GUILTY TX - Fort Worth man charged w/ assaulting a child, Dec 2016

[Tawny]

Pink shirt lady clearly blocked his view. Maybe she was handing the mother a gun. He did not know why the pink shirt lady jumped between him and the mother.

RSBM. See. Here's my take. The officers are supposed to be trained, calm, smart individuals. Anybody with half a brain can tell the mother is getting agitated, and the pink shirt girl was ready to remove her mother from the situation. I HIGHLY DOUBT he stood there thinking she was handing her a freaking gun. I don't even... whatever.

---

Are we really gonna sit here and believe a little 7 year old boy made up a whole story like this for no reason? I'm gonna give that kid the benefit of the doubt until it's proven otherwise. I'm ok with being wrong and dealing with that later because if it's true, then a grown man assaulted a child. But we quick to assume this kid lied and we're quick to accept a cop arresting the mother of said child. How? Why?

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I really do not want to even talk about whether or not the boy littered. And really, as time passes, I'm less and less concerned about figuring out if the man actually choked the kid. What slays me is that nobody seems to think there's anything wrong with an officer implying it's perfectly ok to grab a kid by the throat if that kid litters.

---“Why don’t you teach your son not to litter?” the officer asks Craig.

“He can’t prove to me that my son littered,” Craig responded. “But it doesn’t matter if he did or didn’t, it doesn’t give him the right to put his hands on him.”

“Why not?” the officer responds.---

like... what? "Why not?" An officer just asked a mother why littering doesn't give a grown adult a reason to put his hands on the child. And we're speculating as to why the mother hasn't taught her son not to litter. I'm freaking flabbergasted, y'all.

 

[Tawny]

I'm not sure the Craig family called. This article refers to "just before they were going to call the police they overheard he was already talking to 911", something to that effect. It also mentions that while the cop was talking to the man, the women approached, yelling profanity and calling the officer a "pig". Hm.

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/local/community/fort-worth/article122405439.html

I really am trying to understand your point of view here (sorry to single you out). Can you explain why any of this is more pressing, more significant, than the possible assault and the comments by the officer? Why are we discussing the very understandably upset mother and her actions? I'd be livid if I were her, I can't really say I blame her tbh LOL

 

[JeannaT]

I really am trying to understand your point of view here (sorry to single you out). Can you explain why any of this is more pressing, more significant, than the possible assault and the comments by the officer? Why are we discussing the very understandably upset mother and her actions? I'd be livid if I were her, I can't really say I blame her tbh LOL

There are so many facets to this story that are worth discussing.

If you go back through my postings on this subject (it's a very short thread) you will see that I fault the officer for his behavior. I don't think he should keep his job, from what I've seen of his interaction with the Craig family.

But I'm also intrigued by the neighbor. As I said earlier, I don't think he probably assaulted that child. I know some here take issue with that, and I'm not on a jury so my opinion of him doesn't matter, but from where I sit I don't think he harmed the child. So that's the angle I'm interested in discussing. I don't know that it's worth continuing to discuss the officer's actions - he's been pulled off duty and it would be a little unbelievable if he's put back on active police duty and risk he would again interact with the public in this manner.

It probably won't be long before the neighbor's name is public, and the public will attack him until they get tired of doing so.

But I'm not going to get into an argument with you about this. This is how I perceive the situation, and I don't know that I need to explain it further.

Hope you're having a Merry Christmas, sincerely.

 

[drjones]

edit.

 

[drjones]

edit.

 

[JeannaT]

^what?

you started off saying that this officer treated her like any other officer would have, exactly how she deserved to be treated, and that she was so clearly a terrible person and mother that her children should be removed from her custody.

why on earth would you then think that this officer did anything wrong and should lose his job?

Are you talking to me? You might want to read back through this thread. I have never said any of those things. All my posts are still on the board, none have been removed.

 

[drjones]

^reading too fast, my bad! edited.

 

[al66pine]

In first watching the ~5 1/2 min vid, I notice the LEO talking w man in blue clothes behind him, then LEO turning to white-shirt women and saying ~ 'so what's going on here' to her. I thought- hmm, LEO talking first to blue-clothes guy (if he is the alleged child-choker) before talking to white-shirt woman, identified as 911 caller.

Then after watching entire vid, I realized who took vid, uploaded to I-net, so I wondered about edits, maybe out of order.

"Just before relatives were getting ready to call police, Craig [white-shirt woman] said she saw that the man was already on the phone with them. He was saying there were a lot of “them here now,” Craig said".

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/local/community/fort-worth/article122405439.html Dec 24

W ^ makes sense to me that LEO talked to blue-shirt man, the 911 caller, first, instead of white-shirt woman. IOW as more info comes out, my initial impression changes, at least on this minor point.​

 

[Tawny]

I'm not sure what relevance that minor point (who called 911) has on the overall issue. The writers of the article are to blame for misleading headlines, not the Craigs et al.

Unless we're implying they're being dishonest? Which would lead people to assume the boy was dishonest?

 

[al66pine]

I'm not sure what relevance that minor point (who called 911) has on the overall issue. The writers of the article are to blame for misleading headlines, not the Craigs et al.

Unless we're implying they're being dishonest? Which would lead people to assume the boy was dishonest?

^Yes, writers/editors are to blame for any misleading headlines.

Not implying anything about the Craig family.

Initially just thought it was odd that vid showed LEO talking to blue-shirt first, if Mom was the one who called 911. JM2cts.

 

[JeannaT]

This story appears to have completely died on the vine. Maybe it's because we're in that holiday 2 weeks that includes Christmas and New Years, where nothing gets done.

 

[Tawny]

http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/Vi...taped-Fort-Worth-Arrest-Lawyer-408554305.html

Lawyer Wants Charges Dropped Against Arrest 'Victims,' Filed Against Neighbor, Fort Worth Police Officer

 

[al66pine]

I wondered if the child had a med exam. Hoping he is on the mend.

"The resident accused by the family of assaulting the child is not yet facing any charges, according to Merritt, despite the fact that the child was seen by a doctor and a diagnosis was documented after the incident. Merritt declined to elaborate on what the diagnosis was." bbm
http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/Vi...taped-Fort-Worth-Arrest-Lawyer-408554305.html

 

[drjones]

a raisin? any grown man that puts his hands on a child because they dropped a raisin on the ground is a coward and probably has some "issues"...

hopefully the prosecutor isnt as foolish as the police chief, lets see how much this costs them in the end.

 

[drjones]

http://www.wfaa.com/news/local/fort-worth-police-update-on-controversial-video/384442370

10 days suspended without pay.

neglect of duty. discourtesy. inappropriate contact with 2 of the females.

a full list of violations by the officer will be released.

full accounting will go to a grand jury for further consideration.

 

[drjones]

this is directly from the PDF of the statement issued, but between the time i saved it and went to link it the document was removed from SCRIBD, you can still see it here tho;

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/fort...mily-viral-video-reportedly-suspended-10-days

 

[Tawny]

Thanks for the updates drjones !

 

[JeannaT]

It does seem that after all this time, no charges have been filed against the neighbor. My guess (as it was originally) is that the neighbor didn't do anything criminal.

And also, no indication that the charges the women were arrested for, on outstanding warrants that existed at the time the neighbor called the police on them for behaving threateningly in the street, have been dismissed.

So, as often is the case, the media leapt upon this story, twisted it, and it is much ado about nothing.

 

[Tawny]

It does seem that after all this time, no charges have been filed against the neighbor. My guess (as it was originally) is that the neighbor didn't do anything criminal.

And also, no indication that the charges the women were arrested for, on outstanding warrants that existed at the time the neighbor called the police on them for behaving threateningly in the street, have been dismissed.

So, as often is the case, the media leapt upon this story, twisted it, and it is much ado about nothing.

The officer didn't investigate the original claim, so we literally have no idea if he assaulted that boy or not.

 

[drjones]

The officer didn't investigate the original claim, so we literally have no idea if he assaulted that boy or not.

video could come out of the man choking the boy with both hands and it wouldnt change some peoples minds, thats the danger of making your mind up immediately based on little to no evidence and then getting invested in that opinion.