Outrage in Kentucky over plan to outlaw ‘insulting police’ six months after Breonna Taylor officers cleared
Disorderly conduct charge would be punishable by 90 days in jail and $250 fine
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Your support makes all the difference.A plan to outlaw “insulting police” in Kentucky just six months after officers were cleared in the killing of Breonna Taylor has sparked outrage.
The proposed law is part of a larger bill seeking increased penalties for riots in the state and would carry a punishment of up to 90 days in prison or a $250 fine.
Activists in Kentucky say that it is a “retaliation” for the racial justice protests sparked by the killing of Ms Taylor in Louisville last year.
Under the proposed law anyone who “accosts, insults, taunts, or challenges a law enforcement officer with offensive or derisive words, or by gestures or other physical contact, that would have a direct tendency to provoke a violent response” in a public place would be guilty of second-degree disorderly conduct.
The move comes a year after Ms Taylor was shot and killed by Louisville police during a bungled raid on her apartment, which sparked widespread protests.
In September a grand jury indicted a former Louisville detective involved in the raid, Brett Hankison, for wanton endangerment of neighbours whose apartment was hit when he opened fire.
No charges were filed against the other two officers who opened fire and no one has been charged for causing Ms Taylor’s death.
Chanelle Helm, an organiser with Black Lives Matter Louisville, said the purpose of the bill was clear.
“People are not shot and killed by police because they go and protest, we protest because people are getting shot and killed by police,” she told Newsweek.
“They’re meaning to silence our voices, and that is against our constitutional rights.”
Cassia Herron, the chairperson of Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, branded the bill a “visceral response” to Black Lives Matter protests.
“Our local governments are trying to stop free speech and it’s something that everybody should be concerned about,” she said.
And she added:“They have guns and weapons, they have military equipment ... and now we’re saying if if you flip a police officer off, or call them an a**hole, you’re gonna get charged?
“They’ve got to have thick skin ... that’s what we ask of Black people everyday when we see people getting killed, and we are disrespected at our jobs. We gotta have thick skin.”
Kentucky state senator Danny Carroll has said the bill, which he sponsored, is a response to the vandalism and violence seen during the protests, as well as the US Capitol riot.
“What this deals with are those who cross the line and commit criminal acts,” he has said.
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