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meat sweats posted:The cops play a huge role in creating and maintaining the system and people choose to become cops knowing what the system is. This causes a spiral effect where bad cops and bad politics reinforce each other. It's not handed down from above without anyone choosing to do it. I'm not sure what you mean by bad cops and bad politicians reinforcing each other: do you mean like my example of the SFPD classifying homicides as suicides because that's what the DA and mayor wanted? Because to me, that's an exact example of how you have to have change at the political level if you want permanent change at the police level. Trabisnikof posted:"What is the point of 'assigning blame' to the murderer, instead of looking at the reasons why they had motivation to commit murder?" - Said no cop ever. Motivation is actually one of the main things that cops investigate in a murder. I mean, I know what you were trying to be sarcastic about, it's just kind of funny it wound up like that. Motivation for murder is something you have to establish for murder, and we differentiate between different motivations in terms of criminal penalty. But also, I do think that our approach to crime would be better if we thought less about 'assigning blame' and more about addressing systemic sociological problems--like ending the war on drugs. I'd rather there were fewer murderers, rather than more murderers caught. GROVER CURES HOUSE posted:Literally this entire thread, mostly because you keep cargo culting the socratic method. I'm arguing not only in completely good faith but talking bog-standard sociology. To fix something that's part of a system, especially something that's heavily influenced by another part of the system, like the police, you have to address the parts that feed into them: the prosecutors office, the judiciary, and the laws that they're enforcing. This is just common goddamn sense, and it's really ridiculous that there's this kind of paranoid offense being taken at it. I've never said that short-term solutions should be put on hold, just that long-terms solutions are necessary. This is, again, just straightforward common sense. None of this absolves any cop who roughs up a suspect or fails to report on a suspect being roughed up, or takes a bribe, or does anything else unfit. But if you want to transform the police, you have to look at the way they engage with the rest of the legal system.
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Aug 2, 2014 19:09
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One time I attended a lecture given by a Court of Appeals judge and former prosecutor. He allowed that the entire Court of Appeals grew suspicious of all the sufficiency of the evidence appeals they were receiving that involved some suspiciously convenient unrecorded confessions from one particular detective. They (the Court of Appeals) never did anything about this of course, and by the time their interest had really piqued, the problem had solved itself. Because that detective had been promoted to a command position. His logic was that this now former detective would no longer be in an investigatory position. So, there wouldn't be any more suspicious unrecorded confessions from him. He genuinely told a room full of defense attorneys and prosecutors, without a trace of irony or self-awareness, that this was somehow a proper solution. And it seemed to him to be an absolute fait accompli that the Court of Appeals had no other role in any solution to that problem. I sat with the defense attorneys and we all shared incredulous looks.
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Aug 2, 2014 19:46
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Obdicut posted:I'm not sure what you mean by bad cops and bad politicians reinforcing each other: do you mean like my example of the SFPD classifying homicides as suicides because that's what the DA and mayor wanted? Because to me, that's an exact example of how you have to have change at the political level if you want permanent change at the police level. The political level is the police level when police unions have huge influence over what the law is. The political level is the police level when police departments are staffed by people who think applying for a job where covering up murder is all in a day's work is a great idea. This is the 20th time this has been pointed out, you just ignore it because you learned the word "systems" yesterday.
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Aug 3, 2014 12:56
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meat sweats posted:The political level is the police level when police unions have huge influence over what the law is. They have a lot of influence in some cities, but no, our political system is not controlled by the police. quote:The political level is the police level when police departments are staffed by people who think applying for a job where covering up murder is all in a day's work is a great idea. This doesn't make any sense. How does that make the police level the political level? quote:This is the 20th time this has been pointed out, you just ignore it because you learned the word "systems" yesterday. I don't 'ignore' it, I take issue with it because it makes zero sense. Even if we granted what you said was absolutely true, that every person applying to become a cop thought that covering up murder is all in a days work and a great idea--which, again, I don't know why you need to indulge in this sort of hyperbole, it just makes you look like an idiot--that wouldn't mean the police level was the political level. The political level, to be clear, is the level of people who are elected or appointed and actually make laws and/or interpret them, like legislators, judges, DAs, etc. These people are not police, they have influence over the police, and in order to reform the police you need to also reform these positions. I doubt, really, that you actually disagree with that statement.
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Aug 3, 2014 13:10
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We've successfully driven out most of the moderate voices from this thread at this point (I hope some are still lurking) and are pretty close to chasing off anyone who suggests anything other than police are evil and we should get rid of them. Can we please cool it with the ad hominem attacks? Otherwise we're going to end up with the Cops Makin' Me LOL thread  again only in D&D.
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Aug 3, 2014 15:23
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KernelSlanders posted:We've successfully driven out most of the moderate voices from this thread at this point (I hope some are still lurking) and are pretty close to chasing off anyone who suggests anything other than police are evil and we should get rid of them. Can we please cool it with the ad hominem attacks? Otherwise we're going to end up with the Cops Makin' Me LOL thread Yeah, I'm pretty much done with the thread if the idea that in order to reform the cops you have to reform other parts of the system too is treated like some sort of buffoonish sophmorism rather than, like, completely obviously true.
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Aug 3, 2014 15:55
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I'm interested in the theory that there was a "general breakdown in society" in the 70s due to lack of prosecution. Is there any weight to that claim?
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Aug 3, 2014 16:18
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Obdicut posted:Yeah, I'm pretty much done with the thread if the idea that in order to reform the cops you have to reform other parts of the system too is treated like some sort of buffoonish sophmorism rather than, like, completely obviously true. The problem with you is that whenever someone suggests "Hey maybe lapel cameras would be cool and if a cop murders a bro with like some kind of street execution he should like...go to prison for a period of time?" you come rocketing in insisting that until we solve the other parts of the system (aside from the cop murder part) we can't do anything about Patrolman Executetheunderclass. It gets sort of old. Fast.
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Aug 3, 2014 16:21
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LeJackal posted:The problem with you is that whenever someone suggests "Hey maybe lapel cameras would be cool and if a cop murders a bro with like some kind of street execution he should like...go to prison for a period of time?" you come rocketing in insisting that until we solve the other parts of the system (aside from the cop murder part) we can't do anything about Patrolman Executetheunderclass. This doesn't happen, though. Point out a single time that I've said that until we solve another part of the system we can't do anything about police abuses. Go for it. Radbot posted:I'm interested in the theory that there was a "general breakdown in society" in the 70s due to lack of prosecution. Is there any weight to that claim? I really doubt it. It's a pretty extreme claim. I mean, like, is this nationally, or in particular cities, or what? Obdicut fucked around with this message at 16:59 on Aug 3, 2014 |
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Aug 3, 2014 16:56
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Obdicut posted:This doesn't happen, though. Point out a single time that I've said that until we solve another part of the system we can't do anything about police abuses. Go for it. Point out a single time that you've argued in good faith and actually addressed someone else's points rather than redirecting and demanding they do the work of your argument for you. All the while flopping back and forth between 'all my cop friends are good guys!' and completely absolving individual officers of any responsibility for their own actions.
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Aug 3, 2014 18:22
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Liquid Communism posted:Point out a single time that you've argued in good faith and actually addressed someone else's points rather than redirecting and demanding they do the work of your argument for you. Sure. Someone else said: quote:The justice and legal system are their own separate issues. But there's plenty of police abuse independent of that. Take something like civil asset forfeiture. This kind of use was never envisioned when these laws were written a couple hundred years ago for dealing with high-seas piracy. Asset forfeiture isn't driven by lawmakers or prosecutors; they don't get anything out of it because there aren't even any prosecutions. It's just police departments abusing a law to enrich themselves. And I replied: quote:The police didn't find 'one weird trick' that allowed them to seize property. It was heavily championed by Reagan and his White House, and Bush senior and junior--and probably clinton--and you'll find legislators supporting it vocally these days. That it's an old law doesn't mean that the legislature couldn't change the law if they wanted to. And prosecutors benefit from asset forfeiture too. For one thing, it strips the defendants of assets they could use to defend themselves in the case. For another, prosecutors want convictions. Having highly-funded cops help them get convictions. Prosecutors like, and argue strongly for, the asset forfeiture program. So do legislators. This deals with his points: He says that nobody imagined that anyone would use this law for asset forfeiture. I pointed out that if this use of the law was problematic for legislators, they could fix it. They claimed prosecutors don't get anything out of asset forfeiture--I showed how they do. What about my response was redirecting or demanding someone else do work for me? quote:All the while flopping back and forth between 'all my cop friends are good guys!' and completely absolving individual officers of any responsibility for their own actions. I haven't absolved a single cop for any action. If you think I have, point it out. You can't, because I haven't. I also don't think the fact that I have two cop friends who are good guys means anything about the rest of cops; the reason I brought them up is to point out that cops joining corrupt departments probably know what they're getting into, and that cops joining departments with reputations of being above-board likewise. But again: Point out a single time I've said that any officer isn't responsible for their actions. Go for it. So far, nobody has actually stepped up and shown an example of me doing the things they've accused me of doing.
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Aug 3, 2014 18:35
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Obdicut posted:But again: Point out a single time I've said that any officer isn't responsible for their actions. Go for it. So far, nobody has actually stepped up and shown an example of me doing the things they've accused me of doing. No, you haven't come out and said they're not responsible. Your framing is exquisite, you just deflect and redirect. Obdicut posted:being upset about lovely police work really doesn't solve anything.
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Aug 3, 2014 18:38
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SedanChair posted:No, you haven't come out and said they're not responsible. Your framing is exquisite, you just deflect and redirect. Its a classic trick really, instead of engaging on the issue deflect by criticizing those that are "upset". Remember we shouldn't blame cops for covering up a murder, there were political considerations! If we get "upset" about anything, it should be at a nebulous and hard to define "system" rather than the people taking immoral or unethical actions.
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Aug 3, 2014 18:42
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Trabisnikof posted:Its a classic trick really, instead of engaging on the issue deflect by criticizing those that are "upset". Remember we shouldn't blame cops for covering up a murder, there were political considerations! If we get "upset" about anything, it should be at a nebulous and hard to define "system" rather than the people taking immoral or unethical actions. You can blame them if you want. If you want to reform the police, though, you're going to have to do things beyond blaming the police. Classic trick. And by 'nebulous and hard to define system', you mean things that I've concretely pointed out, like prosecutors being a political position, drug laws, asset forfeiture laws, etc? I will readily admit that the anti-'criminal' bias in our society is nebulous and hard to fix, but I've pointed out plenty of concrete things, too. SedanChair posted:No, you haven't come out and said they're not responsible. Your framing is exquisite, you just deflect and redirect. Nope, I've never said they're not responsible. If you want to back this claim up, point out where I've said they're not responsible. You can't, because I haven't. What I have said is that even if you completely reformed the police, as long as the rest of the system remained the same, the cops would eventually get to the state they're at today. If we reformed police but left drug laws, prosecutors, and the rest of the criminal system in place, eventually the situation would return to what it is now. I'd love it if just one person could show an example of me actually doing what they're accusing me of. \/\/\/\/\/\/ Trabisnikof posted:I actually think that if police had to take responsibility for their actions it would in fact be a big step in police reform. Can you describe how this 'taking responsibility' would work? How it would happen? Obdicut fucked around with this message at 18:48 on Aug 3, 2014 |
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Aug 3, 2014 18:45
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Obdicut posted:You can blame them if you want. If you want to reform the police, though, you're going to have to do things beyond blaming the police. I actually think that if police had to take responsibility for their actions it would in fact be a big step in police reform.
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Aug 3, 2014 18:46
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Obdicut posted:Nope, I've never said they're not responsible. If you want to back this claim up, point out where I've said they're not responsible. You can't, because I haven't. Apparently you are too far up your own rear end to read words anymore because that's what I just said. You are too evasive to come out and say that they are not responsible. You just spend a lot of time talking about everything else in the world and how it matters so much more.
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Aug 3, 2014 19:03
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SedanChair posted:Apparently you are too far up your own rear end to read words anymore because that's what I just said. You are too evasive to come out and say that they are not responsible. You just spend a lot of time talking about everything else in the world and how it matters so much more. Sorry for misreading you. It's true that I 'redirect', in that I fundamentally disagree with the idea that police can be reformed on a long-term basis without reforming other parts of the justice system. This is because it is what I honestly believe and I am arguing that straightforwardly. This isn't, actually, a bad thing in an argument. It does mean I disagree with your position.
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Aug 3, 2014 19:07
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Obdicut posted:Sorry for misreading you. So what you're basically stating here is that you admit, albeit in a very slippery way, that you're just setting up straw men repeatedly? Because let's be clear: I don't think anyone in this thread honestly believes that we'll all live in some Pax Americana wonderland if we just fired all cops. But that's what you keep arguing over. Every time someone attempts to assert there are very specifically identified problems with the police: be it militarization, tendancies towards escalation of situations, bully mentality - every single time you insist that the problem can only be solved with reform of (poorly defined other stuff) and there's no point in attempting to fix immediate problems because why bother when there are other problems, too. This is a tacit defense that the police have done no wrong. When a bully is sitting on your chest beating the everloving gently caress out of you, the first thing you have to do to solve the problem is stop him from hitting you. The root causes of his actions(his father had poor sex education in rural alabama and got his mother knocked up before they graduated, which meant he couldn't achieve higher education and thus was left as a member of the poor underclass, combined with a family history of mental disorder which led to aggressive, even violent behavior only exacerbated when the economy hit a recession and he got downsized from his basic labor job and spent his days drinking cheap beer and wailing on our bully, who has only learned in his lifetime that violence is the way to express your existential angst, and thus is currently sitting on your chest turning your face into hamburger not because he's actually mad at you but because he doesn't know any better) don't really matter. The governor in his office isn't murdering civilians on the streets, that's the cops. The prosecutor's office isn't flashbanging infants in their cribs, that's the cops. Yes, there are larger, systemic problems at play I think we all agree. But until we can stop that boot from stamping, it's going to be really hard to reform the rest of the system.
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Aug 3, 2014 19:40
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Cuntpunch posted:So what you're basically stating here is that you admit, albeit in a very slippery way, that you're just setting up straw men repeatedly? Not in the least. quote:Because let's be clear: I don't think anyone in this thread honestly believes that we'll all live in some Pax Americana wonderland if we just fired all cops. But that's what you keep arguing over. Every time someone attempts to assert there are very specifically identified problems with the police: be it militarization, tendancies towards escalation of situations, bully mentality - every single time you insist that the problem can only be solved with reform of (poorly defined other stuff) and there's no point in attempting to fix immediate problems because why bother when there are other problems, too. Except I don't. I have never, ever said there's no point in fixing immediate problems. If you think I have, prove it. Quote me saying there's no point in fixing an immediate problem. quote:This is a tacit defense that the police have done no wrong. No, it's saying that the wrong that the police do is part of a larger system of wrong. quote:When a bully is sitting on your chest beating the everloving gently caress out of you, the first thing you have to do to solve the problem is stop him from hitting you. The root causes of his actions(his father had poor sex education in rural alabama and got his mother knocked up before they graduated, which meant he couldn't achieve higher education and thus was left as a member of the poor underclass, combined with a family history of mental disorder which led to aggressive, even violent behavior only exacerbated when the economy hit a recession and he got downsized from his basic labor job and spent his days drinking cheap beer and wailing on our bully, who has only learned in his lifetime that violence is the way to express your existential angst, and thus is currently sitting on your chest turning your face into hamburger not because he's actually mad at you but because he doesn't know any better) don't really matter. I agree with all of this. If you want to solve the problem of one individual bully, or one individual bad cop, the solutoin is simple: get the bully off/arrest the cop. If you want to solve the systematic problem of bullying and of bad cops, you need to have a systematic solution. quote:The governor in his office isn't murdering civilians on the streets, that's the cops. The prosecutor's office isn't flashbanging infants in their cribs, that's the cops. But the mayor is the one ordering, say, NPYD to raid Occupy, promoting and defending 'stop and frisk', and the DA's office sets the priority for prosecutions. There are a few cases where the prosecution and the cops are at odds, but in general, the prosecutor's office communicates to the police which investigations to continue and which to drop--think of the Zimmerman case, for example. One cop there wanted to continue the investigation and was sure that Zimmerman was guilty. The prosecutor's office was the one who decided to drop it. The cops hosed up stuff there, but it was the prosecution who said to stop. quote:Yes, there are larger, systemic problems at play I think we all agree. But until we can stop that boot from stamping, it's going to be really hard to reform the rest of the system. I agree that you need to push reform in multiple areas at once, but I don't agree that reform at the police level comes first. I disagree with you, and I think that reform at higher levels will have more effect, and especially more lasting effect. I am fine if you disagree with me on this, but it's weird and silly to accuse me of arguing this in some dishonest fashion. You think that we can reform the cops first, and then address the rest of the system. I don't think we can, especially since I think the only way to reform the police department is through passing laws about police conduct, electing mayors who will use the police responsibly, and if not reforming prosecutor's offices so that they're non-political, electing prosecutors who run on a platform other than "I will lock up more bad guys than my opponent". What is frustrating is that I am making an honest argument about how to reform the police, and the fact that you and I appear to disagree on how to do this is turned into me being dishonest, defending the police, and all sorts of other stuff, none of which is true.
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Aug 3, 2014 19:51
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Obdicut posted:This deals with his points: He says that nobody imagined that anyone would use this law for asset forfeiture. I pointed out that if this use of the law was problematic for legislators, they could fix it. They claimed prosecutors don't get anything out of asset forfeiture--I showed how they do. She, BTW, and I certainly agree that what needs to be done is to legislatively reform or eliminate asset forfeiture—in order to strip police of a tool for abuse. My original point was that cases where cops stop someone for a broken taillight, seize their Game Boy or gold crucifix, send them on their way, and then use the money to fund a pizza party, are not the result of any prosecutorial directive, but of police departments, of their own initiative, USING a law as a tool for abuse. Obdicut posted:You can blame them if you want. If you want to reform the police, though, you're going to have to do things beyond blaming the police. But even concrete suggestions on how to actually reduce cops' power to abuse people with impunity get handwaved by you as just "blaming the police." And why is it that it's impossible to consider police officers malicious agents, but not prosecutors? I mean, if you want to reform the prosecutors, you're going to have to do things beyond blaming the prosecutors, right? This is some moebius-strip-level poo poo here. Obdicut posted:Can you describe how this 'taking responsibility' would work? How it would happen? 
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Aug 3, 2014 20:18
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Cichlid the Loach posted:She, BTW, and I certainly agree that what needs to be done is to legislatively reform or eliminate asset forfeiture—in order to strip police of a tool for abuse. My original point was that cases where cops stop someone for a broken taillight, seize their Game Boy or gold crucifix, send them on their way, and then use the money to fund a pizza party, are not the result of any prosecutorial directive, but of police departments, of their own initiative, USING a law as a tool for abuse. I agree with that, but would say that it also requires the collusion of the local government in order for it to happen. It can't happen if the people who should have oversight don't want it to. There are some places where people who are directly elected are doing this, in that case the failure is at the point of the voters. I certainly think that anyone doing this sort of poo poo should be arrested. I also think that asset forfeiture is used a lot in concert with prosecutors against people who are or are suspected of being 'actual criminals', as in, selling drugs, loosies, what have you--and that this is wrong, too, and is an abuse of power by the state. Whether cops are using the tool to get money from total innocents or from people who actually are dealing drugs, it's still a violation of rights and still wrong. Edit: To back up my point, please read this article on asset forfeiture: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/08/12/taken quote:The county’s district attorney, a fifty-seven-year-old woman with feathered Charlie’s Angels hair named Lynda K. Russell, arrived an hour later. Russell, who moonlighted locally as a country singer, told Henderson and Boatright that they had two options. They could face felony charges for “money laundering” and “child endangerment,” in which case they would go to jail and their children would be handed over to foster care. Or they could sign over their cash to the city of Tenaha, and get back on the road. “No criminal charges shall be filed,” a waiver she drafted read, “and our children shall not be turned over to CPS,” or Child Protective Services. quote:But even concrete suggestions on how to actually reduce cops' power to abuse people with impunity get handwaved by you as just "blaming the police." This isn't true. If you believe it to be true, show me doing that. This is like the tenth time I've asked for someone to do this. Nobody yet has been able to. It's getting really tiresome. quote:And why is it that it's impossible to consider police officers malicious agents, but not prosecutors? It's completely possible to consider police officers malicious agents, and I've never said otherwise. If you think I have, show me doing so. Etc. quote:I mean, if you want to reform the prosecutors, you're going to have to do things beyond blaming the prosecutors, right? This is some moebius-strip-level poo poo here Yes, 'blame', as a moral judgment, doesn't really do any good at any point. I've said what you have to do to reform the prosecutors: turn it into a non-political position. That doesn't involve 'blaming' anyone. And no, seriously, I have no idea what is meant by the police having to take responsibility for their actions. Does this mean a robust system of oversight, so that misbehaving cops are prosecuted and held accountable by someone else? Or some sort of moral revelation on the part of cops everywhere so they stand up and start turning each other in for coverups and the like? Or what? Obdicut fucked around with this message at 21:15 on Aug 3, 2014 |
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Aug 3, 2014 21:00
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Obdicut posted:stuff The reason people don't like your arguments is because you make it sound like you have absolutely no interest in taking immediate action. Someone says "let's put cams on all police and make sure it can't be turned off" and you say "Blaming people does nothing! We need to figure out why they do this and somehow eliminate the systematic problems that allow this" and honestly the way you phrase things makes it sound you don't want to bother with cams or prosecute cops for crimes they commit or make sure they have to interact with the community they're supposed to serve and protect or anything at all immediate because somehow that all amounts to placing blame. Again, this is what it sounds like. Maybe this mess of a thread is all due to miscommunication. Obdicut posted:And no, seriously, I have no idea what is meant by the police having to take responsibility for their actions. Pretty sure going to prison for murder or sexual harassment or stealing and selling drugs is what people mean, just like any other person caught breaking the law. Preferably they will have lapel cams attached their person that they're not allowed - or even able - to turn off so anything they do it caught on tape. Just an idea.
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Aug 3, 2014 21:58
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SwingShift posted:The reason people don't like your arguments is because you make it sound like you have absolutely no interest in taking immediate action. Someone says "let's put cams on all police and make sure it can't be turned off" and you say "Blaming people does nothing! We need to figure out why they do this and somehow eliminate the systematic problems that allow this" Except I don't. I say that cameras are great, but to get them in the first place we probably need legislation and to capitalize on what gains they make we need to do more. quote:and honestly the way you phrase things makes it sound you don't want to bother with cams or prosecute cops for crimes they commit or make sure they have to interact with the community they're supposed to serve and protect or anything at all immediate because somehow that all amounts to placing blame. Again, this is what it sounds like. Maybe this mess of a thread is all due to miscommunication. If you read my posts, I never, ever say that we shouldn't prosecute cops. Any time it comes up, I am completely for prosecuting cops that commit a crime. I just say that doing that, on its own, isn't going to solve the problem--and that it'll be monumentally hard to prosecute cops successfully without reforming DAs offices and changing our cultural attitude towards 'criminals', too. I do think a lot of the problem is that I'm not displaying the right amount of emotion or whatever about those horrible nasty cops and people are responding to tone or something rather than what I'm actually saying. This is why nobody can actually show me doing any of the poo poo they're accusing me of doing in my posts: because it's not there. Edit: as an example of how poo poo is weird in this thread, someone else claimed that DAs don't benefit from asset forfeiture. I showed how they do even in the areas where asset forfeiture doesn't directly fund them--and there are plenty of places where asset forfeiture can fund the DAs, too. Did this make anyone go "Oh whoops, maybe he's got a point?" Nah. It was just 'deflection' or something. And to further back up this point: http://www.ij.org/policing-for-profit-the-abuse-of-civil-asset-forfeiture-4 Under civil forfeiture, police and prosecutors can seize your car or other property, sell it and use the proceeds to fund agency budgets—all without so much as charging you with a crime. Policing for Profit: The Abuse of Civil Asset Forfeiture chronicles how state and federal laws leave innocent property owners vulnerable to forfeiture abuse and encourage law enforcement to take property to boost their budgets. The report finds that by giving law enforcement a direct financial stake in forfeiture efforts, most state and federal laws encourage policing for profit, not justice. It is an excellent report on asset forfeiture and I recommend everyone read it, especially the bit on "how did we get here", and the examination of culpability of the DOJ. quote:Pretty sure going to prison for murder or sexual harassment or stealing and selling drugs is what people mean, just like any other person caught breaking the law. Preferably they will have lapel cams attached their person that they're not allowed - or even able - to turn off so anything they do it caught on tape. Just an idea. In order to get this to happen, we would definitely need to reform DAs offices, who really don't tend to prosecute cops. Prosecutions against cops tend to be dropped, pleaded out, or otherwise taken off the table except for really heinous stuff. But again, I really prefer to prevent crimes in the first place rather than prosecuting them after they happen. There are also a ton of ways that cops can do bad things while remaining entirely legal throughout the entire process, and I would like those things to stop too. Obdicut fucked around with this message at 22:14 on Aug 3, 2014 |
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Aug 3, 2014 22:07
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Why can't people take a moderate position that police should be able to strangle pregnant women to death some of the time? Insisting that humans have an obligation to moral behavior under their own control even if Systems Exist is just so extreme and I think I'm going to pout my way out of the thread with tears welling up in my eyes if people don't find some sort of compromise between "police murdering every person" and "police not murdering people," which as extreme, absolutist opinions are both equally wrong and unworkable. The Truth Is In the Middle!!!
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Aug 3, 2014 23:35
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meat sweats posted:Why can't people take a moderate position that police should be able to strangle pregnant women to death some of the time? Insisting that humans have an obligation to moral behavior under their own control even if Systems Exist is just so extreme and I think I'm going to pout my way out of the thread with tears welling up in my eyes if people don't find some sort of compromise between "police murdering every person" and "police not murdering people," which as extreme, absolutist opinions are both equally wrong and unworkable. The Truth Is In the Middle!!! Did you read the report I posted on asset forfeiture?
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Aug 3, 2014 23:36
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There have been many statements and arguments in this thread, and it appears to have lost its focus with people more concerned with pissing matches then actually talking about the topic. Sadly, that is what happens when you try and discuss something on the internet where people are free to say whatever they want with no cause for reason or intelligent thought. However, claiming to want police reform but yet not being willing to change your own attitudes toward policing will not help. Further, ignoring or side-stepping legitimate issues brought up about police abuse is not helpful either. Democrats and Republicans sit and argue and never get anything done because neither side is willing to consider points made by the other side. You cannot have effective and lasting change if both sides just "tow the party line". There are several points, now, that i would like to make. It is true and a fact that the majority of police interaction with the general public is non-violent. Most people are not "out to get cops". However, the times when someone does want to kill/hurt an officer, or another person, cops have to be trained in how to deal with that. I agree that the culture of policing, setting us at odds with the rest of the public, is not healthy. I don't believe that everyone is out to get us, but i firmly believe that there are some out to get us. If you knew someone was out to get you, it would be in your best interest to prepare to handle that threat should it come. If you don't prepare and that person shows up, you are in trouble and under prepared. There is a fine line, though, between being ready for a threat and going overboard--and i think that it is very easy for officers to take that overboard. The truth, whether you want to hear it or not, is that any change to any government function takes time. There is nothing that can be done immediately to fix the problems. Sure, departments and local communities can crack down on misbehavior among officers. However, that is only a symptom. The problem stems back to politicians not wanting to take the time to legislate reform because it would require actual work. The system is established, perpetuating, and implanted and calls to fix it just get buried under heaps of politics. You cannot have real, lasting police reform by targeting police--that will further increase the divide. You have to fix the system that controls them. In the meantime, plenty of officers do get prosecuted for violating the law. Plenty do get fired for misconduct. However, plenty do go unpunished. No system anywhere will ever be perfect, no matter what you do, and bad apples will still some how manage to hang around. At the end of the day, only true system reform will have any lasting, positive effect. The change will be grueling, and have plenty of problems and criticisms, but it needs to happen. The prison system is a mess, the penal code is overbearing, traffic code is archaic, and the long-seated political control over the system is refusing to change. Good luck!
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Aug 4, 2014 01:33
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justsharkbait posted:
Can someone come up with 5 examples where police officers were convicted and received a sentence at least as harsh as the median sentence for that crime? I'm not asking you to come up with it, but I struggle to think of more than a few examples at best. Even the cannibal cop got off and the Danziger Bridge shooting is still awaiting the retrial. I'm hoping we can come up with 5 examples and maybe this is all just media bias, but I'm concerned that there is a fundamental disconnect between the reality of how abusive behavior by cops is punished and the appearance. I think many Americans believe those that swear an oath to protect and instead commit crimes should be punished as harshly if not more so than your average crook. But reality is far from that. So its difficult for communities to trust police when there is no appearance of accountability or justice when police break the law.
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Aug 4, 2014 01:48
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Trabisnikof posted:Can someone come up with 5 examples where police officers were convicted and received a sentence at least as harsh as the median sentence for that crime? I'm not asking you to come up with it, but I struggle to think of more than a few examples at best. Even the cannibal cop got off and the Danziger Bridge shooting is still awaiting the retrial. Frank James Coppola, Sidney Dorsey, Michael Harold Chapel, Craig Peyer, Gerard John Schaefer.
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Aug 4, 2014 01:57
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Obdicut posted:Frank James Coppola, Sidney Dorsey, Michael Harold Chapel, Craig Peyer, Gerard John Schaefer. So pressed for examples of police being held to account, you post a rogue's gallery of serial killers, robbers and racketeers? I gotta give you credit for having the (five-decade spanning) examples to hand, but none of those really have much to do with the kind of impunity we have been discussing.
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Aug 4, 2014 02:03
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SedanChair posted:So pressed for examples of police being held to account, you post a rogue's gallery of serial killers, robbers and racketeers? I gotta give you credit for having the (five-decade spanning) examples to hand, but none of those really have much to do with the kind of impunity we have been discussing. Hey, those aren't even your goalposts. Put them down.
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Aug 4, 2014 02:07
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It's Just Interesting.
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Aug 4, 2014 02:08
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Obdicut posted:Frank James Coppola (convicted 1978, murder, while off duty) I guess its pretty depressing only one of those convictions is from this century. And even in the Craig Peyer case cops tried to cover up his crime. Unsurprisingly I'm not able to find statistics on crimes committed by law enforcement. Edit: And only 3, maybe 4 were "on the job" abuse so to speak. If we count a politician killing his rival as "on the job". Trabisnikof fucked around with this message at 02:17 on Aug 4, 2014 |
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Aug 4, 2014 02:12
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Trabisnikof posted:I guess its pretty depressing only one of those convictions is from this century. I'm sorry, do you want 5 convictions since 2000? I'd be happy to provide that, but before I do can I ask if there are any other new restrictions to the request? You want them all to be convictions for officers doing something on the job?
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Aug 4, 2014 02:18
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Obdicut posted:I'm sorry, do you want 5 convictions since 2000? I'd be happy to provide that, but before I do can I ask if there are any other new restrictions to the request? You want them all to be convictions for officers doing something on the job? I mean yes if you could actually find 5 from the last 15 years that'd be great. Like I said, I can't find any actual statistics on the matter, although I did find that cops are much more likely to commit murder than the general populous. And I don't know why you're getting so defensive here, do you really believe police get prosecuted as hard as everyone else?
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Aug 4, 2014 02:20
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Trabisnikof posted:I mean yes if you could actually find 5 from the last 15 years that'd be great. Like I said, I can't find any actual statistics on the matter, although I did find that cops are much more likely to commit murder than the general populous. Sure. It will take a little longer of course. Statistics on the matter would be difficult to compile, because whether or not a felony was committed on the job isn't something that's recorded in any of the crime reporting databases; someone would have to do what I'm doing now, which is manually look up each case where a cop has been convicted of a crime and see if it was on the job or not. quote:And I don't know why you're getting so defensive here, do you really believe police get prosecuted as hard as everyone else? You asked for something, I immediately provided it, you immediately asked for more, and I'm providing that. Before providing it, I wanted to make sure that you weren't going to then ask for more, because that would waste time.
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Aug 4, 2014 02:27
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http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2012-08-19/news/bs-md-officers-in-prison-20120819_1_federal-prison-kickback-scheme-baltimore-cops http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/3430932-418/pedersen-prison-burge-law-chicago.html#.U97gG_ldXD4 http://www.patriotledger.com/article/20140219/News/140215444 http://articles.courant.com/2014-01-28/news/hc-meriden-officer-cossette-prison-20140128_1_cossette-handcuffed-temich-pedro-temich http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...excessive-force http://jobs.aol.com/articles/2012/02/14/police-officer-convicted-of-police-brutality-free-after-eight-an/ http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=94660 I think it is more media bias. When you want to have the public keep up a certain perception, you cover what you want to cover. It is that way in everything from police issues, to global events. They cover what they want to on major news. On a more personal note, in my 5 years as a cop, at least 10 officers in the greater local area i policed in got sent to jail for offenses. None of them covered by any major news, and most not even a local paper article. Further, the amount of officers brought on Federal charges for violating rights is not a small number, however those trials and cases rarely receive any media attention. The media chooses to cover the exceptions to the norm because they have an agenda to drive conflict. If reform happens and things get better, then the revenue for media companies goes down and since those same companies control a lot of Hollywood and TV, police reform is bad for business but violence and tragic stories sale. The current system makes a great action movie, but not-so-great real life, but it has effected the police's attitude and the public's. EDIT: Another thing to remember is that trying any case takes months to years. Police accused of crimes have the same rights as anyone else accused of crimes. That process in felony cases takes years. So just because it appears that nothing is being done with all the stuff on the news does not mean nothing will ultimately be done because as with anything in the court system, it takes a long, long time to see any results. Just another thing needing reform. justsharkbait fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Aug 4, 2014 |
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Aug 4, 2014 02:31
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Obdicut posted:Craig Peyer wikipedia posted:Peyer then bludgeoned her with his flashlight and strangled her with a rope. He then threw her body over the edge of an abandoned bridge where she fell into the brush below.  Neither here nor there, but man, what a spooky detail.
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Aug 4, 2014 02:40
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justsharkbait posted:http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2012-08-19/news/bs-md-officers-in-prison-20120819_1_federal-prison-kickback-scheme-baltimore-cops (Illegal kickbacks, 8-42mo.) I guess I didn't make my point clear. Sure all those officers got convicted, but their sentences are reduced from the norm. The average sentence in the US for Assault is 61 months. Only the last example is longer than that and it seems like even that officer got railroaded by mandatory minimums and politics rather than self-policing. Combine this with the well documented facts that deaths and injuries related to arrests are under reported, that cases against police are often dropped, and then even if there is a conviction it is less than what a regular member of the community would receive; those things all add up to create a huge barrier to community trust. In the US less than 50-100 LEOs are murdered each year but 300-400 people are murdered by LEOs in their custody each year. So there are real and significant trust issues that any community would have. Yes, this is a systemic issue but one that is a pre-requisite for regaining community trust. Trabisnikof fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Aug 4, 2014 |
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Aug 4, 2014 02:51
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Trabisnikof posted:I guess I didn't make my point clear. Sure all those officers got convicted, but their sentences are reduced from the norm. The average sentence in the US for Assault is 61 months. Only the last example is longer than that and it seems like even that officer got railroaded by mandatory minimums and politics rather than self-policing. Combine this with the well documented facts that deaths and injuries related to arrests are under reported, that cases against police are often dropped, and then even if there is a conviction it is less than what a regular member of the community would receive; those things all add up to create a huge barrier to community trust. That statistic is biased, though. You are saying they are murdered as if you know. There can be legitimate in-custody deaths. The number of actual true in-custody murders is much lower and probably less then the LEO's murdered, followed by most being negligent deaths, and then those that are justified/cleared. There is still a problem, but it is with negligence and not murder. Blanket calling it murder is incorrect.
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Aug 4, 2014 03:03
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| # ? Jun 5, 2024 13:47 |
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Francis P. Brevetti -- arrested for Class D felony and a misdemeanor, got 3 years suspended sentence and three years probation in a plea deal. For a class D felony, that's a normal sentence. Mark J. Lunsford -- arrested for stealing a watch and cash from an investigation totally more than $4000 bucks, lied to the DEA. Got 20 months in prison and three years of probation. For a first-time offense that's about on the money with a guilty plea. They also asset forfeitured him for good measure. Dennis Spaulding and David Cari, convicted of civil rights violations of latinos, 5 years in federal prison and 2 1/2 years apiece. Out of a 20 year maximum, 5 years is completely within reasonable bounds; Cari was found to be less culpable and more going along with Spaulding. You can just count Spaulding here. Evan Cossette, 14 months of prison and a year of probationary release for unreasonable force. It's a bit more than it would have been for a simple assault, but that's entirely proper since he also lied about it. Robert Verbickas, a CO--assuming that'll do since we're talking about prison guards and cops in the same breath. You can read, if you want, the exact rationale for his sentencing level here: http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-10th-circuit/1464364.html He was sentenced for 30 months, appealed it, and had the sentence upheld. He beat or arranged the beating of several inmates. There's a couple other convictions of COs in that document too. I also just want to note that if you're saying that cops get prosecuted less often or that the laws that govern their sentencing are too lax, then you're saying there's a systemic reason for the problem. Edit: And that took longer than I thought because I had to look up the sentencing separately Obdicut fucked around with this message at 03:08 on Aug 4, 2014 |
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Aug 4, 2014 03:06
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