“It goes without saying, I believe, that if we understood ourselves better, we would damage ourselves less.”
― James Baldwin, The Price of the Ticket: Collected Nonfiction, 1948-1985
Deputy Darren Goforth, 47, was gunned down on Friday while fueling his car. The suspect, pictured right, is believed to be 30-year-old Shannon J. Miles, who was apprehended on Saturday morning without incident. A motive in the killing has not been determined.
Sudden death is a mother, I don’t care where it lands.
According to detectives, Deputy Goforth had worked a traffic accident just prior to being ambushed at the gas station by Miles. Surveillance footage from the gas station shows someone appearing to be Miles, approach the deputy from behind and fire multiple shots at the deputy as he fueled his vehicle. The assailant continues to fire even after Goforth was on the ground. The deputy was pronounced dead at the scene.
Harris County Sheriff Ron Hickman said at a news conference following Miles’ arrest that the department assumed Goforth was a target because he wore a uniform, and bluntly addressed protests against police violence and mass incarceration of blacks.
“Our system of justice absolutely requires a law enforcement presence to protect our communities, so at any point where the rhetoric ramps up to the point where calculated cold-blooded assassination of police officers happen(s). This rhetoric has gotten out of control,” Hickman said.
“We’ve heard black lives matter; all lives matter. Well, cops’ lives matter too; so why don’t we just drop the qualifier and just say lives matter and take that to the bank,” Hickman said.
I wish we could take that to the bank, Sheriff Hickman. I want to place my money in that bank. But that particular depository has a history of predatory servicing in black households. And we all know how that’s panned out so far. Don’t we?
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