3 ms·

There's a very simple way to solve this entire problem. Every single case of a police officer killing someone leads to automatic charges of manslaughter, no mat

There's a very simple way to solve this entire problem. Every single case of a police officer killing someone leads to automatic charges of manslaughter, no matter the circumstances, which must then be refuted in a court of law in front of a jury of the police officer's peers. Police safety will not be affected, as any person in true danger will risk a manslaughter charge to save their own life. Clear cut cases of necessary force will be open and shut without much issue, but the cowardly murderers with their fingers on the trigger around the country will think long and hard before they make that decision to trivially end someone's life.

talmand 10y ago
Telling people that every time they perform this one particular action they will immediately be punished, regardless of the situation, will only result in worse problems than you are trying to solve.
- spacemanmatt 10y ago
  Punished? No, the PP proposed trial to determine whether punishment is necessary. You demonstrate the problem we face -- we can't even put killer police through formal fact-finding. Prosecution is not punishment. If you kill someone, there is probable cause to charge with murder and let the court establish permissibility of the killing.
  - talmand 10y ago
    You don't go to court unless you've been charged. I would imagine it's hard to keep your job as a police officer if you're charged with a crime every time you have a violent encounter with a person. You speak as if there's no fact-finding at all. A police officer can face up to three such things; local, state, and federal. If not more.
    - travmatt 10y ago
      A few years ago there was a murder of a mexican immigrant in a portion of my state known for it's xenophobia. The sheriffs department there was known to abuse said immigrants and intentionally mishandled the police report to aid the teens in being acquitted by the local all-white jury. The feds picked the case up and tried the murderers in federal court under federal hate crime laws, they were sentenced to 9 years. The police chief and some of his deputies were convicted and their minimum sentences ranged from 5-7 years (although they of course served much less than that) for essentially a badly biased police report and some terrible local ties - truly, the only thing that saved them from a very long prison sentence was the compassion of a judge. There's still a lot of xenophobia in the town, of course - but I'm betting the institutional memory of a DOJ civil rights investigation will last quite a while.

talmand 10y ago

Telling people that every time they perform this one particular action they will immediately be punished, regardless of the situation, will only result in worse problems than you are trying to solve.

spacemanmatt 10y ago
Punished? No, the PP proposed trial to determine whether punishment is necessary. You demonstrate the problem we face -- we can't even put killer police through formal fact-finding. Prosecution is not punishment. If you kill someone, there is probable cause to charge with murder and let the court establish permissibility of the killing.
- talmand 10y ago
  You don't go to court unless you've been charged. I would imagine it's hard to keep your job as a police officer if you're charged with a crime every time you have a violent encounter with a person. You speak as if there's no fact-finding at all. A police officer can face up to three such things; local, state, and federal. If not more.
  - travmatt 10y ago
    A few years ago there was a murder of a mexican immigrant in a portion of my state known for it's xenophobia. The sheriffs department there was known to abuse said immigrants and intentionally mishandled the police report to aid the teens in being acquitted by the local all-white jury. The feds picked the case up and tried the murderers in federal court under federal hate crime laws, they were sentenced to 9 years. The police chief and some of his deputies were convicted and their minimum sentences ranged from 5-7 years (although they of course served much less than that) for essentially a badly biased police report and some terrible local ties - truly, the only thing that saved them from a very long prison sentence was the compassion of a judge. There's still a lot of xenophobia in the town, of course - but I'm betting the institutional memory of a DOJ civil rights investigation will last quite a while.