Obey Little. Resist Even Less.

Further investigation in the Dawes case

Comments (0) By Michael Lacey Wednesday, Feb 28 1990

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Second Officer: "Yeah, well, I would too, but if they are gonna decline to do that, we need to know that in the next few minutes."

Officer on the scene: "No, they will decline if we, if we, uh, ask them to decline it, I think they will. If we ask them to take it, they will take it . . . "

Second Officer: " . . . The press isn't on you yet, I assume?"
Officer on the scene: "No, but . . . the press isn't out here but it will be. Well, in fact, I'll have radio call out Allan Schmidt."

Second Officer: "Yeah."
Officer on the scene: "So we can make a press release on this."
Second Officer: "I think we better get him out there."

The more time you spend looking into the killing of Jeffrey Dawes, the more you appreciate how important public-relations mouthpiece Sergeant Allan Schmidt is to the state police.

Officer French was quite explicit: Jeffrey Dawes was not resisting arrest.

If the truth is that Officer French's mistake led to a wrongful death, Officer French still prefers the truth to dishonesty.

Understanding just how thrilling teenagers find a chase is not the same as excusing it.

A seven-year-old interview with Ralph Milstead makes it very clear why this shooting must not be whitewashed.

Both officers were screaming orders at Dawes.