Problem cop in Polk County exposed by own bodycam

boing
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So, only POC are traffic scofflaws?

I didn’t say that.

Whites never do anything wrong.

I didn’t say that either.

The video is self explanatory,

The video isn’t self explanatory, and it proves absolutely nothing other than in this particular case, it appears as if the police officers line of questioning actually DID turn up evidence of criminal activity, and that is what the police are supposed to do. If the driver was white, would you be saying the same thing, or would you turn it around and say that POCs would never have been let off of a criminal charge like this video would have shown?

Again, from THAT video that was posted, I see absolutely nothing that indicates racial bias. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, nor does it mean that particular police officer does or does not have any racial bias. It simply means this video does not show it. Maybe I missed it. To be honest I wasn’t paying all that close attention to it after it took about 1 minute to see that the article, as written, was clearly false, and biased itself. After that, I only paid partial attention, but I saw nothing that indicated racism, as I’ve experienced the exact same questions, the exact same treatment, and I can clearly see what the officer did, and I understand why he did it.

Perhaps you can point out EXACTLY what the police officer did that has you concerned? Once he saw the car doing multiple traffic violations, should have have tried to identify the race of the driver, and if he was a POC, should he have just let him go? Or was it that the fact that the occupants were nervous and clearly hiding something that he should have just let it go? Should he do that if the occupants were white, or is that only for POC?

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If you follow almost anybody long enough you will see them commit a traffic violation.

Yes, except this video clearly doesn’t show that. It should the police officer stopping someone who did multiple traffic violations right in front of him in a one minute timeframe.

Without racist selective enforcement it would be impossible to not pull over many more white people for committing traffic violations in a community that’s “4.84% black and 88.34% white”. So traffic violations shown a body video do not give the officer any legitimate cover given the racial stats.

I agree, mostly. Given everything being equal, then yes, a single cop making vastly more stops of one race would indicate a problem. That means he isn’t confined to a specific area of said community, and that area is also 4.84% black and 88.34% white, or limited a timeframe in which that isn’t true. If you can show all that, then I’d agree with you. But again, this is one video of one stop, and one in which his line of questions did actually turn up evidence of a crime. If you want to actually show racial bias, then you actually have to show it. Not allege it based on one video. Show the history of the police officers stops, and their race, and the general breakdown of the races of the people in his “beat” or areas he is assigned to patrol. That is how you prove racial bias.

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You are saying you need a statistical survey, of the time period the cop is on patrol, to prove to you that the demographics of the community aren’t somehow magically flipped to make his statistically improbable ratio of PoC stopped, somehow possible.

I’m not even going to go into how problematic it is to set up wild conjecture like that, and then ask others to disprove your speculative scenario.

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приветственный товарищ

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You are saying you need a statistical survey, of the time period the cop is on patrol, to prove to you that the demographics of the community aren’t somehow magically flipped to make his statistically improbable ratio of PoC stopped, somehow possible.
I’m not even going to go into how problematic it is to set up wild conjecture like that, and then ask others to disprove your speculative scenario.

Well, if you want to actually prove racial bias, then yes, that is what you have to do. I don’t live in Iowa, but many cities have areas that are predominately a minority. So while the city’s racial make up may be 4.84% of a minority, it could very well be that the area he is tasked to patrol is actually 99% of that same race. To make accusations with out actually looking into other possible causes is just reckless. Until then, you don’t have proof. You just have speculation with some inconclusive facts (if they are even facts). I still don’t see anything other a community group “claiming” something. That isn’t proof or facts unless it’s actually backed up by something.

I mean… A quick google shows that Des Moines, Iowa is actually 10.2% black, 70.5% white, 12.0% hispanic, 4.4% asian. So the original claim of 4.84% black is already incorrect. What else is incorrect or exaggerated? Did the officer stop 150 blacks and 82 non-blacks? Was he tasked to patrol a neighborhood that is 90% black? There are other explanations.

Another quick google actually does show that yes, Des Moines has an area that is predominantly black ( Des Moines, Iowa - Wikipedia ) , of which from just eyeballing does appear to be about 90% black, and 10% other, all in a few square miles. Is that where the officer is posted?

Another quick google shows that many of the “facts” in that article are inaccurate. Iowa CCI “claimed” that officer made 282 arrests in 2017 (not traffic stops), however, that has been proven to be wrong (Des Moines Police Release Arrest Data of Officer Accused of Racial Profiling | who13.com) . Thies (that officer) made 253 arrests in 2017, of which 127 of those were black, or about 50%. And the video was taken near Union Park in Des Moines, Iowa, which just so happens to be in that area where it is predominantly black. So it is quite possible that yes, that officer’s beat covers an area that is 90% black, and about half his arrests are POC.

See, that’s how actually looking into things actually works. Now I don’t have the statistics on where all the arrests were made, or what areas his beat covers, but I know it at least covers an area that is predominantly black.

Googling took a total of about 10 minutes to read two more articles from different news agencies, a quick wikipedia lookup of Des Moines, Iowa including the demographics.

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I don’t think we can fix willful ignorance. Obvious troll is obvious.

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Not sure where that leaves you to reside. The ISS? McMurdo base maybe?

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People see what they want to see, more often than not.

Also, a quick aside;

If strict adherence to the law was actually why the police officer stopped the vehicle, there’s no logical reason why he wouldn’t have stated that as soon as he talked to the driver, ie, “You failed to use your turn signal, you failed to make a complete stop, etc.”

Yet that’s not what the officer in question did; instead he asked bullshit leading questions inferring that the vehicle was stolen, including one that was a ploy to get the driver to hand over his keys.

Then he escalated the stop by making dubious claims of smelling drugs and suspecting the presence of weapons.

O_o

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