The brother of Charles Lee “Cookie” Thornton, who allegedly walked into the Kirkwood city hall today and shot seven people, including the mayor, two city council people, and two police officers, told Channel 4 News tonight that he is “okay” with what his brother did.
“Let me put it in a context that you might understand,” Gerald Thornton told the reporter. “My brother went to war tonight with the people that were of the government that was putting torment and strife into his life.”http://www.pubdef.net/flash_video/cookies_brother.flv
All attempts at sorry justification.
DO NOT LOSE SIGHT, DO NOT BLUR THE LINE, DO NOT EXCUSE.
All that should should be said is the MAN WAS A KILLER.
His “Struggle” with 150 arking tickets had nothing to do with half of the people he killed. Some of them, he had never met. You tell me, why were they party of this? Because they were white automatically makes them part of the establishment? Please…
DO NOT LOSE SIGHT, DO NOT BLUR THE LINE, DO NOT EXCUSE!
KILLER!
Posted by Anonymous | 09. Feb, 2008, 10:49 AMI’m always curious about what the majority of residents REALLY think in Meacham Park. I read an interesting article in the Post stating that many people feel intimidated to speak their minds in that neighborhood out of fear of looking like “Uncle Tom’s.”
I think the annexation of Meacham Park was handled very poorly; the demolition of a large portion of the neighborhood for the shopping center soon after set a bad tone for Kirkwood’s annexation that still seems to resonate. Is it time perhaps for a discussion of Meacham Park becoming an independent city? I don’t know the correct answer, and it doesn’t involve me, but perhaps it is for the better. They would certainly have a strong tax base from the shopping center on S. Kirkwood Rd.
At the end of the day, we must learn to solve our problems without violence. Cookie’s last lawsuit was ridiculous; you do not have the right under the 1st Amendment to scream obscenities at people. It is also coming out that he repeatedly threatened various Kirkwood officials and their families; he even was convicted of assaulting one of the men he later murdered.
Furthermore, we MUST note that many African Americans are speaking out strongly against Cookie’s actions, and are not trying to sugarcoat his crimes as justified. Elliot Davis of Channel 2 is one such individual.
Posted by Non-Kirkwood Resident | 09. Feb, 2008, 12:08 PMIt’s interesting to note that 1/3 of the crowd at the Meacham Park meeting yesterday was white, according to the Post. Look at the pictures of last night’s vigil and how many of Kirkwood’s 7% African American population showed up?
Posted by Anonymous | 09. Feb, 2008, 12:22 PMMy reaction was to be glad there was outraged news coverage—-but I compare the automatic outrage of this to what happened when Tim Bacon was murdered, and I kind of pause—and think—his was not a public spectacle, it was only one person killed, and while there was speculation about the motive being somehow related to the school controversy, it could have been any number of unrelated things.
Still—we need to consider how much we go backwards when we lose our capacity to feel shock and demand answers and explanations to violence. Otherwise—we are headed for the road being traveled in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and pakistan, or any other number of places where five people being murdered causes the reaction “this is pretty much a normal day”.
Posted by kjoe | 09. Feb, 2008, 12:37 PMKirkwood annexed Mecham Park because they wanted to remove the black residents. They didn’t have the legal power to do this until they actually controlled the land. Citizens of Mecham Park voted for this because they believed things would get better. They didn’t obviously as many were removed for shopping. Kirkwood simply wanted to remove the blacks and build a shopping center in order to capture sales tax revenue.
Thousands were displaced by the upper class white establishment. The historically black community, which dates to the 1900′s, was destroyed. I imagine if Dogtown was bulldozed for similar reasons, by perhaps some other ethnic group, then the some of the more conservative Irish wouldn’t sit idly by and allow it.
When government decides to destroy peoples lives don’t be surprised if some of the victims take action.
Posted by Doug Duckworth | 09. Feb, 2008, 1:35 PMWell I guess that’s how the “Cookie” crumbles!
Posted by Anonymous | 09. Feb, 2008, 1:43 PMRemember, you are reading Doug Duckworth’s interpretation of events, not always the facts.
His interpretations are always one-sided.
Posted by Anonymous | 09. Feb, 2008, 2:16 PMA racist coward ambushing unsuspecting people is not war.
Posted by Anonymous | 09. Feb, 2008, 2:36 PMI think we can see that racism isn’t a white man’s disease. It’s apparent among blacks as well.
What can we learn from this tragic occurrence? Complying with laws, ordinances, statutes, and codes minimizes stress in life regardless of race.
Perhaps such ordinances and codes need to be held to a minimum, but until that changes we are all “under the law.” Go to African nations, and you will find restrictive laws and codes.
The loss of innocent lives is never justified, whether those lives be black, white, Native American,or Asian.
We are all flawed human beings. Let’s recognize it in our respective races and stop pointing the fingers at others.
Murder is a heinous crime–no justification whatsover!
I just learned the 80-year old black woman killed by a random gun shooting is the mother of a friend and former colleague of mine. How sad!!!
Posted by A history student | 09. Feb, 2008, 4:26 PManony 10:49 am, I believe we owe it to those who died to understand why this happened and what we could do different as a society, that is not justification, it is reasoning and using the brain you were created with.
America has higher violent crime rates than any other industrialized country. Something is being mishandled in America.
Attitudes like yours, in which you just want to assign blame and walk away is precisely why this problem exists.
No matter what happened with the writing of 150 tickets or anything else that occurred, it is valid to have a discussion about how things could be handled differently to prevent such a tragedy in the future.
Since St. Louis has and will have other transition neighborhoods similar to Meacham, this discussion is important.
The truth is we need to have discussions on all types of violent crime throughout society. We have to get a handle on all of the senseless murders that occur.
For instance there was the Post-Dispatch editor that was recently murdered. Should we handle the parole of prisoners differently? She was murdered by a recent parolee. It is a discussion.
Society has to make adjustments. Other countries successfully maintain low rates of violence, so this is not an impossible task.It is just a question of resolve on the part of the American people.
Posted by GMichaud | 09. Feb, 2008, 9:06 PMWhy else would Kirkwood want the annexation? Do municipalities typically want to increase their number of minorities? Uh not really, especially when they are upper class whites. Dismiss their motivations and you ignore why this tragedy happened and how it could have been prevented.
Posted by Doug Duckworth | 09. Feb, 2008, 11:24 PMAmerica has higher violent crime rates than any other industrialized country. Something is being mishandled in America.
And less restrictive gun control laws than any other industrialized country. Mere correlation or is it causation?
Posted by Anonymous | 10. Feb, 2008, 9:34 AMLet’s put it in perspective.
The brother claiming justification for Thornton’s murderous acts is himself a convicted murderer.
Anything he has to say about excusing murder should rightfully be disregarded
Posted by Anonymous | 10. Feb, 2008, 1:00 PMfktzk”For hundreds of years whites have beat,raped ,killed,enslaved,wrongfully imprisoned and discriminated against blacks and whitefolks get upset when they get a payback for their history of misdeeds!”
Anon, that is racism at its core. Your idea that payback righfully goes to anyone of light skin color simply because of the color of their skin is exactly the part about racism that’s ugly. It blames people for the color of their skin and not the character of their soul. Read some MLKing before you go spouting off.
Posted by Gasman | 10. Feb, 2008, 1:28 PMI wholeheartedly agree with GMichauds’ comments. Clearly how Cookie chose to deal with his situation was unworthy of praise or justification. However; every city can learn from this and practice more consideration in dealing with it’s citizens. Meachum Park has been ignored and it’s resident have been treated poorly. As one friend of Cookies’ said, it was like he was family and he went out to kill other family members. If he was treated more like family rather than a nuisance maybe he would have been directed to some help for both his anguish and for his business.
Posted by Anonymous | 11. Feb, 2008, 1:52 PMWhat about the racially insensitive remarks made by JC Corcoron about UE Vice President Marks. He got two weeks off (vacation?) and may have inspired others to start picking employees off if they were upset about something as petty as missing a football game. UE’s Vice President is far more articulate and intelligent than JC and should be given a lot more respect.
Posted by Anonymous | 11. Feb, 2008, 2:19 PMBushido Hacks, I OWE YOU A BEER!!!
You put it beautifully!!!!
Posted by Todd Ritchie | 12. Feb, 2008, 5:04 PM2196R-03589-01 – ST V GERALD THORNTON
Description: Voluntary Manslaughter { Felony B RSMo: 565.023 }
Date: 07/07/1996 Code: 1004100 Disposition: Jury Verdict-Guilty – 10/17/1997
OCN: 94044867 Arresting Agency: BEL RIDGE PD
Sentence
Sentence: Incarceration DOC
Sentence Date: 12/05/1997 Start Date: 12/05/1997 Length: 6 Years
Text: MISSOURI DEPT. OF CORRECTIONS
Next Charge/Judgment
Description: Armed Criminal Action { Felony Unclassified RSMo: 571.015 }
Date: 07/07/1996 Code: 3101000 Disposition: Jury Verdict-Guilty – 10/17/1997
OCN: 94044867 Arresting Agency: BEL RIDGE PD
Sentence
Sentence: Incarceration DOC
Sentence Date: 12/05/1997 Start Date: 12/05/1997 Length: 3 Years
Text: MISSOURI DEPT. OF CORRECTIONS
Posted by Gerald Thornton | 12. Feb, 2008, 8:55 PM