4 ms·

Are American cities often quite different when it comes to laws and how justice is enacted? I am curious, because I wonder if this could prove to be a differen

• burlesona 6y ago
  Short answer, yes. The states are highly autonomous and the laws vary most at the state level, but they vary from city to city within each state as well. You can already see how this plays out: the protests in Portland were tolerated for a very long time, had they happened in almost any other city I doubt the local officials would have tolerated them for as long. (No comment on whether or not that’s a good thing.)
• tyingq 6y ago
  Yes, they vary wildly. For example, in a lot of rural areas the only law enforcement is a county Sheriff. There's often a "good old boy" system where people that know the sheriff can do whatever they want, driving drunk is a typical example. Everything is potentially a different system from how jail works, bail amounts, maximum penalties, typical plea bargain offers, what laws actually get enforced, etc.
  • protomyth 6y ago
    Does anyone live in a rural place with only a county sheriff? I live in rural ND and there is more law enforcement than that. Also, corrupt sheriffs have been run out of town.
    • tyingq 6y ago
      Well, yes, there's technically things like State Police, but they aren't physically around much. The corrupt sheriff problem is rampant in Oklahoma for sure. I know that civil asset forfeiture laws made it worse. Since they are elected positions, it's difficult to get rid of a bad apple because they have more money than anyone else to run campaigns.
    • wccrawford 6y ago
      I used to, and to my knowledge, that place is still like that. If you lived outside the city limits (which is really easy in a city of 3000 people, but a large county overall) then the only police who would respond to calls were county.
    • kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
      Some towns share the cost of policing by letting the sheriff's office handle law enforcement. The county extracts more money from taxes to do this but there is less duplicated effort overall.
• lotsofpulp 6y ago
  > Perhaps you will end up with "Law and Order" cities, where technology is used unempathetically to punish harshly and discriminate without penalty. Then you would have less strict cities, where freedoms are less trampled in the pursuit of total control. This is already true. People are free to use marijuana/brothels/certain guns/etc in some places and not in others. Some cities have license plate readers on their police cars and roads and red light/speed cameras. Some prosecutors go after certain crimes and not others. Although, I’m sure in every place there is little transparency so if you know the right people, you can get away with a lot more.
• x86_64Ubuntu 6y ago
  The ethnic groups that are generally targeted and harassed by US policing are done so regardless of the city.
• SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  That process has already happened to a large degree. We can contrast New Orleans with cities like Austin and San Jose, which use all of the technologies New Orleans just banned (except facial recognition) and have much lower crime rates to show for it.
  • selimthegrim 6y ago
    Really, or is it that certain demographics got gentrified out?
    • SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
      It’s a multifactorial process. Low crime, strong policing, and high average income are all correlated; I can’t claim I know exactly how the causation goes. (Gentrification seems like an unlikely explanation for Austin, though, since cost of living is pretty close to New Orleans.)
      • selimthegrim 6y ago
        Citation for cost of living?
  • DrScump 6y ago
    San Jose's infrastructure isn't as high tech as you seem to assume. Heck, many downtown streets are on fixed pedestrian cycles rather than controlled using magnetic loop detectors, for one example.