Police Misconduct Catch All Thread

[Loren Pechtel]

You're right. You are absolutely right. What I should have said was "Anyone who claims to be a law enforcement officer that feels action is necessary because of what Afroman did deserves to be sacked."

Yes it is that simple. I'm glad you cleared that up. Thank you.

What he did was technically illegal. I don't believe the cops should be denied their day in court--but neither do I think they deserve a penny from the jury.

 

[blastula]

What he did was technically illegal.

Sure, counselor.

 

[ZiprHead]

You're right. You are absolutely right. What I should have said was "Anyone who claims to be a law enforcement officer that feels action is necessary because of what Afroman did deserves to be sacked."

Yes it is that simple. I'm glad you cleared that up. Thank you.

What he did was technically illegal. I don't believe the cops should be denied their day in court--but neither do I think they deserve a penny from the jury.

In what way was this technically illegal? Cops have absolutely no expectation of privacy while performing their duties.

 

[ZiprHead]

San Jose Police Union Executive Charged With Attempted Illegal Importation Of Fentanyl Analogue

SAN JOSE – The Office of the United States Attorney has filed a federal criminal complaint charging Joanne Marian Segovia with attempt to illegally import a controlled substance in connection with a scheme to bring synthetic opioids into the country and distribute them throughout the United...

www.justice.gov

 

[lpetrich]

KCPD officer ordered to ‘target minority citizens’: Lawsuit | The Kansas City Star

A Kansas City police officer says his superiors instructed him to target minority residents in traffic stops in an effort to meet ticket quotas that are illegal under Missouri law, according to a lawsuit filed earlier this week.

...
Williams says he was punished for raising complaints with his commanders over the so-called ticket quotas and “potentially racially discriminatory” policing practices in predominantly Black and other racial minority neighborhoods.

Williams, who says he has been with the department 21 years, complained to KCPD’s human resources department about a supervisor’s alleged directive “to go to minority neighborhoods to write tickets because of the belief that it would be easier to write multiple citations for every stop,” the lawsuit says.

He alleges his superiors instructed him to “target minority citizens” and says his superiors “constantly” subjected him to “racially inflammatory rhetoric” that was “directed at African American and other citizens.”

noting
Black cops face racism in Kansas City Police Department | The Kansas City Star - "The traffic stop, captured on the officers’ dashboard camera on March 11 last year, showed that a Black person in Kansas City is not immune to police harassment even if they are a veteran cop who, like Robinson, has taken a bullet in the line of duty."

In Kansas City, the solidarity behind the thin blue line does not apply if you are Black, a yearlong investigation by The Star found. The racism festering in the Kansas City Police Department does not spare even its own members, driving many Black officers to leave the force.

and
Kansas City police investigated by DOJ for racism in hiring | The Kansas City Star

Back to the original article. Of KC people and traffic tickets, black people are 30% of the population with 60% of the tickets, and white people are 60% of the population with 37% of the tickets.

 

[lpetrich]

Though the Missouri state legislature outlawed ticket quotas,

But in the lawsuit, Williams contends KCPD effectively bypassed the law by instead requiring traffic officers to make 100 stops per month. The number of stops was based on previous ticket counts, the lawsuit alleges.

Williams also pointed to a practice of sergeants printing tickets and ranking officers based on a ticket count.

...
“Officers have received unsatisfactory marks on their evaluations and had duties and benefits stripped for low ticket writing numbers. This continues to this date,” the lawsuit says.

...
In May 2021, the lawsuit says Williams was put on a “personal performance improvement plan” because of his “low ticket quota.” He says he was verbally instructed to stop 10 cars per day for a year.

Edward Williams earlier made an internal complaint in the police department.

Among the concerns raised in the internal complaint was a directive from a KCPD captain instructing him and other officers to “approach every car with the mindset to be ready to kill everybody in the car,” the lawsuit says.

The complaint also referenced views allegedly expressed by a police captain that “officers should only respond to calls in the white neighborhoods … because those are the folks who are actually paying for the police.”

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You're right. You are absolutely right. What I should have said was "Anyone who claims to be a law enforcement officer that feels action is necessary because of what Afroman did deserves to be sacked."

Yes it is that simple. I'm glad you cleared that up. Thank you.

What he did was technically illegal. I don't believe the cops should be denied their day in court--but neither do I think they deserve a penny from the jury.

In what way was this technically illegal? Cops have absolutely no expectation of privacy while performing their duties.

You don't have the right to commercial profit from showing somebody even when there's no privacy involved. That's why I presented the casino example--consent must be obtained. Or look at The Amazing Race--what you don't see is that any interaction with the locals they either have to get consent or blur out the person's face. And racers tend to avoid contact with the locals for this reason--asking somebody for directions means the team gets delayed while the producers ask.

 

[ZiprHead]

You're right. You are absolutely right. What I should have said was "Anyone who claims to be a law enforcement officer that feels action is necessary because of what Afroman did deserves to be sacked."

Yes it is that simple. I'm glad you cleared that up. Thank you.

What he did was technically illegal. I don't believe the cops should be denied their day in court--but neither do I think they deserve a penny from the jury.

In what way was this technically illegal? Cops have absolutely no expectation of privacy while performing their duties.

You don't have the right to commercial profit from showing somebody even when there's no privacy involved. That's why I presented the casino example--consent must be obtained. Or look at The Amazing Race--what you don't see is that any interaction with the locals they either have to get consent or blur out the person's face. And racers tend to avoid contact with the locals for this reason--asking somebody for directions means the team gets delayed while the producers ask.

Newspapers and other news sources do it all the time, for profit.

Not to mention music videos themselves are generally not a big profit making endeavor in and of themselves. They are promotions for the sales of the artists other profit generating products. It's basically just advertising.

 

[bilby]

You don't have the right to commercial profit from showing somebody even when there's no privacy involved.

Surely that varies by jurisdiction, even within the USA. Certainly it's not generally true of OECD nations.

 

[blastula]

You can't use somebody's image to imply their endorsement, but that's clearly not what Afroman is doing. You can use it for commentary which is what he is doing.

However, I wonder if it may be possible the lady copy could have a defamation claim against him. Afroman says some vile, homophobic things about her. I could support that suit.

 

[Gospel]

Afroman says some vile, homophobic things about her. I could support that suit.

Criticizing rap music for these qualities would be akin to condemning NASCAR for featuring cars on the racetrack.

 

[blastula]

That was in his social media.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You're right. You are absolutely right. What I should have said was "Anyone who claims to be a law enforcement officer that feels action is necessary because of what Afroman did deserves to be sacked."

Yes it is that simple. I'm glad you cleared that up. Thank you.

What he did was technically illegal. I don't believe the cops should be denied their day in court--but neither do I think they deserve a penny from the jury.

In what way was this technically illegal? Cops have absolutely no expectation of privacy while performing their duties.

You don't have the right to commercial profit from showing somebody even when there's no privacy involved. That's why I presented the casino example--consent must be obtained. Or look at The Amazing Race--what you don't see is that any interaction with the locals they either have to get consent or blur out the person's face. And racers tend to avoid contact with the locals for this reason--asking somebody for directions means the team gets delayed while the producers ask.

Newspapers and other news sources do it all the time, for profit.

Not to mention music videos themselves are generally not a big profit making endeavor in and of themselves. They are promotions for the sales of the artists other profit generating products. It's basically just advertising.

News is a special case. You can present news without permission of those being shown.

 

[Derec]

In what way was this technically illegal? Cops have absolutely no expectation of privacy while performing their duties.

There is a difference between "no expectation of privacy" and "people can use your likeness for commercial purposes without permission".
That's why you usually see passers' by faces blurred out in footage of public spaces. Yes, they do not have an expectation of privacy, but that does not mean you can just use their faces freely.

 

[Derec]

Criticizing rap music for these qualities would be akin to condemning NASCAR for featuring cars on the racetrack.

All car race series have cars on a racetrack. So it would be like criticizing rap for somthing common to all music genres.

More apt metaphor would be criticizing Nascar for having crappy outdated cars with negligible brakes and a calendar relying too much on ovals.

 

[southernhybrid]

Has anyone mentioned the one in the link?

https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/07/us/new-mexico-police-shooting-wrong-house/index.html

Authorities are investigating the shooting of a man killed by police at his northwestern New Mexico home after they arrived at the wrong address, police said.

Robert Dotson, 52, was killed Wednesday night by officers with the Farmington Police Department after they received a call reporting a domestic violence incident around 11:30 p.m. and went to his house instead of the one across the street, according to local and state police.

“I am just heartbroken. … Mr. Dotson was not the subject of this call,” Farmington Police Chief Steve Hebbe said during a Thursday video statement posted on Facebook. “This ending is just unbelievably tragic. I’m extremely sorry that we’re in this position.”


Upon arriving to the neighborhood in Farmington, which is about 150 miles northwest of Albuquerque, officers “mistakenly approached 5305 Valley View Avenue instead of 5308 Valley View Avenue,” New Mexico State Police said in a statement Thursday.

After no one answered their knocks on the door, police officers asked the dispatch to call the person who reported the incident and ask them to come to the front door.

At some point, Dotson opened the door of his home while armed with a handgun and at least one officer shot at least one round from their gun, striking and killing Dotson at the scene, according to state police citing body camera footage.

Armed with a handgun, Dotson’s wife exchanged gunfire with officers, but she was not injured, authorities said.

Something similar happened in Atlanta many years ago. The police had a warrant. The went to the wrong door. A woman in her 90s came to the door with a gun in her hand. The police killed her.

Of course, one could use this as a reason why it's not such a great idea to have a gun in your home for self defense, since the police aren't always smart enough to go the correct address when they are serving a warrant or answering a call regarding a crime.

 

[Shadowy Man]

So we’re told that to protect ourselves from gun violence we should own guns but when people do the police shoot them?

 

[lpetrich]

So we’re told that to protect ourselves from gun violence we should own guns but when people do the police shoot them?

Thus making their interpretation of the Second Amendment a dead letter.

It also means that cops must be armed with nonlethal and low-lethality weapons rather than guns as much as possible. Maybe have some guns as backups, but not use guns very much if at all. If they have to shoot someone, their target must have a good chance of recovering in good health.

 

[bilby]

So we’re told that to protect ourselves from gun violence we should own guns but when people do the police shoot them?

Thus making their interpretation of the Second Amendment a dead letter.

It also means that cops must be armed with nonlethal and low-lethality weapons rather than guns as much as possible. Maybe have some guns as backups, but not use guns very much if at all. If they have to shoot someone, their target must have a good chance of recovering in good health.

If firing guns at people is the answer, it's generally a stupid question. Unless you're at war, but then, wars are pretty stupid all round.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

And in the case of Jayland Walker in Akron (a young guy who reacted the wrong way to a police stop... and a bunch of police officers hopped up on adrenaline reacting even worse to his not stopping), there will be no state charges against the officers that shot him up with an unimaginable number of bullets.

Meanwhile school is cancelled for Tuesday (my daughter will not be happy there will be school stuff to do), and I'm glad I still work out of my home and don't need to go to the office. Never quite know where this stuff will go, but some places were boarded up already even before the weekend. After the shooting, things were shut down, so people could protest and there wasn't too much in the way of damage. They didn't interfere and make a protest grow due to resistance. And the funeral was as peaceful as that could have been... even if a guy in a car by my office has a semi-automatic weapon.