Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[DJ]

There's screw-ups and then there's screw-ups. If a surgeon leaves a gauze in a patient and he dies from it, it's negligent manslaughter (well, not sure about USA, but in Croatia a doctor went to jail because a severe screw-up during a routine operation cost his patient a leg). Cops, on the other hand, tend to just get a slap on the wrist, or at worst early retirement. Shooting a 7 year old girl is plain and simple an inexcusable screw-up.

[RedKing]

What's with the stupidly poor intel American cops seem to get, anyway? DO they just go into houses based on hearsay?

Sometimes the problem is created by the perp themself. Let's say you're going in to buy a pistol. You know that's going to be traceable, so you use a neighbor's address instead of your own. Cops trace the weapon after a robbery, and assume the purchase record is legit. Or same with a cellphone purchase. Or maybe they borrowed a neighbor's cellphone to call an accomplice. Cops sift the call logs, track down the phone, and the billing is registered to such-and-such address.

Sometimes it's a typo by the intel folks (though that really is unforgiveable).

Sometimes it's an automated problem with geocoding, where the system can't find a given address and finds the nearest listed one instead.

Or maybe they're basing the location on cellphone triangulation, and they're 20 feet off in a situation with lots of small apartments clustered together (like in a public housing project). A lot of times when these errors occur, its in areas of dense residential housing.

There's a lot of ways errors can creep into the process, and not a lot of good ways of checking it beforehand.

[nil]

What's with the stupidly poor intel American cops seem to get, anyway? DO they just go into houses based on hearsay?

Sometimes the problem is created by the perp themself. Let's say you're going in to buy a pistol. You know that's going to be traceable, so you use a neighbor's address instead of your own. Cops trace the weapon after a robbery, and assume the purchase record is legit. Or same with a cellphone purchase. Or maybe they borrowed a neighbor's cellphone to call an accomplice. Cops sift the call logs, track down the phone, and the billing is registered to such-and-such address.

Sometimes it's a typo by the intel folks (though that really is unforgiveable).

Sometimes it's an automated problem with geocoding, where the system can't find a given address and finds the nearest listed one instead.

Or maybe they're basing the location on cellphone triangulation, and they're 20 feet off in a situation with lots of small apartments clustered together (like in a public housing project). A lot of times when these errors occur, its in areas of dense residential housing.

There's a lot of ways errors can creep into the process, and not a lot of good ways of checking it beforehand.

This is why police shouldn't be a militarized force that routinely and systematically sacrifices citizen safety for their own.

Keeping the gun lowered would only yield officer death in case there was an armed resistance inside.

As to the first part of your comment...you don't have children. And I'm going to leave it at that, lest this thread get locked.

Yep. I'd understand grieving parents or something, but why the hell general public gives a damn? It's really not worth all this fuss.

Because this shit happens all the time.  I don't have a big wall o' text of police abuse on hand at the moment, but it's pretty easy to compile one.  Just in my open tabs I have this, this, and this.

Oh yeah, and:

[Dwarf]

 

[Funk]

I really dislike how every country is slowly turning into a pseudo-fascist state.

slowy my ass read up on the Federal Emergency Management Agency and it Executive Orders.

[nil]

And yes, the information available in this case is biased and very incomplete.  Unfortunately, you can rarely go wrong assuming the worst when it comes to abuse allegations--between the bias of the media, the courts, and above all the blue wall of silence, you only really hear about the worst of the worst, cases with innocent victims, particularly egregious or consequential abuses, and/or video evidence.  Joe Blow the meth dealer will get ignored from top to bottom even if he is telling the truth.

[Duke 2.0]

This is why police shouldn't be a militarized force that routinely and systematically sacrifices citizen safety for their own.

Wait, what? Those issues seem to be inherent in the system whether the police is a militant organization or not. And half of those are the criminal being clever. I don't think any point on that list exemplified this statement. Granted there are other things that do, but what you quoted didn't really support it.

[nil]

I really dislike how every country is slowly turning into a pseudo-fascist state.

slowy my ass read up on the Federal Emergency Management Agency and it Executive Orders.

Personally, this sort of thing is why I don't give much credence to the more apocalyptic Glenn Beck/Alex Jones-type allegations.  Police, politicians, and corporations can already break the law with impunity. 

Our government is already up for sale.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37205691/ns/gulf_oil_spill

As an Obama administration official acknowledged lax regulation prior to the Gulf oil spill, Senate Democrats on Tuesday were foiled in their bid to dramatically lift a cap on oil companies' economic liability for spills...  Republican Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma used procedural move to stop the bill from coming to the Senate floor, saying that raising the cap would hurt smaller drillers.

Campaign contributions

In the 2008 election cycle, Senator Inhofe’s largest campaign donors represented the oil and gas ($446,900 in donations), leadership pacs ($316,720) and electric utilities ($221,654) industries/categories.[48]
In 2010, his largest donors represented the oil and gas ($429,950) and electric utilities ($206,654).

We've already invaded a country on trumped up charges that they may have the ability to pose a threat to us.  We've already seen business make an end-run around organized labor by moving their operations to third-world countries that lack fair wages, workplace regulation, and any bargaining power whatsoever.  The elites in this country aren't going to start rounding people up into camps--they've already got all the power they want and there's no need for them to take the risks of open violence and martial law.

This is why police shouldn't be a militarized force that routinely and systematically sacrifices citizen safety for their own.

Wait, what? Those issues seem to be inherent in the system whether the police is a militant organization or not. And half of those are the criminal being clever. I don't think any point on that list exemplified this statement. Granted there are other things that do, but what you quoted didn't really support it.

The point I was trying to make is that mistakes are inevitable due to all the reasons you listed, so police shouldn't act in a way that cause mistakes to have deadly consequences for innocent citizens.

[RedKing]

Based on that logic, no one should practice medicine either, because fatal mistakes are inevitable. In both cases, I would argue the public good from..you know, HAVING law enforcement and medicine outweighs the evil of isolated mistakes.

[nil]

Based on that logic, no one should practice medicine either, because fatal mistakes are inevitable. In both cases, I would argue the public good from..you know, HAVING law enforcement and medicine outweighs the evil of isolated mistakes.

Who said anything about not having police?  My agenda is more around the lines of "no-knock warrants delivered carried out by SWAT teams with flashbangs and hair-triggers shouldn't be the first resort when dealing with a building that is suspected of housing a criminal but known to house innocent civilians."

At least in this case the suspect is accused of an actual crime--most no-knock warrants are used in the drug war.  The only thing worse than cops killing an innocent person because they raided the wrong house in their search for a murderer is cops killing (and framing!) an innocent person because they raided the wrong house in their search for someone selling dried flowers.

[RedKing]

I agree that the "wrong address" incidents constitute a serious problem and need to be reduced and/or eliminated. And covering up a f**k-up by planting evidence is..well, criminal and should be prosecuted as such.

But there's three competing interests here: public safety, officer safety, and effective enforcement. If you show up and knock politely, and you *have* the right house, your perps are out the back door in a flash, and/or your officers are gunned down.

You can't have a blanket policy of not attempting an apprehension if there's bystanders present, because then the perps start using them like human shields.

The trick is to find a Pareto-optimal balance between the three interests. That takes the involvement of law enforcement, policymakers, and the local community. You'd be amazed how much smoother things operate when the local community cooperates with local law enforcement as opposed to being non-cooperative, obstructive or even downright hostile to law enforcement.

 

[nil]

I agree with the need to find a balance.  I simply think there is far too much emphasis on officer safety and not enough on public safety.  Police are not soldiers deep in enemy territory, yet that is exactly how they act.

Closely and secretly observing a home and snatching the suspect up when he leaves to go buy some smokes or whatever is usually a far safer and more effective method than a no-knock raid, but since it doesn't allow SWAT teams to play GI-Joe and and use their flashy new toys it is often ignored.  As far as community co-operation is concerned, the first step is to tear down the blue wall of silence--citizens will not and should not trust the police so long as they prioritize their buddies over the law.

[Oglokoog]

Shooting a 7 year old girl is plain and simple an inexcusable screw-up.

It's not a screw-up. It's murder. Also, police officers should get far stricter punishments for this sort of thing (as in more strict that normal people, not more strict than they do now.

[Phmcw]

American police has a problem.

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/05/06/video-of-swat-raid-o.html

/sarcasm But of course universal health care is what will make America a fascist country.  /end sarcasm

It's amusing to see how Americans are slowly stripped of their basic right.
First scare them with a spectacular, horrid but very rare incident.
Take drastic disposition, that both diminish their right and make the situation worse. Rinse. Repeat.

Edit: Edited for your convenience.

[Leafsnail]

But of course universal health care is what will make America a fascist country.

Sarcasm or trolling... damn, they look too similar.  I give up.