Rule number one in dealing with psychopaths: “Never let them take you to a second location”
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While technically correct, if that was their intended effect they should have included more of his statement in the quote. “No, It would be unethical” is better than: The doctors said it would be “unethical”. The placement of the quotation marks changes the entire tenor of the quote, to the point that it may be misrepresenting the original doctor’s message. The former sends a clear message that the doctor would not do the procedure on ethical grounds, the latter makes it sound like he has some other reason and is using the ethical issues as a cover.
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“Am I being detained?” That is a very valid, and courageous question at a roadblock or checkpoint. There is no probable cause to detain or question you. But if you ask it that question, you had darn well better not be doing anything illegal. Not even something minor. Not a burned out brake light, not a bald tire, not a cracked windshield. Nothing. You still might wind up taking a beating, or worse. But we do have a few rights left.
But should you ask that question if you are pulled over for a traffic violation? Absolutely not. The only thing out of your mouth should be “yes sir” or “no sir”, and if it goes bad, “I would like to seek the advice of counsel”. They don’t need a warrant to search your car, the need probable cause, even if it is weak or fabricated. If you want to argue, save it for court. When you start arguing on the side of the road, you will not win. Period. You are throwing gas on a fire.
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The quotes imply that the doctor’s judgement was a matter of opinion, for one. And you don’t need quotes for one word. Compare:
The lawsuit claims that Deming Police tried taking Eckert to an emergency room in Deming, but a doctor there refused to perform the anal cavity search citing it was unethical.
The word ‘citing’ implies a quote. The actual quotes only serve to undermine the strength of the doctor’s position by implying uncertainty.
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Yes, totally agree.
How would it not have been faster not to copy-and-paste the quote into Google, instead of continuing off-topic threads?
Sorry, I know it’s snarky, but I just really honestly don’t get it when I see 13 year olds type “Who is Osama Bin Laden” into Yahoo Answers and then wait 20 minutes for a poor reply, instead of typing fewer words into Google and getting the answer instantly.
Yup, you and jandrese make persuasive arguments. I misunderstood your complaint about the use of the quote marks. Totally agree with you.
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Eh, I’m not sure about the generalization (or maybe I just don’t know what countries you’ve been to). I grew up in Italy and it’s pretty common for there to be random police checkpoints where they pull cars over if they don’t like the look of them and give them a hard time about their papers. British police are using their new powers under anti-terrorism laws to the same extent as their US-counterparts. And many, many police in developing countries see their main purpose as being to extract bribes for foreigners (and countrymen).
Ok, the Swedish police are probably very nice. (Actually… probably less so if you’re not white, just like most North European police forces.)
I disagree. You’re probably too used to seeing quotes as scare-quotes, where the whole point is to disassociate them from the author’s beliefs, but in this case it’s being used correctly to show that a person of authority explicitly referred to the probes as “unethical.” It makes the opinion more valid, not less.
I was kinda hoping, but now that you mention it, the whole dog alerting falsely on the same guy more than once should’ve raised some flags.
Good thing Eckert took his suit to Federal court; the crimes crossed jurisdictions and the perpetrators have displayed a pattern of criminal abuse.
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The dude might have smoked a joint shortly before he was pulled over. No drugs on him, but the dog would still smell it.
That and dogs are not as reliable as some people would have you believe. They can have a rather high false positive rate. My car has not had drugs in it for at least 130,000 miles (bought it used from a lot, so I can’t vouch for the time before that), and I still had a dog flag me for a search once at a road stop down in Arizona.
The dog is mostly there to provide probable cause whenever the officer wants.
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what I said about police in the US can be said about Britain too, or any other country whose wealthy depend on exploiting a large segment of the population.
You should go read metapony23’s link. Specifically, the bit about the “drug sniffing” dog.
And yes, that’s what dishonest officers want K-9s for.
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Awww, they are sooo toast! And Gila and Deming are in two different counties (Grant and Luna, respectively). Those warrants came from two different judges, issued to two different PD’s, and using the same uncertified dog in both places? That’s far nastier, even, than the same bunch of idiots pulling the same sick stunt twice. They should be criminally charged - not just handled administratively.
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I’m an ER doctor working in a relatively small town in New Mexico, and I can attest that the police try this far more often than most people know about. The police recently brought us a patient from jail who they suspected of having crammed some drugs into her vagina and they came to us and ordered us to do a pelvic exam to find the drugs. The patient did not want a pelvic exam and she had no abdominal pain or anything wrong with her. We politely informed the police that what they were trying to order us to do was called “Sexual assault” and it was both immoral and highly illegal for them to ask us to do it. There is a procedure in place in the jail system for inmates to have a body cavity search, but the police where I work want to try and get it done without the proper paperwork needed so they wouldn’t have to go to a judge and prove any probable cause. The police got angry with us, but we rightfully refused their order. On the way out, one police officer was overheard by one of our nurses to say something along the lines of “We’ll remember this next time they call us for help with a violent drunk with a knife.” At which point, the nurse called the police department, where she had a relative on the force, and reported him. Later on, the hospital lawyers got involved and they fully backed us up in the ER.
Police officers bringing in people and ordering the doctors to perform certain tests happens very frequently, and they are always angry when we refuse to perform any test that is not medically indicated. I once had a group of 4 police officers bring me a 5 year old child who threw a fit in school, and insisted that he was a dangerous person an demanded that I do a drug test on him. I instead, gave the child a box lunch and told the police to bring him back to school and have the teacher handle his temper tantrums rather than dragging the kid off in restraints.
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gaping asshole…
I wonder if you had that same issue of MAD that I did circa 1980… “O beautiful, for rents that rise…”
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Twice with the same tin-nosed dog? More unfunny slapstick from the Keester Kops.
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Thank you for speaking up!
I know you probably have plenty to do, but if you want to make it stop for good, I have a suggestion: Get in contact with ACLU anonymously. Clearly, you won’t be the only one who has seen this, and I’m certain you aren’t the only one who finds such practices disgusting. Tell them what you know about this, ask them what you can do about it. Now that I’ve seen that this spans counties and departments the question is going to be whether the State or Feds should jump in - though I wouldn’t trust either bunch easily, given what all has been going on recently. ACLU isn’t in either bunch’s pockets, and, as attorneys, can cover your personal interests as a client. They may be interested in at least filing amicus curiae briefs with the courts in support of these plaintiffs. Or, they may have another idea, like contacting the plaintiffs attorneys and pointing them toward other medical establishments they may want to question. But you and probably others you know are in a uniquely-qualified position to lend assistance and help put and end to this for good. The trick, obviously, is to make it work for more potential victims without getting harmed in the process. This approach or similar could get that done but keep the heat off of you personally.
I can’t push you to do this - it’s a personal decision you have to make. But I do hope you will at east consider it and talk to them.
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When they invent human cloning, would you mind sharing some of your DNA? -TIA, humanity
