You would think that after all the mistakes that cops make which result in death and injury the public would stop giving them the benefit of the doubt.
this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2023
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THE POLICE PROBLEM
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The police problem is that police are policed by the police. Cops are accountable only to other cops, which is no accountability at all.
99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.
When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.
When police are fired — which is all too rare — they leave with 'law enforcement experience' and can easily find work in another police department nearby. It's called "Wandering Cops."
When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.
Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.
The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.
All this is a path to a police state.
In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.
Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.
That's the solution.
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Our definition of ‘cops’ is broad, and includes prison guards, probation officers, shitty DAs and judges, etc — anyone who has the authority to fuck over people’s lives, with minimal or no oversight.
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ALLIES
• r/ACAB
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INFO
• A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions
• Cops aren't supposed to be smart
• Killings by law enforcement in Canada
• Killings by law enforcement in the United Kingdom
• Killings by law enforcement in the United States
• Know your rights: Filming the police
• Three words. 70 cases. The tragic history of 'I can’t breathe' (as of 2020)
• Police aren't primarily about helping you or solving crimes.
• Police lie under oath, a lot
• Police spin: An object lesson in Copspeak
• Police unions and arbitrators keep abusive cops on the street
• Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States
• When the police knock on your door
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MODERATORS
I'm European and even I know that the U.S. Constitution's Bill of Rights applies to EVERYONE in U.S. territory, independently of being citizens or not.
If it didn't, no-one overseas would even imagine a vacation to America, where they'd have no rights.
It can’t be surprising most Americans have never read the Constitution, let alone it’s applying to everyone in the country, citizen or not.
But, I’m American, where personal ignorance is something to be prideful of.
In theory, yes.
In practice: depends where the court is, who the judge is, who the DA is, who’s in the police department that arrested you, and - most importantly - the color of your skin. Also, sometimes, which imaginary friend you believe in, and which side you voted for in the last election.
The officers were intending to serve a domestic violence warrant on a neighbor across the street, but got the addresses confused.
Another one where the cops went to the wrong home and the person had a gun. They instantly blast the person instead of trying to defuse the situation when they were at the wrong place.
Wife came downstairs and they fired 15 rounds at her. No hits.
That’s another crazy thing. The law says you can shoot to stop a threat. Yet you see mag dumps. Sorry that should be illegal in most cases.
That’s insane.
I'm a gun owner and I've gotten into quite a few disagreements with other gun owners over the mag dump issue. A few caveats, the people in talking about are generally right- wing and don't know my political beliefs and I've generally had more actual training than they have.
You see this behavior from cops all the time, but the legal reality for an armed citizen does not look favorable. You are responsible for every bullet that's discharged from your firearm. If someone breaks into your home and you dump the mag (7-16 rounds for most pistols) the prosecution will highlight this fact and the jury likely won't look favorably on that behavior.
Beyond the legal implications, it is highly irresponsible behavior in a populated area. Regardless of training, firing in rapid succession decreases accuracy and increases the likelihood of not only missing your target, but striking an unintended individual. This demonstrates an individual who is not in control of their emotions, is reckless, and an unsafe gun owner.
The fact that cops are permitted to do this is unacceptable and demonstrates that the cops who do this are completely unsuitable to the job.
When I went through the academy we were trained to fire two shots. Evaluate the target and fire two more if there was still an active threat. If there was not a threat, we watched the person until medical aid arrived.
Yet you see these shootings were they may dump. That isn’t stopping a threat. That’s murder.
Laws are for you and I.... Unless I'm a cop and then they're just for you.
They claim he had a gun. The evidence suggests otherwise. Not only was he shot in the back of the head from a distance of six feet, the gun on the scene was more than six feet away from the body and did not have his fingerprints or DNA on it. They executed this man's dog and then him we fled for his life. Of course, there's no video and they accept the cops word over the physical evidence, a benefit none of us would receive.
Let’s pretend their story was true.
They were at the wrong house. He wasn’t expecting them. He pointed a gun and was shot.
The police point guns all the time. Their logic is pointing isn’t a threat. Yet they shot this man because he pointed.
The rules should be the same.