said! That was laid on with a trowel.” As You Like It. Celia-Touchstone p.659.
“He’s of a most facinorous spirit.” Haven’t ever used this word in a sentence. Until now. Had to look it up. All’s Well That Ends Well. Paroles-Lafeu p.1040.
“Seems he a dove? His feathers are but borrowed.” Henry VI, Part 2. Margaret-King Henry p.70.Feisty Senator Warren’s been known to speak her mind and she might speak accordingly.“You boggle shrewdly; every feather starts you.” All’s Well That Ends Well King-Bertram p.275
“Thy years want wit, thy wit wants edge and manners.” Titus Andronicus. Demetrius-Chiron p.162.
“Will you credit this base drudge’s words that speaks he knows not what.” Henry VI, Part 2. Stafford-Cade’s followers P.80.
“He is the bluntest wooer in Christendom.” Henry VI, Part 3. Richard-George 5 p.108.
“I do not like your faults.” Julius Caesar. Brutus-Cassius p.647.Perhaps a fitting closing quote for the above.“If I hope well, I’ll never see thee more.” Timon of Athens. Timon-Alcibiades p.960.
“Most shallow man!” As You Like It. Touchstone-Corin p.667.
“I had rather be a tick in a sheep than such a valiant ignorance.” Troilus and Cressida. Thersites-Achilles p.765.
“With every minute you do change a mind, and call him noble that was now your hate, him vile that was your garland.” Coriolanus. Marius-Menenius p.1090.
“Thou hast in thy skull no more brain than I had in mine elbows.” Troilus and Cressida. Thersites-Ajax p.752.
“His purse is empty already, all’s golden words are spent.” Hamlet. Horatio-Hamlet p.718.
“Not Hercules could have knocked out his brain for he had none.” Cymbeline. Guiderius-Belarius p.1207.
“If this were played upon a stage now, I could consider it as an improbable fiction.” Twelfth Night. Fabian-Sir Toby p.734. Modern political ministrations and behavior enabled by social media activity almost represents an improbable fiction. Except unfortunately it’s occurring in real time.The above quotes are just a few gems of insults from Shakespeare’s canon.
|
|