Jonathan Ferrell: On Trial for His Own Murder

[Content Note: Police brutality; death; racism; dehumanization.]

Jonathan Ferrell, the the 24-year-old black man who was fatally shot ten times by a white police officer after Ferrell crashed his car and sought help at a local residence, is being demonized at the voluntary manslaughter trial of Randall Kerrick, the police officer who killed him.

Officer Adam Neal returned to the witness stand. He was questioned by the defense about a written statement he gave on the night that Ferrell died. Neal testified that he heard Kerrick tell Ferrell to get down, but that Ferrell was coming at the officer "hard and fast."

Neal said he saw a Taser fired at Ferrell, but said that either the Taser missed or Ferrell fought through it. He recalled wondering if Ferrell was "on bath salts or mushrooms."

Another Magical Negro with inhuman strength. Like Freddie Gray, who was alleged to have flopped himself around the back of a police van until he put himself in a coma from his injuries, or Victor White III, who supposedly somehow shot himself while his hands were cuffed behind his back, or Michael Brown, who Darren Wilson described as looking like "a demon" after he shot him the first time, and, then, as he fired subsequent shots: "At this point it looked like he was almost bulking up to run through the shots, like it was making him mad that I'm shooting at him."

Or maybe Ferrell was just a regular old black dude on drugs. Maybe that inhuman strength came from bath salts. Or mushrooms. Or pot.

The officers came to the neighborhood after a woman called 911 and reported a man tried to knock down her door. Authorities said that man was Ferrell, looking for help after crashing his car. The 24-year-old former Florida A&M football player had been in the neighborhood smoking marijuana at a friend's house and was not familiar with the area, prosecutors said.

Either way, Ferrell—who had just survived a serious car accident—was definitely at fault. Not the officer who shot at him twelve fucking times.

Not the officer who can be seen on the dashcam footage, shown at last in court yesterday, shouting at Ferrell to get down and then giving him not a moment to comply before shooting at him twelve times and hitting him ten times.

And this, after failing utterly to even identify himself as a police officer.

Prosecutors said Kerrick is guilty because he overreacted when he killed Ferrell. Authorities said the officers did not identify themselves and Neal's video appears to confirm that.

...Neal said he heard three distinct groups of shots. He said Ferrell fell on top of Kerrick after the first group of four shots and made a crawling motion across Kerrick's legs as the officer fired six more times. Ferrell briefly stopped moving, but when he started crawling again, Kerrick fired twice more.

Neal testified on Wednesday that he did not see Ferrell try to hit Kerrick.

Jonathan Ferrell didn't try to hit Officer Randall Kerrick. He fell on him, because Kerrick had shot him. And when he tried to crawl away, Kerrick shot him again and again and again until he was dead.

And maybe, just maybe, Ferrell was running toward Kerrick in the first place because he thought had to protect himself from someone aiming a weapon at him, who he didn't even know was a police officer, because none of the officers there bothered to tell him.

Because they weren't there to help him. They didn't arrive to help Jonathan Ferrell, who had just been in a car accident and was seeking aid. They were there to stop Jonathan Ferrell from scaring people by knocking on their doors.