Wednesday, August 15, 2012

#ChavisCarter:TragedyInMyHomeState

Hey everybody!! Let me start off by saying that I hope that you enjoyed my last video. Make sure that you leave me a comment and give me some feedback.

Chavis Carter
Have you ever heard a snippet of a news story and said to yourself “Well, that was a sad incident.”  but then you keep going with your day.  Well, not too long ago that happened to me.  I first heard about Chavis Carter about a week ago.  When I first heard the story of a handcuffed man shooting himself in the back of a police car it made me raise an eyebrow.   Then I eventually forgot about the story.  While having a conversation with a friend about the bizarre mishap it made me want to do more reading on the story.

The long short of it is that Chavis Carter and two other passengers were pulled over in Jonesboro, AR for driving suspiciously.  During the first search, marijuana and small plastic bags were found on Carter. Carter was put in the back of the police car.  Carter was not handcuffed at this point.  The other passengers were questioned and let go.  The police searched the car and found other drug paraphernalia in the car.  The police did a second body search and then put Carter in the police car this time handcuffed. 

Even though the policemen were about a car’s  length from the car, they do not know when the fatal shot was fired.  One of the policemen smelled smoke and noticed that Carter was slumped over and bloodied.

For me there are a lot of unanswered questions. First, how is that you are a car's length away and you could not hear a gun go off?  A gun shot is is not the quietest sound, yet it wasn't until one of the cops smelled smoke that made the cop go to the car.  Second, another part of this story is that the cops' cars were parked trunk to trunk so none of this was caught on the dashboard cameras.  As many times as I have seen two or more cops pulled over on the side of the street I have never seen police cars parked this way.  The whole point of these cameras is to protect the cop from being accused of something criminal but none of this is on camera.  Lastly, the mother of Chavis said that he was left handed but the shot on the right side of his head.  This would have been difficult for him to do if his left hand is his dominate hand.

Without all these other facts, the main question is how can someone shoot themselves handcuffed?  The Jonesboro Police Department has made a reenactment video showing how this is possible.  The police chief admits that this is bizzare but also says that the average person might think this is impossible.  Even with this video, I still can't understand why this young man would shoot himself over weed possession. 

This case leaves us with more questions than answers.  I will be following this story and will provide updates as this story unfolds.