Lauren LaFleur
Jacksonville Daily Progress
JACKSONVILLE —
Lancaster Police Officer Craig Shaw and Jeremy McMillian, 37 and 23 respectively, were shot and killed on Father’s Day.
Both of these men were fathers — one, Shaw, was doing his duty to protect and serve the people of Lancaster, while McMillian was simply driving his two children into an apartment complex that day.
David Brown Jr., the shooter, had already had a visit from police seven hours before the deadly shooting happened. His girlfriend called to report a disturbance.
She told police Brown Jr. was having a psychotic break and that he was bipolar.
She also told officers that Brown Jr. was the son of Dallas Police Chief David Brown.
Lancaster Police Chief Keith Humphrey made a courtesy call to Brown, letting him know his son was acting erratically. Brown did not answer his phone, though, and did not return the call.
Humphrey said Brown Jr. was not arrested at that first call because “It’s not against the law to be crazy.”
Just seven hours later, Brown Jr. took the lives of two fathers on Father’s Day, then was killed himself by shots from responding officers.
While I agree that it not against the law to be crazy, I find it reprehensible that there was nothing more the responding officers could do.
News reports say the officers separated Brown Jr. and his girlfriend and spoke to them individually for 30 minutes at that first call.
I don’t know what officers are and are not allowed to do in a situation like that, but it sounds to me like they should be able to do more to help.
Perhaps Misti Conaway, Brown Jr.’s girlfriend, opted to stay at the apartment with her man that day.
It just saddens and sickens me that when someone is reported for causing a domestic disturbance and their significant other tells responding officers that the person is acting like someone who has taken PCP, a hallucinogenic, nothing more can be done than talking to the person.
Is there no one police can call on to help in the situation? No mental health professional? Surely in a city like Dallas, there should be someone on duty 24/7 to handle situations like that.
And what of the senior Brown?
Maybe I’m from a different family than most, but I know that if a police officer called my father and left him a message that I was acting in such a manner, Dad would be in his car and at the scene as fast as he could get there. (This is the same man who came to Jacksonville from Beaumont the day before Father’s Day just to spend time with me and my brother for Father’s Day.)
Why did this man not help his son get help for whatever problems were plaguing him long before this happened?
His girlfriend said Brown Jr. acted like he had taken drugs. Perhaps he had.
If Brown Jr. had a drug problem, shouldn’t his father have sought to put his son in a rehabilitation facility?
What about the bipolar issue, though? There are so many amazing medical and other treatments available that can help ease symptoms of any sort of mental disease, if not eradicate them completely.
A man of Brown’s standing and position in law enforcement should know that — and it sickens me that a man in the highest position in the police department of one of the largest cities in the country would not do anything necessary to protect and serve his own son first.
And to protect and serve those his son came in contact with.
Shaw and McMillian have lost their lives because of this gap in care for Brown Jr.
And their children will forever live with the stab of pain at losing their fathers. But to lose them on Father’s Day, of all days — it’s a wound that will take a long time to heal in these families.
To make matters worse, on-duty Dallas police officers were ordered to escort Brown Jr.’s funeral procession Friday — 10 to 12 motorcycles and one squad car responded and did their duty, not knowing the procession they were escorting was that of a cop killer.
A deputy chief made the call for this action, and now Dallas officers are outraged.
And rightfully so.
Police escorts of that size are rarely, if ever, called for private, civilian funerals. They are generally reserved for public funerals or those of fallen officers.
And so the pain continues. This action has proved to essentially be a slap in the face of the families of all those officers killed in the line of duty — families like Shaw’s.
The deputy chief’s resignation has been called for by members of the Dallas Police Association.
I second their call.
