Openly gay police officer Jesus Retana was among those wounded in Thursday night sniper ambush shooting in Dallas,TX that left five officers dead and at least 7 others police officers wounded.
Retana, has worked for Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) for the past 10 years. Retana has been married since 2008 to Andrew Moss a former DART police officer. Moss, who left DART in 2010 for health reasons, had successfully led the fight for DART to provide insurance benefits for same-sex partners.
During the night of the sniper attack gunfire erupted just before 9 p.m., aimed at officers who were monitoring a demonstration by thousands of people protesting the fatal shootings earlier in the week of 2 black men by police officers in Minnesota and Louisiana.
During a standoff that lasted for hours after the attack, the sniper said he wanted to kill more officers, and claimed — apparently falsely — to have planted explosives in the area, and told police negotiators that “he was upset about Black Lives Matter,” the Dallas police chief, David O. Brown, said on Friday.
“He said he was upset about the recent police shootings,” Chief Brown said. “The suspect said he was upset at white people. The suspect stated he wanted to kill white people, especially white officers.”
Jesus has been released from the hospital and is now recovering from home. He has declined any interviews.
A peaceful vigil held in remembrance of the victims of the Orlando terror attack earlier this week at the University of Missouri was sidetracked this week by insensitivity and personal agendas as one of the speakers began denouncing white attendees and an angry gay male couple began shouting back.
College Fix was on the scene and got it all on camera “I was really nervous to get up here because there’s a lot of white people in the crowd,” an activist said. “That wasn’t a joke,” she added after a few nervous chuckles.
She continued to complain that the large group of white people who had come out for a vigil to support and remember those killed in Orlando butnever came out to support Black Lives Matter protests. “ I wish this many people came out to our racial demonstrations and our Black Lives Matter movements. As much as it’s awesome that so many of you are here today, it’s like, who are you really here for?” she asked.
The activist identified as Tiffany Melecio continued: “I don’t want to stand up here and be angry, because this isn’t for me, this isn’t for you, it’s for the people that we lost, and the people that we lose tomorrow, and the people that lost yesterday. But I thought I’d take a moment to list out some facts that many of you probably don’t know because you’re white”.
Melecio says she prepared a speech beforehand, but wrote it with a different community in mind. Her community. The social justice community she grew in over the past five years at Mizzou.
But a gay couple in the audience spoke up and let their feeling be heard and were escorted form the vigil for it.
“We’re all hurt,” Brizendine says. “But I’m tired of our community, and I’m not talking about just the LGBTQ community here, but also our community in Columbia, our community in Mizzou … everything has to be divided into color.”
Brizendine’s husband agreed.
“I expected a community to come to gather … everyone,” Brizendine said . “Right here on this stage, they are segregating us as a community,”
As a Black woman and a proud American, I find her to be disgusting and classless and a narcissistic racist. 49 of our fellow Americans, right here on American soil, were slaughtered in a terrorist attack this past weekend and she stands up on a stage in front of those in mourning and spew this racist garbage?! She says “I was really nervous to get up here because there’s a lot of white people in the crowd”, but the shooter in the massacre in Orlando, where mainly minorities were killed, was not White, he was born to Afghanistan parents. So why is she so “nervous” about standing in front of a White crowd?! I bet she wouldn’t go in front of a crowd of people from Afghanistan or any crowd of people who are from a predominately Muslim country who are mourning the loss of their fellow-heritage/nation/race and spew this divisive and racist garbage. She is a self-serving disgusting human being. And oh yes, no race, including Black, Hispanic, Asian, Indian or of Middle-Eastern decent, are exempt from being a racist or making racist comments. Look up the definition of racism. Her picture should be there.
