Let’s not be too quick to dismiss the “ranting” of renegade LAPD officer Chris Dorner.
Dorner, a three-year police veteran and former Lieutenant in the US Navy who went rogue after being fired by the LAPD, has accused Los Angeles Police of systematically using excessive force, of corruption, of being racist, and of firing him for raising those issues through official channels.
By all media accounts, Dorner “snapped” after his firing, and has vowed to kill police in retaliation. He allegedly has already done so, with several people, including police officers and family members of police already shot dead or wounded.
Now there’s a record huge “manhunt” involving police departments across California, focussing on the mountains around Big Bear, featuring cops dressed in full military gear and armed with semi-automatic weapons. (Some 40-50 senior LAPD officers specifically threatened by Dorner are also being heavily guarded by LAPD cops.) Dorner has so far skilfully eluded his pursuers, despite a $1-million bounty on his head and thousands of people in the posse hunting for him. He has meanwhile developed a large and growing following of people who are actually rooting for him, with some comparing him to the Batman of “Dark Knight,” striking terror into, and wreaking vengeance on a corrupt police culture.
Few would argue that randomly killing police officers and their family members or friends is justified, but I think that there is good reason to suspect that the things that Dorner claims set him off, such as being fired for reporting police brutality, and then going through a rigged hearing, deserve serious consideration and investigation.
The LAPD has a long history of abuse of minorities (actually the majority in Los Angeles, where whites are now a minority). It has long been a kind of paramilitary force -- one which pioneered the military-style Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) approach to “policing.”
If you wanted a good example to prove that nothing has changed over the years, just look at the outrageous incident involving LAPD cops tasked with capturing Dorner, who instead shot up two innocent women who were delivering newspapers in a residential area of Los Angeles. The women, Margie Carranza, 47, and her mother, Emma Hernandez, 71 (now in serious condition in the hospital), were not issued any warning. Police just opened fire from behind them, destroying their truck with heavy semi-automatic fire to the point that it will have to be scrapped and replaced.
The two women are lucky to be alive (check out the pattern of bullet holes in the rear window behind the driver’s position in the accompanying photo). What they experienced was the tactics used by US troops on patrol in Iraq or Afghanistan, not the tactics that one expects of police. Their truck wasn’t even the right make or color, but LAPD’s “finest” decided it was better to be safe than sorry, so instead of acting like cops, they followed Pentagon “rules of engagement”: They attempted to waste the target.
Local residents say that after that shooting, which involved seven LAPD officers and over 70 bullets expended -- with nobody returning fire -- the street and surrounding houses were pockmarked with bullet holes. The Los Angeles Times reports that in the area, there are “bullet holes in cars, trees, garage doors and roofs.”
In roofs?
What we had here was an example of a controversial tactic that the military employed in the Iraq War, and still employs in Afghanistan, called “spray and pray” -- a tactic that led directly to the massive civilian casualties during that US war.
We shouldn’t be surprised that two brown-skinned women were almost mowed down by the LAPD--only that they somehow survived all that deadly firing directed at them with clear intent to kill.
The approach taken by those cop-hunting-cops of shooting first and asking questions later suggests that the LAPD in this “manhunt” for one of their own has no intention of capturing Dorner alive and letting him talk about what he knows about the evils rampant in the 10,000-member department. They want him dead. Locals understand this, and a cottage industry has sprung up of people wearing signs saying "Don't shoot! I'm not Dorner!"
When I lived in Los Angeles back in the 1970s, it was common for LAPD cops to bust into homes, gestapo-like, at 5 in the morning, guns out, to arrest people for minor things like outstanding court warrants for unpaid parking tickets, bald tires, or jaywalking.
Police helicopters also used to tail me -- then an editor of an alternative news weekly -- and my wife, a music graduate student, as we drove home at night. Sometimes, they would follow us from our car to front door with a brilliant spotlight, when we’d come home at night to our house in Echo Park. It was an act of deliberate intimidation.
(They also infiltrated our newspaper with an undercover cop posing as a wannabe journalist. Her job, we later learned, was to learn who our sources were inside the LAPD -- sources who had disclosed such things as that the LAPD had, and probably still has, a “shoot-to-kill” policy for police who fire their weapons.) The LAPD brass were really angry at us for being first to expose their rampant shooting and killing of unarmed residents--a story that later got picked up by the LA Times and some of the local electronic news media.
Friends in Los Angeles tell me nothing has changed about the LAPD, though of course the police weaponry has gotten heavier and their surveillance capabilities have gotten more sophisticated and invasive.
It is clear from the LAPD’s paramilitary response to the Occupy movement in Los Angeles, which included planting undercover cops among the occupiers, some of whom reportedly were agents provocateur who tried to encourage protesters to commit acts of violence, and which ended with police violence and gratuitous arrests, as in New York, that nothing has changed.
In other words, Dorner may be irrational, but he ain’t crazy. And his “army-of-one” campaign against the LAPD has already scored one success, as the department’s chief announced that he is going to re-examine the hearing that led to Dorner’s dismissal from the department to see if it had been fairly and properly handled.
A black military veteran, Dorner joined the police because he reportedly believed in service. Unable to go along with the militarist policing he saw on the job, and the racism all around him, he protested through channels and was apparently rewarded by being fired.
Now, in his own violent way, he is trying to warn us all that something is rotten in the LAPD, and by extension, in the whole police system in the US. Police departments almost everywhere in the US, have morphed, particularly since 9/11/2001, from a role of providing public safety and law enforcement into agencies of brutal fascist control, often using the LAPD's paramilitary model to work from.
As Dorner says in his lengthy manifesto (actually quite explicit and literate, but described as “ranting” in corporate media accounts), in which he explains his actions and indicts the LAPD, “The enemy combatants in LA are not the citizens and suspects, it’s the police officers.”
That could be said of many US police departments, I’m afraid.
Example: Last fall, I had the experience of trying to hitchhike in my little suburban town. A young cop drove up and informed me (incorrectly, it turns out) that it was illegal to hitchhike in Pennsylvania. When I expressed surprise at this and told him I was a journalist working on an article on hitchhiking, he then threatened me directly, saying that if I continued to try and thumb a ride, he would “take you in and lock you up.”
When I called a lawyer friend and said I was inclined to take the officer up on that threat, since I was within my rights under the law hitchhiking as long as I was standing off the road, he warned me against it, saying, “You don’t know what could happen to you if you got arrested.”
And of course he’s right. An arrest, even a wrongful arrest, in the US these days can lead to an added charge -- much more serious -- of resisting arrest, with a court basing its judgement on the word of the officer in the absence of any other witnesses. It can also lead to physical injury or worse, if the officer wants to lie and claim that the arrested person threatened him or her.
If I had been in Los Angeles, I would most likely have been locked up for an incident like that. Forget about any warning. You aren’t supposed to talk back to cops in L.A. And if you are black or Latino, the results of such an arrest could be much worse.
I remember once witnessing LAPD cops stopping a few Latino youths who had been joyriding in what might have been a stolen car. There was a helicopter overhead, and perhaps a dozen patrol cars that had converged on the scene, outside a shopping mall in Silverlake. I ran over to see what was happening and watched as the cops grabbed the kids, none of whom was armed, out of the vehicle and slammed them against the car brutally.
It was looking pretty ugly, but by then neighbors from the surrounding homes, most of them Latino, who had poured out onto their lawns because of the commotion, began yelling at the cops. One man shouted, “We see what you’re doing. These boys are all healthy. If anything happens to any of them after you arrest them we will report you!”
The cops grudgingly backed off in their attack on the boys, and took them away in a squad car. I don’t know what happened to them after that, but they were most certainly saved, by quick community response, from an on-the-spot Rodney King-style beating that could have seriously injured them, or worse.
As things stand right now, with the LAPD clearly gunning for Dorner, and wanting him dead and silenced, not captured, the public has to worry that it has more to fear from the LAPD than it has to fear from Dorner himself. At least Dorner, in his own twisted way, has specific targets in mind. The LAPD is in “spray and pray” mode.
Hopefully, Dorner will realize he can do more by figuring out a safe way to “come in from the cold” so he can try to testify about LAPD crimes, than by killing more cops. If he does manage to surrender, he’d better have a lot of support lined up to keep him safe while in custody.
Showing posts with label Dirty Cops. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dirty Cops. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Anaheim Police Shoot & Use Dogs On Women & Children
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When They Come For Your Guns What Will You Do?
"When they come for my gun, they will have to pry it out of my cold, dead hands," is a common refrain I often hear from the Neo-Cons when there is a threat, credible or otherwise, that the US government is going to take their firearms.
And, when I hear this crazy talk, I agree with them openly. "You are right. They will pry your gun from your cold dead hands," which I often follow with the question, "And where will that leave you except face down in a pool of your own blood the middle of the street, just another dead fool resisting the State?"
This is not a question they are comfortable with, if only because the intent of their saber-rattling was to imply they would fight to keep their weapons, and win.
Nice fantasy. It’s not happening.
If the federal government decides to disarm the public, and one of these (see photo below) rolls down your street after a not-so-subtle request that you kindly turn over your firearms and ammunition "for the common good," it will be nothing less than suicide by cop to do anything other than what you are told.
"Want to take this on?"
The militarization of US police forces is ongoing and escalating. Many cities and towns now own tanks, armed personnel carriers, even attack helicopters, and almost all are outfitted with military weapons not available to the general public.
And, it is not just your hometown cops who are getting new boy-toys. The military itself is buying up weaponry not just for use in the current or next scheduled war, but to deal with the likes of you, citizens who don't seem to understand that the Bill of Rights has been overruled, and that specifically includes, but is not limited to, the right to protest and engage in civil disobedience.
Also ignored (as if it didn't even exist) is the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 which generally bars the military from law enforcement activities within the United States.
According to Public Intelligence:
"...for the last two years, the President’s Budget Submissions for the Department of Defense have included purchases of a significant amount of combat equipment, including armored vehicles, helicopters and even artillery, under an obscure section of the FY2008 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for the purposes of “homeland defense missions, domestic emergency responses, and providing military support to civil authorities.” Items purchased under the section include combat vehicles, tanks, helicopters, artillery, mortar systems, missiles, small arms and communications equipment. Justifications for the budget items indicate that many of the purchases are part of routine resupply and maintenance, yet in each case the procurement is cited as being “necessary for use by the active and reserve components of the Armed Forces for homeland defense missions, domestic emergency responses, and providing military support to civil authorities” under section 1815 of the FY 2008 NDAA." (Emphasis supplied.)
And, they are not just arming cops and weekend warriors for domestic purposes. Active duty Marines are now being trained for law enforcement operations all over the world (of which the US remains a part) specifically to deal with civil uprisings, and the US government knows that civil uprisings are coming to a town near you just as soon as the fantasy of a healing economy is shattered, the US dollar fails, and unemployment goes to 30%+ in real numbers.
And, to you tough-talking Neo-Cons with your AR-15 rifles and a few thousand rounds of ammo, here is reality: they will take your guns, and no, all your Second Amendment bluster aside, you are not going to do anything about it. You are not going to take on a platoon of Marines with state of the art automatic weapons and the best body armor you cannot buy protected by armed personnel carriers and attack helicopters unless you choose to die that day -- for nothing.
You will either be in the country or out, and if you are in, you will stay in and you will comply.
That is your choice . . . for the moment.
Jim Karger is a lawyer, and frequent contributor to The Dollar Vigilante, who has represented American businesses against incursions by government and labor unions for 30 years. In 2001, he left Dallas and moved to San Miguel de Allende in the high desert of central Mexico where he sought and found a freer and simpler life for he and his wife, Kelly, and their 10 dogs.We really believe those are your choices. Stay, and submit... or die. Or go now. Your ancestors all fled their own oppressive police states in Europe, Asia or Africa and now it is your turn to get out before they shut the door. There are plenty of much freer places to run to, mostly in Latin America and Asia.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Cops Killed With Impunity
Stanley Gibson, a disabled Gulf War veteran, was murdered in a Las Vegas parking lot last December 12. He was shot seven times in the back of the head, without provocation, by a stranger wielding an AR-15 rifle. The killer, 34-year-old Jesus Arevalo, remains at large and is easy to find: He’s an officer with the Las Vegas Metro Police.
Gibson was unarmed. He was not a criminal suspect and posed no threat to anybody. His killing was a clear and unmistakable case of criminal homicide. Yet Arevalo has not been charged with a crime. He is on an extended vacation called "administrative leave," during which he continues to collect his taxpayer-funded salary and benefits.
Meanwhile, Gibson’s widow, Rhonda, has been left all but penniless. Her husband was a fully disabled combat veteran of the first Gulf War who suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and cancer – the latter affliction most likely a result of prolonged exposure to depleted uranium. Over the past several years, Gibson’s disability benefits were consistently reduced and cut off entirely shortly before he was murdered by Arevalo.
The day before he was shot, Gibson – whose anti-anxiety medication had been cut off two weeks earlier by the Veterans Administration – suffered a breakdown. According to Rhonda, "He didn’t know where he was and didn’t know what he was doing."
The police were called after Stanley wound up in the front yard screaming at cars and "causing a scene." Claiming that Stanley had taken a "fighting stance," the officers arrested him for "resisting arrest" and booked him at the Las Vegas Detention Center. Although they informed Rhonda that Stanley would be placed on a 72-hour psychiatric hold, he was released within eight hours.
The following morning, Gibson called 911 twice to ask for medical help. He eventually drove to a nearby hospital, but left without receiving treatment. At about 9:30 that evening he called Rhonda to tell her he was parked outside their apartment complex – but he was nowhere to be seen.
Stanley had actually pulled into the parking lot of a condominium next door. She wouldn't learn about what happened to her husband until seeing a news report of the shooting – and recognizing his white Cadillac.
Eyewitnesses recalled that Gibson drove slowly through the lot as if he was lost and confused. At the time, Arevalo and three other officers were at the condo responding to a call from a resident regarding a suspected break-in. Although they had no reason to consider Gibson as a suspect, they surrounded the vehicle and penned it in between several squad cars. Disoriented and frightened, Gibson gunned his engine and spun his wheels—but there was nowhere he could go.
For about a half hour, the officers tried to get Gibson to leave the car. During that period they should have been able to run his license plate and identify the driver. They should have recognized that they were dealing with a sick and confused man, and contacted a crisis intervention team. They should have gotten in touch with his wife, who lived less than a block away. They should have simply waited for Gibson to calm down.
The officers did none of those things. Instead, they chose to escalate the encounter by devising a plan to force him from his car: One officer would shoot out a window with a beanbag round, and another would incapacitate him with pepper spray. After the window was shattered, Officer Jesus Arevalo modified the plan by shooting Gibson seven times in the back of head with his AR-15 rifle.
Arevalo, who has a lengthy history of citizen complaints and official reprimands, was given the customary 72 hours to work out his story with the help of a police union attorney. He was then placed on paid vacation. Clark County Sheriff Douglas Gillespie, who supervises the Metro Police, initially claimed that the shooting was justified because Gibson supposedly threatened the officers by using his car as a "battering ram" – a claim that disintegrated after the emergence of a private video documenting that Gibson’s car was stationary when Arevalo murdered him.
There is some unbearably sinister symmetry in the way Stanley Gibson was murdered by agents of the Government. As a U.S. Army cook in Kuwait, Gibson was assigned to clear away what remained of the tens of thousands of Iraqis slaughtered in the "Highway of Death."
During the First Gulf War, shortly after Saddam Hussein announced the complete withdrawal of his forces from Kuwait, U.S. and allied forces attacked a convoy headed back into Iraq.
Following airstrikes that disabled vehicles at the front and rear of the column, a prolonged assault with incendiary weapons and depleted uranium rounds was undertaken. A sixty-mile stretch of highway was left littered with the hulls of about 2,000 vehicles and the charred remnants of tens of thousands of human beings – helpless, retreating soldiers, as well as civilians who had been caught in the traffic jam.
Gibson spent several days picking through the reeking rubble and disposing of the dead. In one of the ruined vehicles he found the mortal residue of a mother and child who had been melted together when their car was struck by an incendiary bomb.
The exposure to depleted uranium rounds quite likely was responsible for the cancer that forced Gibson to undergo a half-dozen operations and left his face partially paralyzed. Immersion in the horrific aftermath of that atrocity irreparably wounded Gibson’s mind and soul. He had no way of knowing that a little more than twenty years later, armed agents of the same Government that had penned in and slaughtered the helpless Iraqis would do exactly the same thing to him in a Las Vegas parking lot.
Rhonda Gibson blames the VA for the death of her husband. Originally classified as 100 percent disabled, Gibson had seen the VA arbitrarily re-classify him, alter his diagnosis, and change his treatment regimen. Last October 24, during an appointment at the local VA office, Gibson "aggressively confronted" an agency doctor about the capricious cutbacks in his cancer treatment. He was arrested by security officers and eventually pleaded guilty to "assaulting a federal employee" – by raising his voice in frustration over the fact that the government he had served was killing him through malicious neglect.
The couple’s financial situation worsened with each of the agency’s reductions in benefits. In November 2011, the couple lost their home and moved into an apartment next to the condominium where Gibson was killed. Now that Stanley is gone, Rhonda is both emotionally devastated and financially destitute.
Righteously furious over this state of affairs, Steven Sanson, retired Marine and president of Veterans in Politics International, seeks to organize a charity fundraiser: He has challenged Arevalo – who is a former competitive amateur fighter – to a refereed mixed martial arts match, with most of the proceeds going to Gibson’s widow. Sanson hopes to hold the event on 12-12-12 – the anniversary of Stanley Gibson’s murder.
Arevalo, who was as bold as Hector when drawing a bead on the back of an unarmed man’s head, has no appetite for throwing down with someone who can actually fight back. There is no such thing as "qualified immunity" in the Octagon; Arevalo wouldn’t be able to call for backup, nor would he be able to press charges for "obstruction," "disorderly conduct," or "resisting arrest." The referee wouldn't give Arevalo special advantages, and impose restrictions on his opponent, in the name of "officer safety." If the bout went the distance, the police union wouldn't be able to influence the decision rendered by the judges.
Not surprisingly, Arevalo has made himself scarce.
"There are many reasons why I’m trying to organize this event," Sanson told Pro Libertate. "First of all, there’s a grieving wife who has been left without income of any kind and who is literally wasting away. Rhonda approves of the idea – in fact, she’d love to get in the ring with Arevalo herself, even though she’s down to less than one hundred pounds."
"Secondly, I think this would help promote awareness of the desperate need for policy and personnel changes at the Metro Police Department," Sanson continues. "It would also help focus attention on the problems suffered by many returning veterans, some of whom may appear physically healthy but who have psychological problems and deserve much better treatment than they’re getting. I also want to build public support for revamping the current policies regarding officer-involved shootings. Las Vegas has seen far too many shootings of this kind in recent years, yet the official inquiries always exonerate the shooter, no matter how absurd his story or obvious it is that it was a bad shoot."
Until two years ago, officer-involved shootings were investigated through a County Coroner Inquest, a non-adversarial procedure described by former Nevada District Court Judge Don Chairez as "a search for justification of an officer’s actions." Attorney Adam Lagomarsino refers to the County Coroner Inquest procedure as "a kangaroo court and a dog and pony show."
Lagomarsino filed a lawsuit against the Las Vegas Metro Police on behalf of the family of Lavon Cole – an unarmed man who was gunned down in his bathroom by a uniformed serial killer named Detective Bryan Yant. Cole, who had been targeted for a narcotics sting by the Metro Police, was trying to dispose of roughly an ounce of marijuana – a quantity insufficient to sustain a misdemeanor possession charge in Nevada.
The raid on Cole’s home was staged for a film crew employed by Langley Productions – the loathsome outfit responsible for the police-porn series "COPS." Playing to the camera, Yant had brought along his AR-15 rifle, which was unnecessary for an operation targeting a mild-mannered non-violent offender. After bursting into the bathroom, Yant shot Cole in the back while his pregnant girlfriend was pinned to the floor in the next room with a gun to her head.
In addition to a previous shooting under very similar circumstances, Yant had compiled a record of corruption, dishonesty, and criminal misconduct. His version of the Cole shooting – in which the victim supposedly made a "furtive" movement that left the heroic detective in "fear for my life" – was impossible to reconcile with the forensic evidence. Naturally, he was exonerated by the Coroner’s Inquest.
The inquest procedure was introduced in 1969. Between 1976 and 2010, more than two hundred lethal force incidents were examined by a seven-member jury. Only one of them was ruled "negligent" – and that decision was overturned on appeal. This isn't a surprising result, given that the inquest procedure was a collegial exercise: The D.A.'s office literally choreographed the questioning with the police department prior to the hearing.
Attorney Lagomarsino points out that no cross-examination of police officers was permitted during the inquest. "We were allowed to submit written questions, one at a time, to the prosecutor, but we couldn't cross-examine Yant" or even ask follow-up questions, he told Pro Libertate in an August 2010 interview. The prosecutors didn’t even bother to present a summation for the jury. At the conclusion of the inquest into the Trevon Cole shooting, notes former District Judge Chairez, it appeared that the judge "was almost asking for a directed verdict."
Five days before Stanley Gibson was murdered, the Clark County Commission passed an ordinance to reform the Coroner’s Inquest process by including a representative of the victim’s family and making key evidence available to the public. This prompted a protest by the city’s largest criminal lobby – the Las Vegas Police Protective Association, which instructed its members to stop cooperating with the inquests altogether. On June 21, the police union filed a petition for a writ of prohibition against the revised inquest – the most recent of several legal challenges it has filed to prevent the system from being implemented.
"This process is no longer fair to our officers," sniveled union spokesperson Chris Collins, whining that the revamped arrangement wasn’t a "fair and level playing field." Bear in mind that police officers were still immune to cross-examination, and the inquest jury was still prohibited from handing down an indictment.
The DA’s Office remains disinclined to pursue grand jury investigations of police homicides. Accordingly, the only "accountability" for Metro officers who kill while on the clock is that provided by the department’s "Force Investigation Team."
Although he is on congenial terms with Sheriff Gillespie and other key officials, Steve Sannon isn’t willing to countenance their self-serving corruption – and he says that he knows more than a few police officers who share his opinions.
"There are law enforcement officers who have expressed concerns to me about bad leadership at Metro," Sannon told Pro Libertate. "I’ve even had a few of them call me and tell me they’d love to see me in the ring with Arevalo, who’s considered a cocky jerk."
Sannon says that sponsors are lining up to promote the event. There is no institutional or legal impediment to the proposed fight. In fact, an active-duty police officer participated in the June 11 Rogue Warrior Cage Fighting Championships at the Cannery Casino, which raised money for the Stars and Stripes Foundation.
"There’s no reason why Arevalo, who was a fighter before becoming a cop, couldn’t take part in this event," Sannon observes. That is to say, there’s no reason apart from cowardice and (what’s much the same thing) a bad conscience. In any case, Sannon isn’t going to relent in his efforts to impose hands-on accountability for the murder of Stanley Gibson by calling out a police officer who is protected by a system permitting him to kill without consequences.
Gibson was unarmed. He was not a criminal suspect and posed no threat to anybody. His killing was a clear and unmistakable case of criminal homicide. Yet Arevalo has not been charged with a crime. He is on an extended vacation called "administrative leave," during which he continues to collect his taxpayer-funded salary and benefits.
Meanwhile, Gibson’s widow, Rhonda, has been left all but penniless. Her husband was a fully disabled combat veteran of the first Gulf War who suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and cancer – the latter affliction most likely a result of prolonged exposure to depleted uranium. Over the past several years, Gibson’s disability benefits were consistently reduced and cut off entirely shortly before he was murdered by Arevalo.
The day before he was shot, Gibson – whose anti-anxiety medication had been cut off two weeks earlier by the Veterans Administration – suffered a breakdown. According to Rhonda, "He didn’t know where he was and didn’t know what he was doing."
The police were called after Stanley wound up in the front yard screaming at cars and "causing a scene." Claiming that Stanley had taken a "fighting stance," the officers arrested him for "resisting arrest" and booked him at the Las Vegas Detention Center. Although they informed Rhonda that Stanley would be placed on a 72-hour psychiatric hold, he was released within eight hours.
The following morning, Gibson called 911 twice to ask for medical help. He eventually drove to a nearby hospital, but left without receiving treatment. At about 9:30 that evening he called Rhonda to tell her he was parked outside their apartment complex – but he was nowhere to be seen.
Stanley had actually pulled into the parking lot of a condominium next door. She wouldn't learn about what happened to her husband until seeing a news report of the shooting – and recognizing his white Cadillac.
Eyewitnesses recalled that Gibson drove slowly through the lot as if he was lost and confused. At the time, Arevalo and three other officers were at the condo responding to a call from a resident regarding a suspected break-in. Although they had no reason to consider Gibson as a suspect, they surrounded the vehicle and penned it in between several squad cars. Disoriented and frightened, Gibson gunned his engine and spun his wheels—but there was nowhere he could go.
For about a half hour, the officers tried to get Gibson to leave the car. During that period they should have been able to run his license plate and identify the driver. They should have recognized that they were dealing with a sick and confused man, and contacted a crisis intervention team. They should have gotten in touch with his wife, who lived less than a block away. They should have simply waited for Gibson to calm down.
The officers did none of those things. Instead, they chose to escalate the encounter by devising a plan to force him from his car: One officer would shoot out a window with a beanbag round, and another would incapacitate him with pepper spray. After the window was shattered, Officer Jesus Arevalo modified the plan by shooting Gibson seven times in the back of head with his AR-15 rifle.
Arevalo, who has a lengthy history of citizen complaints and official reprimands, was given the customary 72 hours to work out his story with the help of a police union attorney. He was then placed on paid vacation. Clark County Sheriff Douglas Gillespie, who supervises the Metro Police, initially claimed that the shooting was justified because Gibson supposedly threatened the officers by using his car as a "battering ram" – a claim that disintegrated after the emergence of a private video documenting that Gibson’s car was stationary when Arevalo murdered him.
There is some unbearably sinister symmetry in the way Stanley Gibson was murdered by agents of the Government. As a U.S. Army cook in Kuwait, Gibson was assigned to clear away what remained of the tens of thousands of Iraqis slaughtered in the "Highway of Death."
During the First Gulf War, shortly after Saddam Hussein announced the complete withdrawal of his forces from Kuwait, U.S. and allied forces attacked a convoy headed back into Iraq.
Following airstrikes that disabled vehicles at the front and rear of the column, a prolonged assault with incendiary weapons and depleted uranium rounds was undertaken. A sixty-mile stretch of highway was left littered with the hulls of about 2,000 vehicles and the charred remnants of tens of thousands of human beings – helpless, retreating soldiers, as well as civilians who had been caught in the traffic jam.
Gibson spent several days picking through the reeking rubble and disposing of the dead. In one of the ruined vehicles he found the mortal residue of a mother and child who had been melted together when their car was struck by an incendiary bomb.
The exposure to depleted uranium rounds quite likely was responsible for the cancer that forced Gibson to undergo a half-dozen operations and left his face partially paralyzed. Immersion in the horrific aftermath of that atrocity irreparably wounded Gibson’s mind and soul. He had no way of knowing that a little more than twenty years later, armed agents of the same Government that had penned in and slaughtered the helpless Iraqis would do exactly the same thing to him in a Las Vegas parking lot.
Rhonda Gibson blames the VA for the death of her husband. Originally classified as 100 percent disabled, Gibson had seen the VA arbitrarily re-classify him, alter his diagnosis, and change his treatment regimen. Last October 24, during an appointment at the local VA office, Gibson "aggressively confronted" an agency doctor about the capricious cutbacks in his cancer treatment. He was arrested by security officers and eventually pleaded guilty to "assaulting a federal employee" – by raising his voice in frustration over the fact that the government he had served was killing him through malicious neglect.
The couple’s financial situation worsened with each of the agency’s reductions in benefits. In November 2011, the couple lost their home and moved into an apartment next to the condominium where Gibson was killed. Now that Stanley is gone, Rhonda is both emotionally devastated and financially destitute.
Righteously furious over this state of affairs, Steven Sanson, retired Marine and president of Veterans in Politics International, seeks to organize a charity fundraiser: He has challenged Arevalo – who is a former competitive amateur fighter – to a refereed mixed martial arts match, with most of the proceeds going to Gibson’s widow. Sanson hopes to hold the event on 12-12-12 – the anniversary of Stanley Gibson’s murder.
Arevalo, who was as bold as Hector when drawing a bead on the back of an unarmed man’s head, has no appetite for throwing down with someone who can actually fight back. There is no such thing as "qualified immunity" in the Octagon; Arevalo wouldn’t be able to call for backup, nor would he be able to press charges for "obstruction," "disorderly conduct," or "resisting arrest." The referee wouldn't give Arevalo special advantages, and impose restrictions on his opponent, in the name of "officer safety." If the bout went the distance, the police union wouldn't be able to influence the decision rendered by the judges.
Not surprisingly, Arevalo has made himself scarce.
"There are many reasons why I’m trying to organize this event," Sanson told Pro Libertate. "First of all, there’s a grieving wife who has been left without income of any kind and who is literally wasting away. Rhonda approves of the idea – in fact, she’d love to get in the ring with Arevalo herself, even though she’s down to less than one hundred pounds."
"Secondly, I think this would help promote awareness of the desperate need for policy and personnel changes at the Metro Police Department," Sanson continues. "It would also help focus attention on the problems suffered by many returning veterans, some of whom may appear physically healthy but who have psychological problems and deserve much better treatment than they’re getting. I also want to build public support for revamping the current policies regarding officer-involved shootings. Las Vegas has seen far too many shootings of this kind in recent years, yet the official inquiries always exonerate the shooter, no matter how absurd his story or obvious it is that it was a bad shoot."
Until two years ago, officer-involved shootings were investigated through a County Coroner Inquest, a non-adversarial procedure described by former Nevada District Court Judge Don Chairez as "a search for justification of an officer’s actions." Attorney Adam Lagomarsino refers to the County Coroner Inquest procedure as "a kangaroo court and a dog and pony show."
Lagomarsino filed a lawsuit against the Las Vegas Metro Police on behalf of the family of Lavon Cole – an unarmed man who was gunned down in his bathroom by a uniformed serial killer named Detective Bryan Yant. Cole, who had been targeted for a narcotics sting by the Metro Police, was trying to dispose of roughly an ounce of marijuana – a quantity insufficient to sustain a misdemeanor possession charge in Nevada.
The raid on Cole’s home was staged for a film crew employed by Langley Productions – the loathsome outfit responsible for the police-porn series "COPS." Playing to the camera, Yant had brought along his AR-15 rifle, which was unnecessary for an operation targeting a mild-mannered non-violent offender. After bursting into the bathroom, Yant shot Cole in the back while his pregnant girlfriend was pinned to the floor in the next room with a gun to her head.
In addition to a previous shooting under very similar circumstances, Yant had compiled a record of corruption, dishonesty, and criminal misconduct. His version of the Cole shooting – in which the victim supposedly made a "furtive" movement that left the heroic detective in "fear for my life" – was impossible to reconcile with the forensic evidence. Naturally, he was exonerated by the Coroner’s Inquest.
The inquest procedure was introduced in 1969. Between 1976 and 2010, more than two hundred lethal force incidents were examined by a seven-member jury. Only one of them was ruled "negligent" – and that decision was overturned on appeal. This isn't a surprising result, given that the inquest procedure was a collegial exercise: The D.A.'s office literally choreographed the questioning with the police department prior to the hearing.
Attorney Lagomarsino points out that no cross-examination of police officers was permitted during the inquest. "We were allowed to submit written questions, one at a time, to the prosecutor, but we couldn't cross-examine Yant" or even ask follow-up questions, he told Pro Libertate in an August 2010 interview. The prosecutors didn’t even bother to present a summation for the jury. At the conclusion of the inquest into the Trevon Cole shooting, notes former District Judge Chairez, it appeared that the judge "was almost asking for a directed verdict."
Five days before Stanley Gibson was murdered, the Clark County Commission passed an ordinance to reform the Coroner’s Inquest process by including a representative of the victim’s family and making key evidence available to the public. This prompted a protest by the city’s largest criminal lobby – the Las Vegas Police Protective Association, which instructed its members to stop cooperating with the inquests altogether. On June 21, the police union filed a petition for a writ of prohibition against the revised inquest – the most recent of several legal challenges it has filed to prevent the system from being implemented.
"This process is no longer fair to our officers," sniveled union spokesperson Chris Collins, whining that the revamped arrangement wasn’t a "fair and level playing field." Bear in mind that police officers were still immune to cross-examination, and the inquest jury was still prohibited from handing down an indictment.
The DA’s Office remains disinclined to pursue grand jury investigations of police homicides. Accordingly, the only "accountability" for Metro officers who kill while on the clock is that provided by the department’s "Force Investigation Team."
Although he is on congenial terms with Sheriff Gillespie and other key officials, Steve Sannon isn’t willing to countenance their self-serving corruption – and he says that he knows more than a few police officers who share his opinions.
"There are law enforcement officers who have expressed concerns to me about bad leadership at Metro," Sannon told Pro Libertate. "I’ve even had a few of them call me and tell me they’d love to see me in the ring with Arevalo, who’s considered a cocky jerk."
Sannon says that sponsors are lining up to promote the event. There is no institutional or legal impediment to the proposed fight. In fact, an active-duty police officer participated in the June 11 Rogue Warrior Cage Fighting Championships at the Cannery Casino, which raised money for the Stars and Stripes Foundation.
"There’s no reason why Arevalo, who was a fighter before becoming a cop, couldn’t take part in this event," Sannon observes. That is to say, there’s no reason apart from cowardice and (what’s much the same thing) a bad conscience. In any case, Sannon isn’t going to relent in his efforts to impose hands-on accountability for the murder of Stanley Gibson by calling out a police officer who is protected by a system permitting him to kill without consequences.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Police Repeatedly Taser Handcuffed Woman Who Was Domestic Violence Victim
An Iowa police officer who was trying to determine whether a woman was a domestic abuse victim ended up tasing her repeatedly, even after she was handcuffed and hogtied.
Two weeks later, Chariton police officer Tyler Ruble was investigated himself for domestic abuse after his wife accused him of slamming her against a wall and twisting her wrist.
Lucas County sheriff’s deputies responded to that scene, but refused to arrest him, even though his wife had “visible injuries and redness,” according to a news report from WHO-TV of Des Moines.
The tasering incident took place two years ago and was caught on video, but police refused to release it after numerous requests from the news station.
Despite the two incidents against Ruble, he remains on the force.
The incident proves that even though many officers are equipped with body-worn cameras, which should protect both the officers and citizens, it does the public no good if they are not released to the public.
Perhaps lawmakers need to impliment a system where there is more transparency with these videos.
This incident came to light only because internal sources tipped off WHO-TV about the video, which in turn spent weeks trying to obtain it through a public records request.
When they were denied, the video was eventually leaked to them, showing that at least one person within the department has morals.
In a follow-up WHO-TV story (see video below), the woman who was tased, Amy Storm, said she was not even aware there had been a video.
She was charged with two counts of assault and it’s not clear from the news reports if she was convicted.
She never raised an issue about how she was abused because she knew it would be her word against the officers’ and that usually goes nowhere.
Now that she has a copy of the video, she intends to file a complaint.
But it appears that whole county is corrupt considering it was not only Lucas County sheriff’s deputies who refused to arrest Ruble on domestic abuse charges, it was Lucas County Sheriff Jim Baker who was holding Storm’s face down as Ruble tased her.
WHO-TV reporter Aaron Brillbeck should be commended for his diligence in this story because most TV reporters would not have made the effort.
CARLOS MILLER'S LEGAL DEFENSE FUND
I am immersed in a legal case where I not only want to clear my criminal charges stemming from my arrest in January, but I want to sue the Miami-Dade Police Department for deleting my footage, which I was able to recover.
My goal is to set some type of precedent to ensure this does not happen as often as it does today where cops simply get away with it.
Two weeks later, Chariton police officer Tyler Ruble was investigated himself for domestic abuse after his wife accused him of slamming her against a wall and twisting her wrist.
Lucas County sheriff’s deputies responded to that scene, but refused to arrest him, even though his wife had “visible injuries and redness,” according to a news report from WHO-TV of Des Moines.
The tasering incident took place two years ago and was caught on video, but police refused to release it after numerous requests from the news station.
Despite the two incidents against Ruble, he remains on the force.
The incident proves that even though many officers are equipped with body-worn cameras, which should protect both the officers and citizens, it does the public no good if they are not released to the public.
Perhaps lawmakers need to impliment a system where there is more transparency with these videos.
This incident came to light only because internal sources tipped off WHO-TV about the video, which in turn spent weeks trying to obtain it through a public records request.
When they were denied, the video was eventually leaked to them, showing that at least one person within the department has morals.
In a follow-up WHO-TV story (see video below), the woman who was tased, Amy Storm, said she was not even aware there had been a video.
She was charged with two counts of assault and it’s not clear from the news reports if she was convicted.
She never raised an issue about how she was abused because she knew it would be her word against the officers’ and that usually goes nowhere.
Now that she has a copy of the video, she intends to file a complaint.
But it appears that whole county is corrupt considering it was not only Lucas County sheriff’s deputies who refused to arrest Ruble on domestic abuse charges, it was Lucas County Sheriff Jim Baker who was holding Storm’s face down as Ruble tased her.
WHO-TV reporter Aaron Brillbeck should be commended for his diligence in this story because most TV reporters would not have made the effort.
CARLOS MILLER'S LEGAL DEFENSE FUND
I am immersed in a legal case where I not only want to clear my criminal charges stemming from my arrest in January, but I want to sue the Miami-Dade Police Department for deleting my footage, which I was able to recover.
My goal is to set some type of precedent to ensure this does not happen as often as it does today where cops simply get away with it.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Video Proff Positive Fullerton Cops Killed Helpless, Homeless Man
Wed May 9, 2012 8:50AM GMT
Share256
A newly-released surveillance video footage showing the beating of a homeless individual by California policemen has once again exposed the extreme brutality exercised by US police officers against potential suspects.
The footage was recorded last July by a closed-circuit camera at a bus terminal in California’s City of Fullerton in Orange County but was released on Tuesday at a pre-trial hearing of the police officers allegedly involved in the beating of the homeless man, which later resulted in his death.
The footage displays how the homeless man, Kelly Thomas, is being struck repeatedly with fists, batons and finally by the butt of a stun gun by police officers.
Fullerton police officer Manuel Ramos and Corporal Jay Cicinelli have reportedly been charged in the case with second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and excessive use of force.
Testifying at the hearing, a trauma surgeon stated that the continuous compression of Thomas’s chest during his confrontation with California police officers led to breathing complications that eventually caused his death.
The surgeon, Dr. Michael Lekawa, pointed to audio and video recordings of the incident by a surveillance camera that clearly shows that Thomas’s voice changes from initial shouts of “I can’t breathe” to long, drawn-out moans before he completely stops talking.
State prosecutors insist that Fullerton police officer Manuel Ramos punched Thomas in the ribs, tackled him and pinned him down. They further contend that officer Jay Cicinelli used a Taser gun four times on Thomas as he screamed in pain and also struck him in the face eight times with the butt of the Taser gun.
Thomas lost consciousness following the incident and was taken to a hospital, where he passed away after five days.
Share256
A newly-released surveillance video footage showing the beating of a homeless individual by California policemen has once again exposed the extreme brutality exercised by US police officers against potential suspects.
The footage was recorded last July by a closed-circuit camera at a bus terminal in California’s City of Fullerton in Orange County but was released on Tuesday at a pre-trial hearing of the police officers allegedly involved in the beating of the homeless man, which later resulted in his death.
The footage displays how the homeless man, Kelly Thomas, is being struck repeatedly with fists, batons and finally by the butt of a stun gun by police officers.
Fullerton police officer Manuel Ramos and Corporal Jay Cicinelli have reportedly been charged in the case with second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and excessive use of force.
Testifying at the hearing, a trauma surgeon stated that the continuous compression of Thomas’s chest during his confrontation with California police officers led to breathing complications that eventually caused his death.
The surgeon, Dr. Michael Lekawa, pointed to audio and video recordings of the incident by a surveillance camera that clearly shows that Thomas’s voice changes from initial shouts of “I can’t breathe” to long, drawn-out moans before he completely stops talking.
State prosecutors insist that Fullerton police officer Manuel Ramos punched Thomas in the ribs, tackled him and pinned him down. They further contend that officer Jay Cicinelli used a Taser gun four times on Thomas as he screamed in pain and also struck him in the face eight times with the butt of the Taser gun.
Thomas lost consciousness following the incident and was taken to a hospital, where he passed away after five days.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Peace Officer Or Law ENFORCEMENT?
Regina Tasca is a "rogue cop" – and God bless her for it.
Tasca is in the middle of disciplinary hearings that may result in her termination from the Bogota, New Jersey Police Department. She stands accused of "bizarre and outlandish" behavior in two incidents a year ago during which she revealed herself to be "A danger to other police officers."
Her first supposed offense – which wasn't mentioned until after the second – was a failure to assist another officer who was "attacked" by a drunken woman who was roughly half his weight and barely five feet tall. Her second was was to intervene when a police officer from another jurisdiction viciously assaulted an emotionally troubled young man who was not suspected of a crime.
"I consider myself a peace officer," Tasca told Pro Libertate. "My thing is to help make sure that people are safe, and that they don’t have a reason to fear the police – that we treat them like human beings. The incident that started all of this was one in which I intervened to prevent excessive force against a kid who was the subject of a medical call, not a criminal suspect."
On April 29, 2011, Tasca was on patrol when she got a call for medical assistance. Former Bogota Council Member Tara Sharp, concerned about the erratic behavior of her 22-year-old son Kyle, called the police to take him to the hospital for a psychological evaluation. Requesting police intervention, particularly in cases of this kind, is never a good idea. Sharp was exceptionally fortunate that Officer Tasca was the first to respond: She has years of experience as an EMT and had just completed specialized training on situations involving psychologically disturbed people.
Once on the scene, Tasca acted quickly to calm down the distraught young man.
"When the call came, I heard that a couple of officers from Ridgefield Park were coming to provide backup, which I thought was OK, Tasca related to Pro Libertate. "Kyle had been shouting and swearing when I got there, but I got him calmed down." The young man’s mood changed abruptly when he saw the other officers arrive.
"He noticed them and asked me, `Why is there another police officer here from another town?’ Then he said that he was leaving, and he moved maybe two or three steps when one of the Ridgefield officers jumped him."
Sgt. Chris Thibault tackled Kyle, wrapped him in a bear hug, and attempted to handcuff him. Within an instant, Sgt. Joe Rella piled on and began to slug Kyle in the head while his horrified mother screamed at the officers to stop.
Tasca instinctively did what any legitimate peace officer would do: She intervened to protect the victim, pulling Rella off the helpless and battered young man. Eventually the Ridgefield officers handcuffed Kyle – then turned their fury on Tasca.
"One of them yelled at me, `We can’t have this!’" she recalled. "I said, we `can’t have’ what? There was no reason to take that kid to the ground and start slugging him. This was a medical assistance call, and the mother was sitting their screaming at them to stop beating on their son. I didn’t fail to aid another officer; I acted to stop a beatdown."
Two days later, Tasca was summoned by her captain, who informed her that she was being suspended pending a disciplinary hearing. She learned that in addition to "using force" to stop Rella’s assault on Kyle Sharp, Tasca was accused of failing to assist Bogota Officer Jerome Fowler when he was "assaulted" by an intoxicated woman on April 3.
"Nobody had said anything to me about the earlier case until after the incident with the Ridgefield officers," Tasca pointed out to me.
Tasca was on night patrol when she came across "this young girl walking in the middle of the street, crying, with one broken heel. She was very drunk, and the officer who had picked her up had just dropped her off at the apartment of somebody who was described as a `male friend’ – but practically nothing was known about this guy.
He just left her there without finding out anything about the situation at that apartment; she could have been assaulted, raped, or killed. Whoever it was, he just threw her back out on the street – which actually might have been the best outcome. So she was crying hysterically and very distraught when I found her. I radioed HQ that I would be assisting her, and the officer who had picked her up arrived, and we went to the hospital with me carrying her in the back seat of my police car."
The young woman was taken to the Emergency Room at Holy Name Medical Center.
"Once we got there, our job was done," Tasca continues. "I stuck around for a little while to make sure everything was OK. There were about a half-dozen hospital security personnel on the scene, as well as about four or five EMTs and nurses there. The girl walked over to the nurse’s station, then decided that she didn’t want to go to the hospital. When Jay [Officer Fowler] reached for her, she started flailing her arms, and hit his hand, opening up an old cut he had on one of his knuckles."
This was the "assault" that figures so prominently in the charges against Tasca. The officers who ganged up on Kyle Sharp have not been charged or subjected to administrative discipline – but Tasca’s refusal to help ground and pound a tiny, intoxicated woman who had made incidental contact with a fellow officer is being treated as a career-imperiling delinquency.
"Apparently, Jay believed I should have pushed all these people aside and help him subdue a tiny girl – she was about five foot one, and very skinny – who had given him a scratch," Tasca pointed out.
After being put on suspension, Tasca was subjected to a psychological evaluation by Dr. Matthew Geller, a psychiatrist who does contact work for New Jersey law enforcement agencies. Geller provided the diagnosis he had been paid for, ruling that Tasca was unfit for duty. At the same time, the Bogota PD’s internal affairs officer produced a report concluding that Tasca’s refusal to assist Officer Fowler in the April 3 incident demonstrated her unfitness.
The internal affairs review wasn’t exactly a model of investigative rigor, Tasca observes: "There were nearly a dozen other people who witnessed the incident – and the only one he interviewed was a 14-year-old Ambulance Corps volunteer who happened to be his niece!"
Tasca, an openly gay female police officer, believes that at least some of the problems she’s experienced are the product of a cultural clash with what she describes as "the Old Boys Club." More importantly, however, she has been targeted for the unforgiveable offense of "crossing the Blue Line" by taking the side of a Mundane being attacked by a member of the Brotherhood.
"I’ve been an officer here in Bogata for eleven years, and spent seven or eight years as a Class 2 Special Officer in Fairview, which is where I grew up," Tasca told Pro Libertate. "Until now, I’ve never had problems with anybody on the force, or anybody in the community. Oh, sure, when you work near people for ten or twelve hours every day, you’ll have disagreements and maybe say some things you shouldn’t, but that’s typical of just about any relationship, professional or otherwise. But never in my career had I been accused of unfitness for duty until after that incident a year ago.
As a veteran with nearly twenty years in law enforcement, Tasca has noticed a dramatic change in the institutional culture of law enforcement in recent years.
"I think what we’re seeing is a lot of kids who are given power and immediately begin to abuse it," Tasca observes. "Some of these guys are as young as 18 years old. You give them a uniform, and it goes right to their head. And even many of those that don’t do abusive things miss the point, which is that we’re supposed to be peace officers. They get a badge and a gun and they think they’re gods, or at least that they’re entitled to treat people like dirt. I see them as people, and insist on treating them like I’d want to be treated."
In contemporary law enforcement, commitment to the Golden Rule is a firing offense. Just ask Ramon Perez, whose experience is strikingly similar to that of Regina Tasca.
Perez, a probationary officer who had won the top leadership award at his police academy, was cashiered by the Austin, Texas Police Department as a result of his refusal to use a Taser on an elderly, non-violent man during a domestic disturbance in January 2005. The order was unconstitutional, illegal, a violation of the guidelines in the department’s handbook and, most importantly, immoral.
A few days after that incident, Perez was given a punitive transfer to the night shift. Two months later, Perez was told to report to APD psychologist Carol Logan to undergo what he was told would be a "communication" exercise. In fact, it was a disguised "fit-for-duty review" intended to ratify the pre-ordained decision to fire him.
Logan’s four page report focused entirely on Perez's moral and religious beliefs. Perez is a self-described non-denominational fundamentalist Christian, an ordained minister who home-schools his children. He is also firmly convinced that protection of civil liberties is the paramount duty of a peace officer – a duty he regarded, literally, as a sacred trust.
According to Logan, the depth of his commitment to his beliefs – beginning with that perennially unpopular tenet called the Golden Rule – produces an "impairment" of his ability to absorb new facts, to communicate with his superiors, and to deal with "feedback."
As was the case with Regina Tasca, Ramon Perez’s detractors dredged up a second incident of "misconduct" involving a refusal to use unnecessary force.
By twice displaying a peace officer’s preference for de-escalation, Perez had established himself as a repeat offender. He was purged from the APD, a department that has since done much to distinguish itself – in the face of fierce and plentiful competition – as one of the most abusive in the country.
A vast geographic and cultural gulf separates Ramon Perez, a Fundamentalist Evangelical from Texas, and Regina Tasca, an openly gay Roman Catholic from New Jersey. They have at least one critically important thing in common: Both of them intervened in defense of helpless citizens facing criminal violence from fellow cops, and learned that for people who have chosen a career in law enforcement, behaving like a peace officer is a firing offense.
Tasca is in the middle of disciplinary hearings that may result in her termination from the Bogota, New Jersey Police Department. She stands accused of "bizarre and outlandish" behavior in two incidents a year ago during which she revealed herself to be "A danger to other police officers."
Her first supposed offense – which wasn't mentioned until after the second – was a failure to assist another officer who was "attacked" by a drunken woman who was roughly half his weight and barely five feet tall. Her second was was to intervene when a police officer from another jurisdiction viciously assaulted an emotionally troubled young man who was not suspected of a crime.
"I consider myself a peace officer," Tasca told Pro Libertate. "My thing is to help make sure that people are safe, and that they don’t have a reason to fear the police – that we treat them like human beings. The incident that started all of this was one in which I intervened to prevent excessive force against a kid who was the subject of a medical call, not a criminal suspect."
On April 29, 2011, Tasca was on patrol when she got a call for medical assistance. Former Bogota Council Member Tara Sharp, concerned about the erratic behavior of her 22-year-old son Kyle, called the police to take him to the hospital for a psychological evaluation. Requesting police intervention, particularly in cases of this kind, is never a good idea. Sharp was exceptionally fortunate that Officer Tasca was the first to respond: She has years of experience as an EMT and had just completed specialized training on situations involving psychologically disturbed people.
Once on the scene, Tasca acted quickly to calm down the distraught young man.
"When the call came, I heard that a couple of officers from Ridgefield Park were coming to provide backup, which I thought was OK, Tasca related to Pro Libertate. "Kyle had been shouting and swearing when I got there, but I got him calmed down." The young man’s mood changed abruptly when he saw the other officers arrive.
"He noticed them and asked me, `Why is there another police officer here from another town?’ Then he said that he was leaving, and he moved maybe two or three steps when one of the Ridgefield officers jumped him."
Sgt. Chris Thibault tackled Kyle, wrapped him in a bear hug, and attempted to handcuff him. Within an instant, Sgt. Joe Rella piled on and began to slug Kyle in the head while his horrified mother screamed at the officers to stop.
Tasca instinctively did what any legitimate peace officer would do: She intervened to protect the victim, pulling Rella off the helpless and battered young man. Eventually the Ridgefield officers handcuffed Kyle – then turned their fury on Tasca.
"One of them yelled at me, `We can’t have this!’" she recalled. "I said, we `can’t have’ what? There was no reason to take that kid to the ground and start slugging him. This was a medical assistance call, and the mother was sitting their screaming at them to stop beating on their son. I didn’t fail to aid another officer; I acted to stop a beatdown."
Two days later, Tasca was summoned by her captain, who informed her that she was being suspended pending a disciplinary hearing. She learned that in addition to "using force" to stop Rella’s assault on Kyle Sharp, Tasca was accused of failing to assist Bogota Officer Jerome Fowler when he was "assaulted" by an intoxicated woman on April 3.
"Nobody had said anything to me about the earlier case until after the incident with the Ridgefield officers," Tasca pointed out to me.
Tasca was on night patrol when she came across "this young girl walking in the middle of the street, crying, with one broken heel. She was very drunk, and the officer who had picked her up had just dropped her off at the apartment of somebody who was described as a `male friend’ – but practically nothing was known about this guy.
He just left her there without finding out anything about the situation at that apartment; she could have been assaulted, raped, or killed. Whoever it was, he just threw her back out on the street – which actually might have been the best outcome. So she was crying hysterically and very distraught when I found her. I radioed HQ that I would be assisting her, and the officer who had picked her up arrived, and we went to the hospital with me carrying her in the back seat of my police car."
The young woman was taken to the Emergency Room at Holy Name Medical Center.
"Once we got there, our job was done," Tasca continues. "I stuck around for a little while to make sure everything was OK. There were about a half-dozen hospital security personnel on the scene, as well as about four or five EMTs and nurses there. The girl walked over to the nurse’s station, then decided that she didn’t want to go to the hospital. When Jay [Officer Fowler] reached for her, she started flailing her arms, and hit his hand, opening up an old cut he had on one of his knuckles."
This was the "assault" that figures so prominently in the charges against Tasca. The officers who ganged up on Kyle Sharp have not been charged or subjected to administrative discipline – but Tasca’s refusal to help ground and pound a tiny, intoxicated woman who had made incidental contact with a fellow officer is being treated as a career-imperiling delinquency.
"Apparently, Jay believed I should have pushed all these people aside and help him subdue a tiny girl – she was about five foot one, and very skinny – who had given him a scratch," Tasca pointed out.
After being put on suspension, Tasca was subjected to a psychological evaluation by Dr. Matthew Geller, a psychiatrist who does contact work for New Jersey law enforcement agencies. Geller provided the diagnosis he had been paid for, ruling that Tasca was unfit for duty. At the same time, the Bogota PD’s internal affairs officer produced a report concluding that Tasca’s refusal to assist Officer Fowler in the April 3 incident demonstrated her unfitness.
The internal affairs review wasn’t exactly a model of investigative rigor, Tasca observes: "There were nearly a dozen other people who witnessed the incident – and the only one he interviewed was a 14-year-old Ambulance Corps volunteer who happened to be his niece!"
Tasca, an openly gay female police officer, believes that at least some of the problems she’s experienced are the product of a cultural clash with what she describes as "the Old Boys Club." More importantly, however, she has been targeted for the unforgiveable offense of "crossing the Blue Line" by taking the side of a Mundane being attacked by a member of the Brotherhood.
"I’ve been an officer here in Bogata for eleven years, and spent seven or eight years as a Class 2 Special Officer in Fairview, which is where I grew up," Tasca told Pro Libertate. "Until now, I’ve never had problems with anybody on the force, or anybody in the community. Oh, sure, when you work near people for ten or twelve hours every day, you’ll have disagreements and maybe say some things you shouldn’t, but that’s typical of just about any relationship, professional or otherwise. But never in my career had I been accused of unfitness for duty until after that incident a year ago.
As a veteran with nearly twenty years in law enforcement, Tasca has noticed a dramatic change in the institutional culture of law enforcement in recent years.
"I think what we’re seeing is a lot of kids who are given power and immediately begin to abuse it," Tasca observes. "Some of these guys are as young as 18 years old. You give them a uniform, and it goes right to their head. And even many of those that don’t do abusive things miss the point, which is that we’re supposed to be peace officers. They get a badge and a gun and they think they’re gods, or at least that they’re entitled to treat people like dirt. I see them as people, and insist on treating them like I’d want to be treated."
In contemporary law enforcement, commitment to the Golden Rule is a firing offense. Just ask Ramon Perez, whose experience is strikingly similar to that of Regina Tasca.
Perez, a probationary officer who had won the top leadership award at his police academy, was cashiered by the Austin, Texas Police Department as a result of his refusal to use a Taser on an elderly, non-violent man during a domestic disturbance in January 2005. The order was unconstitutional, illegal, a violation of the guidelines in the department’s handbook and, most importantly, immoral.
A few days after that incident, Perez was given a punitive transfer to the night shift. Two months later, Perez was told to report to APD psychologist Carol Logan to undergo what he was told would be a "communication" exercise. In fact, it was a disguised "fit-for-duty review" intended to ratify the pre-ordained decision to fire him.
Logan’s four page report focused entirely on Perez's moral and religious beliefs. Perez is a self-described non-denominational fundamentalist Christian, an ordained minister who home-schools his children. He is also firmly convinced that protection of civil liberties is the paramount duty of a peace officer – a duty he regarded, literally, as a sacred trust.
According to Logan, the depth of his commitment to his beliefs – beginning with that perennially unpopular tenet called the Golden Rule – produces an "impairment" of his ability to absorb new facts, to communicate with his superiors, and to deal with "feedback."
As was the case with Regina Tasca, Ramon Perez’s detractors dredged up a second incident of "misconduct" involving a refusal to use unnecessary force.
By twice displaying a peace officer’s preference for de-escalation, Perez had established himself as a repeat offender. He was purged from the APD, a department that has since done much to distinguish itself – in the face of fierce and plentiful competition – as one of the most abusive in the country.
A vast geographic and cultural gulf separates Ramon Perez, a Fundamentalist Evangelical from Texas, and Regina Tasca, an openly gay Roman Catholic from New Jersey. They have at least one critically important thing in common: Both of them intervened in defense of helpless citizens facing criminal violence from fellow cops, and learned that for people who have chosen a career in law enforcement, behaving like a peace officer is a firing offense.
Sunday, April 22, 2012
A Dozen + US Immigration Officers Taser & Murder Unarmed Man
A new video shows Anastacio Hernadez-Rojas lying on the ground in the fetal position, circled by at least a dozen federal agents as one repeatedly shocks him with an electric stun gun.
A new video shows Anastacio Hernadez-Rojas lying on the ground in the fetal position, circled by at least a dozen federal agents as one repeatedly shocks him with an electric stun gun.
The video was shot by a passer-by and was obtained by the lawyer for the Hernandez-Rojas family as they push on with their wrongful death suit against the US government.
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) aired the video and an interview with the woman who shot it as part of a new documentary. In May 2010, Seattle resident Ashley Young was crossing a bridge from Mexico to the United States. In the “Need to Know” report, Young said that she saw the man lying on the ground was handcuffed. She said she did not witness any evidence of Hernandez-Rojas lashing out at the agents, but they are clearly heard yelling in the video for him to stop resisting. He was then tasered five times while calling for help in Spanish.
She also said that a small crowd had gathered on the bridge and some yelled for the agents to stop. But the officers came along to tell the onlookers to keep walking. One officer demanded that witnesses hand over their cell phones or delete the video they had taken, she said, but she kept walking. Young told PBS she “felt like she watched someone be murdered.”
Anastacio Hernadez-Rojas’ death was ruled a ‘homicide’ by the San Diego medical examiner and was investigated by police, yet no border control agents were charged for their part in the incident.
This will undoubtedly create even more tension, as public outcry about the case has been gaining momentum for two years. It raised serious questions about border agents and what they can potentially do without facing the repercussions of their actions.
The PBS documentary was attempting to draw attention to whether border control has been using excessive force on illegal immigrants after eight people were killed along the border in the past two years.
A new video shows Anastacio Hernadez-Rojas lying on the ground in the fetal position, circled by at least a dozen federal agents as one repeatedly shocks him with an electric stun gun.
The video was shot by a passer-by and was obtained by the lawyer for the Hernandez-Rojas family as they push on with their wrongful death suit against the US government.
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) aired the video and an interview with the woman who shot it as part of a new documentary. In May 2010, Seattle resident Ashley Young was crossing a bridge from Mexico to the United States. In the “Need to Know” report, Young said that she saw the man lying on the ground was handcuffed. She said she did not witness any evidence of Hernandez-Rojas lashing out at the agents, but they are clearly heard yelling in the video for him to stop resisting. He was then tasered five times while calling for help in Spanish.
She also said that a small crowd had gathered on the bridge and some yelled for the agents to stop. But the officers came along to tell the onlookers to keep walking. One officer demanded that witnesses hand over their cell phones or delete the video they had taken, she said, but she kept walking. Young told PBS she “felt like she watched someone be murdered.”
Anastacio Hernadez-Rojas’ death was ruled a ‘homicide’ by the San Diego medical examiner and was investigated by police, yet no border control agents were charged for their part in the incident.
This will undoubtedly create even more tension, as public outcry about the case has been gaining momentum for two years. It raised serious questions about border agents and what they can potentially do without facing the repercussions of their actions.
The PBS documentary was attempting to draw attention to whether border control has been using excessive force on illegal immigrants after eight people were killed along the border in the past two years.
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Friday, February 10, 2012
Police Caught On Dash Cam Brutally Beating/Kicking Man In Diabetic Coma
Police officer seen on dashcam video brutally kicking motorist suffering from diabetic shock in $158,000 lawsuit
A driver in diabetic shock was kicked in the head several times in a shocking display of police brutality that won him $158,000 in a lawsuit.
Adam Greene, of Las Vegas, was pulled over at about 4am on October 29, 2010 after a Nevada State Trooper spotted him weaving in traffic.
Mr Greene claimed he was driving that way because he had fallen into diabetic shock.
Police officer seen on dashcam video brutally kicking motorist suffering from diabetic shock in $158,000 lawsuit
A driver in diabetic shock was kicked in the head several times in a shocking display of police brutality that won him $158,000 in a lawsuit.
Adam Greene, of Las Vegas, was pulled over at about 4am on October 29, 2010 after a Nevada State Trooper spotted him weaving in traffic.
Mr Greene claimed he was driving that way because he had fallen into diabetic shock.
'Don't move!': Dashcam video shows a Nevada state trooper approaching Adam Greene's car with his gun drawn, demanding he put his hands up
'Don't move!': Dashcam video shows a Nevada state trooper approaching Adam Greene's car with his gun drawn, demanding he put his hands up
Traffic stop: Mr Greene did not immediately comply as the state trooper, seen kicking the side of the door, demanded he put his hands up
Traffic stop: Mr Greene did not immediately comply as the state trooper, seen kicking the side of the door, demanded he put his hands up
The dashcam video shows a Nevada state trooper approaching Mr Greene's car with his gun drawn, saying: ‘Don’t move! Hey driver, do not move! Hands up!’
As five cops restrain the man on the ground, a Henderson police officer walks into the shot and kicks Mr Greene in the head five times.
A driver in diabetic shock was kicked in the head several times in a shocking display of police brutality that won him $158,000 in a lawsuit.
Adam Greene, of Las Vegas, was pulled over at about 4am on October 29, 2010 after a Nevada State Trooper spotted him weaving in traffic.
Mr Greene claimed he was driving that way because he had fallen into diabetic shock.
Police officer seen on dashcam video brutally kicking motorist suffering from diabetic shock in $158,000 lawsuit
A driver in diabetic shock was kicked in the head several times in a shocking display of police brutality that won him $158,000 in a lawsuit.
Adam Greene, of Las Vegas, was pulled over at about 4am on October 29, 2010 after a Nevada State Trooper spotted him weaving in traffic.
Mr Greene claimed he was driving that way because he had fallen into diabetic shock.
'Don't move!': Dashcam video shows a Nevada state trooper approaching Adam Greene's car with his gun drawn, demanding he put his hands up
'Don't move!': Dashcam video shows a Nevada state trooper approaching Adam Greene's car with his gun drawn, demanding he put his hands up
Traffic stop: Mr Greene did not immediately comply as the state trooper, seen kicking the side of the door, demanded he put his hands up
Traffic stop: Mr Greene did not immediately comply as the state trooper, seen kicking the side of the door, demanded he put his hands up
The dashcam video shows a Nevada state trooper approaching Mr Greene's car with his gun drawn, saying: ‘Don’t move! Hey driver, do not move! Hands up!’
As five cops restrain the man on the ground, a Henderson police officer walks into the shot and kicks Mr Greene in the head five times.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Monday, January 9, 2012
No Police Immunity For Claims Of Urine Torture
Pennsylvania state police officers do not have immunity from claims that they tortured a woman with pepper spray, cold water and urine while she was in custody and restraints, a federal judge ruled.
State troopers took Derena Madison into custody after a 2:30 a.m. traffic stop in which they arrested her friend for driving under the influence. When officers said they would tow the car, Madison exited to protest. Police arrested her for public drunkenness and disorderly conduct, putting her into handcuffs and restraining her feet with manacles.
While she was restrained and shackled, she claims that Officer Chad Weaver "twice sprayed [her] face, head and body with pepper spray, without justification... for the purpose of torturing her."
In response to her calls for help, she says several officers carried her outside the barracks and doused her with large quantities of cold water, after which she blacked out momentarily and fell to her knees in the snow. "When she regained consciousness," Madison allegedly "felt and smelled urine on her head, face, neck and person. She believes that while she was unconscious, one or more of the defendants urinated on her."
Madison says she never received medical assistance or an opportunity to decontaminate from the pepper spray. She sued Officers Chad Weaver, Michael Zampogna, an individual identified only as Cooley, and two other unidentified individuals.
The officers moved to partially dismiss, saying the claims of intentional infliction of emotional distress and assault and battery are "barred by sovereign immunity."
They claimed that "subduing persons is one of the acts of law enforcement officers are employed to perform; officers are also permitted to use force, if necessary, in the commission of their duties," and that "in effectuating a traffic stop and dealing with an 'out-of-control' person,' the officers were intending to serve the purposes of their 'master,' the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," according to the court's summary.
But Madison says she was "already subdued and shackled at the time the troopers applied pepper spray, water and urine," according to the court. "The acts were not related to 'subduing' her and were not examples of necessary force."
She claims the alleged acts were "meant to degrade and humiliate her, rather than to serve and purpose of the police or the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," the court summarized.
Since sovereign immunity does not bar claims involving actions outside the scope of an officer's employment, Chief U.S. District Judge Gary Lancaster denied the officers' motion.
"Commonwealth employees are immune from liability due to intentional misconduct, so long as the employee is acting within the scope of his or her employment," Lancaster wrote. But, if the court takes Madison's allegations as true, it "cannot say that such acts are 'clearly incidental' to the duties of law enforcement officers." Madison's "allegations of assault outside the police barracks suggest personal motivation, rather than intent to serve the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," he added. "Therefore, [the officers] are not entitled to sovereign immunity based on the pleadings."
State troopers took Derena Madison into custody after a 2:30 a.m. traffic stop in which they arrested her friend for driving under the influence. When officers said they would tow the car, Madison exited to protest. Police arrested her for public drunkenness and disorderly conduct, putting her into handcuffs and restraining her feet with manacles.
While she was restrained and shackled, she claims that Officer Chad Weaver "twice sprayed [her] face, head and body with pepper spray, without justification... for the purpose of torturing her."
In response to her calls for help, she says several officers carried her outside the barracks and doused her with large quantities of cold water, after which she blacked out momentarily and fell to her knees in the snow. "When she regained consciousness," Madison allegedly "felt and smelled urine on her head, face, neck and person. She believes that while she was unconscious, one or more of the defendants urinated on her."
Madison says she never received medical assistance or an opportunity to decontaminate from the pepper spray. She sued Officers Chad Weaver, Michael Zampogna, an individual identified only as Cooley, and two other unidentified individuals.
The officers moved to partially dismiss, saying the claims of intentional infliction of emotional distress and assault and battery are "barred by sovereign immunity."
They claimed that "subduing persons is one of the acts of law enforcement officers are employed to perform; officers are also permitted to use force, if necessary, in the commission of their duties," and that "in effectuating a traffic stop and dealing with an 'out-of-control' person,' the officers were intending to serve the purposes of their 'master,' the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," according to the court's summary.
But Madison says she was "already subdued and shackled at the time the troopers applied pepper spray, water and urine," according to the court. "The acts were not related to 'subduing' her and were not examples of necessary force."
She claims the alleged acts were "meant to degrade and humiliate her, rather than to serve and purpose of the police or the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," the court summarized.
Since sovereign immunity does not bar claims involving actions outside the scope of an officer's employment, Chief U.S. District Judge Gary Lancaster denied the officers' motion.
"Commonwealth employees are immune from liability due to intentional misconduct, so long as the employee is acting within the scope of his or her employment," Lancaster wrote. But, if the court takes Madison's allegations as true, it "cannot say that such acts are 'clearly incidental' to the duties of law enforcement officers." Madison's "allegations of assault outside the police barracks suggest personal motivation, rather than intent to serve the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," he added. "Therefore, [the officers] are not entitled to sovereign immunity based on the pleadings."
Saturday, January 7, 2012
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Cop Types
Today, it is law enforcement that threatens harmless, morally (if not legally) innocent people with violence. The guy who, for example, grows a small batch of pot plants in his backyard (as opposed to the lawful citizen who brews his own beer). Or the seatbelt scofflaw – whose actions threaten harm to none except, perhaps, himself (and even then, only potentially). Or the farmer who sells “unapproved” milk to his neighbors. And the students who dare to exercise their right to peaceable assembly. The driver who declines to be a witness against himself and refuses to submit, sans warrant – and very often, sans probable cause – to a random stop and search of his vehicle and person.
The list of victimless crimes – and latter-day victims of law enforcement – is long. Citizens are aware of the creepy fact that being a peaceful, harmless person who respects the rights of others is no longer sufficient to avoid becoming the target of a law enforcer. That the law increasingly targets people who have violated no other person’s rights – but who have violated “the law.” That is, who have committed some affront against the state.
Which is why citizens today increasingly dislike – and fear – these law enforcers. It is also why today we have essentially three kinds people who suit up for this sort of work:
Type one: The robotic “just doing my job” type. He is either not smart enough or introspective/thoughtful enough to consider the nature of the system; whether the laws are just or even reasonable. This is the cop type that can’t be reasoned with and more, the type who will enforce any law and any order simply because it’s an order or because it’s the law. Nothing more is required. He just follows orders. And it’s our job to Obey.
The upshot is this type of cop is only bad to the extent that the laws he enforces are bad. There is a limit. He usually won’t exceed the law or go beyond what he is ordered to do (because then he’d be exercising initiative and this type of cop is almost constitutionally incapable of that because it conflicts with his inner prime directive of obedience to the hierarchy.) He is fundamentally a bureaucrat. Bad perhaps, but not usually deliberately vicious.
Type two: The power-luster. This one enjoys wielding power over others. It makes him feel big and strong. He is often narcissistic and may even be sadistic. He absolutely lacks empathy. He sees us as ” civilians” – or worse. And it’s our job to Submit.
This type of enforcer is frightening because given the opportunity he will assault and possibly even kill you. And he’s actively looking for that opportunity. A recent example being the group of such enforcers in Fullerton, CA who beat a helpless homeless man to death (see here). And they will feel no remorse afterward. Indeed, they will get pleasure out of it. This is the sort of person who would have – and may yet again – line people up in front of a ditch.
Or man an oven.
Type three: The old school cop. He is usually old, literally. A relic of the days when cops didn’t expect immediate submission, when cops were expected to treat citizens civilly. He has mellowed – or become aware (and thus, cynical) about the nature of The Job. He tries to be decent, within the boundaries of what’s possible given “the law” and current law enforcement culture. He’s close to retirement, though, and doesn’t want to make too many waves. He’s also rare. You might get him one out of ten times these days.
Expect to see much less of him in the future, too.
His type is being screened out, actively and otherwise. Actively, because our increasingly militarized “law enforcement” agencies seek order-followers as new recruits. And who better-prepared (better conditioned) to follow orders than ex-military? A decade’s worth of combat (well, occupation) hardened veterans has streamed back to the Homeland in search of work – and what work are they better-prepared for than law enforcement?
Note well that these law enforcers typically have a military rank structure. The head enforcer is often festooned with general’s stars or a colonel’s silver eagles. They wear menacing black BDUs, complete with flak jackets or body armor. Even in the country, were the major crimes are hunting out of season or getting a bit too boozed up on a Friday night. I live in an extremely rural part of southwest Virginia in a county that has literally one traffic light. Yet even here, courtesy of the Heimatsicherheitsdeinst apparat that sprouted after 911, there is now a bulletproofed “command post” and all the accoutrements of a fully militarized “law enforcement” department.
They, too, are just “following orders.” And local people have noticed that the new crop of cop is crew cut and unforgiving. Andy Griffith need not apply. His kind’s not wanted anymore. Of course, Andy wouldn’t want any part of this mess anyhow.
The list of victimless crimes – and latter-day victims of law enforcement – is long. Citizens are aware of the creepy fact that being a peaceful, harmless person who respects the rights of others is no longer sufficient to avoid becoming the target of a law enforcer. That the law increasingly targets people who have violated no other person’s rights – but who have violated “the law.” That is, who have committed some affront against the state.
Which is why citizens today increasingly dislike – and fear – these law enforcers. It is also why today we have essentially three kinds people who suit up for this sort of work:
Type one: The robotic “just doing my job” type. He is either not smart enough or introspective/thoughtful enough to consider the nature of the system; whether the laws are just or even reasonable. This is the cop type that can’t be reasoned with and more, the type who will enforce any law and any order simply because it’s an order or because it’s the law. Nothing more is required. He just follows orders. And it’s our job to Obey.
The upshot is this type of cop is only bad to the extent that the laws he enforces are bad. There is a limit. He usually won’t exceed the law or go beyond what he is ordered to do (because then he’d be exercising initiative and this type of cop is almost constitutionally incapable of that because it conflicts with his inner prime directive of obedience to the hierarchy.) He is fundamentally a bureaucrat. Bad perhaps, but not usually deliberately vicious.
Type two: The power-luster. This one enjoys wielding power over others. It makes him feel big and strong. He is often narcissistic and may even be sadistic. He absolutely lacks empathy. He sees us as ” civilians” – or worse. And it’s our job to Submit.
This type of enforcer is frightening because given the opportunity he will assault and possibly even kill you. And he’s actively looking for that opportunity. A recent example being the group of such enforcers in Fullerton, CA who beat a helpless homeless man to death (see here). And they will feel no remorse afterward. Indeed, they will get pleasure out of it. This is the sort of person who would have – and may yet again – line people up in front of a ditch.
Or man an oven.
Type three: The old school cop. He is usually old, literally. A relic of the days when cops didn’t expect immediate submission, when cops were expected to treat citizens civilly. He has mellowed – or become aware (and thus, cynical) about the nature of The Job. He tries to be decent, within the boundaries of what’s possible given “the law” and current law enforcement culture. He’s close to retirement, though, and doesn’t want to make too many waves. He’s also rare. You might get him one out of ten times these days.
Expect to see much less of him in the future, too.
His type is being screened out, actively and otherwise. Actively, because our increasingly militarized “law enforcement” agencies seek order-followers as new recruits. And who better-prepared (better conditioned) to follow orders than ex-military? A decade’s worth of combat (well, occupation) hardened veterans has streamed back to the Homeland in search of work – and what work are they better-prepared for than law enforcement?
Note well that these law enforcers typically have a military rank structure. The head enforcer is often festooned with general’s stars or a colonel’s silver eagles. They wear menacing black BDUs, complete with flak jackets or body armor. Even in the country, were the major crimes are hunting out of season or getting a bit too boozed up on a Friday night. I live in an extremely rural part of southwest Virginia in a county that has literally one traffic light. Yet even here, courtesy of the Heimatsicherheitsdeinst apparat that sprouted after 911, there is now a bulletproofed “command post” and all the accoutrements of a fully militarized “law enforcement” department.
They, too, are just “following orders.” And local people have noticed that the new crop of cop is crew cut and unforgiving. Andy Griffith need not apply. His kind’s not wanted anymore. Of course, Andy wouldn’t want any part of this mess anyhow.
Friday, December 30, 2011
Cops Enter Homes Without Permission Or Warrants
'These days, police don't seem to need a warrant to enter your home without your permission when you're not there. Well, at least not in Westerly, R.I.
According to a local report, crews from the local utility company, accompanied by cops, were going door-to-door to close off the gas meters of about 1,600 homes, under the guise of trying to fix a "distribution problem."
If no one is at the home, cops and locksmiths are going into the homes in order to shut off the gas valve. The utility, National Grid, said its crews would be returning to the homes to turn gas meters back on once the problem is identified.'
NOTE: Try this tactic as a landlord and land your butt in jail.
According to a local report, crews from the local utility company, accompanied by cops, were going door-to-door to close off the gas meters of about 1,600 homes, under the guise of trying to fix a "distribution problem."
If no one is at the home, cops and locksmiths are going into the homes in order to shut off the gas valve. The utility, National Grid, said its crews would be returning to the homes to turn gas meters back on once the problem is identified.'
NOTE: Try this tactic as a landlord and land your butt in jail.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
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