Ongoing U.S Police Brutality and Corruption Discussion Thread

Marvin Gaye sang about "trigger happy policing" in 1971

call me old fashioned but there's wayyyyyy too many 'watch this person get murdered' videos on the internet than I care for..

I think you mean "mass-viewings of lynchings are back in vogue, only now people can view them from their phones and don't have to physically congregate in the same space to watch"

call me old fashioned but there's wayyyyyy too many 'watch this person get murdered' videos on the internet than I care for..

i agree. the thing started autoplaying while i was reading shaun king's twitter feed. i should have looked away.

oh boy this definitely gets the copspeak award this month. A kid was killed by a bullet. Also, some cops opened fire nearby
(v @daricsnyder) pic.twitter.com/A8xG8if0WB

— Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) June 23, 2017

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/off-duty-st-louis-officer-injured-by-friendly-fire-after/article_761b9cc4-75d1-5023-a38f-c4096f99d114.html

Black police officer comes out of his house to render possible aid at a car crash/crime scene, is ordered to ground by other officers. They then confirm he's a cop, tell him he can get up. Another officer who had just arrived on the scene immediately draws his gun and shoots him, in the arm.

i get that the police are individually and institutionally racist. but why are they such cowards?

fuck, Georgia: http://www.11alive.com/news/investigations/the-drug-whisperer/437061710

"our officers are more reliable than drug tests." man, fuck youuuuuuuuu. one of the uncomfortable truths we've all agreed upon is that sometimes, people who have committed a crime go free because you can't prove it. maybe there are people driving stoned that you can't arrest. arresting sober people "just in case" to make up for that = not going to solve anything.

I can attest there have been many times after waking up after an apnea-esque disrupted sleep that one could confuse me w/ someone who was stoned.

not enough crime, gotta make some up
too much crime, gotta not report it

indicators

like they're fuckin drug dogs sniffin you out or somethin

This is all reminiscent of this: https://wrongfulconvictionsblog.org/2012/03/02/arson-investigation-after-decades-of-junk-science/

(note: I know nothing about this site or its credibility; it was the first one I found that referenced the issues I remember dimly from an article I read a few years ago about a dude falsely jailed for arson due to a fire investigator who was 100% wrong and refused to believe the scientific refutation that resulted in the dude's exoneration)

DJP this one? http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/09/07/trial-by-fire

Now that I read it, they reference the story I was half-remembering; the dude was actually executed and the state wouldn't exonerate him despite the mounting evidence that the argument used to convict him was wrong.

xp: yes caek, that one

just spent my commute reading that. wow.

it's just like, the idea that scientific tests that don't prove the alleged's guilt also don't necessarily prove their innocence isn't necessarily incorrect (on a case-by-case basis), but the extrapolation of "a hunch should supercede the evidence" is downright terrifying. Like, ok, you still think they did it even though the test suggests otherwise - release them! Otherwise, who are we protecting if we're ok with executing innocent people?

yes, none of that is mindblowing, but I'm a bit terrified of anti-science becoming an even bigger thing in the police community (even remember shivering when Nifong suggested the Duke students were guilty of rape because "DNA evidence clearing them doesn't mean anything").

(aware he was the DA and not police but still)

anti-science is huge in the law enforcement community, including attorneys on both sides. forensics is mostly a sham

Judge Harry Edwards summarizes it rather well - this was after the NAS report in 2009 that basically said "oh wow, this community of practitioners is in need of serious help"

https://www.jstor.org/stable/41307115?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

So then the Obama administration stood up a National Commission on Forensic Sciences between DOJ and NIST, that Jeff Sessions shuttered in April, because he's a fucking cunt.

The frustrating thing about the recent shooting in MN is not the liberal concern about what the police have been doing; it's the conservative concern.

The situation is horrifying and tragic and I hope the officer involved is indicted, but it's incredibly painful to see a near-universal outcry over this in the wake of the one-sided outcry over Philando Castile (and the outcome of that situation).

One could argue that these people should show some consistency; I would argue that they are. They are consistently showing their support for white supremacy. I hate that white supremacy has affected me to the point where this tragedy is sharing headspace with unkind thoughts about people who will mourn the shooting of a dog or a gorilla before they mourn the shooting of a black person. I don't want to be that person; I don't want to live in this society. Everything, including me, needs to change.

The answer to the problem of police-driven lynchings is not "expand the target population that gets lynched".

Last night, there was a flurry of police activity outside my house. Normally, I would go down and talk to the police, largely to ascertain if something was happening that I needed to be concerned about and to introduce myself by proxy as a resident of the neighborhood to the officers responding to the situation. In the wake of everything that's been publicized over the past few years, I chose instead to turn up the volume on the TV and hope/pray no one started shooting.

you got "Man in the Mirror" stuck in my head.

It is a grim thing to think of the admittedly great, positive message behind that song and to juxtapose it against how Michael Jackson chose to implement it upon himself.

Well, this is a grim thread.

I am thankful on a nearly daily basis that the DCPD and other local LE have not (yet) become whatever the hell it is the PDs in the rest of the country are devolving into. US Capitol Police notwithstanding.

I was gonna say; if the problem under discussion was that the police are indiscriminately gunning down EVERYONE, opposing the current state of affairs wouldn't be controversial because it would also affect a larger number of white people.

― ¶ (DJP), Thursday, September 29, 2016 12:15 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

less then a year for things to begin to swing this way

Last references to Homan Square itt were from two years back; new, awful details just released via a Guardian investigation

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/19/homan-square-chicago-police-disappeared-thousands

NYPD sergeants union shamelessly cried "blue racism"

https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/8/22/16179930/blue-racism-police

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-prepares-to-lift-limits-on-military-gear-for-police/2017/08/27/3dee004c-8b86-11e7-9c53-6a169beb0953_story.html

Documents obtained by The Associated Press indicate Trump was preparing to sign an executive order undoing an Obama administration directive that restricted police agencies’ access to grenade launchers, bullet-proof vests, riot shields, firearms, ammunition and other surplus military equipment.

Trump’s order would fully restore the program under which “assets that would otherwise be scrapped can be repurposed to help state, local, and tribal law enforcement better protect public safety and reduce crime,” according to the documents.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions could outline the changes during a Monday speech to the national conference of the Fraternal Order of Police in Nashville, Tennessee, a person familiar with the matter said.

President Barack Obama issued an executive order in 2015 that severely limited the surplus program, partly triggered by public outrage over the use of military gear during protests in Ferguson, Missouri, following the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown. Police responded in riot gear and deployed tear gas, dogs and armored vehicles. At times they also pointed assault rifles at protesters.

Obama’s order prohibited the federal government from providing grenade launchers, bayonets, tracked armored vehicles, weaponized aircraft and vehicles, and firearms and ammunition of .50-caliber or greater to police. As of December, the agency overseeing the program had recalled at least 100 grenade launchers, more than 1,600 bayonets and 126 tracked vehicles — those that run on continuous, tank-like tracks instead of wheels — that were provided through the program.

Trump vowed to rescind the executive order in a written response to a Fraternal Order of Police questionnaire that helped him win an endorsement from the organization of rank-and-file officers. He reiterated his promise during a gathering of police officers in July, saying the equipment still on the streets is being put to good use.

Last references to Homan Square itt were from two years back; new, awful details just released via a Guardian investigation

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/19/homan-square-chicago-police-disappeared-thousands

― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), Friday, 11 August 2017 01:16 (two weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

that article is itself from two years ago though

well at least he's honest

http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Remember-we-only-shoot-black-people-Georgia-12164011.php

FTP

http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/01/health/utah-nurse-arrest-police-video/index.html

Read about that on Splinter yesterday, was unable to think clearly for several minutes.

The full video of the Utah nurse's arrest was making me crazy. I don't think I would have held it together under intimidation.

*under that intimidation

St Louis police assault an elderly woman for protesting the St Louis police pic.twitter.com/wxoU5U28Yt

— jordan 🌹🌹 (@JordanUhl) September 16, 2017

Things are starting to remind me of this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8awXGkgW1vI

violence "breaks out" AFTER police kill someone and not WHEN they killed someone is one of the more Orwellian cliches of our time pic.twitter.com/jd9POmhls4

— Adam H. Johnson (@adamjohnsonNYC) September 19, 2017

come the FUCK ON

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/oklahoma-city-police-shoot-kill-deaf-man-holding-pipe/

"we didnt hear the people shouting 'he can't hear you'".

if only there were some other ways to observe when someone clearly isn't processing what you're saying.

but the officers didn't hear the witnesses

That's all that's going to be needed to avoid charges or get an acquittal, I suppose.

Okay folks, dare I say we almost have a 'light' story here on this front, almost. The third paragraph below being the key one.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/suffolk-county-da-thomas-spota-top-assistant-indicted-feds-article-1.3588145

Longtime Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota and a top assistant have been indicted by the feds on "shocking and appalling" charges that they tried covering up a disgraced police chief's brutal beating of a suspect.

Brooklyn federal prosecutors unveiled the charges against the Long Island lawman Wednesday, saying he and his high-ranking lieutenant colluded on how to conceal James Burke's 2012 pummeling of a handcuffed man inside a Smithtown police precinct.

The beating victim, Christopher Loeb, made the mistake of breaking into the wrong vehicle—Burke's police-issued SUV—and swiping the police big's sex toys, a porn video, a gun belt, cigars and a humidor. Burke threatened him with a "hot shot"—slang for a lethal heroin overdose.

The Greatest Story Ever Told

also on the lighter side but the operation they fucked up sounds like standard corrupt asset-seizure shit.

http://www.newsweek.com/detroit-cops-fight-each-other-very-embarrassing-undercover-mix-710270

At least six detectives in 67 Precinct probed for planting guns; two who quit rather than justify themselves. A phantom "informant." A riot. DA quietly dropping cases because no one trusts these cops. How is this not a bigger story?! https://t.co/hlZnhkBBXe

— Harry Siegel (@harrysiegel) November 28, 2017

that's this

Scoop: Two cops quit NYPD, as years-long saga of officers planting guns on men in East Flatbush continues… From @rparascandola @NYDailyNews https://t.co/MnjxatvA15 pic.twitter.com/MXfiAC4Nc6

— Harry Siegel (@harrysiegel) November 28, 2017

http://abcnews.go.com/US/cop-michael-slager-faces-19-24-years-prison/story?id=51595376&cid=clicksource_4380645_2_three_posts_card_hed

^^^ I was not expecting this.

I honestly wonder if his lawyers were.

I, weirdly, feel some amount of empathy toward Slager since he put in a guilty plea to this civil charge? Like, maybe dude isn't 100% irredeemable if he can admit to the wrongness of his actions? I also was not expecting to have this reaction.

was the guilty plea strategic due to thinking the second trial may not result in a mistrial and trying to minimize the damage? (which I guess Ned might have been getting at)?