Last Wednesday, Edith Rodriguez was laying on the floor of the MLK-Harbor Hospital in a fetal position vomiting blood for 45 minutes. It might have been longer, but Los Angeles police determined that Ms. Rodriguez, apparently a potential parole violator, was ready for sentence. They executed her.
Other lawyers can discuss the fact that the hospital medical and nursing staff found her unworthy of assistance, or that the numerous calls to 911 brought about nothing more than the disdain of the very important operators, for whom Ms. Rodriguez’s extremis was hardly an emergency. But I’m going to stick with the cops.
How twisted has our hatred of the poor, of immigrants, of minorities, of potential parole violators, become that they should be intentionally left to die on the floor. They wouldn’t let this happen to a dog. But Ms. Rodriguez, apparently, was not nearly that important.
Some of the knee-jerk conservatives will bend over backwards to make excuses for the death of Ms. Rodriguez at the hands of police, snidely suggesting that she deserved it or brought it upon herself for some act of wrongdoing at some earlier moment in her life, and thereby relieving the cops of any responsibility. And in their disgusting logic, implicitly contend that she deserved the death penalty. That Ms. Rodriguez deserved to die on the floor because she was imperfect. To anyone who would even consider espousing such a view, I cannot find words strong enough to express how you sicken me.
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This is a horrible incident that needs to be thoroughly investigated and acted upon, though King-Harbor has continued for years to be a disaster, and it seems hardly a coincidence that the population it “serves” is low on the socio-economic scale and almost exclusively racial and ethnic minorities.
In the interest of accuracy, however, let me correct part of your statement: the Los Angeles Police Department was never involved in this incident. The 9-1-1 calls went to the Los Angeles County SHERIFF’s Department’s Century substation and were handled (or MIS-handled) by Sheriff’s deputies, and the officers who responded to arrest Mrs Rodriguez were members of the Los Angeles County Office of Public Safety police, who provide security and law enforcement at County facilities. These are both agencies of the County, and in no way related to the LAPD or the City of Los Angeles.
I am not in any way, shape, or form diminishing the the horrors to Mrs Rodriguez or her loved ones (and so many others at King-Drew in the past), but let’s point our fingers at the people who WERE involved.
I apologize for the incorrectly-formatted links to the Sheriff’s Department and the L.A. County Office of Public Safety Police in my comment. I don’t see any way to go back in and edit them.
SHG NOTE: Problem solved.
Thanks for correcting the details, Paul. Not being from LA, I don’t have the requisite familiarity with the various law enforcement agencies in LA County and relied on the information provided by the news media. As is too often the case, they get the details wrong.
You are absolutely right about accuracy, and your corrections are appreciated.
SHG
Why not point fingers at the fat parole violator. Maybe she should take better care of her fat self and her fat family. Did you see those fatties on TV?
THE COUNTY POLICE WERE INVOLVED IN THIS, LOOK AT THE LOGO ON THE BLACK AND WHITE THE OFFICERS WERE ATTEMPTING TO PUT RODRIGUEZ INTO…IT IS NOT SHERIFF’S. LASD HAD NOT TAKEN OVER COUNTY POLICE YET….NEXT YEAR.
LASD AND COUNTY POLICE DO NOT RECEIVE THE SAME STANDARD OF TRAINING…THE DISPATCHER WAS MORE THAN LIKELY A CIVILIAN.
BOB, DID GOD DIE AND PUT YOU IN CHARGE OF DETERMINING WHO SHOULD LIVE AND WHO SHOULD DIE….ANIMALS GET BETTER TREATMENT…SHAME ON YOU…YOUR KARMA WILL CATCH UP WITH YOU.
“How twisted has our hatred of the poor, of immigrants, of minorities, of potential parole violators, become that they should be intentionally left to die on the floor. They wouldn’t let this happen to a dog. But Ms. Rodriguez, apparently, was not nearly that important.”
SHE WAS IN A HOSPITAL RUN BY MINORITIES….SO, HOW DO YOU SPIN THIS?