Another martyr for the cause created with a false narrative.
Via Baltimore Sun:
It was the day after Freddie Gray’s death from injuries suffered in Baltimore Police custody, and Officer Zach Novak — who was involved but never charged in Gray’s arrest — responded to a text message from another officer about how he was holding up by expressing concern for a third colleague, Officer Edward Nero.
“I’m good. Nero’s a wreck,” Novak wrote. “They put him and 3 others on admin leave until further notice. He’s beating himself up over it even though he and nobody else did anything. [There] was literally no force at all involved in the whole incident.”
Gray had been found unconscious and not breathing in the back of a police van after a nearly 45-minute ride around the city, and speculation about what had caused his injuries was rampant.
“People hate police to begin with so everyone assumes we must have brutalized this guy,” Novak wrote. “This is fueled by the recent anti-police sentiment. Now everyone has to wait for the facts to slowly come out and exonerate everyone.”
“They will still riot and burn down their own community,” the second officer responded.
A week later, on April 27, 2015, rioting did erupt and the city did burn, most notably in the West Baltimore neighborhood where Gray grew up and was arrested.[…]
In their private conversations, the officers were candid, even vulnerable. At times they resorted to gallows humor. They also expressed resentment that Gray’s death — which they described as being entirely unrelated to their own actions — had put them in the position they were in and caused so much strife and violence in the city.
The officers worried about the safety of their families, talked about arming themselves, discussed requests from investigators that they provide statements, mentioned efforts by friends to raise money on their behalf, and gathered for meals together, according to the records. They also criticized Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby — and Prince, when the now-dead singer brought Mosby on stage at a benefit concert for the city in early May 2015.
The officers discussed why Donta Allen, the other man in the police van with Gray, would change his story in the press and fear for his own safety. And they devoured media coverage of the case and the rioting, sharing links with one another, criticizing the coverage — including some in The Baltimore Sun — and sometimes expressing shock or detached frustration at what was being reported.