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Post 23 Jul 2016, 2:08 am

GMTom wrote:Nope, the problem is people who feel "entitled" and do not comply!
Yeah. They probably believe rubbish like this:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Or

"No person shall ... be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law"

Notice I said we would have FEW problems if they complied, there will always be a few problems of course, but the vast majority would simply go away.
So how do you get a seriously ill person, a deaf person or a severely autistic person to comply? Or someone under the influence of drink or drugs, even?

Of course we all agree the two sides should work together, of course we agree force should be proportional, etc but the cop must assume some things and their life is on the line. What we have are those who refuse to listen to officers and are getting shot because of it.
Refusal to comply is not the same as being a deadly threat. And perhaps it's the assumptions that officers make that is the problem. If they are assuming greater threat than there really is, then they will overreact.


What do we do?
Get people to comply!
I would have no problem with educating people WHY they need to comply and the reasons for it, let it be known that citizens do have recourse for unlawful demands and the police are accountable but compliance is paramount. we currently have a lot of thugs who think they are above having to listen to an officer, they also have no problem assaulting an officer. That behavior will get you shot, armed or not yet they keep doing it and when harmed we hear how an unarmed man was shot by a cop, nothing more. Disobeying these orders does not give police carte blanche to do as they will, nobody ever said that but it certainly puts that person at risk of having serious consequences follow and depending on the circumstances, yeah, it could include being shot. Police sometimes go too far, absolutely and again, you have recourse for this!
So no suggestions from you as to how the police can improve trust in them individually and as a body? No suggestions that they use respect rather than fear? No looking into whether behaviour on the part of officers contributes to escalating situations from a simple traffic stop to violence?

How about moving away from traffic stops and increasing the use of cameras and other detection for speeding or minor offences?

as far as the link and feeling the cops had 'stab proof" shirts...really?
You want to let them lunge at an officer before being stopped? I don't believe their faces are stab proof nor their necks, arms, legs, etc.
any sort of "armor" is for protection only and not meant to actually welcome attack. If a cop is wearing a bullet proof vest should he allow himself to be shot at before retaliating? ...absolutely not!
It is not retaliation if it is pre-emptive.

This may not be a popular position, but to me, the police have a job to protect society, including with their lives. Similar to soldiers. Of course we should not support cop killers. And any time someone kills a cop the law should be applied fully. When seven cops confront a guy with a knife, they have an upper hand even without guns. Don't self-defence classes include the scenario of having to deal with a knife wielding attacker any more?
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Post 23 Jul 2016, 8:39 am

danivon wrote:As I said before, suing afterwards is a poor solution. As is what happens in this case - the cop resigned (and so presumably can't be disciplined).

What about prevention of injustice?


"Redress" of grievances is guaranteed in the Constitution (BoR).

"Prevention" of grievances is mandated, but there's really no way to prevent someone from doing the wrong thing.

However, if you watch nearly all police interactions resulting in death or GBI, the person does not cooperate with the instructions of the police. The sainted Rodney King is an example. He led the police on a chase, then did not passively comply with instructions.

Should he have been beaten?

No.

Did he cooperate?

No.

He got a big civil settlement.
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Post 23 Jul 2016, 11:08 am

I guess I don't expect the police to fight a guy with a knife hand--to--hand. That is too risky. But lethal force should be a last resort. And they should be using good tactics to avoid using lethal force and there has to be a willingness to accept some level of risk. What do I mean by that? A lot of people are being shot that are actually unarmed. White people and black people. Any possible imaginary risk to the officer is not good enough. Police officers have to have a certain amount of courage to wait until a suspect does something that poses a lethal threat to him. Sure an unarmed guy can be justifiably shot in some circumstances (e.g, there's a car chase and guy comes out of his car towards police and reached quickly into waistband), but it has to be an act that poses a lethal threat right now, not what if the suspect did this, what if he reached for a gun.

Take the two examples referenced here. First, the guy with the knife. The police had two viable options. They could have unleashed the dog or they could have one officer try to tase the guy covered by another. They chose the worst possible option of having a dog agitate the suspect and make him less likely to put down the knife for fear the dog would attack but unwilling to use the dog. That's bad tactics.

Then there was the autistic kid with his counselor. The police officer imagined something was going on so he fired upon an autistic kid and a behavioral counselor.

Here is an interesting article which discusses a lot of aspects of this issue. One of the cases it discusses includes the shooting of a white kid while he was lying on the ground. Other involved the shooting of a white kid in Michigan while he was lying on the ground. No amount of money is going to help those parents deal with that. Or the black kid in Cleveland with a bb gun shot within 2 seconds of the police getting there. The list goes on and on.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nati ... story.html
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Post 25 Jul 2016, 6:13 am

You guys posting against the police are simply in the wrong, common sense is against you, the actual laws are against you and the courts are against you. I point out police have a right to make commands, that's simply a FACT.

I very clearly keep saying they must have reasons for their commands and can of course be sued if they go beyond their authority yet we get nonsense postings about how I think it's something else. Please read what was written.

I also never said all police are saints, some (like that autistic counselor situation) are bad. The police ion these situations will be sued and will lose. Citizens have recourse, the police must and almost always do follow a great deal of restraint. But they are the ones facing danger and they need to quickly decide when their life is threatened. The courts will give great latitude in this process as they should, this means citizens must follow orders or POSSIBLY face something much worse than they expected and depending on the situation, it could be deadly and the police could be in the right. This does not give police carte blanche to do as they like, of course not. But one runs the risk of some real bad stuff coming their way by ignoring a police command.
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Post 25 Jul 2016, 6:55 am

Honestly, I don't know what you're reading, Tom. When you respond in vague generalities instead of responding to actual arguments then it makes almost it impossible to respond to and I am not going to respond. If you want to take an argument l that was made by Owen or myself and critique it then maybe we could get somewhere. But here I would have to repeat my argument and show how you are not responding to it and I am not going to bother doing that. It's really not that hard to take an argument that was actually made and respond directly to it.
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Post 25 Jul 2016, 11:07 am

GMTom wrote:You guys posting against the police are simply in the wrong, common sense is against you, the actual laws are against you and the courts are against you. I point out police have a right to make commands, that's simply a FACT.
Common sense means cops can shoot at an autistic man because he doesn't comply with "commands" (and hey "accidentally" hitting the carer who is complying but also trying to explain that the autistic guy only has a toy truck, not a gun)?

Oh, they can sue. Either of the citizens could have been killed. The autistic guy is apparently heavily traumatised, the police explanations make little sense, but hey, "they can sue". So all is well.

I asked if you had any suggestions other than "comply with police commands". All you respond with is the assertion that I am "wrong".

It still strikes me as the sort of advice you get in fascist regimes, rather than freedom-loving democracies.
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Post 25 Jul 2016, 11:49 am

Freeman,
You posted the following
[quote]Let me see if I have your position right, Tom:

(1) People should comply;
(2) if they don't comply then whatever happens is their fault (if they're still alive they can sue if they are still sore about what happened...)
(3) We should not really care about what police do when people do not comply because that would have never happened if they did comply.[/quote
even though I never said any of that, excuse me if I get upset you purposely misleading what i actually said!

Danivon
Citizens have recourse
you can do little else. Police must use such power only when necessary and you agree there are times when this is required. They must have that authority but only when required, the only way to allow both is to allow the police to be sued.

You simply can't have it any other way. We had few problems until people started to ignore commands and actually be foolish enough to attack the police. Liberal attitudes then side with these morons because, heck, they were not armed so the police must be wrong and when courts rule in favor of the police the liberals agree riots are appropriate responses?
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Post 25 Jul 2016, 4:59 pm

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/2016/07/23/faith-ekakitie-iowa-city-police-pokemon-go/87473984/

Ekakitie is from Ontario, Canada. Do you see what happens when you comply? Nobody got hurt, and the misunderstanding is resolved. Even with headphones on...
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Post 26 Jul 2016, 12:50 pm

freeman3 wrote:I guess I don't expect the police to fight a guy with a knife hand--to--hand. That is too risky. But lethal force should be a last resort. And they should be using good tactics to avoid using lethal force and there has to be a willingness to accept some level of risk. What do I mean by that? A lot of people are being shot that are actually unarmed. White people and black people. Any possible imaginary risk to the officer is not good enough. Police officers have to have a certain amount of courage to wait until a suspect does something that poses a lethal threat to him. Sure an unarmed guy can be justifiably shot in some circumstances (e.g, there's a car chase and guy comes out of his car towards police and reached quickly into waistband), but it has to be an act that poses a lethal threat right now, not what if the suspect did this, what if he reached for a gun.


Every situation has to be considered separately.

For example, let's say there is a 110 lb. police officer and a 300 lb. suspect lowers his head and starts charging from 20 yards. What would you like the officer to do? Run? Try to dodge the suspect? Take his/her lumps and hope the suspect relents before the officer is pummeled to death or has his/her weapon taken away?

For the record, tasers are not a cure-all. Sometimes, you miss with a dart. When that happens, there is no effect. In some small percentage of instances, the taser has no effect. If you're by yourself, you won't get another chance.

Most of the officers I've known do have some courage. Some are cowards. Getting cowards fired is not as easy as it should be.
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Post 27 Jul 2016, 5:17 am

GMTom wrote:Danivon
Citizens have recourse
you can do little else. Police must use such power only when necessary and you agree there are times when this is required. They must have that authority but only when required, the only way to allow both is to allow the police to be sued.

You simply can't have it any other way. We had few problems until people started to ignore commands and actually be foolish enough to attack the police. Liberal attitudes then side with these morons because, heck, they were not armed so the police must be wrong and when courts rule in favor of the police the liberals agree riots are appropriate responses?
Sorry, but there are alternatives / complements to just allowing the police to be sued. And by all means do that - and of course the US being a litigious society already does, but that does not appear to have solved the issue alone.

As well as the post-incident ability to launch a civil action, there are all kinds of options. Better proactive monitoring of police behaviour. Independent investigation into complaints against officers. Better training. Stricter disciplinary codes. As DF points out, it is hard to get rid of bad cops - make it easier.

Now, those may not be palatable to cops, or their unions, and it may be problematic in the US which has very few independent public bodies, but it is a better alternative than the status quo, or saying that people should comply or accept the consequences, even when not every citizen has the capacity to comply, and in some cases has a Constitutional Right not to.
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Post 27 Jul 2016, 8:21 am

That is an interesting point that DF brings up. Why is it difficult to get rid of bad cops. Danivon is right. It is the unions, and not just with cops. If there is a bad employee, he/she should be terminated. If falsely terminated, that can come out in a lawsuit.

Side note:
All the Freddie Gray case accused have had the cases thrown out or found innocent.
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Post 28 Jul 2016, 5:51 am

danivon wrote:As well as the post-incident ability to launch a civil action, there are all kinds of options. Better proactive monitoring of police behaviour. Independent investigation into complaints against officers. Better training. Stricter disciplinary codes. As DF points out, it is hard to get rid of bad cops - make it easier.

Now, those may not be palatable to cops, or their unions, and it may be problematic in the US which has very few independent public bodies, but it is a better alternative than the status quo, or saying that people should comply or accept the consequences, even when not every citizen has the capacity to comply, and in some cases has a Constitutional Right not to.


1. Independent investigation. This is fine. Go ahead. There can never be too many government jobs, I suppose.

2. Better training. This would help in some cases. However, you can train until your eyes bleed, but if you don't have the right people, it won't matter. I still get promotion lists from my old department. Some of the people getting promoted to fairly high rank used to work for me. Some of them . . . are lucky to have jobs. The problem with that department for the last 20 years has been leadership that was more interested in making sure everyone was PC than making sure everyone was trained to do the job. The promotion lists reflect the "rainbow" atmosphere of the department, but not the highest caliber of people.

3. Stricter disciplinary codes. It is an odd thing that an "accident" can cost you days off as a police officer. It is more probable that an officer will do days off without pay for a traffic accident than for minor excessive force. The discipline system is often capricious and biased.

More to your point (I believe): it should be easier to fire people, but 95% of the time it is clear these people should be fired early on. However, with the expense involved to recruit and hire, our department was timid in this respect, particularly with female and minority officers. A bad officer won't get better. Some of them, frankly, have little common sense. You can't teach that.

4. Civil service laws may have to be weakened. You won't be able to do that with JUST cops.

5. Anyone who doesn't comply with the orders of an officer (and, enough with the asterisk and 'what if' arguments) is a moron and deserves what they get. Sorry. I comply with orders, even when they are illegal. Why? Because I don't want to get hit, beat or shot. You may not like that, but the alternative is the civilians telling the cops what to do (on the street). Someone has to be "in charge."
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Post 28 Jul 2016, 6:05 am

bbauska wrote:That is an interesting point that DF brings up. Why is it difficult to get rid of bad cops. Danivon is right. It is the unions, and not just with cops. If there is a bad employee, he/she should be terminated. If falsely terminated, that can come out in a lawsuit.


Why is it difficult?

1. Laziness. It is easier to pass people through than to do all the necessary documentation. When I got someone fired, it was a lot of work. And, I had to get supervisors on other shifts to do some work as well. It was nearly a part-time job for me. It needed to happen, but it was difficult.

2. There are protected classes. I caught someone violating our ethics rules in an egregious manner. When I went to my supervisor, the next thing I heard was that supervisor telling the subject, "Don't worry about it, girlfriend. We got your back."

3. The odds of getting falsely terminated are near zero. It would take a supervisor with a personal grudge to do this. Is it possible? Sure, but extremely unlikely.

Side note:
All the Freddie Gray case accused have had the cases thrown out or found innocent.


The prosecutor was abominable yesterday. She said part of the problem was that the prosecution could not choose a jury trial.

Um, the Constitution guarantees that to the defendant!

She also said the coroner ruled Gray's death was "a homicide." That does not mean the cops killed him. That's what she had to prove. It's that nasty old Constitution again.

She was unprofessional and embarrassing.
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Post 12 Aug 2016, 11:15 am

They might be winning the prosecutions in the Gray case, but the Baltimore PD gets withering criticism in the DOJ report.

http://civilrights.baltimorecity.gov/si ... -FINAL.pdf
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Post 12 Aug 2016, 11:41 am

Regarding getting of bad cops, I have to chuckle at how Brad seeks to blame liberal beliefs (unions) for causing problems with police because they cannot get rid of bad cops. Anyway, obviously I don't have first-hand knowledge with regard to how police agencies work to get rid of bad cops--I'll defer to DF on that--but I see a couple of difficulties: (1) the police (along with the fire department and the military) are increasingly treated as a superior class (not by minorities of course but by white middle-class and up communities)--this makes it difficult for any external control of police because they have strong political allies to resist such interference, and (2) even good cops want to make it very tough to get rid of a cop; they have very valuable pensions and they want to have tenure-like protection from being fired. Teachers like tenure, even good teachers who would be never fired. Unless you are going to get rid of cop pensions, the police are going to resist getting rid of bad cops except in egregious cases. Put another way, they would rather tolerate having some not so good cops rather than risk getting fired and losing their pension because they have a supervisor who doesn't like them. (And no I am not advocating getting rid of police pensions but the higher the stakes are with regard to getting fired, the higher the bar the police are going to want with regard to getting rid of a cop.)