In Baltimore, Brazen Officers Took Every Chance to Rob and Cheat
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Shaking down kids while cruising around in a black and white is one thing. Being equipped with military gear including armored cars opens up a whole new level of control issues.
http://www.businessinsider.com/photos-the-rook-armored-cater...
I'm not sure which one of those two does more damage to society in the longer term. The second obviously has problems but the first chips away at the foundations and I suspect that long term that one will have far more potential to do damage.
A caption of one of the linked photos about the Rook at the Philadelphia police equipment convention - 'The last attachment is the grapple claw, which can remove fortified doors and burglar bars and even be used to remove debris from natural disasters'.
Surely natural disasters and helping people comes first not, as an afterthought....
Also, much of the equipment that people point to as evidence of "militarization" is either generic equipment that has valid police use (e.g. armored trucks. Brinks security, for example, uses them for their secure transport services), or is not military equipment at all. Riot shields, gas masks, and tear gas aren't commonly used by the military and they are designed to resolve things like riots non-lethally. In the old days, soldiers were broke up riots by clubbing people with sticks and shooting wooden bullets. Today's riot police are much better equipped to safely disperse a crowd with their "militarized" equipment.
One difference between our militarized (and unionized) police forces and the real military is that if you're in the military and you shoot someone who didn't need shooting, you are in very deep shit.
The police are demanding -- and getting -- all of the perks of the Heroic Warrior job title, accompanied by few of the responsibilities that should go with it and essentially none of the accountability.
I am even more dubious of the second claim you make. A US citizen has vastly better ability to attempt to exact justice for their own police force's actions than someone in northern Iraq or Afghanistan's tribal regions. Especially when the military is more likely to use indirect weapons and weapons with drastically longer range (artillery, airstrikes, etc.) the notion that an unnecessary killing is more likely to result in disciplinary action in the military is very unlikely - there's a substantial chance such loss of life isn't even detected.
That's not an accurate characterization. Suggested reading: https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Warrior-Cop-Militarization-Ameri...
I am even more dubious of the second claim you make. A US citizen has vastly better ability to attempt to exact justice for their own police force's actions than someone in northern Iraq or Afghanistan's tribal regions.
A deployed soldier may be more likely to succeed in hiding the evidence of crimes they commit. They'd better succeed, because that's the only way they'll escape punishment. The differences come into play when the rogue cop or soldier is actually caught. Military personnel are held to higher standards than civilians in many respects, while police continually demand to be held to lower ones.
[1] trigger warning: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre
Only if the wrong people find out. Just like with the cops.
Not the corruption of individual cops on the street, but I bet there are some kickbacks given for purchase of heavy equipment. Don't want to get political about it but tear gas is pretty aggressive, and is ironically banned for use on the battlefield but it's considered totally normal for police to use it to control civilian populations.
And, as the sibling said, police is not purchasing DoD equipment[1], if there is any corruption it could not be in form of kickbacks.
I would assume because actually getting surplus military gear isn't the only manner in which police departments can get more militarized.
When the police have to go up against criminals wielding AK's and high powered rifles I want them to be as equipped as possible to defend themselves. The problem is not with the police but rather the widespread availability of guns in our society. It's easy to heft blame on the police, but also intellectually disingenuous because they act and react to the conditions of the society they are tasked to protect. Those conditions are where blame must be placed.
As an aside, if a malicious government ever wanted to exert control over the populace then they would have a very easy time doing so with the military regardless of how well equipped the police were. In fact, distributed police forces beholden to local municipalities would likely be a line of defense against a centralized aggressive military.
"Police militarization" is really nothing to be concerned about. Unless you're a criminal.
Edit: Not being sarcastic.
FWIW, this was not news to the residents of Baltimore. They have been talking about this for over 25 years. Anyone who listened could hear about it. Nobody really gave a shit.
A friend of mine grew up in East Baltimore. They would sit outside on their stoop, because the parents didn't want them inside, and there was no place to play outside other than in the street - no playgrounds, no trees, no parks, no back yards. Sometimes cops would roll up on their corner, get out, and question them about what they were doing. "We're sitting." They were told to empty their pockets. If they had any money on them, the police would confiscate it and drive off.
Re: "one of the most startling police corruption scandals in a generation" - they aren't mentioning how Baltimore City Detention Center was literally controlled entirely by the Black Guerrilla Mafia for 20 years. 44 employees and inmates were arrested in a sting operation a few years ago.
Or how the city's police used aerial and other surveillance methods (thanks, FBI) to tap and track mobile phones without a warrant or court order.
Other recent controversies involve the wrongful death of Freddie Gray, planting drugs on a suspect on camera, and a US Justice Department report condemning the BCPD for "violating the constitutional rights of citizens, using excessive force, and discriminating against African Americans".
Same experience I've had. I currently still live here. My zip code has a lower life expectancy than Yemen,and North Korea.
Hard to believe actions like that were taking place in the U.S. Sounds like something straight out of a Narcos episode.
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampart_scandal 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_v._City_of_Oakland
I'm not sure. I'm more familiar with the small town side of society, and I'd guess that it's much easier to hide this sort of behavior in a larger city. There's much less anonymity in a small town, and keeping this sort of behavior going would require "buy in" from the entire police force rather than just a nucleus of corrupt officers. So while the small town police force might be more likely to abuse civil forfeiture against out-of-town drivers, I'd be surprised if this level of corruption targeting residents would be possible in a smaller department.
To take Baltimore as an example: https://civilrights.baltimorecity.gov/civilian-review-board
There is the civilian review board, paid for by city taxes, who do nothing but review cases of police abuse and take said officers to court. That's how stories like the parent story become widely known.
So the question is: would you rather live in Baltimore, where these things are reported AND there are powers that can help you with these problems... or would you rather be in Small Town America where the Sheriff is the de-facto ruler and you ain't got nuthing against him?
---------
Anyway, the main issue with Baltimore cops is that they're grossly underpaid. If they live 30 minutes away in a slightly richer area, they can get a higher-paycheck, AND get higher-respect from the community.
Baltimore cops are in a tough spot right now. Morale is low, paychecks are low, and everyone sees them as villains (especially after "The Wire"). Why be a Baltimore cop when suburbia is safer, pays better, and earns more respect?
As such, the cops who stay in Baltimore are usually the ones who can't leave for whatever reason. "Good Cops" go elsewhere, there's basically a "brain drain" on decent cops in Baltimore, and I'm unsure how the city is supposed to move forward.
Personally, I much prefer my chances in small town America. I'm currently living in the Bay Area, but planning to move to somewhere much smaller. I may be naive, but I have much less fear of systematic corruption of the authorities in smaller towns. Alternatively, as a white male, I may be correct in my personal assessment despite the non-universality of the answer.
I'm not sure how one would go about definitively answering the question of whether the unreported cases of abuse in small towns are more prevalent than the reported plus unreported abuses in the larger cities. But I don't think it should involve "correcting" for the on-the-job differences between rural and city officers. Even if the brain drain and low morale help to explain why the remaining officers are more likely to be abusive, as a citizen I'd still probably be wise avoid those places and prefer locations with more content officers.
Is it? I'm a Canadian and everything I hear about the US police terrifies me - SWATing leading to innocent people being killed, unarmed black men being shot, no-knock warrants, civil forfeiture, the impossibility of convicting police for just about anything. If the worst thing they were doing was selling drugs that'd be an improvement as far as I can tell.
That said, kids like to make things up too, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what happened here.
When I was in kindergarten, I once lied about seeing a snake in the schoolyard. I don't remember why or how, I just told a stupid lie like every stupid kid (which is the same thing as every kid) does all the time. Now, no one believed me and I don't think that anyone else in the world remembers what I said, but imagine if they did. Imagine the grown-ups had taken it seriously and called 911 (well, 125 realistically , it wasn't in North America). The city would have started a large investigation to find the missing killer snake, the media would have printed article after article reporting on how people should be scared of sending their kids to school when there are dangerous animals on the loose and no one does anything about it, recess would have been cancelled, ... Imagine a shark scare, but on a larger scale. Every now and then, some grown-up would have asked me if I was sure I saw a snake, and due to the aforementioned stupidity, plus the fact that I was afraid of getting in trouble, I would have nodded yes. It would have been The News until something else distracted people from it.
None of this happened because no one believed me in the first place. But if it had happened, should I have been held criminally responsible for all the trouble?
That's my point. Kids lie all the time for all sorts of reasons. If you want to start holding them responsible through criminal justice system, you would have to send every one of them to jail.
Here’s a reminder: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Dziekański_Taser_inci...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_police_ex...
Is it really widespread in Canada?
Yah.
Here’s the video: https://youtu.be/1CR_k-dTnDU
One part of it is probably guns: even in states with strong gun control, there are plenty of them in the hands of hoodlums, so voters appreciate the Dirty Harry approach to dealing with them.
But to me that doesn't quite explain why cops seems to have such semi-formal impunity (see for example http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/01/get..., http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/01/pol... and http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/01/pol...).
Of course we can guess various reasons, voters like police, cops stick together etc, prosecutors and police work together etc. But those things are true in other countries too.
And the middle and upper classes--the only voices ever represented in media (excluding the current endless spate of articles interviewing poor Trump voters)--of course they not only have no problem with the police, they don't know anyone who's been shaken down. As a general rule, at least.
So, you look at the predominant voices in the media, and they have no problem with the corruption of cops, and they don't know anyone who does.
Gosh, even my nominally progressive sister goes into any discussion about police brutality with an assumption that whoever got shot deserved it. And she's generally aware of social issues!
The biases are baked in so deep, and so uncomfortable to unpack, it's easier to just to turn away from it all.
The Braidwood Inquiry concluded the use of Tasers in the case wasn't justified. The officers were charged with perjury (not murder, but at least something). The RCMP issued an apology to Dziekański's mother.
Compare this to the response to fatal shootings in the US, and it's very clear to me I prefer this line of the sand.
Whoa, those cops surely have a serious level of political backing.
This baffles me always to no end - the flame with which the officials would defend cops who went seriously out of borders. Every time in every locale.
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2012/06/29/saga_of_a_toront...
I recognize nothing in this story in my town's local police (we're about 65,000 population, and the cops are quite relaxed and civil as a default).
> I recognize nothing in this story in my town's local police (we're about 65,000 population, and the cops are quite relaxed and civil as a default).
I was stopped without explanation in Andover, KS (population < 12000 as of 2010). Officers harassed me and threatened to arrest me when I would not allow them to search my vehicle. They claimed that they smelled pot in the car. I Was not a pot smoker and was borrowing the vehicle from an anti drug family member while mine was in the shop. The claim was bogus and they were clearly trying to intimidate me.
In a neighboring city (Wichita), police responding to a 911 call that I placed after being robbed at gunpoint played good-cop-bad-cop with me. They suspected that my roommate and I were selling pot (we weren’t) and refused to press charges on the assailant because they assumed we were withholding information. I tried to call them on it, but I was unsuccessful. They didn’t give a shit about us because of the assumptions they made coming into the situation.
FWIW, I have two friends who are cops. I do not think all cops are bad people. Your dismissal of the issue is problematic.
In my situation, a young woman was killed by a car. So a person is dead, and neither the victim's family and friends, the perpetrator's family or others will really know if justice were served.
That's not making excuses for corruption or the despicable conduct in Baltimore. But sometimes our perception of police conduct goes one way because we haven't walked a mile in their shoes, and don't have the big picture of how their world works.
refused to press charges
You are allowing yourself to be misguided if you focus on what gets put on the front page of CNN.
No sane person would want to risk their life on a daily basis, wrestle people into their cars against their will on a daily basis, and be subject to the scrutiny you describe in your post, the hatred that is described in other posts, all for a policeman's salary. Literally no sane person would take that deal. Are you about to sign up to be a cop? Hell fucking no.
Without that- you would have died in that car-accident you sometimes get flashbacks to. There is a dentist effect here at work- everybody forgets the negative moments in live, everyone forgets about theire dentist until it hurts again. Police and Emergency services are socially isolated due to that effect.
This is nothing new. These things get exposed quite frequently, and surely happen far more often.
The reason you haven't heard about it is that just doesn't get widely reported when it happens.
Interestingly, there's a globally-recognised phrase - "Only in America".
This honestly seems like exactly the sort of corruption I'd expect to hear about in the US... There's just so much negative press about your government and police that a lot of people wouldn't expect it anywhere other than America.
It means something is so ridiculous, it could only happen in America. It's like when you see people buying a rifle in Walmart - Only in America. Or when they're getting a one-gallon cup of Coke from McDonalds, or drive away from a fuel bowser with the hose still plugged in etc etc. These things can happen elsewhere, for sure, but it's an extremely well-known and common comment to make.
Why not? Everybody else is making it. Besides, it gives the commenter that oh so delicious smug sense of unearned superiority. Besides, everybody else is doing it. Except..
>It's like when you see people buying a rifle in Walmart - Only in America.
People buy rifles in all kinds of stores all over the world so why would Walmart be any kind of exception?
>Or when they're getting a one-gallon cup of Coke from McDonalds,
This literally does not exist.
>or drive away from a fuel bowser with the hose still plugged in
People do this anywhere they are allowed to pump their own gas. FWIW in my 40 years, I've seen the aftermath of this exactly once.
To respond to your other comment:
>I disagree - I don't watch any [mass media]. This honestly seems like exactly the sort of corruption I'd expect to hear about in the US...
Except according to the corruption perception index, the US is less corrupt than most European countries[0] including the likes of France, Portugal and Ireland, and far less corrupt than the vast majority of countries in the world. You claim to not be watching the media but you're getting your false information from somewhere so maybe turn that off too.
[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index
An exaggeration in itself but then you go on to support it with claims that are either entirely false or orthogonal to the point. So I corrected you. Yet somehow I'm supposed to be "offended". Since you are so good at internet psychiatry, here's another word for you. Projection.
- Its weird everywhere else in the world to sell firearms in the same store as kids toys, milk and cheese. Weird.
- Gallon cups have indeed existed in promotions at various fast food outlets in the US, maybe not McDonalds I suppose.
- It's extremely rare to have people pull away from a bowser without checking the hose has been put away when you aren't pre-paying for fuel (i.e. many places around the world). However almost every image and video of it posted to car forums etc are from the United States.
- The US government is perceived as corrupt to many people in many nations, and the current office is making that perception greater. That is why people can accept that this level of corruption in Baltimore has happened.
But these were just lighthearted examples, and I digress.
That's a bizarre conclusion but whatever.
>- Its weird everywhere else in the world to sell firearms in the same store as kids toys, milk and cheese. Weird.
It's a giant department store. They sell everything. By saying it is weird, you are projecting your own biases.
>- Gallon cups have indeed existed in promotions at various fast food outlets in the US, maybe not McDonalds I suppose.
Yeah. Not McDonald's. It's almost like I said that. I also have never seen any fast food restaurant with any promotional cup size approaching anything near a gallon.
>- It's extremely rare to have people pull away from a bowser without checking the hose has been put away when you aren't pre-paying for fuel (i.e. many places around the world). However almost every image and video of it posted to car forums etc are from the United States.
Oh you saw it in some pictures in a car forum? Well I guess that settles it then.
>- The US government is perceived as corrupt to many people in many nations, and the current office is making that perception greater. That is why people can accept that this level of corruption in Baltimore has happened.
Yet the link I posted shows the US, like I said, to be perceived as less corrupt than, e.g., France. And Spain. And Japan. And Portugal. And on and on.
>But these were just lighthearted examples, and I digress.
You aren't being "lighthearted" any more than the people you are parroting who originally made these comments were. You are spreading lies and being hateful. You think you are better than "those people" in America so you spew your hatred on the internet. Except most of what you say is false or based on some other crap you, wait for it, read on the internet.
To the downvoters: I'm just devastated you took some of my internet points away. But thanks for reminding me I'm on r/hackernews. Nice "rebuttal"
That's an incredibly feeble-minded and edgy-childish thing to say.
Yet, if corruption happens in African, Middle Eastern, and Asian nationas nobody says "Only in Russia, China, or Saudi Arabia". That's just called normal.
There are European nations that are more corrupt than the USA.
https://www.transparency.org/news/feature/corruption_percept...
What is going to stop something like this occuring again? Officers going to jail?
wrongdoings by officers are mostly handled internally with administrative leave aka paid vacation
Unlike a regular job, government employees have a due process right to their job. You cannot suspend them without pay without due process.
I don't think they should have a due process right to a job, but the courts disagree. Trump sort of suggested removing that right during the state of the union, but it won't happen.
The conservatives will come for them at some point too...until then you have places like Philly that, at least used to, have complaints against police be heard by the union before they are passed on to internal affairs.
Bmore takes the cake, though...just wtf all over and back again.
I really really doubt that. All the conservatives I know love the police and think they can do no wrong.
I hate to agree.
Just an example https://archive.fo/QjtoQ
> A Minnesota prosecutor said on Thursday he needs more time to decide whether to charge a police officer who fatally shot an Australian woman who called 911 for help.
> Minneapolis officer Mohamed Noor shot Justine Ruszczyk Damond on 15 July, just minutes after she called 911 to report a possible sexual assault in the alley behind her home.
> The 40-year-old life coach was engaged to be married, and her death drew international attention. It also cost Minneapolis’ then-police chief her job and forced major revisions to the police department’s policy on body cameras. Hennepin County attorney Mike Freeman had promised a decision by the end of the year. But on Thursday he said his office was “getting more information and evidence, and additional investigation must be completed”.
You'd think that all the "conservatives" would demand that the shooter be hanged, quartered, and drawn. At least, there is a silver lining in this case that the new police chief knows that the public will not tolerate something like this.
* http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/house-races/221721-how-r...
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Minnesota
"Minnesotans have voted for Democratic presidential candidates ever since 1976, more times consecutively than any other state outside of the south, and longer than any state."
Your family must live in the Twin Cities metro because Minnesota gets real conservative real quick outside of Minneapolis, St Paul and the inner Suburbs.
Police unions are the most reliably conservative unions, and are powerful advocates for conservative policies. If hardcore libertarians were in power, they might be threatened, but mainstream conservatives aren't likely to come for them.
There is another side to this story, though I agree the behavior is mostly inexcusable.
These changes were made to prevent the previous situation, where a "political machine" could control a town, appoint their people to the important posts and create a town-wide corruption system, often by tossing boons to the poorer people in the central city (Tammany Hall was the most infamous of these operations[1]).
Of course, one might this replacement system degenerated to the point that you have similar corruption, perhaps even less accountability and fewer boons to the disenfranchised.
But the present order is very strongly entrenched in American politics and given the American system is presently close to a mockery of democracy, the chance of change today looks slim no matter how many egregious appear.
Police should be treated like other political officials and there should be a democratic mechanism for the public to remove them from their position.
There should be a national ban on psychological profiling during the police hiring process. Police departments should compensate their officers with substantially higher salaried instead of their current compensation: poor pay with perks like the chance to exert power, abuse people, steal things, and almost completely avoid prosecution.
Finally, police officers should be required to live in the areas they police. They should be provided with the same public housing the general public enjoys if they have trouble finding or affording a house.
Of course, these ideas are too sensible to be ever become real.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/10/20/558832090...
From a minute of googling, looks like San Diego had more dramatic results
>> It's to be expected that these cameras might have little impact on the behavior of police officers in Washington, D.C., he says, because this particular force went through about a decade of federal oversight to help improve the department.
Seems as though the D.C. PD didn't have many issues that needed correcting?
I contested a ticket I received from an aggressive traffic cop in Portland for texting in a stand-still bumper to bumper traffic jam. He was on a motorcycle and saw me as he rode by on the sidewalk!!! This guy had incredible nerve. In court, I insisted we view the footage from his body camera, which could only be done if I first refuse his plea offer, a significant issue IMO. I took the risk. The way he spoke to me was so militant and I thought it would be good to have the room give it a listen and see the traffic jam. The footage turns off as he is walking up to my car!!! Then he told me “either the battery died or the tape ran out”. Tape!!! This was 2015. The ticket was dropped, but I don’t think many people I know would have had this persistence, especially risking the plea denial. Beyond being annoyed, I was also intrigued with the abuse of power in such a trivial case.
(I agree you shouldn't HAVE to in a society with a well functioning justice system, but that would be the obvious means)
"Sorry madam the last person I dealt with broke my camera, I'm not a cop at the moment"
Political policing departments... Hhmm you think the police equivalent of trump are going to be any less corrupt?
I'm also sure housing the police where they work would definitely no in anyway make them, their family and property, any sort of target being as everyone loves the police.
He could help in any way a normal citizen could help someone in trouble until another officer arrives with a working body cam.
> Political policing That’s not what I said.
What’s wrong with allowing the public to petition for a police officer to be fired?
> I'm also sure housing the police where they work would definitely no in anyway make them, their family and property, any sort of target being as everyone loves the police.
Everyone hates the police. That’s the point. It’s a lot harder to curb stomp a kid’s head if you know you’ll see his mother at the grocery store. It’s a lot harder to force a woman to blow you at a traffic stop if she’s in a book club with your wife.
If your profession requires you to have a secret lair, you’re probably a villain.
"Sorry madam I know the theif is getting away but I can only help as a normal citizen"
Or
"Sorry madam I cannot do anything just now I need my camera, if I tried to save her and it went wrong someone could claim I did someone wrong and a mob could then demand I lose my job based on only half facts"
>What’s wrong with allowing the public to petition for a police officer to be fired?
Because as you say everyone hates to police, that would mean you're local high level gangster could drum up enough support to fill the ranks of the police with cops who wouldn't touch them.
>Everyone hates the police. That’s the point. It’s a lot harder to curb stomp a kid’s head...
Also a lot harder to arrest those dangerous and violent criminals who will then take revenge on you, your family or property. But then I forget if you're a cop your family is fair game, because fuck cops right?
You know, there's a converse to that.
We're developing more and more AI that can detect "events". Wouldn't be interesting if you could detect "criminal" events, even if the officer didn't see, remember, or even know they were criminal to begin with?
It means, that every body cam, camera, and recorder turns into a statute-of-limitations criminal detector. A fishing expedition only bound by compute power. And each charge is a goldmine of $$$$, with almost inexcusable evidence (video!).
It's why the idea of "Badgecam" is boneheaded without one more addendum: the data is sealed until court order opens it up, upon probable cause at the time with said officer. Else, this massive data collection turns into a panopticon of driving and walking officers and devices.
They have stated that they are committed to transparency.
Both.
The population distribution of Baltimore is based on a practice of redlining, where banks, real estate owners, and others conspired to literally confine black people to certain areas and restrict access to services. Though the original practice is now abolished, neighborhood boundaries and lack of access have not changed, and there are new forms of redlining (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining#Current_issues). This is one of the many reasons that there continues to be a quasi-segregation, endemic racism, and poverty in the city.
To me, the answer is quite clear: the government needs to break up the city. They need to force banks to give loans to people to provide businesses and services to African Americans. They need to break up neighborhoods so that there is a more even distribution of rich, middle class and poor, and less ethnic separation (Sandtown-Winchester, the neighborhood Freddie Gray was from, is 99% black). They need to provide better access to transportation throughout the city so people can get to jobs, schools, and social services without additional incumbents. They need to redirect the giant tax breaks going to local giants like Under Armor and use it to fund school lunches, increased teaching facilities/teachers, job education programs, and after school activities. There's a lot of shit that needs to be done to reduce the level of poverty, drugs, and violent crime.
Once that is done, and with increased wages, hopefully the police won't feel the need to take advantage of a broken society and vulnerable population.
Cities often have multiple options for who "owns" local policing - county level police, county level sheriff's office, contracting out to a neighboring town, or even state police.
Heck, even Cupertino, CA (home of Apple) does that.
> New York City has agreed to pay up to $75 million to settle a federal class-action lawsuit that accused its Police Department of issuing hundreds of thousands of criminal summonses that were later found to be without legal justification, according to a signed copy of the proposed deal filed on Monday.
The broader issue is naturally the police have a lot of leverage on your average court system, police are often not liable for even the most egregious mistake, only actual malice is required and occasionally then legal contortions can justify various behaviors and so-forth.
But even more, if someone wins a suit against the police of town X, town X pays the fine and that money comes out of money for parks and libraries of town X, not say, from the pay of cops of town X, who can thus merrily ignore even a successful suit.
There needs to be an independent police force to police the police. Internal affairs is a joke, and the interests of DAs are too closesly aligned with police to be a reliable check.
So, Baltimore ends up with much greater problems as smaller ones snow ball.
Body cameras are helping to distance officers from hurting their team but they're not being managed in a way that will ensure integrity. The fox can't guard the hen house. Police control when the cameras are on, they control the recordings, and they control who reviews the recordings.
I might as well add that Trump is in the process of creating this culture among the branches of government. Smaller problems won't be reported. Much greater problems will eventually emerge. Everyone will ask how this could ever happen. A political savior will swoop in and reform.
At some point I hope to see a #MeBlue social campaign by good cops to out bad cops.
"If you're not one of us you're one of them" is exactly the kind of cop logic that got us here.
I'm not arguing that treason / corruption aren't worthy of increased focus, but your proposal doesn't seem to be it.
There's also these pesky anti anti-corruption / pro "free speech" SCOTUS cases :(
Fixing corruption law (including SCOTUS precedent) is very hard, no need to add very debatable issues additionally.
How does the audit culture work in the US? Are government agencies required to establish compliance with their stated positions (e.g. their position on Transparency) ?
As with any city it's best you avoid certain crime ridden areas, but other then that it's great! The low cost of living in the surrounding counties and Govt IT jobs where salary ranges from 120 to 250k are fairly plentiful. Also, traffic isnt too bad, there is a tech scene, a startup scene and good amount to do in and outside of the city.
Thus, I was pointing out positive aspects of this city that are available to everyone!
As for being privileged I am not rich nor have parents that are wealthy rather about middle class. My startups I started and made no money off we’re all paid for by myself from savings or grants I received from incubators. Thus anyone who wants to can work hard .. save money .. do a startup to either hit the jackpot or use the experience to learn an on demand skill.
I am no way making 120 to 250k in Govt IT but know friends who are after ten or more years. Maybe I will one day and if so that would be great .. though it would come after years of hard work.
The Shield on the other hand..
These guys don't exactly sound like good police: "The unit, whose purpose was to get guns off the street, even stole and sold guns."
The entire 5th season has most of the department cooking the books to get their overtime pay.
If I remember correctly they still and accidentally lose some of that money in the back of their car. Lt. Daniels notices and tells them to bring it it back. They find it, but it looks bad regardless of their honest intentions. ("Do you think he believed us?" - "Would you?")
the city is essentially crime-free
a sign of a ``clean'', efficient police force
Plainclothes detectives are simply police that are not in uniform ('undercover'), they are still part of the regular police force.
Really not that different.
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/17505/police_and_poor_...
Nonsense, the police were not created with that goal in mind. The Romans had police, plenty of European cities had police forces prior to the 18th century (see Rembrandt's painting 'the Nightwatch' for some proof of that) and so does every other normal society today, even the ones that are not dictatorships. Also, you've just made the leap from 'secret police' to 'plainclothes detectives' to 'any police'.
The linked article is clearly pushing an agenda and in the process does a lot of historical revision.
Police is a normal and useful component of society, the kind of excesses that Americans have to contend with are a direct result of a society that is broken in many ways and for which there are no easy fixes.
If you let the regular police get away with enough bad stuff over time the good guys will leave the force and more bad elements will enter. Keep this going for a couple of decades and you get Baltimore. But it need not be that way. Fixing this will be hard though, they are pretty strongly entrenched now and it will take major force to get rid of them, similar to how hard it is to get rid of the Mafia in Italy.
So, every 'normal' society doesn't have a ruling class that uses police to protect its assets from the working class?
>Also, you've just made the leap from 'secret police' to 'plainclothes detectives' to 'any police'.
Don't see the contention here.
>If you let the regular police get away with enough bad stuff over time the good guys will leave the force and more bad elements will enter. Keep this going for a couple of decades and you get Baltimore.
Replace Baltimore with 99% of the police agencies in the US (can't speak for other countries), and I'd agree.
In the US at least, "undercover" implies that they are not identifying themselves as police.
I see a difference between the Stasi and the US police currently, but its not like the US police don't exhibit many of the same behaviors. In a related article referencing the same group of police here, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/14/us/baltimore-police-depar...
That description of jump-out squads, where you never know when some random guy on the street is gonna detain you and arrest/beat/steal from you sounds a lot like the descriptions of secret police in other countries. There was also that black site in chicago where the police disappeared people
I also don't think a dictatorship is a necessary component for calling some group a secret police. An oligarchy and even a representative democracy can do that just as well. Its not like we don't already have secret courts. The apparatus exists for this already