Why Did The Police Shoot Ta’Kiya Young?

On August 24, a police officer in Columbus, Ohio shot dead a woman in her car. Ta’Kiya Young was 21 years old, yet in spite of her young age she was said to be the mother of both a 3 year old and a 6 year old. She was also pregnant. The police had been called to the scene because a number of women had allegedly been seen stealing alcohol from a supermarket, and she was a suspect. 

The entire encounter was captured on bodycam video from both the officers who attended the scene; various edits, many with pre-emptive warnings, can be found on YouTube and other video sites.

Obviously this was a tragedy, even convicted shoplifters should not be executed in this day and age, but the usual suspects, including Black Lives Matter, have predictably framed this through a racial prism – black woman killed by a white police officer.

Is this really a racial thing? The short answer is no, although the insane propaganda that has been directed against the American police over the past three years has undoubtedly contributed to it.

The first factor to be considered here is America’s even more insane gun culture. The United States isn’t the only country that has an armed citizenry but no other has the same attitude towards guns. In England, where firearms are more or less illegal, the list of police officers shot dead by armed criminals is very short. The last one was Matt Ratana who was murdered on September 25, 2020, by a suspect in a police custody centre of all places. The case before that, a truly shocking one, was when two female officers were murdered on September 12, 2012 by gangster Dale Cregan, who had already murdered two people.

Other officers have been killed in the line of duty, but apart from the special case of Northern Ireland, police officers in the British Isles are extremely unlikely to be shot or otherwise murdered by members of the public. Contrast this with the United States where last year alone no fewer than 61 officers were killed by gunfire.

Even allowing for its much larger population, this is a staggering number; American police officers have also been targeted for assassination, something that is unheard of in the UK outside of Northern Ireland and known terrorist organisations. Because of that, and in view of the number of shootings generally – fatal and non-fatal – it is hardly surprising that the American police are hyper-vigilant whenever they interact with members of the public on less than friendly terms.

It is also unquestionable that some police are poorly trained when it comes to firearms. In July 2017, Justine Damond was shot dead in Minneapolis by a police officer after making a 911 call. Because the victim was white and the killer black, this case generated far less outrage than the justifiable non-fatal shooting of Jacob Blake three years later.

Anyone who believes the firearms training of the American police to be up to standard is invited to compare any such interaction with the professional takedown of two extremely dangerous terrorists by the British police in 2013. These fanatics had just murdered a man in the street, almost hacking off his head in the process, then they ran towards an unmarked police car. The firearms officers would have been more than justified in shooting them both dead, but showing remarkable restraint, they shot only to incapacitate and then arrest.

The final and most important factor in the fatal shooting of Ta’Kiya Young is best explained by viewing another video. In March 2021, Nashville police officer Josh Baker attempted to make a routine arrest of a young black woman who was driving a car registered to a man who had outstanding warrants. What happened next was truly extraordinary but fortunately the entire encounter was caught on video. 

It remains to be seen how much blame for the deaths of Nika Holbert or Ta’Kiya Young can be blamed on the hysteria generated by Black Lives Matter and their fellow travellers, but it clearly didn’t help.