Police have body cameras and vehicle cameras that can provide much of the rest of the context. The public doesn't have access to that video and the police don't release it save when it reinforces their narrative.
If the police were blameless here, they have lots of tools to clear their name.
So what does this leave us with? A story designed to inflame. Complicating matters more is that the couple were actually big donators to BLM and the DNC, which adds more layers to the narrative, but of course this isn’t mentioned and we are meant to assume they are Trump voters (even though that doesn’t make a difference legally, it makes a difference narratively)
EDIT: and the happy-go-lucky censors downvote into oblivion, proving my point.
I’ve seen no evidence of guns from the protestors, just the racist Karen and Ken.
https://twitter.com/averyrisch/status/1277398535973949440
So no, not a "standoff". Such behavior is certainly sufficient grounds to dismiss any claims of self-defense - lethal force is justified in self-defense when a reasonable person would perceive a threat of imminent death or significant bodily harm; but if you believe something to be a source of such a grave threat, why would you run at it?
There's significant documentary evidence of the incident on video, starting ~27:50: https://www.facebook.com/derk.brown.5/videos/154551737227670...
There's also some dispute about the legal disposition of the property on which protesters may have been protesting, but at worst it appears to be a private street. Just because it is a private property doesn't mean it was their private property, to defend with threats of lethal violence. Being a member of the HOA and paying your dues doesn't give legal title to treat property as your own.
https://www.facebook.com/kim.mason.716/posts/102190071407824...
And then, of course, that gate isn't destroyed in any of the videos from the scene. There are photos showing a destroyed gate - which looks identical - so it clearly was destroyed at some point. But the relevant question is whether that already happened before the confrontation, and it doesn't look like it did.
As for the guy's claim that he is a BLM supporter - you can judge the veracity of that for yourself, based on this:
https://www.fec.gov/data/receipts/individual-contributions/?...
(and then, perhaps, derive a heuristic to judge his other claims)
Is it true though? I saw police actions that looked bad on video, but having been on the scene earlier that day I knew the context that cast it in a very different light. And yet no counter-evidence was published. They did not clear their name, despite being in the right (or much more right than the video shown).
Witness accounts: https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/gwa2ub/seattle_pol...
I was there earlier and I saw a scared resident trying to drive home through that gate. A protester right next to me made a snide remark about the "expensive" car and proposed blocking the gate. The gate was not blocked that time, but given the video they did it later for some other vehicle.
Two things I conclude from this:
1. The police do not necessarily publish exculpating evidence for their own actions.
2. You wouldn't know what happened if you were not there.
This latter point I cannot emphasize enough - I was there often and last Thursday I realized that one can make/edit enough material to support any point of view.
Their actions police here are openly antagonistic, even with the context you've given.
I can't hear what the police are saying to the protesters, can you?
That's context.
The police actions appear mildly questionable, I'll give you that. But we lack context to understand what happened here.
The problem here is that both sides are defensive of themselves. This is precisely why understanding context and nuance is important, because each is incentivized to favor their own viewpoint.
Context which justifies the police's actions.
Yes, they do have a lot of tools to clear their name. We've seen quite a few occasions where various departments have provided body-cam or dash cam footage showing that force was indeed justified. Generally speaking when they have provided that footage, it's muted the reactions to specific events.
> I saw police actions that looked bad on video
You'd have to ask the respective agencies why they haven't shared any body-cam footage which might exonerate them.