Heather Ellis

[AYHJA]

OK, I'm just now hearing about this...And I don't have all the facts yet, but...

Apparently, a sister got arrested for allegedly cutting line at Wal-Mart..?

Seemingly, this is some kind of ridiculous coverup, and probably racist shit, but again, I don't have all the facts...I just think its fucking horrible shit like this still happens..! All Wal-Mart has to do is release the security footage, but they haven't, probably because they don't have it...But...Yet another reason why I dread every dollar I have to spend in that fucking store...Just ridiculous man...

[Skinny Bastard]

I would be a little PO'ed if someone cut in front of me at the checkout line and pushed my items out of the way. I would probably call the person out on it or at the very least, give them the look. I'm sure such actions on my part might even cause the person to escalate further and start some sort of altercation. I'm sure that is what happened here. But, from what I can see, being rude was was not her crime, just the catalyst. It is not illegal to be rude and ignorant of others, it is just a shame.

However, resisting arrest and assaulting a police officer are both illegal. And if the crime calls for a 15 year sentence, then so be it. I'm not going to lose any sleep over it, and it appears that the NAACP isn't either. Now, I'm not saying that that is what happened. It is interesting that the police haven't released the tape. It is equally interesting that the NAACP is NOT involved. I am not so dumb as to believe everything the police say, just because they are the police.... But I am sure there were witnessess as well. Maybe she doesn't have a case.

If she assaulted the officer or resisted arrest, she should drop the race card BS. The problem with the race card is that it has been over played in many situations and has lost some of it's effectiveness in tragedies were it really needs to be called out. Just my 2 cents (possibly influenced by my pissy mood this morning).

[Drew]

The law is the law in this country, and a lot of times, scumbag police officers and citizens incite people into doing things they may not normally have done. It seems there are two completely different sides to this story...and one is filled with recorded events and matters and the other with feelings and doesn't.

The one side is painting the picture of this young African American woman who was the victim of racial discrimination or profiling (I'm not really sure what the racist claim is in this case) and just reacted to her situation. This side of course maintains that she is being arrested and sentenced for cutting in line...which obviously is not the case.

The other side is saying she assaulted an officer, resisted arrest, and disturbed the peace. These are crimes and they carry a prison sentence if convicted.

Unfortunately ...the police are on the second side...so pretty much nothing else matters. No matter what actually happened in the store, no matter how much shit was said to her, and whether or not the police deserved every bit of assault they got....it doesn't matter. She hit (or kicked, or did whatever) to the police and she will be arrested for it. Simple as that.


It sucks, but that's the case no matter the race, age, or gender of the citizen. Now I'm not saying a lot of possibly racist shit didn't go down on the scene....but she chose to attack the police officers...and she'll pay for that. I think everyone wishes we could see everything that happened in the video...and lord knows there are corrupt cops everywhere....but I don't really see a whole lot of hope for her...and don't really understand why this is a news story.

Also...how does this say anything bad about Walmart? I can understand there are some reasons why people don't like the store...but surely this says nothing about Walmart....it could have happened in any grocery store.

[AYHJA]

If someone cut in front of me...Moved my shit out the way, then it would be ME that would need to have charges filed against, not the person that did the cutting...

Again, I don't have all the facts, but I'm curious as to why Wal-Mart won't release the tape...I mean, if this happened in my store, I'd be going the other way of the bad pub...And Wal-Mart especially...But again...

This was 3 years ago...And even if she did everything that they say she did...

15 years..? I mean, really..? THAT'S the racist element I'm referring to...I mean, like I said, facts of the case not withstanding, you're pushing for 15 years..? I know people, personally and literally, that have done less time for murder 1...If she cussed out, spat in the face and shitted on a cops shoes...15 years..? We're spending tax bucks to persue cases like this..? 3 years going..? C'mon now...

Again, if she did all that...They would have released the tape by now...I can't imagine not believing her at this point...If I was accused of doing something and did it, I'd be sulking somewhere, especially if video evidence is present...But this girl and her family have been all over, begging them to release the tape and they won't...So, yeah...I smell bullshit...

[Drew]

" Heather was arrested and charged with trespassing, disturbing the peace, and two felony counts of assaulting a police officer"

I'm not an expert, but I imagine from those charges the figure of 15 years maximum is not out of the question. Will she get 15 years? Probably not. Even if she does, will she serve all 15? Most likely no.

That's just a by the book figure that is used in news articles...but rarely actually goes into practice. We've all heard of people who have committed worse crimes and gotten off easier...but it's futile to even discuss the "15 years" because she hasn't been sentenced to serve any time.....when/if she ever actually gets convicted and sentenced to jail...we'll see how long her actual sentence is and then we can discuss it and if it is racist in nature or not.....until then...it's just a figure pulled out of the books and probably won't get used. Every crime carries a much stiffer maximum sentence than is usually given out, and I do not see this one being any different.

I'm just curious as to why this is coming back now? Granted you may have just stumbled upon it now...but I was surprised to see how old this case was...Has there been some updates that brought this to your attention or were you just doing some diggin and this popped up?

As far as the tape not being released....say what you want, but to me that's neutral. It doesn't incriminate anyone, police, Walmart, or Ellis.

[AYHJA]

Someone pointed it out to me, but like I said, its 3 years old, its still in the news...The girl is still going to court about it...The date is set for tomorrow, so...

Saying the tape is irrelevant is to me, like saying we'll just withhold DNA evidence from a rape case...I mean, the bigger deal is that there is information that could end this case, one way or the other...Reminds me of the 911 Pentagon shit...They say a plane flew into the Pentagon, but immediately confiscated all the video evidence...What's neutral about that..? It stinks..!

Felony assault...Means that she caused bodily harm to one of the police officers...That's not hard to prove...Show me the officers who got they ass whipped...

Trespassing, again, not hard to prove...Where are the witnesses that saw her whipping all this ass..?

DTP...Is a misdemeanor, and probably all she should have been charged with in the first place, if anything...

From the facts that they had on CNN, they said that the cashier put gas on the situation by asking her for I.D. even when she paid with cash, and refused to give her change...

Here's what I think happened...

I think she cut line...I think somebody in the line got huffy, and she basically told them to kiss her ass...The cashier pissed her off further by her action...The cashier checked out everyone that was in the line, holding this woman's change, asking her for I.D., etc. until the cops came...Of course she's pissed off when they get there...Cops are notoriously arrogant, we see it all the time...The police hands you a KKK card..? WTF man...Check out the debate on CNN...

http://snurl.com/ta0bl

[Drew]

Saying the tape is irrelevant is to me, like saying we'll just withhold DNA evidence from a rape case...I mean, the bigger deal is that there is information that could end this case, one way or the other...

I didn't say the tape was irrelevant....I said that the fact that its not being released doesn't incriminate anyone... your analogy is way off base... but to go with it...what I'm saying is...if the hospital was reluctant to release DNA evidence...it doesn't mean that the person is innocent or guilty...or even that the police are trying to cover up some big scandal or something....

It's just the way this shit goes some times...evidence doesn't get released for a while...people don't show tapes.... it's more of a problem with the legal system not demanding a release of them then it is some giant ploy or scheme to frame someone...not that that is what you're implying...but I don't think its a stretch to assume at least some people will.


whoa whoa I just watched the debate and don't understand where you're coming from at all lol.

They said Ellis's people aren't releasing the tapes...clearly if the defense is in posession of them and is refusing to release them...they aren't all out proving this woman's innocence.. the tape is "inconclusive" and only shows the end of the altercation...so it would seem that the tape is thrown out completely.

And the debate also says that there are 3 witnesses backing up the FIVE police officers story about what she did...so what do you mean where are the witnesses?

She's the only one who is telling her side of the story (which doesn't mean she's guilty...but it doesn't seem like her complete innocence is buyable here) I mean she literally said that they picked her up and she lost bodily control and they were forcing her to flail around and kick them.....seriously? I used to tell that lie too when I was younger...that people moved into my fist...I wasn't actually trying to hit them..it was their fault.

I mean this woman is seriously trying to say that they were forcing her to hit them by picking her up and swinging her around?


This seems like a classic case to me...the police are assholes...they incited this woman after she was already mad...and she did some illegal shit to them (resisting arrest and assault) She therefore needs to take responsiblity for her actions and face the charges.

Like the one woman was trying to say "yeah but everyone has their breaking point"...but reaching a breaking poitn doesn't remove your agency from your actions. If someone calls me ugly 100 times...and I kill them ...I'm still up for murder. If they call her the N word and she assaults them...she's getting charged for assault.

Yes police are assholes and yes I believe they had more to do with what she did than they're saying...but I'm sure she had more to do with it than she is saying....and she's on the wrong side of the law, simple as that.

[AYHJA]

Ahh, good to have you back...Indeed...Lets see...

With the analogy, I'm saying its not neurtral...People saying they saw the tape and that its inconclusive is like someone telling me they saw Norbit and it blowed...For the record, I fucking loved Norbit, and want to watch it now...

Why in the hell was there an altercation in the parking lot anyway..? Another reason why this shit stinks...Wal-Mart's policy is that they call the police and let them handle it...So, the cashier stalls this chick out long enough for the cops to come...Lets just say she's in the fucking store acting a FOOL x's 10....Once she's out of the store, how does she get arrested..? She was out, she was leaving, what's all the extra..? What good, legal reason do the cops have to follow her into the parking lot..?

I mean she literally said that they picked her up and she lost bodily control and they were forcing her to flail around and kick them

Lets be logical here...Have you ever dumped, or been dumped..? When I was a kid, we used to wrestle on the playground...The idea, was to simply grain control of the other guy and throw him to the ground...Now me, I hardly ever got dumped, I was a squat, heavy cocky motherfucker...They lunge, I move around, circle, and hit them with the belly to back...When you pick a person up Drew, and attempt to prevent them from coming down on their feet, this is not good for the person being picked up...When your feet are off the ground, you are at the mercy of the person attempting to have you taste playground dirt, aka, out of control...Now, maybe its just me, but if I'm about to be dumped, I'm not in ''brace for impact mode''...I'm trying to figure a way to gain leverage and land on my feet or as close to it as possible...Oh, and BTW, I'm a guy...

You can't imagine a man picking up or handling a girl in a way that she would flail out..? You don't play fight with your girlfriends..? The first thing a girl does when she gets picked up from behind is kick and flail...The cops said they got hit in the shin and on the lip...Now, what's more logical to you, that she was standing toe to toe, dropping muay thai on 2 cops, or that they caught some backlash when they tried to dump her for whatever reason..?

You're right, she was pissed, and the cops did EVERYTHING they could to escalate the situation so that they could take action...Again, this is my whole point, just so that we are clear, I don't think the police are absolved of anything...You want me to believe that a young, black college student in a town where the black to white ratio is 11:1, is standing in a parking lot threatening to whip all kinds of ass..?

If someone calls me ugly 100 times...and I kill them ...I'm still up for murder. If they call her the N word and she assaults them...she's getting charged for assault.

Talk about far out analogies, lol...A policeman is there to upload the peace, period...If he's there handing out fucking KKK cards, calling her the N-bomb, he is WAY out of line...WAY out of line...No badge gives you the right to mistreat people...

[Drew]

I'm not saying that what the police did is right...in fact I've said numerous times that I think its wrong and that police act like assholes inciting people all the time. That doesn't change the fact that she's on the wrong side of the law here.

I'm not including my moral opinion on this matter....I'm simply taking the stance that she's screwed no matter what actually went down. Does the evidence seem a little shaky? Of course it does. Is that going to matter when she has 3 witnesses and 5 cops' word against hers? Not at all.

I'm trying to represent what I think is going to happen to her....not what I think should happen. So I think we're stuck because we're talking about two different things here.

[raum]

http://www.dddnews.com/story/1547759.html

This is a story of when a person's belligerence outweighs their common sense. Chick has anger issues.

I personally think the moral of her story is you don't @#$% with the cops, especially if you are out of state. How can she be a teacher if she can't learn polite compliance with police officers. As for what went down, they don't have to show us the damn tapes. It was not the clerk who called the cops. The security guard responded to the situation, when he observed it. The clerk called the Store Manager. After she was rude and noncompliant, he called the in-store security guard. The security officer happens to also be an off-duty police officer.

HE called the cops when she did not respect the store's desire for her to leave. She showed her ass to him, and he kicked it. That is not wal-mart. That is her being smart with a rent-a-cop, and turns out, he has a badge, too! So he called the on-duty cops. Everyone keeps overlooking that.

The last thing was the cops were talking some shit no doubt, but letting her go, and then she had to get the last word in.
She was out of line, and showed her ass again. That was why they finally came and got her. YOU DO NOT TALK SHIT TO COPS WHEN THEY ARE LETTING YOU GO. It may not be right when you have cops talking shit to you, but you do not want the trouble of calling them on it. When they just let you go from four counts of trespassign and disturbing the peace, you do not suggest to the police that they instead harass “drug dealers and crack heads,” rather than “taxpaying citizens.” Especially not when you are still waiting for you ride. Everyone got that?

The fact is clear, she was acting like she was immune to the law. She is not. Chick watches too many movies and shows where people talk shit to cops. She was invited to plea, a civil thing to do. She said she was going to, and then chose not to, and involved the NAACP. Then her story kept changing, her motivation for deciding this was a racist issue, and the fact her supporters were inconsistent and uninformed... Well, her chance to plea for 1 year probation was something she should have done, but she wanted to be a crusader. Instead she is in it for a minute, as my momma said.

If she had not been invited to a plea, I would say it was racist. But she was. No race card playable on the field. Are cops racist, sure lots are. Alot of em hate the way I dress too. Even others would prolly look for something wrong if they what I am interested in. Cops are a fickle bunch. But a fickle bunch with power to fuck your christmas up!