Don’t you realize the police motto:
“To protect and serve [other cops].”
Duh.
I listen to police using the first part “that officer was one bad apple” to describe a belligerent and abusive cop during press conferences.
Did they forget what the rest of that saying is and means? Why don’t journalists ask, “Do you mean that officer spoiled the rest of the department? Because that is what is meant by using that saying.”
Although at this point who would trust the police not to come back at the journalist? Even the legislative branch is getting in no the bullying of journalist … although he apologized.
DON"T THROW ME OTHER THE BALCONY, BRO!
3 Likes
So the article doesn’t say why he was reinstated after being fired. Why? was his union insisting?
Other coverage indicates that they did not find his behavior to be excessive. Or, rather, within the acceptable range of force available to an officer in his circumstance.
I’m sure that several of them were traumatized enough by the events that they will take themselves off of the police force by filing for disability due to emotional distress.
3 Likes
One function of the criminal justice system is to maintain Jim Crow. Those laws didn’t just disappear in 1968. In light of this, police brutality and violating rights make perfect sense. It’s what they are for.
1 Like
The practice of administrative punishment or firing police for criminal activity has to stop. Police are not above the law.
Why do cops beat people? Because we let them.
1 Like
To a black man, those cops are a very real threat. That’s why the brother legally filming the event, decides to run back into his home where he should have been safe. The only threat to a cop is a white lawyer in an upper class neighborhood.
3 Likes
What, you expect the cops to get charged for breaking and entering, burglary, destroying of evidence, and obstruction of justice, just because they did those things? Ain’t gonna happen.
Cop Overheards could be an interesting Tumblr. A place where all the non-cops that interact with cops could share what they hear on a daily basis.
1 Like
Disgusting.
Most likely, i would say it’s the union , although I didn’t RTA. I’ve heard some insanely blatant coverup apologies out of the mouths of Police union reps. There’s no limit to the illegal, coercive, violent behavior they’ll claim is an “anti-cop” agenda.
In a case like this, I suppose the only thing the lower-class, non-cop citizens can take solace in is the fact that they didn’t get beat to death a-la Kelly Thomas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Kelly_Thomas
I find it not insignificant that both of the officers pictured (James Kinsella and Aaron Von Behren) are pasty, creepy looking men. I’m convinced that a large cross-section of police officers get into the job in the first place because they were picked on/didn’t get laid in high school, and they want to feel powerful.
I agree, and I’ve been in that situation myself. While sitting at an outdoor cafe a group of about 6 policemen sat down next to me and began to discuss (what was recent at the time) the last Obama-Romney debate. I was not shocked to hear that to a man they were all Romney supporters, but the vitriol of some of their comments frightened me a bit and I moved away from the group (otherwise, I would’ve opened my mouth and likely had it closed by their boots).
If there’s a “Tuskegee Effect” to describe how the African-American community has lost trust in healthcare providers, I guess there’s a similar effect to describe how that same community has lost trust in law enforcement. It’s called “Reality”.
1 Like
Long time ago ('89) I took some classes at a community college. One day walking from class to the parking lot, one of the other guys in my class started chatting with me. He enthusiastically told me that he was getting his basic requirements out of the way and was planning to go into the police academy with the very specific intent to become a state patrolman so he could harass hippies driving up and down the Oregon strip of I-5. You could see he got an adrenalin rush just talking about it. Not sure why he chose to talk to me since I was wearing what would later be called grunge clothes and had long hair. I guess it was clear I wasn’t a hippie and that was all he cared about. The guy scared the crap out of me and I did my best to avoid him after that day.
1 Like
Keep in mind whenever you hear the word ‘Fired’ used for cops, teachers, or other public employee union members, it doesn’t mean at all what you think it means. It’s just a suspension, and the first step in a years long chain of dozens of reviews and appeals. If he wins any single one of those he’s back in, no questions asked, usually with back pay (since the suspension was then unwarranted).
Generally the only thing that ends this is when the ‘fired’ person gives up on the process.
Sadly lollin @ “upward mobility of the poor.”
Do you think the cops would have behaved differently if they were towing unregistered cars belonging to a white family of similar economic status (yard filled with misc junk, el camino out front), when one of the owners drives up in a scrapper pickup truck (so described because it’s got a ton of scrap in the back) and starts arguing with them about the cars they’re towing?
I’ve had an unregistered car on the street, it doesn’t get towed immediately, it sits there and accumulates a couple of tickets before they finally remove it.
He was legally filming the event (well, I don’t know about bogus recording statutes in Omaha that might require two party consent or some garbage like that) but he wasn’t following the instructions of the police. Twice he was removed from the street and left alone, and twice he came back onto the street. Cops aren’t going to respond favorably to encroachment, and there’s a difference between it being legal to film something and having some sort of constitutional right to film.
“Hey, I’ve got a crappy cellphone camera, I can’t see the action, so I’m going to ignore your instructions to stay back on the sidewalk and instead get closer to you cops who are having trouble restraining my brother so I can film you. And by the way, I’m going to exercise my first amendment right to shout out my opinion at the top of my lungs that THAT IS ABUSE, THAT IS ABUSE, etc”
That’s not the same thing as “he was legally filming the event”
Also, he only decided to run back all the way to his home after he was being chased by a cop. If he wanted to be safe in his home, he could have done so either of the first two times the police officer escorted / chased him away from the scene. The third time, he wasn’t ‘running for the safety of his house’ because he was eluding the police. There is a difference in the two acts.
Why are those cops any more of a threat to the black men here than their possibly white neighbors up the street who also may have had unregistered cars?
There is nothing here that screams out that this was a racially motivated event, aside from the color of the skin of the people involved which seems by all accounts secondary to the behaviors of the people involved.
Regarding your pithy “the only threat to a cop” line, I get that you’re trying to be witty, but you’re so cosmically wrong here and it fails at every level. Let’s go check out the FBI’s crime stats on law enforcement offices killed and assaulted
For example, in 2012, roughly 1 in 10 officers were assaulted while performing their duties - over 50,000 incidents. About 1/3 of those sustained injuries during the assault.
Over 60% of assaults to officers occurred when they were the only officer on hand. Like, for example, when all the other officers ran after the video recording brother and left the other officer along with the brother on the ground.
Here’s a fun one for you, of the officers killed that same year, nearly 60% were killed by white assailants, while only about 30% were killed by black assailants.
Strangely, despite your assertion that affluent white lawyers represent the biggest threat to a officer safety, it doesn’t seem to register as a statistically significant criteria.
So, anyway, what are you trying to say? Cops are a threat to people who don’t follow their instructions, why do you feel race is an issue in this case? Everything everyone’s said about how terrible the cops are is fine, because they prove it over and over, but it seems like you’re piling on this case out of habit which is lazy and makes it harder to be genuinely outraged when cops do step out of line.
Yes, this could have innocently been cops vs. beligerent citizen. Yet in this case, cops were fired or disciplined and the situation of low income black man vs. dozens of cops, being beaten and basically treated like an animal is something we see far too often to dismiss as an anomaly. Apologizing for the cops is shameful.
2 Likes
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
