6 ms·

The very idea that the police would return to the house without cause or warrant and search it - which is a grotesque constitutional violation - reflects an att

The very idea that the police would return to the house without cause or warrant and search it - which is a grotesque constitutional violation - reflects an attitude of hostility and opposition to the community the police are supposed to literally "protect and serve." I'm increasingly of the belief that the domestic police in the United States shouldn't even be called a force, they should be called a service. They should not carry firearms, and they should not receive primarily military training. They should be well paid and receive aggressive financial incentives to continue their education. They should always be wearing a body cam when on duty. There will always be a need for armed police at some point, but that point is not the streets, and not daily response to mundane events.

gohrt 10y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles
dforrestwilson1 10y ago
One caveat to this: from the data I've seen a lot of these issues revolve around specific communities. Please keep in mind that police forces are not national, but rather local.
- gohrt 10y ago
  They are local, but we see patterns repeated nationally.
  - pyre 10y ago
    We also see some of the same patterns internationally. One might even venture a guess that the power the is inherently given to perform police duties has a universal appeal towards abuse that affects many humans in the same way...
    - soundwave106 10y ago
      Which is why I see it less as an American police problem versus an American police culture problem. The bad cop stereotype is universal. But America's current police culture in my opinion encourages bad cop behavior. The culture is way too military-oriented versus community oriented at the moment. It is hard to "protect and serve" your community if you are always at "war" with some "enemy". This case is a perfect example of that.
  - walshemj 10y ago
    but the usa has very local police forces many of which are tiny forces and have much less oversight than a centrally managed force as is common in the EU and UK
- rocqua 10y ago
  Is there strong backing for this from communities? It seems to me like the most outrageous police brutality sources would be solved by high-level oversight.
baldfat 10y ago
This is the perfect dilemma to bring to people who back police 100%. Who are they going to defend? The Police or the War Veteran? Clearly the local police made various constitutional violations against a suicidal war veteran and they trashed his place and left it for him to come back to. How jaded and unconcerned? Sadly one of my former employees left and joined the war and while there lost a buddy in Iraq. After being home for 12 months he took his life leaving all of us in shock. If police did that to a hero who are they willing to go for bat for????
- reverend_gonzo 10y ago
  Just to clarify: he was not at all suicidal, but accidentally called the suicide hotlibs instead of a crisis hotline.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - baldfat 10y ago
    Just to clarify the Veteran Crisis Hot line was renamed in 2011 from the Veteran Suicidal Prevention Line. If he was suicidal it even makes the actions of the police even worse. The whole issue is not the initial interactions with the police nor their initial entree into the home. The issue is the second and third entree into his home and unconstitutional search of his home. This occurred hours after the first search was conducted and the subject was getting medical treatment.
    - DanBC 10y ago
      > Just to clarify the Veteran Crisis Hot line was renamed in 2011 from the Veteran Suicidal Prevention Line. ...and was done so to encourage early intervention, sometimes before the veteran becomes suicidal. https://www.veteranscrisisline.net/About/AboutVeteransCrisisLine.aspx https://www.veteranscrisisline.net/About/AboutVeteransCrisis... >> In 2011, the National Veterans Suicide Prevention Hotline was renamed the Veterans Crisis Line to encourage Veterans and their families and friends to make the call. People who know a Veteran best may be the first to recognize emotional distress and reach out for support when issues reach a crisis point — and well before a Veteran is at risk of suicide.
snowwrestler 10y ago
One of the challenges today is the number of military veterans to return from the Middle East and get jobs in law enforcement after their discharge. As a matter of habit and training, they pursue the police job like the military job: as a search for and battle with enemies. But what communities want is a police force that provides safety to citizens, not one that fights enemies. There's a big difference between those mindsets.
- 67726e 10y ago
  I've always heard that many folks often had more stringent ROEs in Iraq and Afghanistan. How does this mesh with the notion of a trigger-happy cop?
  - snowwrestler 10y ago
    It's not about being trigger-happy, it's the focus of thinking. The military's job is to defeat enemies. If you are a soldier, enemies are people who want to kill you, the soldier. They're enemies when everyone wakes up and they're enemies when everyone goes to bed. So the soldiers' job in-country is to sort people into enemies and civilians; to defend civilians and kill enemies. In the U.S., a police officer's job is to enforce the law. They are supposed to be policing behavior, not sorting people. Everyone is a civilian. A civilian who broke the law is not an enemy, and the justice system is not seeking to defeat them. The law is supposed to punish behavior in proportion to the crime, and in accordance with the written law. Now of course it's not that simple; there are organized crime syndicates, like drug gangs or terrorist cells, who target police. But the reality is that those are a tiny tiny percentage of the population. But law enforcement has spent a decade re-organizing itself to defeat them. That's how you get an "Emergency Response Team" (SWAT) setting up a secure perimeter and clearing houses around a sleepy veteran who just called for a little support, as in this story. They didn't show up to help a veteran; they showed up to defeat an enemy.
lossolo 10y ago
> They should not carry firearms Unfortunately in a society where a lot of citizens have fire arms, where gang culture exist this will not be possible at all. How many times police was shot on routine daily events? Police not carrying weapons is not realistic in USA.
- lg 10y ago
  agreed. if they are unarmed then they can forget about arresting people and bringing them into jail and in front of a judge. plenty of people are willing to kill to avoid that outcome.
  - euyyn 10y ago
    > they can forget about arresting people and bringing them into jail and in front of a judge Hyperbole much? I expect most arrests are done without firearms being drawn. > plenty of people are willing to kill to avoid that outcome. And plenty of people are willing to kill for other reasons too, which is why no one's discussing that zero police officers should carry firearms. What's being questioned is the policy of all of them doing it.
    - lg 10y ago
      maybe most arrests happen that way, but you need to be prepared for any reasonable eventuality. apprehending people can be very dangerous. I see no reason why an officer would willingly go into that situation unprepared to defend him/herself with lethal force. having armed help a radio call away doesn't seem comforting when you're dealing with someone who's armed and angry now.
      - euyyn 10y ago
        I would bet most shots at the police aren't because the criminal wants to straight up murder a police officer out of anger in the heat of the moment. Rather because he's scared, wants to flee, and his only option left for that is his gun. It's a given here in the US that the moment you as much as appear to draw a gun at a cop, you're getting shot. So I don't think criminals even have to think about it to know that it's a "kill first or die" situation, once you're down that route. Now, if the criminal knows that the cop is unarmed, all of that changes: his gun is just leverage. He flees (or expels the cops off his house), which is undesirable; but then's when the situation can be escalated. No more "wild West" situations of "this guy might shoot me any moment, better be prepared to kill him for my life".
olalonde 10y ago
Interestingly, the police in China do not carry firearms nor are they allowed to do high speed car chases.
bubbleRefuge 10y ago
< They should be well paid and receive aggressive financial < incentives to continue their education. My buddy is a copy in a mid-size south florida town and is getting 6K retirement checks after 20 years of service and still working full time in the DROP program. I'd say he's fairly well paid for only high school education.
phs318u 10y ago
> They should always be wearing a body cam Agreed. Also works if the citizenry wear body cams.

gohrt 10y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles

dforrestwilson1 10y ago

One caveat to this: from the data I've seen a lot of these issues revolve around specific communities. Please keep in mind that police forces are not national, but rather local.

gohrt 10y ago
They are local, but we see patterns repeated nationally.
- pyre 10y ago
  We also see some of the same patterns internationally. One might even venture a guess that the power the is inherently given to perform police duties has a universal appeal towards abuse that affects many humans in the same way...
  - soundwave106 10y ago
    Which is why I see it less as an American police problem versus an American police culture problem. The bad cop stereotype is universal. But America's current police culture in my opinion encourages bad cop behavior. The culture is way too military-oriented versus community oriented at the moment. It is hard to "protect and serve" your community if you are always at "war" with some "enemy". This case is a perfect example of that.
- walshemj 10y ago
  but the usa has very local police forces many of which are tiny forces and have much less oversight than a centrally managed force as is common in the EU and UK
rocqua 10y ago
Is there strong backing for this from communities? It seems to me like the most outrageous police brutality sources would be solved by high-level oversight.

baldfat 10y ago

This is the perfect dilemma to bring to people who back police 100%. Who are they going to defend? The Police or the War Veteran? Clearly the local police made various constitutional violations against a suicidal war veteran and they trashed his place and left it for him to come back to. How jaded and unconcerned? Sadly one of my former employees left and joined the war and while there lost a buddy in Iraq. After being home for 12 months he took his life leaving all of us in shock. If police did that to a hero who are they willing to go for bat for????

reverend_gonzo 10y ago
Just to clarify: he was not at all suicidal, but accidentally called the suicide hotlibs instead of a crisis hotline.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- baldfat 10y ago
  Just to clarify the Veteran Crisis Hot line was renamed in 2011 from the Veteran Suicidal Prevention Line. If he was suicidal it even makes the actions of the police even worse. The whole issue is not the initial interactions with the police nor their initial entree into the home. The issue is the second and third entree into his home and unconstitutional search of his home. This occurred hours after the first search was conducted and the subject was getting medical treatment.
  - DanBC 10y ago
    > Just to clarify the Veteran Crisis Hot line was renamed in 2011 from the Veteran Suicidal Prevention Line. ...and was done so to encourage early intervention, sometimes before the veteran becomes suicidal. https://www.veteranscrisisline.net/About/AboutVeteransCrisisLine.aspx https://www.veteranscrisisline.net/About/AboutVeteransCrisis... >> In 2011, the National Veterans Suicide Prevention Hotline was renamed the Veterans Crisis Line to encourage Veterans and their families and friends to make the call. People who know a Veteran best may be the first to recognize emotional distress and reach out for support when issues reach a crisis point — and well before a Veteran is at risk of suicide.

snowwrestler 10y ago

One of the challenges today is the number of military veterans to return from the Middle East and get jobs in law enforcement after their discharge. As a matter of habit and training, they pursue the police job like the military job: as a search for and battle with enemies. But what communities want is a police force that provides safety to citizens, not one that fights enemies. There's a big difference between those mindsets.

67726e 10y ago
I've always heard that many folks often had more stringent ROEs in Iraq and Afghanistan. How does this mesh with the notion of a trigger-happy cop?
- snowwrestler 10y ago
  It's not about being trigger-happy, it's the focus of thinking. The military's job is to defeat enemies. If you are a soldier, enemies are people who want to kill you, the soldier. They're enemies when everyone wakes up and they're enemies when everyone goes to bed. So the soldiers' job in-country is to sort people into enemies and civilians; to defend civilians and kill enemies. In the U.S., a police officer's job is to enforce the law. They are supposed to be policing behavior, not sorting people. Everyone is a civilian. A civilian who broke the law is not an enemy, and the justice system is not seeking to defeat them. The law is supposed to punish behavior in proportion to the crime, and in accordance with the written law. Now of course it's not that simple; there are organized crime syndicates, like drug gangs or terrorist cells, who target police. But the reality is that those are a tiny tiny percentage of the population. But law enforcement has spent a decade re-organizing itself to defeat them. That's how you get an "Emergency Response Team" (SWAT) setting up a secure perimeter and clearing houses around a sleepy veteran who just called for a little support, as in this story. They didn't show up to help a veteran; they showed up to defeat an enemy.

lossolo 10y ago

> They should not carry firearms Unfortunately in a society where a lot of citizens have fire arms, where gang culture exist this will not be possible at all. How many times police was shot on routine daily events? Police not carrying weapons is not realistic in USA.

lg 10y ago
agreed. if they are unarmed then they can forget about arresting people and bringing them into jail and in front of a judge. plenty of people are willing to kill to avoid that outcome.
- euyyn 10y ago
  > they can forget about arresting people and bringing them into jail and in front of a judge Hyperbole much? I expect most arrests are done without firearms being drawn. > plenty of people are willing to kill to avoid that outcome. And plenty of people are willing to kill for other reasons too, which is why no one's discussing that zero police officers should carry firearms. What's being questioned is the policy of all of them doing it.
  - lg 10y ago
    maybe most arrests happen that way, but you need to be prepared for any reasonable eventuality. apprehending people can be very dangerous. I see no reason why an officer would willingly go into that situation unprepared to defend him/herself with lethal force. having armed help a radio call away doesn't seem comforting when you're dealing with someone who's armed and angry now.
    - euyyn 10y ago
      I would bet most shots at the police aren't because the criminal wants to straight up murder a police officer out of anger in the heat of the moment. Rather because he's scared, wants to flee, and his only option left for that is his gun. It's a given here in the US that the moment you as much as appear to draw a gun at a cop, you're getting shot. So I don't think criminals even have to think about it to know that it's a "kill first or die" situation, once you're down that route. Now, if the criminal knows that the cop is unarmed, all of that changes: his gun is just leverage. He flees (or expels the cops off his house), which is undesirable; but then's when the situation can be escalated. No more "wild West" situations of "this guy might shoot me any moment, better be prepared to kill him for my life".

olalonde 10y ago

Interestingly, the police in China do not carry firearms nor are they allowed to do high speed car chases.

bubbleRefuge 10y ago

< They should be well paid and receive aggressive financial < incentives to continue their education. My buddy is a copy in a mid-size south florida town and is getting 6K retirement checks after 20 years of service and still working full time in the DROP program. I'd say he's fairly well paid for only high school education.

phs318u 10y ago

> They should always be wearing a body cam Agreed. Also works if the citizenry wear body cams.