Cop Who Killed Kelly Thomas Gets Calmly Booted From Denny’s by Other Patrons

A couple of weeks after
being acquitted of beating an unarmed homeless man to death in
Fullerton, California, former police officer Manuel Ramos
decided to throw on his SoCal t-shirt and pop out to the local
Denny’s.

Looks like the locals weren’t quite as ready as the courts to
forgive and forget this:

On the evening of July 5, 2011, the Fullerton Police Department
received a call that someone was trying to break into cars at the
town bus depot. Ramos and another officer arrived on the scene and
encountered Thomas, a mentally ill local who Ramos had met before.
(Thomas wasn’t breaking into any vehicles.) When he didn’t obey
Ramos’ commands to put his hands on his knees, Ramos started
swinging his baton at Thomas’ legs. Soon six officers, including
Cicinelli, were on the scene, crushing and pounding the unarmed
man. Cicinelli later recounted that he hit Thomas’ face 20 times
with a Taser.

So when Ramos hit up Denny’s last month, someone
posted this account on Facebook:

Alongside it, this photo of Ramos slugging his beer (UPDATE: or
water?) as he got up to leave:

Well played, Denny’s patrons. Reason‘s own Jacob Sullum
has convincingly
made the case why Ramos shouldn’t be retried for the killing,
but three cheers for non-violent social censure where the justice
system failed. 

Reason and Reason TV have
been all over the Kelly Thomas case. Check out a couple of the
videos to learn more about the story: