GAVEL GAMUT
By Jim Redwine
www.jamesmredwine.com
(Week of 16 September 2024)
IT’S COMPLICATED
In the 1967 movie Cool Hand Luke Paul Newman played petit criminal Luke Jackson who was sentenced to two years in a southern prison. Strother Martin portrayed a prison captain who was determined to force Luke to strictly comply with all the prison regulations, sensible or arbitrary.
Luke found it hard to simply “go along to get along”; he preferred to endure the Captain’s sadistic whippings and beatings to compromising his resistance, what Luke saw as principles. As seen from the outside, neither man’s actions and reactions made sense. The Captain ironically explained the conflict between this contest of wills as, “What we have here is failure to communicate.”
Cool Hand Luke came to mind when I saw the bystander and police bodycam videos of professional footballer Tyreek Hill’s and Miami policeman Danny Torres’ altercation on Sunday, September 8, 2024. As with most human conflicts, the “truth” of this incident varies depending upon perspective. Just as Luke and the Captain viewed their own actions as righteous, Hill and Torres saw the situation differently.
Somethings are fairly straight forward. Hill is a thirty-year old Black man who was driving to his job when Torres and two other policemen stopped Hill for speeding. Torres estimated Hill was going sixty miles per hour in a thirty zone. Hill was driving a McLaren 720S coupe with heavily tinted windows. The 720S was manufactured in England and had a MSRP of half a million dollars. Hill has a contract that pays him thirty million dollars per year to play football for the Miami Dolphins. Torres is of Hispanic heritage and has been on the police force for twenty-seven years. According to the Internet, a Miami policeman earns between 42,000 and 86,000 dollars per year.
When Hill stopped, Torres approached his car and tapped on the driver-side window telling Hill to roll it down. Hill lowered the window far enough to hand Torres his driver’s license and told Torres to not tap on his window. This is about the point where the alter egos of Luke and the Captain appeared. Torres told Hill to lower the window all the way but Hill did not comply. Torres began to raise his voice and ordered Hill to get out of the car. From this point on perspective is important and facts are whatever that perspective believes.
Hill’s version includes questions of racism and Torres’ version includes questions of privilege. Hill said he would not have been pulled from his car, thrown on the hot pavement and handcuffed if he had not been Black. Torres asserted that if Hill had simply complied with reasonable orders the matter could have been handled as a routine traffic stop. Torres has not said so but it is possible he resented Hill’s fancy car and attitude.
We do not know what truly motivated the unreasonable actions of Hill or Torres. What we do know is that each of us has been involved in situations where our obstinance has been unreasonable and has led to bad outcomes, maybe not like handcuffs for Hill and a suspension for Torres, but other unpleasant results for us.
Perhaps Hill did react to the original stop as a violation of his status as a wealthy sports superstar. Or maybe Torres did resent Hill’s status and wealth. We do not know and probably will not find out. However, what we do know is that just as Luke, the Captain, Hill and Torres, our own stubbornness and temper have led to results that just with a little more positive behavior and an attitude that the world is not our enemy, could have saved us, and others, from heartache.
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