Posted on 08/10/2013 6:40:14 AM PDT by SoFloFreeper
At just 17, Israel Hernandez-Llach was already an award-winning artist, on the threshold of acclaim in Miami Beach art circles. He was a sculptor, painter, writer and photographer whose craft was inspired by his home country of Colombia and his adopted city, Miami.
He was also a graffiti artist, known as "Reefa," who sprayed colorful splashes of paint on the city's abandoned buildings while playing cat-and-mouse with cops, who, like many property owners, consider graffiti taggers to be vandals, not artists.
It was while spray-painting a shuttered McDonald's early Tuesday morning that Hernandez-Llach was chased down by Miami Beach police and shot in the chest with a Taser. He later died.
(Excerpt) Read more at hispanicbusiness.com ...
Sound familiar? There are enough parallels to see there are activists trying to make this a Trayvon-like case.....
The one thing missing so far? A "civil rights" lawyer....
Taggers should be targets.
Period.
“Colorful,”my smelly rear Obama.
I think your parenthetical editorial opinion is a little too early. There seem to be two different stories: either a guy charging cops or 5 cops (Miami cops that is) against one guy. Let’s let the investigation unfold.
BTW, Tasers should be classified as lethal weapons.
Illegal alien, I presume. He should have stayed in Columbia and done his art there. The USA does not have a shortage of Hispanics or graffiti pollution.
Like to take a can of pink spay paint and “tag” one of these artists houses, bikes, computers with a big ol male organ.
So that's another way to spell "Vandal"? This prick wrote all over the entire front, and windows, of a storefront......art that ain't.
You may be right...but the obama-lovin’ Miami media is really, really playing this up....trying to drum up the tears for this kid who ran from cops....and was given the opportunity to surrender....
I even heard one report where one of his friends said “He wasn’t a criminal, he was an artist!” Later, the reporterette says his friends admit he was doing something illegal, but should not have died because of it......
Artists use their own canvas, not other people’s property. This was a vandal and a criminal. It’s unfortunate that his multiple stupid actions led to a natural consequence of such choices, but they were his choices to make. I don’t have a problem with Tasers for those resisting arrest or running from police.
Idiot liberal logic. It's not the quality or subject matter that determine the legality. It's property rights. If DaVince painted The Last Supper on a cathedral wall without permission it's vandalism.
It won’t go anywhere. No Jesse Jackson or Sharpton’s like people in
The Hispanic community.
The one thing missing so far? A “civil rights” lawyer....
Nope ——what is missing is a Hispanic Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton.
The Hispanics do not have a good Shyt Stirrer to get them in the media and stay there.
This vandal was breaking the law and he knew it. Running proves it.
Hope the taser is rechargeable, price of batteries and all.
However, that would mean that Taser could only be used when lethal force is justified. This would mean that the gun or the taser could be used in a lethal use of force situation. If you are justified and feel the need to use lethal force then why would you use a tool that would only shock the person? If the gun is used, the only reason to use it is to terminate the person it is pointed at. I wish we had data on the number of taser uses compared to number of deaths occurring after someone was tased.
I don’t think he was killed by the Taser.
He had three serious falls during his attempt to escape, hitting hard twice, with the third time caused by collapsing from the Taser. After being Tasered, he was arrested, but *then* experienced medical distress.
Had it been the Taser, the effects would have been immediate. So I suspect that one of his first two falls caused internal injuries, such as a ruptured spleen, liver or pancreas, or even more likely to the arteries and veins that support them.
Because the liver and spleen are highly vascular, injuries to these organs can cause fatal blood loss either from the organ itself or the arteries and veins that supply them.
If this is the case, diagnostic autopsy will be obvious, because his abdominal cavity will be full of blood.
Will the Legend of Reefa now grow to rival that of the Legend of Trayvon?
They shot him! They shot him! Why didn’t they just taser him?
Oh.
******
It may be HIS art that was important to him, but it wasn’t HIS canvas.
What if the property owners had sprayed him pink and said it was just art? Everyone OK wit dat?
Tasers are classified as “less-lethal”, not to be confused with “less-than-lethal”.
This could not be less like the Trayvon Martin case.
A filthy predator thug cop sentenced someone to die on the street for graffiti. Or maybe because the guy made the cop really mad when he ran.
The evidence is in that tasers kill. Not all the time, but many times. Tasers should only be allowed in the same circumstances as a firearm: the officer is assaulted and in reasonable fear for his life.
And “I’m just making sure I make it to the end of my shift” doesn’t count as reasonable fear for your life, by the way, although somehow that’s become the new lowered standard by which deadly force is exercised all over the country.
Unbelievable that FReepers are defending fascism and cop lawlessness.
I’ll think about what you said, but I find it remarkable you are defending the defacing of property.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.