On July 14, Minneapolis police shot and killed twenty-year-old Tekle Sundberg after a six-hour standoff that included multiple shots by the "victim" being fired into the apartment of a young woman and her two small children.  This was because Tekle Sundberg was trying to kill her.  Yet according to attorney Ben Crump, Tekle was a "smart, loving, and artistic" young man "experiencing a mental health crisis."  The photo accompanying Crump's call to action showed Tekle wearing white, the color of innocence, while smiling for the camera.  However, a second photo in the Twitter feed displayed another side of Tekle's character as he held two pistols and a bag of contraband while playfully posing for the camera.

Crump demanded ANSWERS (his capitalization, not mine) from the Minneapolis police about how they conducted themselves during the standoff.  He also posted videos of the grieving adoptive parents blaming the police for killing their son "unnecessarily" and called for people to protest at the scene of the crime, which they did.  Tekle's white parents claimed that the police promised they wouldn't shoot him (a curious claim to make in an active shooter situation, to be sure) and predictably suggested that their son would still be alive if he were white.  However, the police reported that whenever they tried to have the father speak to Tekle, the young man turned his music up full blast and screamed at them.

Just how disgusting can Tekle's parents get?  Zero sympathy was expressed for their son's intended victim or her children.  Their son was actively trying to murder his neighbor when the police finally shot and killed him, more than six hours after the standoff began, and still they blame the police.  If Tekle had been white, the only difference in the outcome is that the cops most likely wouldn't have waited six hours before they finally shot and killed him.  The man was spraying live rounds into another apartment, trying to kill its inhabitants, which, in my opinion, forfeits his right to continue breathing.

Say the name "George Floyd," and people bow their heads in reverence for the petty criminal, who died while in police custody from an officer "kneeling on his neck" until he suffocated — which didn't happen, but don't tell that to Officer Derek Chauvin, because he's in prison for allegedly killing Floyd.  Now say the name "Tony Timpa."  Who?  Minneapolis police officers went to prison for detaining Floyd with a controversial hold for nine minutes.  Dallas police officers held Tony Timpa with the very same hold for almost fourteen minutes, and, like Floyd, Timpa died.  Why have there been no media reports of Timpa's death like the reports on George Floyd?  Well, Tony Timpa was a white man.

If Timpa's story failed to move you, what about Edward Bronstein?  Two months before George Floyd died, the very same thing happened to Bronstein — cops kneeled on him, and he died.  What happened to the officers in the Timpa and Bronstein cases?  Nothing.

Obviously, police brutality isn't the real issue for Black Lives Matter.  Nor does the innocence or guilt of the candidate for martyrdom matter.  Skin color is all that matters to Black Lives Matter.  It doesn't hurt if you have a criminal record, too.

Seventy-five percent of the people killed by the police each year are white, Asian, or Hispanic.  Twenty-five percent of the suspects killed by police are black.  If anything, police have become more reluctant to engage with and subdue a violent black offender out of fear that Black Lives Matter and Ben Crump will marshal the forces of evil against them, and that reluctance puts even more lives at risk.

Not only does BLM always side against the police, but the group frequently sides against the black victims of black criminal thugs.  Apparently, only black criminals aren't supposed to get shot, no matter what they've done.  In stark contrast, innocent black women and children are fair game.  If you are a young black criminal, you're untouchable as far as Black Lives Matter is concerned.  Black Lives Matter doesn't care about people.  It cares only about power.  The people behind Black Lives Matter don't care about black lives in general; they care about only the lives of dangerous black criminals and buying expensive real estate in rich white neighborhoods.

George Floyd?  He's been elevated to the ranks of a minor deity, although a lightning strike seems to have offered God's final word on the matter.  And contrary to what Ben Crump might have you believe, Tekle Sundberg was no angel.  He was a thug and a criminal, and he's far from the only example of Black Lives Matter choosing to champion the wrong black lives.  Jacob Blake admits that he had a knife when police shot him.  Black Lives Matter led a major protest to honor the man that police had been trying to arrest for sexual assault, criminal trespass, and disorderly conduct.  The protests in Kenosha led to Kyle Rittenhouse being forced to kill several people in self-defense as the situation grew completely out of control.

Michael Brown robbed a convenience store and broke the orbital bone in the face of police officer Darren Wilson, but BLM lied and claimed that Brown had his hands up.  And Ferguson, Missouri was burned to the ground because of another pernicious lie.  Rayshard Brooks passed out in the drive-through lane of a Wendy's and eventually managed to get shot and killed while resisting arrest for DUI.  For some unknown reason, video of the police having a normal conversation with Brooks aired on television, but video of Brooks resisting arrest and firing a Taser at the cops did not.  Naturally, protesters burned the restaurant to the ground.

Much more importantly, little eight-year-old Secoriea Turner was shot and killed when a protester fired a bullet into her mother's car.  Two of the protesters were arrested for her murder.  Two years after Brooks's death, "mourners" planned a vigil to remember him.  Nobody has a vigil planned for Secoriea Turner.

Black Lives Matter protesters immediately dropped to a knee when reports aired that an armed carjacker had been killed by the police.  The protesters promised to loot and riot in response, but after they learned that the carjacker was white, the protest suddenly ended, quickly and quietly.  They didn't care that the perpetrator had allegedly been waving a gun and shooting at police, but they did care about his skin color, because only the lives of black criminals matter to Black Lives Matter.  If you're an innocent bystander, a woman, or a child — even if you're black — well, you're just collateral damage.

The young woman Sundberg had been trying to kill bravely came out of her apartment to confront the angry crowd that came to march in front of her building and shouted at them, "He tried to kill me in front of my kids!  There are bullet holes in my kitchen!"

One of the protestors chillingly replied, "Not in you, though!"

What type of a human being would say such a thing to the victim of a violent crime?

John Leonard is a freelance writer.  His seventh book, The God Conclusion, is available on Amazon, and his other books can be found at LeonardBooks.net.  He may be contacted via his website at southernprose.com.

Image: Johnny Silvercloud via Flickr (cropped), CC BY-SA 2.0.