The Great Police Work Thread

fortsbest

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And you never answered any of my questions.

Are you trained to pull a taser when someone is not getting out of there car in a timely maner?
Once the officer decided he was going to make an arrest and the lady was noncompliant, then as an alternative to physically yanking her out of the car I bet he was justified in using his taser. In our department policy the taser is the same level of force as open open hand control. And it wasn't that she wasn't getting out in a timely manner, she was refusing to get out telling him she didn't have to and he had no right.

Does not putting out a cigarette reason for asking someone to get out of the car?
It can be. Depends on the totality of circumstances. I've already explained my reasons for asking people to put out a cig.

Yes the officer has a right to ask someone to get out of the car do you think his actions were warranted?
His actions may not have been mine, but I bet based on policy he did nothing wrong. Doesn't mean I wouldn't have counseled him to be more patient. But again I say all this talk about firing him based on this incident alone and is ludicre. That this lady killed herself is not his fault but I bet money he thinks about it as if it may have been.
 

fortsbest

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I think your problem was that you digressed onto how people ought to be polite to police as if that was a crime, not being respectful enough. It just isn't.
Not at all what I said. Reread it. respectfulness isn't a requirement in dealing with police it just helps. Obeying lawfully giving verbal commands when you are being legally detained is.

Before you paint me with the same brush for never being on the cop's side, I supported Wilson's actions in Ferguson, you can check my posts on it in this thread.
Didn't mean to lump you in sorry.
 

fortsbest

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:lol (Can't help but laugh about the complaint process. Officers stick like glue together)

In reality people should always be polite. It's just how I was raised. But not being polite isn't justification for an officer to do whatever he wants.
I've addressed this several times before. And as lawyer you should know that it doesn't benefit any officer or department for a supervisor to not take proper corrective action when needed. Liability nowadays is far to great. This isn't the 20th century any more.
 

Clay_Allison

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The one thing about that case that makes perfect sense is that it's highway patrol. I've never had a negative interaction with any city police officer or county sheriff's deputy, but the three times I've interacted with a cop that was unprofessional it was a goddamn State Trooper. I don't know what else they teach them when they go to the academy, but it sure as hell isn't how to behave like a reasonable human being.
 

L.T. Fan

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The one thing about that case that makes perfect sense is that it's highway patrol. I've never had a negative interaction with any city police officer or county sheriff's deputy, but the three times I've interacted with a cop that was unprofessional it was a goddamn State Trooper. I don't know what else they teach them when they go to the academy, but it sure as hell isn't how to behave like a reasonable human being.
Sounds like you have lots of encounters. :art
 

Cowboysrock55

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I've addressed this several times before. And as lawyer you should know that it doesn't benefit any officer or department for a supervisor to not take proper corrective action when needed. Liability nowadays is far to great. This isn't the 20th century any more.
I've handled a couple excessive force claims. I'm well aware of what little regard they give to complaints around here. Most of the time the liability never gets back to the officers even when their is a suit filed.

Out of curiosity what about a cigarette scares you in a situation that say a handing them a pen to sign a ticket doesn't? Unless you're covered in a flammable liquid it would basically be impossible for that cigarette to ignite you. Honest question, I just think it's a bit silly to talk about the cig like it is some sort of a weapon or something that added real danger to the situation.
 

Cowboysrock55

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The one thing about that case that makes perfect sense is that it's highway patrol. I've never had a negative interaction with any city police officer or county sheriff's deputy, but the three times I've interacted with a cop that was unprofessional it was a goddamn State Trooper. I don't know what else they teach them when they go to the academy, but it sure as hell isn't how to behave like a reasonable human being.
I know a lot of people that work for the sheriff's departments and they have absolutely nothing good to say about the highway patrol in Missouri either. Some of the most clueless people. If you're bored look up Brandon Ellingson/Lake Ozarks. Talk about a completely incompetent and untrained highway patrol.
 

Clay_Allison

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I know a lot of people that work for the sheriff's departments and they have absolutely nothing good to say about the highway patrol in Missouri either. Some of the most clueless people. If you're bored look up Brandon Ellingson/Lake Ozarks. Talk about a completely incompetent and untrained highway patrol.
Real cops actually get to help people sometimes. Highway Patrol are overpaid meter maids who do nothing but write radar tickets for 25 years and retire. I think that leaves them a little bitter, especially if they hoped they could move up into narcotics or something cool, but never had the connections to get that promotion.
 

fortsbest

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I've handled a couple excessive force claims. I'm well aware of what little regard they give to complaints around here. Most of the time the liability never gets back to the officers even when their is a suit filed.

Out of curiosity what about a cigarette scares you in a situation that say a handing them a pen to sign a ticket doesn't? Unless you're covered in a flammable liquid it would basically be impossible for that cigarette to ignite you. Honest question, I just think it's a bit silly to talk about the cig like it is some sort of a weapon or something that added real danger to the situation.
It isn't that it so much scares me. Aside from domestic assault/family violence calls, traffic stops are the the most dangerous "routine" thing a police officer does and in 99% of the time it is all a trooper does. So an officer makes a stop, he's got to watch the traffic around him (look up all the vids of an officer getting hit by passing cars), all the occupants of a vehicle, and keep a wary eye out for any indication of danger. Look at all the vids of officers getting shot or hurt because of lack of attention or maybe it was something no one could have seen. So an officer is on heightened alert and sensitivity to begin with. They have to be concerned with anything that can be used as a distraction, weapon etc. OR the guy may have just been allergic, who knows. My thought after my incident was it was just one less thing I had to worry about being thrown or flicked in my face as a distraction. Ashes in my face or eyes or mouth just aren't pleasant and I don't like smoke. So if you are standing beside a car on the street side, and someone pitches or flicks something at your face what is your natural reaction? to jerk back right? What happens if that happens just as an 18 wheeler or truck with a big side mirror roles by? It could be really disastrous. Like I said, it isn't so much a fear thing as an elimination of a risk.
I have urged and will continue to urge all of you here to visit you local departments and if they have the program, do a ride in on an evening or midnight shift. It might really give you a perspective you may not have had before. And lastly I will say like I have always said, there are officers that are turds and don't need to be police, and there are good officers that have bad incidents that need disciplined or correcting. But the immediate reaction of some of you here claiming this guy needs to be fired and never be a cop again is emotional over reaction based on the chick killing herself. This guy may have been like the dude in the Garland thing that had just dealt with 2 suicides or something or maybe last week the dude saved countless lives. He didn't pistol whip her, call her racial slurs or even used the taser.
 
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Jiggyfly

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Once the officer decided he was going to make an arrest and the lady was noncompliant, then as an alternative to physically yanking her out of the car I bet he was justified in using his taser. In our department policy the taser is the same level of force as open open hand control. And it wasn't that she wasn't getting out in a timely manner, she was refusing to get out telling him she didn't have to and he had no right.
Once he decided he was going to make an arrest?

What about that interaction was arrest worthy?

Using your logic her not putting the cigareete out caused him to want to arrest, how does that make any sense?

The timeline of events went from him asking her why she was upset, to asking her to put her cigarette out to asking her to get out of the car, when was arrest warranted in your mind?

Once again why did he ask her to get out of the car?

Why did he just not give her the ticket and move on?

He most definitley did not follow policy as noted by his supervisor and him being put on desk duty.

You are ignoring a lot of details of the incident to take up for this guy which illustrates the problems I noted before with empowering this type of behavior.
 

Jiggyfly

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Campus Police Officer Indicted on Murder Charge in Cincinnati Shooting of Black Motorist
Samuel DuBose had been stopped for a missing front license plate
Updated July 29, 2015 5:57 p.m. ET
368 COMMENTS
An Ohio prosecutor announced a murder indictment of a University of Cincinnati police officer who shot and killed a motorist after stopping him for a missing front license plate.

In an unusually blunt statement, Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters said, “This office has probably reviewed upwards of 100 police shootings. This is the first time that we thought this is without question a murder. This should never have happened.”

The shooting occurred about a mile from campus on July 19, when Officer Ray Tensing pulled over Samuel DuBose, a 43-year-old unarmed black motorist. The officer, who is white, has said he was being dragged by Mr. DuBose’s car as the motorist tried to leave the scene and he was forced to shoot.

Mr. Deters said this account was contradicted by video evidence that showed the officer shooting Mr. DuBose without provocation. “He was just slowly rolling away,” Mr. Deters said. “He wasn’t dragged.”


Stew Matthews, Mr. Tensing’s attorney, told local media that he was very upset with the prosecutor’s presentation of the indictment. “He has tried to create great prejudice against my client, but fortunately that’s what we have courts for,” Mr. Matthews said, “Because when all the evidence comes out, I think there will be a different version of what went on here.”

Officer Tensing’s body-cam video, released by the prosecutor, showed the officer repeatedly asking Mr. DuBose for his license. Mr. DuBose in turn asked a number of times why he was being stopped. “Again, the front tag,” the officer said.

At one point, Mr. DuBose hands the officer an unopened bottle of gin after he was asked what was in the bottle.

“Well, until I can figure out if you have a license or not, go ahead and take your seat belt off,” Mr. Tensing said.

“I didn’t even do nothing,” Mr. DuBose responded, pulling his door shut and starting the car.

As the car starts to pull away, the officer appears to reach inside with one hand, yelling “Stop! Stop!” and pulls out his gun with the other and allegedly fires the weapon.

Mr. Matthews referred to a video from a second body-cam, worn by another officer, that he said could add some “clarity and detail” to the incident.

Asked how Mr. Tensing, who turned himself in this afternoon, was doing, Mr. Matthews said, “I can’t explain it. Obviously, he’s devastated. I’m not shocked that there was an indictment—a murder indictment just astounds me.”

The indictment comes at a time of rising tension between police and black suspects, an issue that has touched cities from Baltimore to Ferguson, Mo. Most recently, Sandra Bland was found dead in her jail cell in a small Texas town, after being pulled over for failing to use her turn signal.
__________________________________________________ __________________________________

And this case illustrates once again the problem with police forces 2 other cops backed up his story of being dragged by the car and him fearing for life.
 

Clay_Allison

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I've handled a couple excessive force claims. I'm well aware of what little regard they give to complaints around here. Most of the time the liability never gets back to the officers even when their is a suit filed.

Out of curiosity what about a cigarette scares you in a situation that say a handing them a pen to sign a ticket doesn't? Unless you're covered in a flammable liquid it would basically be impossible for that cigarette to ignite you. Honest question, I just think it's a bit silly to talk about the cig like it is some sort of a weapon or something that added real danger to the situation.
Someone sticking a lit cig into your face would be a very convenient prelude to a more serious attack, the pain plus the fact that your eyes are going to reflexively be closed are going to leave you unprepared for a car door being slammed into you or unable to see a gun being pulled from the console.

If I had to have a fight with someone I'd be glad for the opportunity to throw something, a cig, a drink, whatever, in their face before I hit them.
 

Jiggyfly

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The complexities of traffic stops, from a police officer’s perspective


http://www.msn.com/en-ph/news/opinion/the-complexities-of-traffic-stops-from-a-police-officer’s-perspective/ar-AAdE9cg?ocid=spartandhp

Early one December morning in East Baltimore in 2000, I saw a car drive by with its headlights off. For minor traffic violations, for honest mistakes — if the driver was sober, polite and carrying a valid license and registration — I would usually just issue a warning.

I stopped the car. But before I could get on the police radio to call in the stop, the driver — a very agitated middle-aged African American woman, and seemingly middle-class — exited the car while shouting into her cellphone. She ended one call and made another. The “routine” went out of this 1 a.m. stop.

I told her to get back in her car several times, which she finally did reluctantly . I approached and asked for her license. She was on her phone saying she wanted a sergeant and another officer and added: “If I’m going to get shot, I want it to be recorded because I know this is recorded and I know my rights . . . if I get shot, I want it documented.”

She wouldn’t stop talking, yelling really, at me and into her phone : “He just pulled me over for being black. I can’t believe this would happen to me. There are all those drug dealers, and you’ve got to harass me!” I could see the parking lights on her dashboard were illuminated, which maybe made her think her headlights were on. I pointed this out to her. She said, ignoring my point, that she was on her way to donate suitcases for charity. After a few more requests, she gave me her license.

As I returned to my car, a call came over the radio for a woman being assaulted by a police officer at my location. I told the dispatcher there was no assault in progress, and the call was related to my traffic stop. Before I had even approached her, much less spoken to her, she had called 911, aggrieved, certain of the injustice she was experiencing at the hands of a white officer.

In this July 10, 2015, frame from dashcam video provided by the Texas Department of Public Safety, trooper Brian Encinia arrests Sandra Bland after she became combative during a routine traffic stop in Waller County, Texas. Bland was taken to the Waller County Jail that day and was found dead in her cell on July 13.

I thought of this stop while watching the video of Sandra Bland, the young woman who died in jail after she was stopped in Texas for an illegal lane change, a minor violation. Like that scenario, my traffic stop could have gone in any number of directions.

Legally, morally and tactically, I had many options and tools at my disposal. I could have raised my voice. I could have issued more orders. I could have threatened the woman with force and arrested her for non-compliance. I could have done all that legally, but I didn’t want to. What is legally permitted is not always morally acceptable. I didn’t want to start a physical altercation because there’s always a chance you’ll lose.

I was on guard but not afraid. I was focused on a goal: to finish this stop without anybody getting injured. Honestly, I had little sympathy for this woman’s mistaken sense of moral justice. But I had empathy for her as a human being. And other things being equal, I’d prefer not to wrestle and handcuff a middle-aged woman for a minor traffic violation, no matter the legal justification. I could win tactically but not morally.

My sergeant, a bit baffled, and another officer, more simply amused, arrived on the scene within minutes. After a brief summary from me, my sergeant told me to remain near my car while he approached and talked to the woman. I filled in a ticket to give her. Ironically, given her insistence that I stopped her only because she was black (in a neighborhood that is 98 percent African American), a verbal warning could be used as proof that the stop was unjustified. I needed a paper trail to cover my actions.

The driver remained upset, glaring while she signed for the ticket: “I had my lights on. How can you look me in the eye and tell me I didn’t have my lights on? God will judge you. You’ll have to answer to God in the end!”

In the end, we had only a traffic court judge to answer to. He listened to our versions of the stop before concluding, “Sounds like a routine traffic stop. . . . I’ll take the officer’s word over yours. Guilty.”

Was that the ideal ending? I don’t know. Little about policing is ideal. But that’s why we have police officers, to handle non-ideal situations. These often involve people who are lost, mentally ill, criminals or victims. And, like Sandra Bland, nobody should die because police officers are more interested in absolute dominance than professional, moral and tactical discretion. Peaceful resolution isn’t just the right thing to do — it’s the very purpose of policing.
 

Cotton

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That was very well written, and he makes good points.
 

fortsbest

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Once he decided he was going to make an arrest?

What about that interaction was arrest worthy?

Using your logic her not putting the cigareete out caused him to want to arrest, how does that make any sense?

The timeline of events went from him asking her why she was upset, to asking her to put her cigarette out to asking her to get out of the car, when was arrest warranted in your mind?

Once again why did he ask her to get out of the car?

Why did he just not give her the ticket and move on?

He most definitley did not follow policy as noted by his supervisor and him being put on desk duty.

You are ignoring a lot of details of the incident to take up for this guy which illustrates the problems I noted before with empowering this type of behavior.
I took up for the guy somewhat because some of you already had him fired and never again wearing a badge. I also said I wouldn't have done things the way he did some things.
I gave reasons as to why he may have taken the actions he did. I also said it wasn't the way I would have handled things. I gave you possible reasons for everything he may have done and I ignored nothing. I did not see where a supervisor said he did not follow policy and just because he was put on a desk during after a nationally televised news incident does not mean he didn't follow policy either. He behaved in a manner I wouldn't have and as a supervisor I would have counseled him about his behavior. But this case is far more blown out of proportion because Bland decided to kill herself and people want someone else to blame rather than the person that killed herself.

It was a good article.
 

Jiggyfly

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I took up for the guy somewhat because some of you already had him fired and never again wearing a badge. I also said I wouldn't have done things the way he did some things.
I gave reasons as to why he may have taken the actions he did. I also said it wasn't the way I would have handled things. I gave you possible reasons for everything he may have done and I ignored nothing. I did not see where a supervisor said he did not follow policy and just because he was put on a desk during after a nationally televised news incident does not mean he didn't follow policy either. He behaved in a manner I wouldn't have and as a supervisor I would have counseled him about his behavior. But this case is far more blown out of proportion because Bland decided to kill herself and people want someone else to blame rather than the person that killed herself.

It was a good article.
You just can't help yourself.:lol

Why give possible reasons for actions and not just comment on the actions presented?

I notice you don't give any possible reasons for Blands actions or does she not deserve the same?

And then you go on to claim that him being put on desk duty is just for show, when multiple other police officers have pointed out him escalating this situation.

Thank you for proving my point of officers bending over backward to give each other cover and thereby reinforcing this type of behavior.
 

fortsbest

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And this is why I quit writing in this thread for a while. You can't help yourself either because you read and see only what you want. I proved no point of yours that you weren't already committed to and would have accepted an alternative to. You just keep living your life believing that all cops protect each other no matter what they do, we all hate minorities and will take whatever chance we can to abuse them. Must be a tough way to live.
 
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