PRESSURE ESCALATING IN UPSTATE POLICE SHOOTING
S.C. Senator Tom Davis – who has previously pushed for common sense reform of the Palmetto State’s marijuana laws – is now standing up for an Upstate teenager gunned down by a police officer over ten grams of marijuana.
Davis is railing against a dash cam video depicting the final moments of Zachary Hammond – a 19-year-old Seneca, S.C. resident who was shot and killed by an undercover town police officer this summer during a botched drug bust.
Remember that story? Yeah. We expressed our outrage early on … at the shooting itself, at the totally anti-transparent response from all levels of government and of course at the broader lunacy of America’s failed “War on Drugs.”
Anyway, video of this shooting was belatedly released by the S.C. State Law Enforcement Division (SLED) last week – prompting Davis to address the situation.
“The more I watch this video of ??Zachary Hammond? getting shot and killed, the angrier I get,” Davis wrote on his Facebook page. “In South Carolina, the shooting of a person by a law enforcement officer is justified if the officer reasonably believed he was in imminent danger of sustaining bodily harm and if there was no other means of avoiding that danger. How can anyone watching this video conclude this killing was legally justified? I’ve asked several of my law enforcement friends to give me their opinion, and to a person they’ve said it was ‘a bad shooting’ and that the local prosecutor’s decision not to charge the police officer was wrong.”
“And all of this in a sting to bust a teenager for possessing ten grams of pot,” Davis added.
Indeed … which is the real issue here.
“Even if you subscribe to the anti-liberty view that recreational pot use should be outlawed, in what universe is entrapping a citizen over ten grams of weed a proper prioritization of law enforcement resources?” we wrote last week in addressing this case.
Davis isn’t the only lawmaker weighing in on the Hammond controversy. S.C. Rep. Todd Rutherford of Columbia, S.C. held a press conference with Hammond’s family in Greenville, S.C. this week – calling for tougher laws against the use of excessive force by police officers.
Rutherford also called on S.C. attorney general Alan Wilson to pursue charges against the officer – Mark Tiller – after S.C. tenth circuit solicitor Chrissy Adams declined to press charges against him. Wilson could take the case if he wants to given his status as the state’s top prosecutor, although attorneys general in the past have historically deferred to local prosecutors on such decisions.
Whatever Wilson decides to do, federal investigators are also probing the incident – and a source familiar with that investigation told us there was a “very good chance” charges could be filed against Tiller.
56 comments
PRO legalization liberal politicians supporting a failed dope head that died because he apparently tried to kill a cop?What a surprise. Give it up liberals.Ohio should be a good indicator of where middle America stands on your desire to addict our children to drugs.
Concentrate on transgender male faggots using little girl bathrooms so they can molest children.That IS the Democrat Party today.Hell a father is now trying to marry his adopted son in Pennsylvania. You people are freaks.
killing somebody for 10 grams of pot is like killing somebody for having a candy bar.
Appears to me he resisted arrest and tried to run the cop over.Bye Bye!Fuck you dope heads trying to poison and molest our children.
running from the cops over 10 grams of pot is stupid and bad things can happen…
One more off the streets.
thats what i said about metts
“very good sources” say charges will be filed? LMAO!!! Give it up Boz? You can’t make this shit up.
Three peas in a pod, carpetbagger Davis, Folks and Rutherford. The Seneca policeman obviously has super powers including clairvoyance. He can walk up to a car and immediately know that there are only 10 grams of an illegal substance aboard. Folks’ point over the amount is smokescreen (pun intended). Folks also fails to mention the other illegal substances that were found via toxicology in Hammond’s system. Hammond is merely the infamous three’s Tawana Brawley.
Perhaps Folks was in a stupor during the 60 Minutes piece last Sunday about heroin in middle class suburbia. When addicts were asked about their addiction, many stated that their addiction first started with marijuana and then progressed to heroin. You are familiar with the word gateway aren’t you?
well if i step out in front of a car and blow the brains out of the driver, i expect to be acquitted by you teabagging slugs, hell the driver was trying to kill me.
Cop did a great job, in my opinion.
and you are a bloodthirsty asshole, what is your point?
Cop did a great job,in my opinion.Another drug thug off the streets.
duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Focus on your transgender buddies using bathrooms and molesting children.Until Houston you perverts were doing well.
ok, give some examples of transgenders molesting children, of course you can’t, just another one of the white trash lies.
I just gave you one.Transgender freaks wanting to use different sex bathrooms to be around children.Houston said NO!
i can not think of a time in the last 40 years that i have been in a public bathroom without an adult with children, i have many times accompanied young men into a restroom just in case. your are a liar, men take care of children, then there is you
lol…I have NO doubt you have (in your own words) accompanied children you don’t know into bathrooms…OH MY!!!
Glad to know you support cops killing unarmed people on the spot for trying to drive away.
yep…here in S.C. you can blow away an unarmed kid because you run up to his car, don’t show your badge, use poor judgement against your police training and then claim he was trying to run you over…something…something…stand your ground.
The law says do or die. We need help.
I recall reading comments from one of the regulars on here, who lived in the Upstate. He apparently had some insider info or other insight on the case. He noted where this “poor little guy with just 10 grams of pot”, had run more than one police roadblock or traffic stop in the days and weeks leading up to his death and there were messages on his cell phone where he bragged about it. I believe there were also solid indices that he was aspiring to be a major dealer of stuff much heavier than marijuana.
I have no problem with easing (or eliminating) laws against pot and even harder drugs. The cost in money, court time, and lives of police and citizens is just not worth the lackluster “results”. Drug laws, like Prohibition, have only served to strengthen organized crime, crooked cops, crooked judges, and crooked politicians. That said, the little thug in training showed complete disregard for the cop’s life and safety, “OVER 10 GRAMS OF MARIJUANA.”
He asked for it, he got it, it wasn’t a Toyota.
we will have to disagree on this CIC, but what is new, hope you are doing well
Hi Stump! While we often wind up on differing sides of dome issues, I believe you to be a good and honest soul. All here about as well as I can expect, I guess. How about you?
fine, wish your voice was here earlier, got a long day tommorrow and am bailing, soldier on my friend
U R a rock. I stand with you.
School starts early.Hit the school crossings early?
Stump it’s TROLL land !!!
I am staying off of 2 Notch in Columbia tonight and just got wings from a sports pub called Bakers.
You two liberals get a room.It is sickening. :)
.It was a bad shoot. Did that officer murder that kid? No.He broke all of his training and put himself in position to fear for his life, and I find that suspect, only covered by “heat of the moment” case Law as Mike on the Beach has pointed out. He shouldn’t be in prison but his LE career should be over.
CIC, that was me and now Todd Fucking Rutherford was up here yesterday whining and moaning about that little drug-dealing thug who put himself in the position that he was in. If that thug would have gotten away at a high rate of speed and ran over some people in the parking lot on the way out, I bet the tone would be a little different. I tried to post a link about all of the things the kid said prior to the day he was shot but FITS won’t let me but the Greenville News article was on 10/28/2015 entitled “Family Will keep fighting for justice after fatal shooting”. Seems the kid wanting to “go shootin” and was in “full outlaw mode”. Looks like the cops stopped what the parents wouldn’t or couldn’t, and now they will have millions of dollars as a result.
Hi Southmauldin! Thank you for that information! I thought it was you but wasn’t certain enough to say so, for sure.
Yep, it looks as though mom-n-pop may be about to hit the trailer park lottery jackpot, sad to say. Who says that bad parenting doesn’t pay?
Zach Hammond’s case bears no resemblance to Tawana Brawley. You would know that if you were paying attention. It is precisely because Tiller was (and still is) NOT clairvoyant that he DID NOT KNOW what was in the car or in anyone’s system. The FACT is that NO CRIME had been committed and therefore NO ARREST can be made. But, according to you and CorruptioninColumbia and southmauldin, a cop can shoot and kill you anyway and get away with it “because he feared for his life” while placing himself in danger. That logic wouldn’t fly anywhere if he weren’t a policeman. All of us would be in jail. Use some sense. The implication is that it’s fine to cops to shoot YOU without consequence. We cannot have this level of chaos or we will become the absolute police state.
shooting a teenager in the head for selling a little pot, small government at its best, medical care for those who can’t afford it, that big fucking government ruining this country
You faggots got your gay marriage.Be quiet.Middle America has turned on you.Bye Bye Dems!
you would be quite out of place anywhere from here, trust me, i have lived all over the country and you are considered a freak.
lol…I am EXACTLY what 50% of this country is thinking and how they vote.
you are the freaks, and normal conservatives have not adjusted yet
Adjusted to what? 2% of this country is queer and less than 1% transgender yet the marriage law was changed by fiat per SCOTUS.Pot laws? 65% in Ohio said go fuck yourselves.
Democrats can’t win without illegals. Middle America has turned on ya. Bye Bye! No Amnesty.Obama destroyed the Democrat Party.
you choose to be ignorant and because you choose your ignorance, i feel comfortable calling you a liar. the Ohio law allowed only ten people to grow the pot, making them huge multi millioniares, they rejected the cartel, not the right to smoke pot
False liar.Had NOTHING to do with the imagined ‘cartels’.They rejected Democrat Party perversion and attempts to poison our children.
Pot will NEVER be legal in Ohio.
like same sex marriage?
Not if the PEOPLE vote. Gay marriage would not be legal in 40 states if on a ballot.Socialist Democrats have lost the PEOPLE so they have to push this perversion thru the courts.
should we rebel against the courts?
Rebel? People just need to vote.All politics are still local and why Democrats can’t win elections anymore.
The courts are stacked with liberals that have been indoctrinated in the state controlled universities.
It is really to late for this nation to recover from the damage the lawless Obama has inflicted on this nation-however as long as there is no path to citizenship for illegals we can survive for another century.
Bi love
Hey, ease up. Davis is a Republican-
Given his stance on this topic he’s somewhat unusual in that he’s not ignoring the fact the cop pumped bullets into the kid once the car was driving BY him like most Republicans that lick the jackboot no matter what.
He probably isn’t a real Republican though…being an attorney and all he probably just uses the label for easy election/re-election.
Here Here Fits!!! We don’t agree on much but this article is spot on and I fully support Rep. Davis, the family and the legal team in their fight for justice against this horrific display of police homicide against an unarmed civilian over pot.
Doesn’t this prove that its not a race problem? Don’t it make you feel better that whites are being killed too? Liberals should be happy.
I don’t know if what this police officer did was a crime or not. If it’s not a crime, it certainly should be.
Only morons and imbeciles fail to condemn this ONE incident of trigger-happy cop and stay tuned tomorrow because Will Folks will state
How many brave and professional cops defend your life daily and do it right—Will will be running a five-part series on that…NO…WAIT !!!
and it was from behind when the danger was gone
Big question is what is Tiller doing? Have they reinstated this murderer and adulterer or they still letting him vacation on tax payers money. Bottom line is the longer he is employed then the more the tax payer are really footing the civil law suit he will lose. Covington, Alexander and Adams are incompetent and going to cost the citizens a lot of money. Tiller was dancing along side of car screaming foul language and decided to shoot when teen was going to drive off. Never was he in danger and Adams should not be above the law. The FEDs should charge her with obstruction of justice.
The officer was doing his job. The kid was fleeing. The video shows he DID NOT cooperate. He RAN. Point blank cop tells you to get your hands in the air you do.
Read the evidence on the texts. This wasn’t just about a little marijuanna.
Well quite a few of you evidently didn’t see the tape. this cop wanted to get this kid. had he followed Standard operating procedure which under State of South Carolina states that you block the vehicle in and use your car as cover. This cop wanted this bust so bad he put his life in danger by running up to the car. And this is a supposed supervisor is breaking standard operating procedures and he is still employed. It was a misdemeanor amount of drugs. The kid went over a curb to get away he was avoiding hitting the cop . The cop say he pushed off the vehicle so he was not in danger. He had no right to shoot the kid.