If what happened to William K. Rush has any relevance it must be seen in the context of a minimal set of facts. He was not an educated man. He worked hard in the construction trade to support his family and occasionally drank too much on weekends and his only experience with the legal system was a parking violation and two speeding tickets. His generally affable nature belied the fact that he had been a Ranger in the Army, and was no stranger to the stress of combat; but that was many years ago. His upbringing, and that of his siblings, had been rough; he was the only one in his immediate family that had anything close to a normal family life.

A year ago on a Friday night, as was his custom, Bill Rush stopped by the bank to deposit his paycheck and get some cash. Shortly after he entered the bank two men came it to rob it. At some point an alarm was given and one of the robbers, armed with a rifle, attacked a woman lying on the floor next to Mr. Rush, whereupon he somehow got the man’s rifle away from him and shot to death both robbers. Mr. Rush was Caucasian and both of the robbers were African American. There had been in that community some recent allegations of police brutality against African American men and as a result of this publicity and the repeated playing of some surveillance videotape of the bank robbery on the local news channels, there was a push by some groups to have Mr. Rush prosecuted for killing the robbers. The county DA refused to indite and political pressure was brought for a Federal prosecution based upon a Civil Rights violation. These are the only facts of the case upon which everyone was in agreement.

Mr. Silas Delany, the younger of the two robbers, was a senior in high school and no one who knew him could ever understand how he came to be in that bank. His maternal aunt and uncle had raised him in a good home and he had no known gang connections and other than a couple of suspensions for minor discipline problems at school had not been in any trouble with the law. Perhaps it was as simple as poor neighborhoods and the lure of easy money.

Mr. Antwon Speck, on the other hand, was a bad man by almost any standard a society would apply. He had a history of repeated offences, many of them violent, and was known wherever he went as a troublemaker. He had been incarcerated multiple times and showed no inclination to change that pattern. His only living relative was a sister who never understood why they kept letting him out of prison. She was never involved in the trial.

The last person to testify at the trial of Mr. Rush was Mr. Rush himself. Not being familiar with legal proceeding he could not understand why his lawyer did not want him to testify for he assumed that the jury would want to hear his take on things and so he demanded that his attorney put him on the stand.

William K. Rush stood and walked to the stand. He knew that he needed to make a good impression and that he must suppress the fire within him. He placed his hand upon the Bible but could not hear a thing until the pounding in his ears subsided.

J. Ted Bartlett, Bill’s lawyer, approached. "Now Bill I want you to tell us, in your own words, what happened that day at the bank."

"I went into the bank to put my check in, like I done ever Friday after work. While I’m waitin’ there these two men come in to rob it. They made us all to lie down on the floor and in a little bit there’s all these sirens and commotion outside. Reckon someone must have set off one of the alarms. Anyway, these two knuckleheads is runnin’ around like crazy sayin’ as how they’re going to shoot anyone that doesn’t do exactly like they say…can you hear me OK?"

"Well, this woman lying on the floor next to me, she’s cryin’ and carryin’ on to beat hell and one of the robbers, the short one with the beard, comes over and he tells her to shut the hell up. You can see she’s tryin’ but without much luck so he slaps her in the side of the head with the butt of his rifle. The other one starts hollering at him and I can tell from the sound that he’s clear on the other side of the bank. Now the short one is standin’ over me."

"Yea, that one. He’s standing over me so I kick him right in the … Can I say that in court? I mean where I kicked him?"

"That’s it. I kicked him hard to. As hard as I could. And as he fell over I grabbed his rifle and I got up and shot the other one."

"The other one, the one I kicked, I guess he seen what was goin’ on and he grabbed at me, so I shot him too."

"I’m not for sure. My ears was ringing from shooting the one so close to me on the floor. There was people runnin’ all over the place and pretty soon the police grabbed me and threw me to the floor. Like to busted my head open."

"Well I had the rifle. I couldn’t hear what they was hollerin’ at me… I guess they thought I might be one of the robbers."

"They took me outside and sat me in one of their cars, all handcuffed and such and bye and bye they figured out I wasn’t one of the robbers. But they didn’t let me go. On account of killin’ them two men they said."

"That county prosecutor guy said it was mostly a formality because men had been killed. They let me go the next day."

"And now you’re on trial, in Federal court, not for killing two men who were committing a felony by robbing a bank, but for violating a man’s civil rights."

"Some of the people in the bank were upset. Some got sick. It’s not a pretty sight, someone getting shot at close range."

"Now Bill, the prosecution contends that you violated Mr. Speck’s civil rights. They say that you took his life after the crisis was over. What they’re saying is that Mr. Speck was incapacitated to the extent that he could not harm you and, understanding that, you killed him. And that you killed him, at least partly, because he was a Black man. What I want you to do now is focus in on the time frame. Tell us exactly what you’re reaction was when Mr. Speck grabbed your leg."

"I don’t know. It’s like a reflex. Something you do without thinking. I got a temper and I’ll be the first to admit it, and I wouldn’t try to tell anyone that I was some hero or nothin’ such as that… I… I’ll just be damned if I’ll lay down peaceful on the floor and let one of them put a bullet in me. The man had already beat on the woman next to me with his rifle. He grabbed me and I shot him. I don’t know what else to say…"

"So let me focus on the relevant section of that tape. The section where we see Mr. Speck grab at your leg and then gets shot."

Mr. Kensington with the help of some attendants moved a large TV screen to the front of the room. He played a short section of the tape, blown up so that the pictures are big but very grainy. He played the same section of the tape three times.

"It looks to me, Mr. Rush, after many viewings, that you are in total control of the situation. Wouldn’t you agree?"

Mr. Kensington played the same section of tape again three times. "The man, Mr. Speck, grabs at your leg and you appear to look down and pause for a moment and then you bring the rifle barrel down and shoot. Aren’t we all seeing the same thing?"

"Well the way you’re showing that picture, blown up and slowed way down, I could have just as easy ran home for dinner and come back later to shoot him."

There was a laugh from the gallery and Mr. Kensington was noticeably perturbed. "You find this amusing, Mr. Rush? You find watching a tape of a man being executed something to joke about!"

Bill Rush looked over toward his attorney. "Can’t you object or something? He’s calling this an execution. Damn!"

Mr. Kensington spoke up again. "Mr. Rush, you do understand that the law does not allow you to take another persons life because he is robbing a bank."

"I didn’t shoot him because he was robbing the bank. I…"

"Mr. Rush, you must answer my questions with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer unless you are told otherwise."

"OK."

"I don’t think of them that way. Some I like and some I don’t like. Same as with most folks. But you’re barking up the wrong tree if you’re supposin’ I killed them men ‘cause they was black."

"Mr. Rush you must answer my questions with a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ answer unless I instruct you differently. Is that clear?"

"You can drop the ‘sir’. You have a brother named Roy who lives in Maryland, near Baltimore?"

"Mr. Rush, didn’t your brother, an officer in the Ku Klux Klan, call you the other night to congratulate you on…let’s see how does it go here…oh yes, on blowing away those two Spades."

"No? On December 23, two years ago, didn’t you and your brother attend a meeting of the Ku Klux Klan? A simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, Mr. Rush."

"Now see here, dammit! You want to make out like I’m some kind of racist skinhead Nazi or some such. That was supposed to be a lodge meeting… I didn’t know…"

"Order! Order! Mr. Rush…"

"Judge, I ain’t like my brother… He got fifty dollars for whoever he could get to that meeting. He didn’t tell me what it really was because he knows I would not have…"

"You are directed to give a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, Mr. Rush. I won’t warn you again, is that clear?"

"No! It ain’t clear your honor. How can I go right along when he’s trying to make out like I killed a man because he’s black. That ain’t the truth of it…"

The judge talked to both lawyers for some minutes and then Bill’s lawyer came over to him. "I’m sorry, Bill. I know how you feel but this is how it’s done. Mr. Kensington has some more questions and, like we talked about before, he’s going to be tough on you. That’s his job. He has to show the other side of it."

"But win or lose, he gets paid and goes home. Why don’t he just ask me straight out if I killed them men because they were black and I’ll answer him straight out and the jury can believe me or not. Why all this bullshit?"

"If you don’t do what the judge says he can put you in jail. And he can finish this without you."

"Son-of-a-bitch, Ted. I honest to God ain’t done nothin’ wrong. Half the guys I work with is black. Why don’t they bring them in here instead of the ones outside that scream at me whenever I come in or leave?"

"Our time is up. Now remember, Bill, just answer his questions like he wants and go on…"

"In fact, according to your service record you’re an expert with this rifle. The very same rifle used in the bank hold-up. So when you shot Mr. Delany with this rifle at approximately sixty-one feet, right through the mouth, you knew what you were doing did you not?"

"There is another shooting much less in doubt, which I want to ask you about. You testified, with admirable brevity, that when Mr. Speck grabbed you by the leg you shot him. How far away from you was he?"

"This is the coroner’s report. It says here that the fatal shot was fired from a distance not more than four to six inches away Mr. Rush. Point blank! You don’t deny that do you?"

"Mr. Rush, after you incapacitated Mr. Speck with a kick to the groin, and then shot Mr. Delany, did you feel that your life was in imminent danger?"

"I didn’t think about it. I wasn’t going to give him back his rifle, if that’s what you mean."

"Mr. Rush, if you didn’t feel that Mr. Speck could take your life, at that very moment, then under the law you could not kill him. So the relevant question here is did you feel at that very moment that Mr. Speck was going to kill you?"

"How in the hell could a person know that? I mean if a man points a gun at you and demands your money what are you supposed to do, call Legal Aid. Isn’t there some presumption under your law that if some Son-of-a-bitch sticks a gun in your face he might use it?"

"Only because I took it away from him. And I thought he was trying to get it back."

"Facts, Mr. Rush! We want to deal in facts! We know Mr. Speck was unarmed. We don’t know what he was trying to do or not trying to do. And because you killed him we can’t ask him can we?"

"Fine. I’m all for facts! I went into the bank to cash my paycheck. Just why in the hell did your Mr. Speck stop in."

"So it is not likely the Mr. Speck, having just been kicked in the groin seconds before, was much of a threat to you. Isn’t that so?"

"He was a threat to me the minute he came in that bank. I wasn’t there to rob him."

"And that’s why you killed Mr. Speck, isn’t it? Not because he robbed a bank, not even because he hit Mrs. Blaylock with a rifle; but because you were angry! Isn’t that so, Mr. Rush?"

"You killed a man Mr. Rush. You took away the most precious of civil rights, the right to live, because he was a black bank robber and you were angry!"

"You don’t wand to know what went on! You don’t care what really happened. You want to win a case. I shot both of them because I was scared to death and mad as hell! You’re goddamned right! I was angry!"

"Them sons-of-bitches give up what ever rights they had when they come in there to rob that bank. And they damn well didn’t seem to have a problem using your deadly force. You can’t have it both ways."

"You think a man can’t give up his rights? You point a loaded rifle at me you better pull the trigger, even if it’s just to preserve your civil rights!"

William K. Rush was convicted of violating Mr. Speck’s civil rights. He was fined five thousand dollars and given a suspended sentence.