California’s Criminal Cops
mercurynews.com
mercurynews.com
For instance, California has a handgun roster. If a citizen buys a handgun, it needs to be on a special list. The last time a model was added was 2013 [1]. Supposedly it's to make sure pistols are safe. But if you are a police officer, go ahead and buy a 2019 model! In fact, go ahead and buy a 2019 model, and then sell it for 2X to a normal citizen, if you want. A good side business!
How does any part of that make sense?
I guess the theory is that officers are well-trained and responsible, but where is the evidence of that? And why can't anyone else take the same magical steps to show their worthiness?
[1] Due largely to the "microstamping" requirememt, which is impractical to meet, but required for new models (some very minor variants are still allowed without microstamping). See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstamping
It's just the way things are when you "trust the government" to work in your best interest.
If you're not on them like stink on a turd, they'll go tyrannical
Other commenters have already covered possible motives I will cover the practicality side.
It would be impossible to pass gun control with that massive voting block (law enforcement and everyone that supports them) against you. Public safety or something along those lines is one of the reasons people advocate for gun control. If you don't exempt the police then basically every police chief will go on record saying your gun control will be terrible for public safety.
Cops are also allowed to keep guns after they retire. It's important to remember that guns are issued to police for self-defence, since the work they undertake puts them in harm's way. That doesn't change after they retire.
That no one else has that right maybe tells us we should expand CCW reciprocity. It's already something like 35 states.
I'd need to see some stats on how often retited police officers are retaliated against by criminals before I'll buy that this is anywhere near likely enough to worry about.
How many retired law enforcement officers go on binge shooting sprees?
Or should we oppose them having a legally purchased firearm just because?
The double standard!
Either way assuming that being armed doesn't provide a 100% effective deterrent, statistics should still help us here. Even assuming a very high deterrence rate, you would still expect to see at least a handful of revenge murders of retired cops every year if this was a significant problem at all.
>provides no defense advantage should they do so
This one should be very easy to determine. How many times each year do armed retired cops thwart revenge attacks?
From what a quick Google search tells me both of these things basically never happen.
If not, how are these police privileges remotely relevant to any need beyond that of a normal citizen?
First of all, why are they not bound by the same magazine capacity limits? If more than 10 rounds are needed for self defense, shouldn't everyone in the state have that tool at their disposal (per Heller)?
Similar question about buying a newer model of pistol. Why would the 2019 model be crucial to keep a retired cop from getting gunned down, but forbidden to others? There isn't even a major functional difference between a 2013 glock and a 2019 glock.
And generalizations about how retired police somehow need their special guns and nobody else does are just not compatible with the notion of individual rights. I bet a lot of abused women are in much greater danger than an average retired cop. Who decides who the special groups are that get special privileges?
Fundamentally, a police officer is a citizen. It happens that their job is dangerous, and I respect and admire their courage. But it's also a position of power, and we need to keep that under some control so that we maintain trust. Arbitrary privileges erode that trust.
It's not about keeping people safer, nor about making it easier to track criminals...
It would be less offensive to just be transparent about these regulations. It's about making it more difficult for anyone to legally purchase or maintain a firearm.
The argument you make about Gen 3 vs Gen 5 Glocks actually suggests there is no reason to restrict the general public from buying them, either. The Gen 5 has duplicate controls for left-handed shooting and is thus safer for some people.
All the points you are making are basically why the laws are dumb -- 10 round magazines are not significantly safer for the public than 17 round magazines, for example -- and no one likes to be subject to useless restrictions. Least of all cops.
But now, Western governments have to endure usurious prices or massive budget/time overruns for basic supplies (e.g. Germany has a problem with shoes for soldiers), quality issues (in Germany, G36 rifle, police uniforms in Bavaria and IIRC there were also issues with protection vests).
Planned economy Soviet-style didn't fail because of being what it was, it failed because of a lack of data gathering and processing (demand modeling), as well as the procedural inflexibility to react to short term changes.
There may be a nearby article about police brutality, negligence, incompetence, corruption, favortism, or even murder. The article may even suggest that the problems are sustemic in some departments.
But as far as the media can tell, they are completely unrelated topics. It's just assumed that gun control excludes police, and that's obvious and normal and right.
However, most American police and sheriff's departments tend to support gun ownership. Maybe because they are as aware as anyone of the saying: "When seconds count, police are only minutes away.".
From that perspective, it is likely that any gun control legislation will increase the power difference between individuals and the state.
I'm hoping more people will do like you and draw conclusions to Hong Kong. When 50%+ of your populace has taken to the streets, and still can't achieve their goals it should be illuminating.
From what I've read, this has been changing in recent years, with British police getting more and more armed, apparently in response to terrorists and organized crime being better armed.
So the US and British police are converging, but perhaps not in the way that gun control advocates might have hoped.
Firearms officers will remain - thankfully - volunteers subject to significant extra training, psychological screening and oversight. When mistakes or negligence happen they make front page news. There are more firearms units and more in visible positions like airports and other protection than there used to be, but they remain a small minority of the overall.
Wikipedia says in the year 2011–12, conventional firearms were used FIVE times. At the time there were 6,756 Authorised Firearms Officers and 12,550 police operations in which firearms were authorised throughout England and Wales. Which doesn't sound like UK:US convergence to me. :)
What are differences in UK training? I imagine the training is very good because the confidence not to over-react in self-defense comes from knowing (a) that you can handle many situations and (b) how to assess the situation you when are in it.
In 12 months up to March 2018, there were 18,746 armed police operations in the UK. Weapons were fired on 12 occasions. In comparison, 1,147 people were shot dead by police in the US in 2017.
Since 1990, a total of 70 people were fatally shot in the UK.
12 occasions of guns used vs 1,147 people shot by the police during the same time frame. 70 people killed in 30 years vs 1,147 in 1 year.
So please, UK and US police are not converging, do not spread misinformation.
Using numbers from 1990 is also meaningless for addressing the claim that gun use by UK police is increasing, as low numbers could just represent it being low in past.
... to shoot you in your home.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/texas-police-officer-sh...
But really, I never comprehend why police support civilians having guns since it just makes their job more dangerous.
By the statistics, even if widespread gun ownership only has a 0.0001% chance of preventing tyranny every year then it seems worth it
Furthermore, how do you reckon you would deal with tyranny, if not with arms?
[1] https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM [2] https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-... [3] https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2018/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
We just ignore ("non-binding") referendums sometimes
I mean someone did actually shoot and kill someone over just suggesting that people should vote in a certain way, and he's generally considered the bad guy in this interaction.
Or simply stop checking for warrants altogether, so that every unlucky motorist isn't put into a situation that is primed to deal with a cornered animal.
There is a deeper philosophical point that if the reason someone is being stopped is a moving violation, then that is not a cause to address anything besides that specific violation. Sticking to that would also help reduce the occurrence of "broken taillight" pretexts.
It's becoming more and more common to see British police with guns at events, central stations, etc (and not just handguns.. they carry MP5s). It's apparently to give the public confidence that terrorists won't attack but in reality it just makes me more scared of being shot by the police.
And the police union fights for the rights of police, not citizens.
Their rhetoric might say otherwise, but their underlying motives are clear. And they often scratch each other’s backs.
When the teachers union says that a new gun control law will protect kids, everyone just believes them.
Police beat their spouses at 4x the rate of the general population. The extremely well-armed police (who themselves demonstrate that they tend toward the more violent part of society) are one of the primary reasons that widespread civilian gun ownership is essential.
Without it, you get situations like what happened during the RNC in 2004, where the peaceful are denied defense, yet the oppressors are armed to the teeth.
[1] https://www.mercurynews.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/SJM-L...
Two weeks ago in France, 2 policemen were sentenced for beating up students. This kind of conviction is extremely rare, but they were caught on CCTV beating up "for fun" two students that were walking back home. It was probably a racist beating, since they first attacked the colored guy. Their sentences were symbolic. Both are still policemen, and one of them has been promoted. https://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-actu/prison-avec-sursis-pour-d... (in French)
De facto, policemen are above the law. And of course, many of them abuse that system. Yet most people don't care. They want law and order, even if the law is not the same for everyone, and even if the order is not just, and sometimes criminal.
Basically none, if you mean as a rule. There are exceptions of course in all countries, including the United States, but by and large, officers are above the law.
Yet the answer is rarely "less government / oversight" when it comes to these issues. It's just a race to get their preferred candidate into office who will wield the expanding power in a more efficient and effective manner, of course.
My dad was Oakland PD in the 70s - he quit after OPD killed several black panthers. He said he had to quit, as, "When you spend your whole life looking for bad, soon, thats all you can see"
https://old.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/dujohq/1111_hong_...
This means that if you treat them equally to a random person, they have the knowledge to/will get away with more crimes.
The only problem with holding them to a higher standard once you understand this, is that it generates resentment, and the higher standard becomes a different system they learn and game.
I say this as someone committed to justice for who 15 years in policing is receding into the past.
I don't have a perfect solution or I might have stayed in policing, at least kept my badge- I work in security now which scratches the itch that got me into law-enforcement in the first place. (don't tell my coworker devs that- some already think infosec is out to get them- we are not) It is hard to stay justice oriented no matter where you are- in gov law enforcement or the private sector, startup or big-corp.
The idea of police existing to protect you ( Protect and Serve nonsense ) is just PR/marketing. Just like "Don't be evil".
I suspect in most countries, these same pattern holds.
And there was the old summing up of cliches as the cops went from beating up the Irish for 'not fitting into society' to being the Irish beating up Hippies for 'not fitting into society'. Indeed part of why historically gay neighborhoods and districts exist in many cases is because they congregated under friendlier enforcement jurisdictions.
Putting aside the ancient police 'expecting the city to mob accused and restrain or kill them' the military largely were what we call the police essentially - at least with European history although they weren't homogeneous and there was some nuance to it and memetic factors. English highwaymen for instance could thrive better in the isles than on the Continent where they had Gendarme where as in England using cavalry for that was viewed as tyrannical.
Their longbow practice also had some 'citizen army' and ancestral 2nd Amendment rhetorical factors while still not exactly 'free' it still provided a check to power in a 'don't piss off the armed peasantry enough that they decide an armed rebellion is worth it'. Meanwhile France and others specifically didn't adopt the practice because the rebellion concerns made the idea anathema to their worldview.
They were created first and foremost for slaves, not immigrant masses. History gets too sanitized for my liking in this country and we miss important lessons because of it.
The down voters are why sanitizing history is a bad idea. It also allows the criminal past of many families/institutions to be swept under the rug.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_police_(United_States)
https://www.history.com/news/underground-railroad-mexico-esc...
Amazon's had an episode in their tv series: The Giant Beast that is the Global Economy where they covered corruption throughout the world. It showed who's living with it and who's stamping it out better.
Direct link to the episode: https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B07NVPSSK7/ref=stream...
https://www.thisamericanlife.org/684/burn-it-down/prologue-a...
https://www.thisamericanlife.org/684/transcript
This was just one department in one city, and it was mostly just bad behavior ("macho, frat house culture"), nothing criminal. The effort failed.
Well this is terrible... I'd have expected courts to do things by the book.
It's a real eye opener if you thought that courts do things by the book imho.
Like... Avery's dna was found in the victim's car, and the victim's charred bones were found in Avery's fire pit. But the show plays these off and makes it seem like a police conspiracy.
Yeah, smeared blood that looked like it came from a q tip. And a vial of his blood in the evidence locker was found punctured by a syringe with no record as to when or why.
Not surprised that was looked at suspiciously.
https://onmilwaukee.com/movies/articles/makingamudererbloodv...
> two national experts – including the chair of the committee that writes the industry standards on drawing blood samples – told OnMilwaukee that such blood vials are supposed to have holes pierced in their rubber stoppers. According to the experts, that's how the blood gets into the vial.
An interesting read is, “The Faithful Executioner” about 16th century Nuremberg. The book is heavily based on contemporary sources. The town archers, who are responsible for law enforcement, often cause trouble through drunkenness, excessive violence, and general bad behavior, and are rarely held accountable except for the most egregious offenses. An interesting parallel that points to that broader tension.
Honestly I dont like the American enthusiasm for restricting employment of criminals that have served their time. If someone had a DUI or cheated on time cards in their past I have no problem with them being a cop. Brutalizing family members sounds more serious but I'd like to find out more before judging someone on a brief description.
I know somebody whose cop ex-husband first beat her and then terrorized her for years. No local cop would ever do anything about it. She moved away a few hundred miles and even there he managed to get other cops to harass her constantly. This should just not be possible and people who behave like that simply aren’t fit to be a cop.
From what I know stuff like this is quite common.
Addition: the abusive ex-husband retired with 50 and pulls a 150k pension now.
>More than 80 law enforcement officers working today in California are convicted criminals
So 80/80,000 have some sort of misdemeanor conviction. I wonder how many of those are serious and how the rate compares to doctors, politicians, and engineers
And this on top of the the fact that cops underreport cop crimes, and prosecutors use their discretion to not prosecute cops by a huge margin.
Drunk driving can reveal poor judgement and a lack of foresight. Cheating on time cards can reveal a lack of ethics. It could also reveal a personal struggle with gambling, drugs, or other other financial problems. These sorts of problems constantly demand more money and might cause future fraud or theft issues due to on-going or escalating financial desperation.
Of course, all that aside, it's often easy to tell if someone's "turned toward the light" and grown up a bit, usually making him okay to hire. I'd agree that brutalizing family members probably reveals a pretty screwed-up guy, and probably wouldn't ever hire such a person. It's worse than murder; one has to be more of a psychopath to hurt those he loves than walk walking into a store and shoot a man as part of an armed robbery.
Idk i just thought that it was incredibly telling that the group of people that continuously arrest others for drugs putting them in situations where they are unable to find employment, do not suffer from the same penalties when they get caught abusing the drug that they say is OK (and is arguably one of the most destructive of all drugs).
It truly sucks to hate and fear the group of people that are supposed to help and protect you in emergency. Even now that I am a professional, long removed from my days of risky behavior like fearing the police while leaving a rave with personal amounts of drugs, they still prove they dont care about helping and are more concerned about their bonuses from finding drugs. The last time I called police because my roommate was drunk and yelling and threatening me, they saw a single syringe cap on the bathroom floor from where my roommate had thrown the bathroom trash can. They got aggressive and started threatening and looking around the apartment and in open rooms without express permission. I work in a biochemistry lab and use syringes, mostlyneedl3less everyday at work, had accidentally thrown some minor trash in my pocket and emptied it out while changing clothing in the bathroom. But this apparently was probable cause enough to be an asshole and search around mildly and forget about the actual reason i called
Saw this on front page of reddit today: https://www.reddit.com/r/Wellthatsucks/comments/dua2bh/hong_...
I know there are cases where doctors lose their medical license and there's a handful of states where they can move and regain a license. Is the same true for police officers?
That's not how it always works. The officers pled to misdemeanors because they knew they could keep their jobs with a misdemeanor. In other states they would plea to a non-criminal charge instead, or manage to not get convicted at all.
they went to places where the records were supposed to be instead of merely googling and being content with the poor information? Two pages to describe that experience coming right up
And a nephew who is a detective.
And the gym I work out at is crawling with cops. There's a judge and some school police, too.
All of them are very good people. I think the few bad apples get a lot of press.
Just how "good" are they if the "blue wall of silence" is rule #1 in terms of ignoring what you call "bad apples" and what civilians call criminal misconduct?
I am not aware of any bad behavior from any of them, and I am first-hand witness to good deeds done by them.
Do you have any first-hand knowledge of police misbehaving? I mean people you actually know?
Do you have any first-hand knowledge of police misbehaving?
You mean other than the time I got pulled over in some shithole town in NJ because that's just what the local police did there to raise revenue?
The Interstate used to end right at that point, it went down to a normal 4-lane road. The local pigs would have a car working that area, pulling people over. When they finished writing a ticket for one car, they'd get back on the road, going the other direction (they only worked about a 1 mile stretch). Within 30 seconds their lights would be flashing and they'd pull another car over.
I used to commute that stretch of road daily, so I saw this happen constantly. Constantly. Constantly. For years and years. Finally they finished the Interstate and bypassed the town.
This was the early 1980s. That's what used to happen in the open in NJ. Far worse were other shithole towns in NJ that had a reputation for having police control the stoplights as you went thru town. They'd flip the light red, pull you over, arrest you, take you to court right then. "What you got there now, Seth", said the judge to the arresting police officer. That one I heard second hand, from a friend of mine, a person I "actually knew". Nothing an on-the-spot fine payment couldn't take care of.
Simple petty graft. Done out in the open. For years. Just off an Interstate.
Experiences like that give the entire justice system a bad name. Everyone knows what's going on, nobody does anything about it, even if they're not personally profiting from the corruption.
It's that pesky blue wall of silence, elaborated in detail at the link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_wall_of_silence
I lived in NYC in 1970. Was the stuff documented by the Knapp Commission made up? Was all of that stuff contemporaneously reported on TV and in the newspapers made up for ratings and circulation? Did I have to personally experience it before I was allowed to believe it?
Unfortunately, one bad interaction with police negates 100 good interactions. Just like one bad meal at a restaurant can negate the 100 good meals you've previously had there. That's simple human nature.
Simply allowing people to be barred from office because of conviction past or present is dangerous as it gives a very abusable tool to disqualify political rivals. This isn't a theoretical thing - many dictatorships and sham-democracies use it regularly. Now politicians shouldn't have impunity but it is ultimately up to the voters to decide what does and doesn't disqualify someone from governorship. If the voters know of their record and decide to elect them anyway it is within their right. Mathew Lyon got re-elected after being jailed for violation of the Sedition act where his whole defense was 'this law is blatantly unconstitutional'.
Meanwhile a police position employeed is supposed to be subordinate to the laws and by the books. Demonstrating questionable judgement and keeping them on isn't fair to /everyone else/. Having every last police officer elected wouldn't be very logistically plausible nor would voters be as well equipped to evaluate candidates so having a 'bureaucratic' process makes sense for those sorts of roles.