System Gives Texas Killer Cop Immunity
November 2, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
On July 26, 2013, Austin, Texas police detective Charles Kleinert chased Larry Jackson, Jr., a 32-year-old Black man, shot him in the neck and killed him. Kleinert claimed he fired his pistol accidentally.
Texas prosecutors said Jackson was “unarmed, fleeing and posed no threat of serious physical harm to anyone.” When a Texas grand jury indicted Kleinert on manslaughter charges, it seemed like maybe for once a cop might go to trial for killing an unarmed Black man.
But NO!!!!
On June 26, 2015, Kleinert filed a motion to dismiss the indictment. And District Judge Lee Yeakel has now thrown out the charge against Kleinert. Yeakel cited the “supremacy clause” of the Constitution which says that federal law takes primacy over state law. Yeakel ruled that Kleinert has immunity from the state’s charges because he was working for a federal task force at the time that he murdered Larry Jackson, Jr. Yeakel’s ruling was also based on his belief that the actions Kleinert took against Jackson—i.e., murder—”were no more than was necessary and proper.”
Adam Loewy, an attorney for Jackson’s family, called the judge’s decision a “complete outrage” and said, “This is a legal technicality that will allow a killer to walk free.”
The people’s demand stands: Indict, convict, send the killer cops to jail! The whole damn system is guilty as hell!
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