Tuesday the retired NYPD Detective, who callously took the life of a Black man on the George Washington Bridge, was, once again, charged with murder, for the heinous killing he committed on Oct. 20.
Why did the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office reduce the charge from murder to manslaughter to begin with? Why?
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office claimed they upgraded the charge (from manslaughter to second-degree murder) following “an extensive ongoing investigation.” But that rationale seems very peculiar. Are they telling us with all the bridge’s cameras, not to mention the accounts from other pedestrians, they didn’t fully ascertain the heartless indifference of this killing? Particularly, when the killer-cop casually drove home afterward?
Wasn’t this really another example of the way in which the so-called justice system always reflexively protects cops who commit crimes against Black people, including murder? Did the objections of the victim’s family, and friends—including his Con Edison co-workers—force the DA to rethink that egregious decision?
There have even been allegations that this cop had his identity scrubbed from the Internet—before he was arrested. Was this to prevent his photos from being published publicly?
NYPD killer-cop Detective Victor Romero, 62, appears, by numerous accounts, to have acted with depraved indifference, and callous disregard for life, when he fired into the car of Koran Irvine, 46, in a reported incident of road rage. Irvine and Romero’s cars apparently nearly collided on the world’s busiest motor bridge, before Romero fired a shot into Irvine’s car killing him.
Romero then proceeded to drive away from the scene of the crime he perpetrated and went on his merry way home to his family, while Irvine’s family, and kids, would never see him alive again. Romero’s trigger-happy actions also endangered the lives of others on the GW Bridge.
Think of it: a former NYPD cop commits what looks like cold-blooded murder, shooting a hard-working Black man to death, on the GW Bridge, while leaving the scene of the crime, and he was charged with manslaughter, not murder. What’s wrong with this picture? What does this tell us about the two-tiered system of American “justice?”
Assuming all the details are true, the original murder charge against Detective Romero should never have been reduced to manslaughter in the first place. In fact, Romero should never have been given bail at all.
Authorities claim Romero is not a flight risk and freed him on a $1 million dollar bond. Koran Irvine’s sister, Zeria, responded to this saying, “They say that he’s not a flight risk…we can’t take his passport away. He fled the scene. He left my brother to die.”
Let’s consider what would surely have happened if the situation was reversed. If Irvine was the killer of Detective Romero would Irvine have been given bail as an accused cop-killer?
Of course not.
If that had been the case, Irvine would never again have seen the light of day outside jail and prison bars. Bail would have been definitely denied. And, he would have been likely promptly convicted and sent to prison for the rest of his life.
But America’s white justice system is a racist ass-backwards one. So, it protects cops who kill and murder Black people. And, on the rare occasion that the system has no choice but to “punish” a racist killer-cop (like say George Floyd’s killer, Officer Derek Chauvin) they are afforded mercy and unearned deference.
For example, in Texas, Officer Amber Guyger, who shot 26-year-old Botham Jean down dead, while he was inside his home eating ice-cream was just released from prison after serving seven years. In Chicago, Officer Jason Van Dyke, who executed 17-year-old Laquan McDonald—firing some 16 shots at McDonald, as he was walking away, was eventually convicted, of second-degree murder, and sentenced to six years and nine months— but served less than half of that time for that heinous murder.
So, all these pro-police “back the Blue” folks who lecture us about the “rule of law” hypocritically advocate for coverups, and leniency, when criminal cops abuse their power and take the lives of Black Americans. But if America had a fair moral legal system the opposite would happen. Instead, examples would be made of these killer-cop monsters—to protect the legitimacy of America’s legal system.
How can these “law and order” pretenders expect Black Americans to respect this corrupt legal system when politicians, prosecutors and judges refuse to hold cops accountable for crimes they perpetrate against us?
But, truthfully, the white legal infrastructure is built on white supremacy, not legitimacy.
Will the police union publicly support Detective Romero? In this case, probably not. However, here is a deeper question: if these police unions were acting in good faith, when their racist cops unjustly kill us, shouldn’t we expect them to publicly speak out? Shouldn’t they denounce the culture of cop criminality within American policing? Wouldn’t that show us they really believe in holding their “brothers in Blue” accountable when they brutalize and kills Black people? Instead, these unions, time and again, prove to us they will willingly aid-and-abet the racist crimes of bigoted cops.
However, we cannot just blame these killer-cops. The crimes cops commit against Black Americans are a result of the institutional racism that was implemented by America’s white political system. That reality continues. This is why the George Floyd Policing legislation was murdered in Congress. And it is also why prosecutors, and judges, are often deployed to whitewash the racist hate crimes of cops.
Unfortunately, even in the current Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, which many label as a progressive one, we see police getting some of the same preferential treatment that we witness happening across America.
The decision to allow retired NYPD Detective Victor Romero to receive bail and go home—while also, at first, reducing the murder charge to manslaughter—for the road-rage killing of Koran Irvine, is another example that tells us American justice isn’t blind when the victimized are Black and when the killers and murderers are cops—like NYPD Detective Victor Romero.
