As someone who lives in Oakland I might be able to give a local perspective. Many of my friends are angry about this and almost everyone I talked to yesterday seemed to have an opinion on it. Universally most of the people I talked to thought it was Murder but weren't prepared to go blow up downtown over it.
As near as I heard the riot was mostly instigated by several far-left groups and "trust-fund Anarchists" rather then the actual community that makes up Oakland. A friend of mine's store took some severe damage in both riots over this incident despite being a vocal supporter of Oscar Grants family in this. Its the people of Oakland who have been hurt by the rioting, not the supposedly corrupt justice system. All the rioting has accomplished is setting Oakland back yet again and making our city look even worse in the nations eyes.
I'm personally glad I stayed in Berkeley with a good friend for the duration of this tragedy. I'd like to add that the only people who lose no matter what in this are the people of Oakland.
It's rather unfortunate that there have been riots over this. I can't say whether or not this is the correct charge (though clearly this guy should have been charged with something, this being the minimum possible case) but even so it's not something to riot over. I just watched a video of a bunch of people breaking into a Footlocker and stealing a bunch of shoes and stuff - I don't know what these people are thinking, it's not as if that's going to help anyone or anything. Rather than one step back now it's two.
Indeed. Looting during a riot over a cop killer getting a 'light sentence'? Most of those rioters probably don't even care about it or the community at all.
This would be a non-story if a black cop did this to a white man...
If their was a history of it in Oakland then it probably would be a story. Of course, the reverse is true in this situation.
