by Steed Dropout
May 10, 2013
LETTER TO BERKELEY POLICE CHIEF MICHAEL K. MEEHAN:
[Editor's Note: When Xavier Kayla Moore,41, a troubled 350 lb. transsexual died Feb. 12 in police custody, cop opponents called them "murderers." Medical evidence recently released absolves the police. Chief Meehan is nuts over film.]
Thanks for having Jenn hand over the saggy 348 page report in the Xavier Moore death-in-custody controversy. Fortunately, some of the pages are duds.
The report would make a great movie.
The Moore case recalls the film, Stars 80 (Fosse, ’83) and Sunset Boulevard (Wilder,’50), where the stars die before the film’s time-line begins.
We never lose hope that the star (Moore), to whom we become increasingly attached — will somehow survive.
We replay the story-line looking for ways to save the star. If only this; if only that.
What if Berkeley Mental Health’s mobile crisis team had been called instead of police? Their phone response closed five hours before Moore’s crisis. But even if they had responded, Moore might have been resistant, and the police called.
If only two of responding officers who had been called by Moore’s mother months before had befriended Moore on a “welfare check” (but they were unable to make contact). Moore might have recognized them that night as the welfare-check friends Berkeley cops can be.
Moore had cooperated with police in previous 5150s, but, as her ex-boyfriend testified, she was “different that night.”
If only Moore had cleared her outstanding warrant and not faced arrest.
But Moore — a threat to himself and others — could not have avoided arrest for mental evaluation. Moore saw people who weren’t there and babbled about the FBI and Dinosaurs.
The ex described Moore’s talk as “ziggity-boom.”
What if Moore’s ex-boyfriend had not been driven to jail, reducing the number of first-response officers from three to two? If Moore had been sooner restrained (the additional officer might have helped), perhaps Moore would have been subjected to less stress?
Then again, the presence of the ex-boyfriend just aroused Moore’s anger. Removing the ex was an on-site tactics decision, difficult to challenge if you weren’t there.
This is after-movie popcorn talk. Moore was a medical disaster waiting to break. In addition to Moore’s alcohol and toxic drug cocktail consumption, Moore had an enlarged heart and was grossly obese, (a short 300 plus).
In his drugged state, Moore was so strong he exhausted arresting officers in a struggle that “seemed [to last] forever.”
He had untreated high blood-pressure, a detail not known to the coroner.
MEMORABLE SCENES
The Struggle: Moore screaming at high pitch, “no, no, I won’t go.” Moore, no underwear, in leopard-skin tube top and matching wrap-around skirt loses his skirt in the struggle. Arriving officer makes it a threesome on the floor-futon, as the struggle continues.
Third officer to arrive on scene notices Moore is having difficulty breathing
Breathing check. Moore passes.
Breathing check. Moore fails and CPR commences.
An exhausted, sweat-drenched, limping officer who had grappled with Moore, refuses relief and drives to the hospital to be of help.
A crack-pipe falls from Moore’s extended pony-tail during the pathologist’s exam.
Police canvass Moore’s more-than-fifty neighbors, document and archive the crime scene. Most were not aware of the crisis, but some report shouts of a scuffle.
We see two posted notes, one in the living room, another in the kitchen: “A bitch ain’t shit (both).”
The signs, if Moore’s, recalls the enigma of Rosebud, Citizen Kane’s boyhood sled.
Moore’s step-mother tells of Moore’s coma-inducing bike-car accident (at four), after which he became constantly angry.
“A bitch ain’t shit.”
Moore in treatment in the Haight while transitioning to female. Moore’s step-mother calls police months before the crisis reporting that stress from gender pressures is endangering Moore’s precarious mental health.
ENTER MYSTERY WOMAN
Angel is a mystery woman like Laura (’44, Preminger) or Kim Novak (Vertigo, ’58, Hitchcock). We learn that she was Moore’s transgendered girlfriend but had left the apartment hours before the crisis.
Angel could explain Moore’s state of mind.
Did Moore admire Angel because she had undergone gender re-assignment surgery?
“A Bitch ain’t shit.” What did it mean?
But repeated attempts to find Angel fail as the investigation winds down.
CREDITS
Produced and Directed by Berkeley Police Chief Michael K. Meehan
Publicist: Jennifer Coats
Story: BPD
Starring: As officer’s names roll, background, a montage starring Moore rolls foreground.
We see Moore in earlier days when she weighed 270; she’s almost child-like. She’s reading her poetry, singing, dancing gracefully, wrapped in a colorful sarong.
Footage of angry protesters at BPD headquarters in February, hatred in their eyes.
Pan to sign from protest after BPD report released this week: “HELL-NO; WE DON’T ACCEPT THE REPORT!”
I arrived at just before three in Tilden Park for a ceremony inducting the Dalai Lama, his holiness, in Berkeley's Rotary Club's Peace Grove, near the peak in Tilden Peak. If you follow the peace grove sign, you'll fall into a gulch, left. Maybe that's why the grove is 'off-the-beaten path.' Attendance at past peace grove inductions has, reportedly, declined in recent years. I wondered if the ceremony would come off. I didn't check the staging area for the event (deserted) because I hiked up from a different start.
He thought so, but he admitted that his doctors had been less than candid about the downside to his survival.
