We believe the dying words of Timothy McCree Johnson. We don’t think he was reaching for anything when he was shot by a “fearful” Fairfax County police officer as he ran away from him on a March evening in 2023. We do think the governor of Virginia is reaching when he states that freeing the former officer who killed Johnson is “in the interest of justice.”

Earlier, this week, Gov. Glenn Youngkin, commuted the sentence of Wesley Shifflett. He was sentenced for recklessly discharging a firearm by a Fairfax County Court, after a long trial process that saw him acquitted of voluntary manslaughter.

Fired from his job before the conviction, Shifflet was serving a five-year sentence, with two years suspended and an additional five years of probation, until the governor got involved, reversing a decision he called “unjust.”

What kind of “justice” are we talking about here? The kind that lets a police officer, whose reckless actions caused the death of a man, walk away without facing the consequences? It’s hard to see this as anything but another slap in the face to those seeking accountability in law enforcement.

The governor continues, “I am convinced that the court’s sentence of incarceration is unjust and violates the cornerstone of our justice system—that similarly situated individuals receive proportionate sentences.” 

So what’s the governor really saying?

Is he suggesting when a police officer takes a life, the rules shouldn’t apply the same way they do for everyone else? Or that since other police officers have dodged consequences for killing black men, this one should as well?

If that’s the case, then the message is clear: some lives matter more than others, and some people are allowed to escape the consequences of their actions because of the uniform they wear. That’s not justice.

Whoever thinks so, is doing some serious reaching.