Police Kill Unarmed Texas Woman

[Content Note: Guns; violence; police brutality; racism.]

In Bastrop County, Texas, Sheriff Deputy Daniel Willis killed Yvette Smith, a black woman, when she came to her door after officers were called regarding a fight near the residence:

Just after 12:30 a.m. Sunday, Bastrop County sheriffs were called to a home on Zimmerman Avenue. The caller said two men, who KVUE News has learned are father and son, were fighting over a gun.

When deputies arrived, one of the men was outside. The other was inside. Smith came to the door and was shot by 28-year-old Deputy Daniel Willis. She was taken to the hospital, where she died.

Initially, investigators said Smith had a gun and didn't follow the deputy's commands. Hours later, they retracted that statement saying they don't know if Smith had a gun.

The home owner and neighbors said she did not.

...No one with the sheriff's office would talk about the investigation. Willis started working with the department last May. He is on administrative leave pending the investigation.

Naturally, I find it deeply suspicious that the sheriff's department originally claimed that Smith "had a gun and didn't follow the deputy's commands," thus blaming her for her own killing. This is an echo of the Jonathan Ferrell case, in which Ferrell, a black man, was tased and shot ten times and police claimed that he had acted "aggressively" and charged the officers, a claim that was later walked back. And these are hardly the only two cases which fit this same pattern.

I don't know what else to do, except to keep talking about every single incident in which police kill a black woman or man for, at worst, failing to behave exactly as they are expected to behave while a gun is pointed at them.

[H/T to Jess.]