In my last post about the shooting of Emantic “EJ” Bradford Jr. at the Riverchase Galleria Mall in Hoover, I posted a piece from CBS news and missed and important detail.
In a statement issued Monday, police said Bradford had a gun in his hand “during the seconds following the gunshots, which instantly heightened the sense of threat to approaching police officers.”
Ben Crump, a lawyer representing the Bradford family, said there was a presumption that Bradford was the criminal because he was a black man. The officer who opened fire hasn’t yet been identified.
Bradford’s family has said he had a permit to carry a weapon legally, and their attorney has said witnesses reported that Bradford was trying to help after the shooting.
I didn’t put two and two together on the name Ben Crump. Miguel did in the comments.
I wrote about Crump before, recently in my coverage of the propaganda documentary series Trevyon Martin: Rest in Power.
Boy, what a piece of shit Crump is. He’s what happens when Al Sharpton and the skeeziest of ambulance chasers have a baby.
There was another detail that I left out because, again, I didn’t think about it at the time.
McClure said Bradford attended his church, and McClure will officiate at funeral services on Saturday which will include a eulogy by the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
The Reverend Jesse “Hymietown” Jackson, the pastor of choice for radical Left wing anti-American Progressive bigots.
Here is what we know about Bradford. He had a CCW and was trying to help other people in the mall. He was active duty military on leave at the time of the shooting.
I’m not going to say that Bradford was a conservative Republican because he was a solider with a CCW permit, but so far what we know about him seems to reflect the kinds of values the we support. Service to our country, concealed carry, and risking (and ultimately losing) his life to help others in a crises.
Letting Ben Crump and Jesse Jackson force their way into this tragedy and turn it into an anti-cop, “see, gun rights are not for black men,” and presumably anti-Trump (why not, it’s what happened at Aretha Franklin’s funeral) radicalized circus is going to overly politicize this and turn it into a travesty.
Without the release of further information I am going to take the Hanlon’s Razor approach to this. As the British say, “cockup before conspiracy.”
I’m guessing the police were told “active shooter at the mall” and simply shot and killed the first guy they saw in the area of the shooter with a gun in his hand. Add to it that the suspect and Bradford were both black and I get the feeling that this was just a tragedy of misidentification and quick response as opposed to a murder motivated by racism.
I really want the NRA to make a statment in support of Bradford as a hero, a soldier and CCW permit holder who unfortunately died while trying to help other during a shooting.
I have a feeling that Crump and Jackson are going to make Bradford a martyr to American racism and implicit bias in police and all that crap we saw after the Michael Brown shooting.
What really worries me is there will be a backlash against this that causes the people to oppose Crump and Jackson’s horrendous political shitshow by sullying Bradford’s name.
That cannot be allowed to happen.
We lost a solider and a hero in a tragedy. We must remember him as such.
Whatever Crump and Jackson say, we cannot respond by tearing Bradford down.
We, at this moment must support Bradford’s memory and his family, and show them respect.
Let Crump and Jackson come off looking like assholes. We must be impeccable.
That is how we win.
Update: apparently Bradford was not active duty military. That was the official news that I read as of the time of writing this post.
That has been redacted.
Further changes may happen as more information becomes available.
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