AKA William

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Yup, it looks a whole lot like all of the officers — police and TABC — got away with the Stonewall-style raid of the Rainbow Lounge that left Chad Gibson hospitalized.

As I wrote yesterday, the Ft. Worth police involved in the raid were expected to be cleared of charges of excessive force. And today they were. But, don’t worry, they were punished, those officers:

. . . the chief confirmed that two police officers, Officer K.Q. Gober and Sgt. R.M. Morris, will be suspended for one day and Officer J.M. Back received a three-day suspension.

J.M. Back was cited for handcuffing a person without probable cause, for releasing that person without issuing a citation, bringing unfavorable criticism to the police department and for failing to complete offense reports the night of the arrest.

Sgt. Morris was suspended for using “poor judgment in his tactics” to conduct the bar check.

Officer Gober was suspended for making a conscious decision not to complete the required offense report before the end of his shift and did not complete the offense report until his return to work the following night. Gober was also reprimanded for the negative media attention.

For bringing negative media attention. And poor tactical judgment. And bringing unfavorable criticism to the department. Not unjustified. Unfavorable.

But don’t you worry. Today, the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission released the results of their second and final investigation.

Agents from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission didn’t target the Rainbow Lounge because it was a gay bar and didn’t use excessive force against three patrons who were arrested during the raid, including one who was seriously injured . . .

[From the press release] Administrator Alan Steen said, “Although the evidence did not show that our agents targeted the bar or used excessive force, it does not take away from the fact that the agents violated several policies that night. I want to take another opportunity to say that this is not how we treat people, and we have been looking at this from every angle to find ways to make sure it does not happen again.”

In August, TABC announced that Agent Chris Aller, Agent Trainee Jason Chapman and Sgt. Terry Parsons were terminated for various policy and procedural violations found in the initial Rainbow Lounge investigation report. Aller and Parsons filed appeals, but Administrator Alan Steen upheld the terminations.

Right, right. You can beat the shit out of a gay man because he’s gay, and it’s not excessive force just as long as you later say, “We have been looking at this from every angle to find ways to make sure it does not happen again.”

Is anyone else sick of words? That’s all we get. Placating words.