There is no acceptable reason to shoot someone dead in the street. He was an ICU nurse who spent his life helping others. He posed no imminent threat. And yet they killed him anyway.

No trial. No jury. No chance to face his accusers or answer for whatever he was alleged to have done. Just summary execution in the street.

This breaks my heart. This cannot be who we are as a people, as a nation. We are better than this—or we must be.

We cannot stay silent.

Because next, it will be us.

When we allow the state to bypass due process for anyone—no matter what they’re accused of—we normalize that power. We create precedent. We build the infrastructure of injustice that can turn on anyone. The protections we fail to defend for others are the same protections we’ll need when our turn comes.

This isn’t abstract. This is how democratic norms erode. First they come for those we’re told deserve it. Then they come for those who speak up. Then they come for anyone who’s in the way. The categories expand. The justifications multiply. And by the time we realize we needed those safeguards, they’re already gone.

Speaking out isn’t just about this nurse, this case, this moment. It’s about refusing to accept a world where anyone can be killed in the street without trial. It’s about insisting that due process isn’t conditional, that human dignity isn’t negotiable, that justice requires more than uniforms and allegations.

Silence is complicity. And complicity makes us all vulnerable.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​