Pushing back comes with a cost
The two cops had stopped a car being driven by Aaron Roberts. Neubert approached; somehow his arm got trapped inside. When Roberts started driving, Neubert was dragged alongside until his partner, Officer Craig Price, shot Roberts.
Later tox reports revealed that Roberts, a convicted felon who had walked away from a work-release detail, had traces of drugs in his system.
And although an inquest ruled the shooting justified, it was one of a series of fatal confrontations between white cops and minority suspects that fueled mistrust of the police.
Now one cop is pushing back. Neubert has filed suit against the owner of the car — Roberts' mother, Deloris. He's also suing the state, arguing that Roberts should never have been on the street that night.
Am I missing something?
"A lot," Mel Miller told me.
Miller, a King County Sheriff's deputy, should know. In April 2002, while off-duty, Miller killed Robert Thomas Sr. Thomas, his son and his son's girlfriend had stopped their truck in Miller's neighborhood east of Renton. Miller walked out of his house with his gun, confronted Thomas and shot him. Miller later said he saw Thomas reaching for a gun.
Another white cop. Another black victim.
And another inquest that ruled the shooting justified.
"I had a legal right to carry a handgun out there and see what the problem was," Miller said.
But while he was cleared, he still feels a marked man. So he understands Neubert's lawsuit, saying it's "the only opportunity to get due process."
"Greg is a very courageous man," Miller said. "He's trying to do this so the next cop down the line doesn't get screwed."
The two officers haven't met, Miller said, but are members of a "leper colony" of shared experiences: sleepless nights, media scrutiny, fear for your and your family's safety, lost weight, lost hair, lost friends. Rooms go quiet when you enter them. Careers are detoured. Retirement options are reduced. Life is shortened.
If filing a lawsuit eases any of that, so be it, Miller said.
"The system really is stacked against the cop," Miller said. "No matter what we do, we're wrong. And we're not allowed to step out there and say, 'This guy over here is lying.' "
Especially, he said, if the cop is white and the suspect is not.
"The system bends over backwards for special-interest groups and unjustly jumps all over the average white guy."
Miller is back on the job. But the past refuses to stay there. Thomas' family is suing him and the Sheriff's Department for $25 million.
Miller said he'd love to file a suit of his own. "But it would be hard on my wife."
So he'll watch Neubert's suit with special interest.
"He's trying to get a certain sense of vindication," he said. "In the course of the inquest, and the circus around it, you are vilified. It doesn't matter how justified you are, you're going to be painted as wrong.
"Because you survived."
Reach Nicole Brodeur at 206-464-2334 or at nbrodeur@seattletimes.com. More columns at www.seattletimes.com/columnists
She's glad there's no gag order.