7 ms·

Why is there not more transparency? It makes zero sense. What is going to stop something like this occuring again? Officers going to jail?

gr3yh47 9y ago
>What is going to stop something like this occuring again? Officers going to jail? wrongdoings by officers are mostly handled internally with administrative leave aka paid vacation
- jacquesm 9y ago
  That's a reward, not a punishment.
  - na85 9y ago
    Exactly.
- acchow 9y ago
  Do you have data to support this claim? What proportion get paid leave vs. fired (or jailed)
  - gr3yh47 9y ago
    no empirical data, just following news and seeing overwhelmingly that officers do not get jailed and almost never get fired
    - probablynot 9y ago
      You have to figure if the most public and controversial cases result in a halfassed investigation and some paid vacation, the ones that never make the news probably don't even go that far.
    - logfromblammo 9y ago
      And those who do get fired get rehired later, after the news media heat cools off, either by the same department, or by another law enforcement agency in the same area.
- rhino369 9y ago
  I have no idea if they do get sanctioned with admin leave. But people often confuse "suspension with pay until a determination of guilty" as a punishment. However, it's really just a way to suspend them until guilt can be determined. Unlike a regular job, government employees have a due process right to their job. You cannot suspend them without pay without due process. I don't think they should have a due process right to a job, but the courts disagree. Trump sort of suggested removing that right during the state of the union, but it won't happen.
youdontknowtho 9y ago
Police unions are the only strong unions left in the country. The conservatives will come for them at some point too...until then you have places like Philly that, at least used to, have complaints against police be heard by the union before they are passed on to internal affairs. Bmore takes the cake, though...just wtf all over and back again.
- nitwit005 9y ago
  I kind of doubt the conservatives will come for them. They're often allies, even if they don't like to admit being friends with unions. The only evil the current Republican party seems interested in banishing from the world is Democrats.
- SteveNuts 9y ago
  > The conservatives will come for them at some point too... I really really doubt that. All the conservatives I know love the police and think they can do no wrong.
  - mcny 9y ago
    > I really really doubt that. All the conservatives I know love the police and think they can do no wrong. I hate to agree. Just an example https://archive.fo/QjtoQ https://archive.fo/QjtoQ > A Minnesota prosecutor said on Thursday he needs more time to decide whether to charge a police officer who fatally shot an Australian woman who called 911 for help. > Minneapolis officer Mohamed Noor shot Justine Ruszczyk Damond on 15 July, just minutes after she called 911 to report a possible sexual assault in the alley behind her home. > The 40-year-old life coach was engaged to be married, and her death drew international attention. It also cost Minneapolis’ then-police chief her job and forced major revisions to the police department’s policy on body cameras. Hennepin County attorney Mike Freeman had promised a decision by the end of the year. But on Thursday he said his office was “getting more information and evidence, and additional investigation must be completed”. You'd think that all the "conservatives" would demand that the shooter be hanged, quartered, and drawn. At least, there is a silver lining in this case that the new police chief knows that the public will not tolerate something like this.
justonepost 9y ago
Problem is partly that crime is pretty bad in Baltimore and tax base doesn’t help combat it. Officers are constantly having to bend the rules to make any impact. Slippery slope into bad behavior. Also, few well trained and talented police officers want to work in such an environment due to personal risk and stress. The few that do want to be rewarded for the hell they go through. There is another side to this story, though I agree the behavior is mostly inexcusable.
- grasshopperpurp 9y ago
  Inequality puts more pressure on police/creates much more work for police. People don't mention that enough.
joe_the_user 9y ago
The history of the early 20th "progressive" movement was a legacy of legal devices which make the police basically outside the control of local political institutions. Police are civil servants like health inspectors or zoning experts. These changes were made to prevent the previous situation, where a "political machine" could control a town, appoint their people to the important posts and create a town-wide corruption system, often by tossing boons to the poorer people in the central city (Tammany Hall was the most infamous of these operations[1]). Of course, one might this replacement system degenerated to the point that you have similar corruption, perhaps even less accountability and fewer boons to the disenfranchised. But the present order is very strongly entrenched in American politics and given the American system is presently close to a mockery of democracy, the chance of change today looks slim no matter how many egregious appear. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammany_Hall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammany_Hall
- sjg007 9y ago
  The Feds could do something.
txsh 9y ago
There should be a body cam on every officer and their police powers and privileges should deactivate the moment its turned off deliberately or “accidentally”. A time delayed feed should be made public and an independent federal agency should randomly audit the recordings for civil rights abuses. Police should be treated like other political officials and there should be a democratic mechanism for the public to remove them from their position. There should be a national ban on psychological profiling during the police hiring process. Police departments should compensate their officers with substantially higher salaried instead of their current compensation: poor pay with perks like the chance to exert power, abuse people, steal things, and almost completely avoid prosecution. Finally, police officers should be required to live in the areas they police. They should be provided with the same public housing the general public enjoys if they have trouble finding or affording a house. Of course, these ideas are too sensible to be ever become real.
- jbattle 9y ago
  I'm not anti-bodycam at all - but they don't seem to have had the effect we all hoped for... https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/10/20/558832090/body-cam-study-shows-no-effect-on-police-use-of-force-or-citizen-complaints https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/10/20/558832090... From a minute of googling, looks like San Diego had more dramatic results
  - acedio 9y ago
    From the article: >> It's to be expected that these cameras might have little impact on the behavior of police officers in Washington, D.C., he says, because this particular force went through about a decade of federal oversight to help improve the department. Seems as though the D.C. PD didn't have many issues that needed correcting?
  - gt_ 9y ago
    ...according to a study conducted by the police department in question. I contested a ticket I received from an aggressive traffic cop in Portland for texting in a stand-still bumper to bumper traffic jam. He was on a motorcycle and saw me as he rode by on the sidewalk!!! This guy had incredible nerve. In court, I insisted we view the footage from his body camera, which could only be done if I first refuse his plea offer, a significant issue IMO. I took the risk. The way he spoke to me was so militant and I thought it would be good to have the room give it a listen and see the traffic jam. The footage turns off as he is walking up to my car!!! Then he told me “either the battery died or the tape ran out”. Tape!!! This was 2015. The ticket was dropped, but I don’t think many people I know would have had this persistence, especially risking the plea denial. Beyond being annoyed, I was also intrigued with the abuse of power in such a trivial case.
solarengineer 9y ago
The Blatimore police page on transparency: https://www.baltimorepolice.org/transparency/overview https://www.baltimorepolice.org/transparency/overview They have stated that they are committed to transparency.

gr3yh47 9y ago

>What is going to stop something like this occuring again? Officers going to jail? wrongdoings by officers are mostly handled internally with administrative leave aka paid vacation

jacquesm 9y ago
That's a reward, not a punishment.
- na85 9y ago
  Exactly.
acchow 9y ago
Do you have data to support this claim? What proportion get paid leave vs. fired (or jailed)
- gr3yh47 9y ago
  no empirical data, just following news and seeing overwhelmingly that officers do not get jailed and almost never get fired
  - probablynot 9y ago
    You have to figure if the most public and controversial cases result in a halfassed investigation and some paid vacation, the ones that never make the news probably don't even go that far.
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    And those who do get fired get rehired later, after the news media heat cools off, either by the same department, or by another law enforcement agency in the same area.
rhino369 9y ago
I have no idea if they do get sanctioned with admin leave. But people often confuse "suspension with pay until a determination of guilty" as a punishment. However, it's really just a way to suspend them until guilt can be determined. Unlike a regular job, government employees have a due process right to their job. You cannot suspend them without pay without due process. I don't think they should have a due process right to a job, but the courts disagree. Trump sort of suggested removing that right during the state of the union, but it won't happen.

youdontknowtho 9y ago

Police unions are the only strong unions left in the country. The conservatives will come for them at some point too...until then you have places like Philly that, at least used to, have complaints against police be heard by the union before they are passed on to internal affairs. Bmore takes the cake, though...just wtf all over and back again.

nitwit005 9y ago
I kind of doubt the conservatives will come for them. They're often allies, even if they don't like to admit being friends with unions. The only evil the current Republican party seems interested in banishing from the world is Democrats.
SteveNuts 9y ago
> The conservatives will come for them at some point too... I really really doubt that. All the conservatives I know love the police and think they can do no wrong.
- mcny 9y ago
  > I really really doubt that. All the conservatives I know love the police and think they can do no wrong. I hate to agree. Just an example https://archive.fo/QjtoQ https://archive.fo/QjtoQ > A Minnesota prosecutor said on Thursday he needs more time to decide whether to charge a police officer who fatally shot an Australian woman who called 911 for help. > Minneapolis officer Mohamed Noor shot Justine Ruszczyk Damond on 15 July, just minutes after she called 911 to report a possible sexual assault in the alley behind her home. > The 40-year-old life coach was engaged to be married, and her death drew international attention. It also cost Minneapolis’ then-police chief her job and forced major revisions to the police department’s policy on body cameras. Hennepin County attorney Mike Freeman had promised a decision by the end of the year. But on Thursday he said his office was “getting more information and evidence, and additional investigation must be completed”. You'd think that all the "conservatives" would demand that the shooter be hanged, quartered, and drawn. At least, there is a silver lining in this case that the new police chief knows that the public will not tolerate something like this.

justonepost 9y ago

Problem is partly that crime is pretty bad in Baltimore and tax base doesn’t help combat it. Officers are constantly having to bend the rules to make any impact. Slippery slope into bad behavior. Also, few well trained and talented police officers want to work in such an environment due to personal risk and stress. The few that do want to be rewarded for the hell they go through. There is another side to this story, though I agree the behavior is mostly inexcusable.

grasshopperpurp 9y ago
Inequality puts more pressure on police/creates much more work for police. People don't mention that enough.

joe_the_user 9y ago

The history of the early 20th "progressive" movement was a legacy of legal devices which make the police basically outside the control of local political institutions. Police are civil servants like health inspectors or zoning experts. These changes were made to prevent the previous situation, where a "political machine" could control a town, appoint their people to the important posts and create a town-wide corruption system, often by tossing boons to the poorer people in the central city (Tammany Hall was the most infamous of these operations[1]). Of course, one might this replacement system degenerated to the point that you have similar corruption, perhaps even less accountability and fewer boons to the disenfranchised. But the present order is very strongly entrenched in American politics and given the American system is presently close to a mockery of democracy, the chance of change today looks slim no matter how many egregious appear. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammany_Hall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammany_Hall

sjg007 9y ago
The Feds could do something.

txsh 9y ago

There should be a body cam on every officer and their police powers and privileges should deactivate the moment its turned off deliberately or “accidentally”. A time delayed feed should be made public and an independent federal agency should randomly audit the recordings for civil rights abuses. Police should be treated like other political officials and there should be a democratic mechanism for the public to remove them from their position. There should be a national ban on psychological profiling during the police hiring process. Police departments should compensate their officers with substantially higher salaried instead of their current compensation: poor pay with perks like the chance to exert power, abuse people, steal things, and almost completely avoid prosecution. Finally, police officers should be required to live in the areas they police. They should be provided with the same public housing the general public enjoys if they have trouble finding or affording a house. Of course, these ideas are too sensible to be ever become real.

jbattle 9y ago
I'm not anti-bodycam at all - but they don't seem to have had the effect we all hoped for... https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/10/20/558832090/body-cam-study-shows-no-effect-on-police-use-of-force-or-citizen-complaints https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/10/20/558832090... From a minute of googling, looks like San Diego had more dramatic results
- acedio 9y ago
  From the article: >> It's to be expected that these cameras might have little impact on the behavior of police officers in Washington, D.C., he says, because this particular force went through about a decade of federal oversight to help improve the department. Seems as though the D.C. PD didn't have many issues that needed correcting?
- gt_ 9y ago
  ...according to a study conducted by the police department in question. I contested a ticket I received from an aggressive traffic cop in Portland for texting in a stand-still bumper to bumper traffic jam. He was on a motorcycle and saw me as he rode by on the sidewalk!!! This guy had incredible nerve. In court, I insisted we view the footage from his body camera, which could only be done if I first refuse his plea offer, a significant issue IMO. I took the risk. The way he spoke to me was so militant and I thought it would be good to have the room give it a listen and see the traffic jam. The footage turns off as he is walking up to my car!!! Then he told me “either the battery died or the tape ran out”. Tape!!! This was 2015. The ticket was dropped, but I don’t think many people I know would have had this persistence, especially risking the plea denial. Beyond being annoyed, I was also intrigued with the abuse of power in such a trivial case.

solarengineer 9y ago

The Blatimore police page on transparency: https://www.baltimorepolice.org/transparency/overview https://www.baltimorepolice.org/transparency/overview They have stated that they are committed to transparency.