^{by Tom Head, About.com Guide to Civil Liberties}

Nicole Paultre-Bell and her mother await the verdict. Photo: Pool / Getty Images.

Three men left a bachelor party. A group of armed assailants ran towards them. The driver, whose wedding was scheduled for the next morning, attempted to flee the apparent carjackers. The assailants fired 50 bullets, killing the driver and injuring his two passengers.

The driver was unarmed. His passengers were unarmed. These facts are not in dispute.

The assailants, it was later revealed, were plainclothes officers of the New York Police Department. They were attempting to investigate rumors of prostitution at the club. They thought they heard someone say "gun." They claim that they verbally identified themselves as they ran up to the car, drew their own guns, and fired them. It wouldn't have necessarily mattered if they did. Carjackers shout things--crazy things--all the time to get the attention of the driver.

Maybe the driver should have taken a calculated gamble and just let them have the car, but most carjackers don't spray cars with bullets. They steal cars. Murder charges, clearly identifiable bullet damage in their stolen automobiles--it's not good business for carjackers. NYPD officers don't have to worry so much about murder charges because NYPD officers are never charged with murder for killing black or Latino suspects on the streets. It's rare that they're charged with anything at all. The occasional shooting death of an unarmed brown or black man, like the human sacrifice performed by ancient fertility cults, is viewed as a blood tax.

The three killers, charged with manslaughter, reckless endangerment, and assault, asked for a bench trial--a trial by judge instead of by jury, the right of every criminal defendant. Surely they knew that a jury might deadlock and result in a mistrial, then perhaps a retrial. They wanted an acquittal on a first pass. They got one.

I'd barely followed this case after the indictment was announced because I took it for granted that the officers would be convicted of something. Generally speaking, shooting three unarmed people and killing one of them results in a conviction if it goes to trial. But this, I should have reminded myself, is the NYPD.

I don't pretend to know what the shooters were thinking. I've never been in their shoes. I assume it's a difficult, dangerous job. I assume they were genuinely frightened, that they genuinely felt that their lives might be at risk. But then the same can probably be said of most killers on America's urban streets, who more often than not are involved in dangerous drug-related disputes, disputes that fall outside of the magisterium of the police and the law-abiding world that police represent. Those shootings bulk up the homicide statistics of every major city in the United States.

No, I'm not a police officer. I have the luxury of sitting here in my chair knowing that I can call 911 at any time and count on the protection of police officers. Police officers have a very difficult job. They should receive a six-figure salary instead of the minimal salary that they presently receive. But they should receive that salary in money, not in acquittals.

I wonder what would happen if we showed civilians the same deference that the State of New York has shown to these police officers--where "I was scared" is an excuse for drawing firearms and firing indiscriminately into an occupied vehicle. My suspicion is that more people, people from every walk of life, would die. Those are sacrifices that we are not willing, as a culture, to make.

But apparently killing a Sean Bell, every now and then, is okay. Through the officers, white Americans who endorse the shoot-first policy, but know that it will never affect them personally, put these young men on altars and drive daggers through their hearts. And for another year, we have good crops.

The Department of Justice has the opportunity to pursue federal civil rights charges against the officers. It should. The New York Police Department is still conducting an internal investigation to determine what, if any, disciplinary action the officers might receive. It must. Sean Bell's widow, who was at least allowed to take his name, has filed a wrongful death suit against the officers. It was, by any reasonable standard, a wrongful death. And it was also, if we are to reject the logic of human sacrifice, a federal civil rights violation--and at least an example of reckless endangerment, if not manslaughter. Police are taught better ways to stop an occupied vehicle than perforating it with dozens of bullets.

But if the majority of Americans are comfortable letting Sean Bell's killers take his life with no legal consequences, because they're willing to pay that price to live in a "safer" country, then each American should at least hang a plaque on the living room wall. And every time another young unarmed man dies in New York or Los Angeles because police have been given a general license to kill, they should be required to engrave that name on their plaques. It should be a really big plaque, because this happens quite often. (Sean Bell's story made national headlines not because he was an unarmed black man who was shot to death by police, but because he was an unarmed black man who was shot to death by police the night before his wedding.) And at the top, every plaque should read: "IN LOVING MEMORY OF THE INNOCENT PEOPLE WE KILLED IN THE NAME OF OUR OWN SAFETY."

It's the least we can do.

See also:

• Summary of the Sean Bell Shooting and NYPD Trial