Dear Gillian
Although I have no way of knowing – I assume you may not know about this case. The US, indeed the entire West in general, is riddled with ongoing crime – with the Police, the Media and politicians all generating the false reality that each crime is ‘unique’, ‘aberrant’ and ‘unlikely’ (and ‘out of the ordinary’) – when the reality is that the predatory capitalism pursued in the West generates the ‘at source’ conditions (and contradictions) which manifest as a continuous wave of all types of ongoing ‘criminal’ activity:
Obviously, what the Police did to Ryan Waller is disgusting and to my mind amounts to the criminal behaviour of ‘Torture’ – that is a ‘Crime Against Humanity’ – but no one is saying this in the US because it would overlap with a criticism of the predatory capitalism the Americans ‘worship’ – and for which the US Military has murdered 20-30 million men, women and children around the globe between 1945 to present! My point is that I suspect ‘Heather Quan’ possesses a Chinese surname (If I am correct then ‘Quan’ can be spelt ‘權-权’ or ‘全’ and ‘關’ depending upon family history) – passed on to her by her father (whom I believe is named ‘Robert Quan’).
Although Ryan Waller was shot in the face (and ‘brain’) and survived with a severe brain injury for a number of hours afterwards (the Coroner stated Ryan’s jaw was broken after he was shot in the face – presumably when the Police tackled him to the ground upon arrest) – Heather Quan was shot in the head and immediately killed by the two Hillbilly-type characters who invaded their home on Xmas Day, 2006! Her story is always treated as subordinate to that of Ryan – and she only seems to exist (as a validation) via her association with Ryan (this is not the fault of Ryan or his family – but US society as a whole). It is nothing new – I know – but the day we stop caring about the racial bias is the day US anti-intellectualism finally triumphs through the removal of all obstacles to its dominance!
THE SANGHA KOMMUNE (SSR) 