Je'Rean is dead too...

I'm a Detroiter. Not a native since I came here to go to college twenty years ago by way of St. Louis, met and married a pretty girl and have been here ever since, but I still consider it my home. Just can't get with American League baseball. Detroit has been in the news recently. If the words 'Detroit' and 'News' are used in the same sentence then you know something beyond terrible must have occurred.

This time its about as bad as it gets as seven year old Aiyana Jones was shot to death, by a police officer's stray bullet, in an ill-conceived raid to corral a murder suspect. I imagine there will be a full investigation, the officer who fired the bullet will be reprimanded and probably suspended though I doubt he will serve any time but that will all take care of itself and that's not what we are here to talk about. It's everything else surrounding the death of Aiyana Jones that we are touching upon here today.

Before Aiyana's body hit the ground lawyer Jeffrey Feiger had already filed two law suits against the City of Detroit to 'help the family find closure'. Exactly. Aiyana might be dead but at least somebody's going to paid from it. That's turning a frown upside down where I come from. Aiyana's body might've been on the ground for about a minute before we got visits from both Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Reverend Sharpton was here to deliver Aiyana's eulogy. Why? I think we have enough preachers here in Detroit more than capable enough to deliver an impassioned eulogy, negating the need for us to import preachers from New York City. The cynics amongst us would say that Reverends Jackson and Sharpton were only here to further exploit an already volatile situation to raise public awareness about themselves. But that's what a cynic would say, not me. We're not even going to mention the reality show that was taping all of this. Would the police officers have been so gung-ho if they didn't have to put on a show for the cameras?

My question is who flew in to eulogize Je'Rean Blake? That's the seventeen year old boy who got shot to death for looking at 34 year old Chauncey Owens the wrong way. Chauncey is the reason the reason the police were putting on a show for the cameras and Chauncey is the primary reason that Aiyana is dead. But as far as I know there's no fancy lawyers representing the Blake family, mainly because there's really nobody to sue since Chauncey Blake is probably broke, and there's no New York preachers flying in to eulogize a boy for looking at somebody the wrong way because that happens far too often and offers few exploiting opportunities.

Incompetent police officers tap dancing for a reality TV show shooting a seven year old child is an isolated incident. If a police officer shoots another kid in my remaining days in this city I will be surprised. If I make it out this month without hearing about some knucklehead shooting somebody for something stupid I will be surprised. Out of those two which one do you think is the real problem? The Lawyer is going to paid and paid well, the reverends have left town and found other incidents in other parts of the country to exploit and offer no solutions and Je'Rean Blake is just as dead as Aiyana Jones. But that would be a cynic talking and that's not me.