In July 2017, dual Australian-US citizen Justine Damond called 911 in the city of Minneapolis, wishing to report what she feared might be a sexual assault taking place at the back of her home. On approaching the police vehicle sent to the scene, she was slain by officer Mohamed Noor.
The response to the killing immediately raised eyebrows. For one, there was a response to Noor's actions, an on-duty officer who had deployed his fire arm in dangerously cavalier fashion. He was subsequently charged with murder and manslaughter. Minneapolis police spokesman John Elder was quick to insist that race had no part to play. The optics were troublingly different, as Noor was inaccurately accused of being a fast-tract affirmative action hire.
A Minnesota jury duly found Noor guilty of third degree murder and manslaughter, though acquitted him of a count of second-degree murder. He had become the first police officer to be convicted of murder in Minnesota in 'recent memory' — a statement worth recalling in and of itself.
Damond's fiancé, Don, hoped the verdict would lead to reforms of the Minneapolis Police Department in policies and procedures. (A change to the vague body camera policy, and the resignation of Minneapolis' police chief, had already taken place.) Her grieving father, John Ruszczyk, was content that the decision 'reflects the community's commitment to three important pillars of a civil society — the rule of law, the respect for the sanctity of life, and the obligation of the police force to serve and protect'.
A closer reading of the entire process presents a more complex, and troubling picture. From the start, this case seemed different. Then Chief Janee Harteau was impatient to get proceedings against Noor going. A little bit of premature adjudication was also thrown into the mix, but this did not endear her. Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges wanted a scalp and demanded the veteran's resignation, having 'lost confidence in the chief's ability to lead us further'.
Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman also fell into the over-enthusiastic trap of publicly pressing the case against Noor, expressing frustration before union members in a recorded address at what seemed to be a lack of initial evidence. Authorities, and officials, wanted a conviction.
This was in stark contrast to the previous year's killing of Philando Castile by MPD's Jeronimo Yanez, a police officer who pulled over his victim for a broken tail light. Castile's death, inflicted by five shots as he was reaching for his license, was recorded and streamed on Facebook by his girlfriend. Officials proved aloof: Castile had been pulled over 49 times for mostly minor traffic violations.
"The rule of law and its variable appraisal of both perpetrators and victims remain marked by the politics of cruel difference."
Yanez was charged with manslaughter and predictably acquitted. While pleased by the efforts made in the Damond case, Castile's mother, Valerie, could not help but note disparities. The jury in her son's case, for instance, had been selected in one day; it had taken a week for Damond.
When the disparity between the cases on the issue of prosecution and treatment was noted to Freeman, he coolly dismissed it. 'We have to look at each case based on the facts and the evidence and the law in front of us.'
While Noor offered a suitable demonology, Damond offered the prospect of commemoration and worship. Identity Evripa, a California-based white nationalist group, created a memorial in her honour featuring candles, flowers, a framed portrait and a sign saying 'United We Stand'. The initial vacillation over bringing charges against Noor was noted by the group. 'One family will be having an incomplete Christmas this year.' Elder did remove the makeshift memorial, claiming that he could not allow 'anything like that to be put up at that location'.
The legal process, it seemed, had found their man. The subtext here was that letting Noor off would have been dangerous, with relations between the MPD in otherwise safe and affluent areas damaged. 'People's willingness to interact with police officers,' suggested Todd Schuman, a resident near the site of Damond's shooting, 'has taken a decline.' Schuman would be subsequently warning his two children 'about their interactions with police officers'. In doing so, he echoed the sentiments of thousands of black residents.
For all that, a troubling note of self-congratulation seemed to prevail at Noor's demise. The MPD would be reformed. Suitable catharsis had been reached. There was even a somewhat smug temper in Australian coverage of the trial, with the ABC's Conor Duffy speculating that Damond, had she returned to Sydney as originally intended, would hardly have been shot in Sydney in similar fashion.
The more relevant and tragic point is that the rule of law and its variable appraisal of both perpetrators and victims in America's police culture, remain marked by the politics of cruel difference. In Valerie Castile's words, 'it's so unfortunate in our country people are treated differently'.
Dr Binoy Kampmark is a former Commonwealth Scholar who lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne.
Main image: Former Minneapolis police officer Mohamed Noor in 2017 at the commencement of his trial for the shooting death of Justine Damond (Photo by Stephen Maturen / Getty Images)