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However, this is not the first time that Walters has been involved in some off-duty trouble. On April 1, 2006 Ricardo Walters shot and killed a man who was trying to break into his car at his home in Hempstead. He said that he was awoken by the car alarm, grabbed his off-duty weapon and went outside to confront the two would-be thieves. As he stepped out of his house, according to the report, one of the men fired a shot at him. Walters returned fire three times, hitting one of the men in the head while the other one fled. No gun was ever recovered from the scene and, as far as my research tells me, no one ever found the other man. It has been alleged by a commenter who claims to have some knowledge of the case that the Hempstead PD was incompetent in handling the case. This begs the question of who was this other guy, and where was this gun with which they allegedly shot at CO Walters? It might be beneficial for Hempstead PD to take a fresh look at this case given Walters's recent arrest.
It appears that Ricardo Walters has either had a string of bad luck or a penchant for getting himself into trouble. I sincerely hope that there was no cover-up involving the shooting out on Long Island in the spring of last year, but some things about the case just simply do not add up. I would urge you to write to the District Attorney of Nassau County, Kathleen Rice, and request that the case involving CO Walters back in April of last year be looked at again with a careful eye.
***NOTE*** The original post (which included a comment thread) had to be deleted because of technical difficulties with Blogger. It should be noted that someone commenting under the name of "blogher" brought up some problems with my post (such as my sarcasm which could be translated to be a personal attack on Mr. Walters). After reviewing the post again, I saw how some of my sarcastic comments could be seen as personal attacks on Mr. Walters. I just want to say that they were not meant that way, as I do not know Mr. Walters personally and thus can not comment on who he is as a person. All of this being said, I am solely going off of news reports and happened upon the information regarding both cases involving Mr. Walters and (as I have in this post) I am simply putting the information out there as clearly as I can. I will leave it up to the reader to come to his or her own conclusions. Thank you to "blogher" and "EmmGee" for the comment thread and the (mostly) civil debate.
Hey kane, me again.
ReplyDeleteSince I guess I am the commenter who has knowledge of this case, I would like to clarify something. The incompetence of the Hempstead Police I spoke of came in the incidences *prior to* the shooting. Off the top of my head there were a total of 4 car break-ins in approximately a year and a half span. 3 of them on Mr. Walters vehicle. The "drug using" perp was witnessed running into a house after one of the break-ins. Even with that, the police were not able to apprehend him. Had the police been able to get him off the street, I think it is fair to say that the shooting would never have occurred. I don't think they bungled the actual shooting incident. I think they finally did something right on that spring day in 2006.
It still kind of bothers me that you are asking that the case be re-opened. Why? Why not use your energy to get to the root of the problem - the house around the corner from Mr. Walters, where all the drug deals go down and cops seem to show up often but never do anything. The place where the crack head walks to, with one eye on the shiny car in Mr. Walters driveway.
Somebody in the Newsday forum posted this information:
...on Law Enforcement- If the State of New York deems you fit to carry a handgun AND you're Law Enforcement if someone is committing a crime AND THREATENS your life or others with deadly force "such as firing a gun at you or others" you may cease that action by using DEADLY FORCE. Obviously the perp that fired at him shot first, thus causing the OFFICER to return fire "one of them was to the head"...
I can't recite the law, but If this is true then what is your beef?
Since the other posts were deleted I will reiterate this...it doesn't make sense that a man who makes over 100K needs to rob a woman who has to ride the bus...I would guess she couldn't be carrying enough cash to be worth the effort. And, I don't think anyone is stupid enough to show up, face uncovered in an easily identifiable car and try and rob someone with a gun. There has to be more to this story, and I think we are limited by what we can glean from a police report/newspaper article. Police document the facts of an incident, hopefully without judgment. The newspapers report based on the police report, hopefully without judgment. In a perfect world, we the people would wait until the case actually goes before a judge and jury before we draw our own conclusions.
Hello again blogher:
ReplyDeleteThank you for the clarification. The re-opening of the case of justifiable homicide from last year is a double-edged sword. If there is a cover-up (I am not saying that there is, just saying that is one possibility), then it would reveal that. If (as you allege) the police have had a history of non-action in the neighborhood when there is clearly a crackhouse (or something like it) in the area, then the re-opening of the case would (hopefully) reveal that.