Light his ass up: Trooper Brian Encinia pictured left. Sandra Bland, right, was arrested by Encinia during a racist traffic stop in Waller County, TX on July 10th. After needlessly escalating an already tense situation, Encinia falsely charged Bland with "assaulting an officer". Bland died in jail three days later, under "mysterious" circumstances.
Pig trooper Encinia initially pulled Bland over while driving in Waller Country, TX on July 10th 2015. Bland, a resident of Naperville, IL, was driving to her old college, Prairie View A&M University, where she was to be interviewed for an outreach counselor position. According to reports, Bland had allegedly changed lanes without signaling (no one will ever know), this was when Encinia pulled her over. Bland was understandably agitated, as she immediately recognized the implications of having been a Black woman being pulled over by a White cop in Texas. But she was never "combative" as erroneous police reports have claimed, much less any sort of threat. To the contrary, Bland remains calm and compliant during the first moments of this encounter. That would change drastically.
At some point Encinia ordered Bland to "put out her cigarette". Bland questioned why she had to put out her cigarette in HER OWN car - as she was well within her right to have done. Encinia then decided to drastically escalate an already tense situation, by ordering Bland out of her vehicle. Bland was then arrested and falsely accused of assaulting an officer. A brave vigilant citizen captured part of Bland's violent arrest on his mobile device. That video can be viewed HERE. In it, several other pigs can be observed on the scene. At some point, one of the cops even begins walking in a threatening manner towards the person recording them. This police thug orders the cop-watcher to leave, even though the person recording appears to be at least a dozen plus yards away, and clearly not interfering. Recently, dashboard-mounted camera video of the incident has been released. It depicts the entire incident between Encinia and Bland, and can be viewed HERE.
While giving an unlawful, unconstitutional comand to exit her vehicle, officer Encinia pulls out his taser and barks at Bland, "I WILL LIGHT YOU UP!", as you can clearly hear in the dash cam video. Bland then exits, under extreme duress and still continuing to protest her treatment. At which point, she is assaulted, handcuffed, and taken to jail. Once Bland had been kidnapped, she was issued bond of $5,000. Bland had managed to contact familiy and friends, who were arranging to post the minimum 10% (or $500) required to get her released. But in the meantime, Bland had no other choice but to sit in a rotten Texas gulag over the weekend... her life in iminant peril.
Bland was initially arrested on Friday July 10th around 4:00 in the afternoon. On Monday July 13th at around 9:00am, Bland's body would be found dead in her cell. A supposed "suicide-by-hanging", Bland had a plastic trash bag tied around her neck. Typically, Black people are killed by racist cops before ever making it ti jail. For some reason, officer Encinia did not simply shoot Bland right there in the street. But it is clear, that either he or his police comrades managed to get to Bland while she was in jail... with no withnesses and completely helpless.
Bland's funeral was held on Saturday July 25th 2015. She was an outspoken activist who gave her own critique on the murders of other People of Color at the hands of cops. She is now a martyr who paid the ultimate price.
If I, as a white male, refused to exit my car during a routine stop, and I have been ordered out of my car during such stops, I'd expect to get arrested; it's happened to people I know, many of whom are also white males. Cops have the right to order you out of the car as long as they have the right to detain you. In Bland's case, it would seem as if the stop were over at the time when he ordered her out, but he could easily argue that he was still evaluating whether to give her a sobriety test, which, at least by Texas standards, she would likely have failed. He should have let her know what justification he had for continuing to detain her, though I'm not sure if he was legally obligated to do so. The point is, whatever you think about this Hispanic cop's (and his black female cohort's) methods, they were not likely targeting Bland based on her race. She was probably targeted because she seemed stoned and probably was.
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