8 ms·

Militarized police overreach — a second excerpt from Radley Balko's book

152 points by codyb 13y ago

asr2bd 13y ago
Since drug war/prison system/militarized police keeps popping up on HN, I'd highly recommend anyone very interested in learning more about how this came to be to watch the documentary "The House I Live In." Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0atL1HSwi8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0atL1HSwi8 Link to site: http://www.thehouseilivein.org/ http://www.thehouseilivein.org/ It's an excellent explanation of how drug laws and being "tough" on crime have led to skyrocketing incarceration rates, trigger happy cops, and broken communities.
codyb 13y ago
This is part two of Salon.com's excerpts from the book: "Rise of the Warrior Cop: The militarization of America's Police Forces." To read the first ("Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book."): http://www.salon.com/2013/07/07/“why_did_you_shoot_me_i_was_reading_a_book_the_new_warrior_cop_is_out_of_control/ http://www.salon.com/2013/07/07/“why_did_you_shoot_me_i_was_... and the corresponding hacker news discussion of the first: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001843 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001843
yaddayadda 13y ago
My blood is boiling!
- Pwntastic 13y ago
  This makes me so incredibly angry, and I don't even know what we can do about it at this point
  - Artistry121 13y ago
    Ask your local police department for information about their SWAT team. If its not forthcoming or postive write your local officials.
    - fixxer 13y ago
      Excellent suggestion. It is easy to feel powerless, but we have to remember that we have direct access to the most powerful system ever invented for information transfer. Time to use for something other than looking at cats!
    - slinkyavenger 13y ago
      Asking my local police department about anything like that is a good way to get harassed and ticketed.
      - danielweber 13y ago
        You definitely don't want to ask them how you file a complaint against a cop. http://www.popehat.com/2012/02/28/remember-cops-are-your-friends/ http://www.popehat.com/2012/02/28/remember-cops-are-your-fri... The video will make you mad. I'm saying that as an excuse not to watch it.
  - LoganCale 13y ago
    Reading the article made me so angry I'm having a hard time even expressing my anger in words. Police officers who behave like this should be in prison and banned from ever getting a job as a cop again. The bosses who authorize and cover for them should be in prison as well. Behavior like this should be absolutely unacceptable. Instead it's encouraged and praised by the people who should be holding them accountable. I'm sure there are a few cops out there who would never behave this way, but the bad ones seem to be increasing in number rapidly. A lot of it undoubtedly has to do with the fact that their power keeps increasing, and that attracts the wrong sort of person to the job. And peer pressure and isolation from the rest of society due to their us-vs-them mentality doesn't help for the rest of them. When faced with their friends abusing power, it's easier to ignore it and let it slide rather than make waves.
  - pstuart 13y ago
    What you can do is try to educate other people. A key solution is to end the War on Drugs, which is the fodder for this madness. That can only happen when the population realizes that it is a failure and that a different approach is needed. Otherwise reasonable people will say "but these drugs are dangerous and we must protect people from their harm" -- help them understand that is a fallacy and you will have made a difference.
    - hga 13y ago
      It was "the fodder for this madness", but it is now so beyond just the Drug War ending the latter wouldn't change this problem. The actual result would be way worse for those of us who aren't part of the drug culture as the police-judicial complex would struggle to avoid layoffs. Which is also part of our problem, real crime is way down (certain parts of the country excepted), yet the authorities haven't downsized in response.
      - kevinthew 13y ago
        What we could do is hold police accountable for the violent crimes they commit, shocking I know.
        msandford 13y ago
        Good luck getting the DA to actually press charges. If the DA says it's not a crime, you don't have any standing to go to a judge for criminal proceedings. You can only sue for civil. With how corrupt things seem to be in some places, that's a definite loophole.
Simucal 13y ago
Is it standard operating procedure for SWAT teams to always kill the dogs of the homes they enter? It seems like every story I read about a police raid usually ends with the household dogs getting killed. That is the most enraging part of this story. My dog is like family to me and if someone killed him I would be absolutely devastated.
- LoganCale 13y ago
  Cops are cowards and are terrified of dogs, especially in high stress environments. Sometimes they kill them just to remove the possibility of a threat from them. As many people consider their pets part of their family (myself included), I'm surprise there haven't been any revenge killings of the cops involved yet. I suspect it's only a matter of time before they do it to the wrong person. Edit: Cops kill dogs so often there's a website that tracks (some) of the stories. http://dogmurders.wordpress.com/ http://dogmurders.wordpress.com/
  - ekianjo 13y ago
    Wow, this site clearly shows they are not killing pitbulls or stuff like that. Labradors. The nicest dogs ever. This is disgusting.
- codyb 13y ago
  I also wondered that and also wonder if perhaps, for the book, raids were cherry picked which contained dog killings. Despite this, the stories which were picked are absolutely disheartening and frightening.
- hga 13y ago
  It does seem to be SOP and not just in SWAT raids, and answering codyb this has to my knowledge held true for years, Balko doesn't have to do much cherry picking to cite a lot of puppycide incidents. Hmmm, they might be particularly prominent because they're tangible unlike "police terrified my family and me" but didn't kill or seriously injure humans.
- aetherson 13y ago
jwoah12 13y ago
Having gone to University of Maryland, I have to say that I am not at all surprised that this occurred in PG County. Every time I had to deal with county police or government for any reason, it was a miserable experience that showed severe incompetence, if not corruption. Also, they have a tank that they deploy (along with SWAT officers with shields and tear gas/rubber bullets) if students party in the streets after sporting events.
- pmorici 13y ago
  My car was stolen from the DC metro and was recovered by the PG county police. Trying to get my car back from them gave me the impression that the average PG county police department employee is barely literate and totally incompetent.
  - jwoah12 13y ago
    Sounds about right. When my house in College Park was robbed, I never wound up getting any insurance money for my stolen property because I just couldn't string together enough competent employees to complete the process.
mr_luc 13y ago
Welp, I had to stop reading that halfway through ... ... but then I came back to the tab and finished it. So, do we know why SWAT teams are being used for regular police work like serving warrants? Is it basically because cops get to feel more like Batman when they wear costumes?
- pmorici 13y ago
  The old saying "when you've got a hammer everything looks like a nail" comes to mind. If you have a full time SWAT team but only need them legitimately 6% of the time what do you do with the rest of their time? In these cases it looks like the Police department's solution is to just use them for inappropriate stuff when there isn't anything better to do.
  - D9u 13y ago
    In my area we have SERT police who are also regular police officers who do normal duty unless the SERT team is called up.
- jkeel 13y ago
  That's what I'd like to know too? I'm reminded of the old line I hear of "well, that escalated quickly". Shouldn't there be maybe a simple check from a non-armed individual (I'm thinking a nice gentleman or lady in business attire - an investigator). Seems like most people will gladly help the police if they are kind and courteous. Then if that doesn't work out, bring in standard officers (no SWAT), to discuss matters but without breaking into a house. There still seems like there should be many levels of escalation before a SWAT is called. Only if some sort of armed conflict occurs then a SWAT team is probably necessary and called in with proper escalation procedures. Why jump straight to armed conflict mode by bringing in a SWAT? Heck, I would even wager to say that RIGHT before a SWAT is called if you warn the individuals that if they don't comply, a SWAT will be called, then just the warning will be enough. Still I can't stress enough, that there should be escalation procedures. Long escalation procedures.
- Tuna-Fish 13y ago
  Because the person who gets to make the call is often either someone on the team, or someone who is likely friends with the members of the team, who is not fiscally responsible for the optimal use of resources, and because the officers get paid more for high-risk jobs (such as SWAT raids).
speeder 13y ago
I would like to point, that several US SWAT teams are trained by a brazillian company, that is world famous for training the best SWAT teams. The thing is: that company is THAT famous, because it has literal urban warfare veterans, here in Brazil our SWAT teams (with other names) are used to fight heavily armed (ie: bazookas, grenade launchers, armour piercing auto-cannons) drug lords. Our teams here routinely kills lots of people, out of necessity, and they consider their job war, also our most elite and violent teams, sent into the worst places, are part of the military police (that here is a "normal" police but is actually part of the army, they follow normal army rules and hierarchy, and in case of foreign war, can be sent to the other country and keep their current hierarchy level there). Here in Brazil most of it is necessity, but it is not surprise that training US SWAT here would result into something weird... Here in Brazil SWAT need to use APCs (like this: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cPqcotWunXw/UBRoaofiekI/AAAAAAAABKQ/DRxTM_cy2zI/s1600/caveiraobopepmerjln9.jpg http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cPqcotWunXw/UBRoaofiekI/AAAAAAAABK...) to invade enemy territory, fight some seriously bloody fights with enemies armed with military weapons (like this one that a cop is displaying after capture in Rio de Janeiro: http://i1.r7.com/data/files/2C92/94A4/2C9A/D947/012C/A28F/0303/1A1A/Severino%20Silva%20-%20Bazuca%20-%20grande.jpg http://i1.r7.com/data/files/2C92/94A4/2C9A/D947/012C/A28F/03... ) Sending people trained to face this, to do regulamentation checks, or raid a party, or a amateur gambling ring, is beyond absurd and silly. Oh, the website of the company that train some US SWAT teams: http://www.cati.com.br/site/pt/?target=curso_interno&cid=27 http://www.cati.com.br/site/pt/?target=curso_interno&cid=27 the US version is broken for some weird reason, also yes, the site is very cheesy... but I know it is true because a friend of mine that works for GOE (Special Operations Group, of the São Paulo civil police) gave me the link and explained some stuff (and back then, invited me to be a volunteer fake hostage for their training)
- gt565k 13y ago
  BOPE? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batalh%C3%A3o_de_Opera%C3%A7%C3%B5es_Policiais_Especiais http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batalh%C3%A3o_de_Opera%C3%A7%C3... Elite Squad and Elite Squad 2, the movies, do a good job of portraying what speeder is talking about. The Brazilian favellas are run by drug lords. From my understanding, there has been a big push by Brazil to eradicate these criminals before the World Cup begins. It's quite interesting that BOPE is training US SWAT teams. Here's an interesting video of Brazil's Special Forces (BOPE) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5Y5flAuEFQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5Y5flAuEFQ
twentyfourseven 13y ago
Omnipresent surveillance, more prisons, secret courts and the militarization of the police - Obama's presidency looks like a reign of terror.
- LoganCale 13y ago
  These are local police departments, not under the control of the President or the Department of Justice. It's a far bigger problem than one person or one administration.
  - pyrocat 13y ago
    Yeah but they were funded and trained by DHS money, training that focuses on fighting wars not peaceful conflict resolution. You're right though, it's not just one administration, this is the Bush Administrations fault as much as the Obama Administration.
  - msandford 13y ago
    Sure but the executive branch is setting a horrible example by enforcing federal laws against drugs in states where said drugs are legal. If the administration and a local jurisdiction disagree on what's legal they shouldn't use the citizenry as a proxy punching bag through which they release their frustration.
  - pmorici 13y ago
    "These are local police departments" But in many cases they are using equipment and training made possible by federal government largesse.
jbellis 13y ago
Relevant, an interactive map of botched paramilitary police raids: http://www.cato.org/raidmap http://www.cato.org/raidmap
- jkeel 13y ago
  Yippee! Only 3 in my town! (1 - Raid on an Innocent Suspect, 2 - Death of an innocent) :-/
sailfast 13y ago
This escalation seems to be due to a number of things: 1) A perceived rise in the weapons capabilities of criminals and terrorists (See: LA Bank Robbery w/ automatics and vests) 2) A great deal of 9/11 DHS money going to local enforcement grants to prevent terrorism and up capabilities (providing the weapons and armor 3) A colossal lack of judgment and an incredibly improper escalation of force employed in civilian targets. It is incredibly maddening and frustrating, but at the same time I can understand it from the Police perspective. Perhaps we can combat this with a few policy and legal related things: 1) Legislation that provides a method to sue the government for excessive force, damages, and property damage 2) Require any urban assault teams to videotape raids and make that content public to the courts to verify accounts 3) Reduce the amount of money that goes to excessive gear, armor, and weapons and free up more money for training on target judgment and force escalation. Not a silver bullet, and it won't bring these dogs, or the man with the book in the previous segment, but it could be a start.
- johndevor 13y ago
  How about we just eliminate them altogether? There was a time when they didn't exist and life was fine (or arguably better).
  - sailfast 13y ago
    While I agree a significant down-sizing of these tactical forces is required, I think a good argument can be made for the capability of police and government leaders to call a specially trained team within a certain timeframe to combat escalated force. If a couple of guys with easily available automatic weapons decide to stroll through a shopping mall it's nice to have that option, but you don't need one in every town, and every police officer doesn't need to be in full tactical kit all the time. I'm speaking out of turn but part of it is also cultural - if you're wearing a vest and you've got the weapons and everything strapped to you looking unsociable with your sunglasses and scowl you're a badass. I gather normal blues don't get the same reaction within the community.
    - zhemao 13y ago
blhack 13y ago
This is a controversial position, and I recognize that it isn't perfect. I don't think that regular cops should have weapons. They should be primarily involved in conflict resolution only. If somebody wants to overpower a cop because they own a gun and the cop doesn't, then that person should be charged with a crime, but the cop should ALWAYS be the weaker party. And I mean no weapons. No pepper spray, no tasers. Nothing. Police departments should also take an active role in making sure that their uniforms, as well as their vehicles, are as non-aggressive looking as possible. Cops should be the people that stop to help you change a tire when you have a flat, help you get home if you're drunk, or mediate between you and the scary homeless dude that won't get off your porch. Police work should be a dangerous job, and the only people who should even be capable of doing it are people who are experts at conflict resolution, not escalation. I recognize that weapons are sometimes necessary, but I think that a cop showing up with a gun should be an extremely rare thing to see. I know there is the argument that cops are there to protect us...but from who? Unless it is a hostage scenario, when is a time that a cop is going to directly intervene in a bad guy doing something bad to me, and a is going to need their gun to do so? -- Police are protected by something called "qualified immunity", which is to say that, while in the pursuit of their job as a police officer, are not subject to the same laws with regards to assault as most civilians. I think that this should go away. If a cop assaults somebody, it should go to court, and the cop should have to prove that it was self defense. If they shoot somebody, they better be able to prove that they had a direct threat to their own life. Cops should be burdened with additional responsibilities but offered no additional rights.
- kilroy123 13y ago
  Some law enforcement officers have no choice but to operate like this. My dad was a Sheriff in a really remote area of California when I was a kid. He would often tell me how his closest backup was sometimes 30-45 minutes away. When he pulled someone over, or responded to a domestic dispute, he had no choice but to try to resolve any conflicts by talking. He once even told me, his number one weapon of choice was talking. I don't think he ever even had to pull out his gun once, during his career. Sadly, if you know another cop can roll onto the sene in under 30 seconds, there isn't much incentive to resolve problems without a huge show of force.
antitrust 13y ago
It sounds like the problem here is not militarization of police, but the incompetence of these particular police and the huge amount of drug-related activity going on. If people react to the end of drug prohibition the same way they reacted to the end of alcohol prohibition, the whole country will be strung out in weeks if we legalize the stuff. That's the only thing that keeps me from jumping on the legalization bandwagon. I'd support the cops in the Calvo case standing trial for total incompetence however.
- blhack 13y ago
  If meth is legalized tomorrow, will you start using it?
- jessaustin 13y ago
  If people react to the end of drug prohibition the same way they reacted to the end of alcohol prohibition... Have you ever visited the USA? Or any other area where it's legal for adults to purchase and consume alcohol? If not, I think you should do so at your earliest opportunity. It might blow your mind.
- D9u 13y ago
  "...the whole country will be strung out in weeks if we legalize the stuff." Some would point to the thinning of the herd aspect of allowing those so inclined to kill themselves with their drug(s) of choice... Less losers = less problems.
  - antitrust 13y ago
    I am enjoying the subtlety of your Darwinian argument. One friend of mine suggests that we need to make adult play centers that have pitfalls, like dead drops, to keep people fit and alert. The kicker is that they would be placed in such a way that it would be necessary to traverse them to get to essentials like the DMV, liquor store, etc. But I guess the big question is whether you think these people on drugs will create a massive amount of collateral damage or not on their way to thin themselves out? I imagine cars crashing through walls, people passing out with their stoves on and burning down their apartments, strung-out people electrocuting themselves, that kind of thing.
jacalata 13y ago
So it sounds like a) there are more SWAT teams than incidents that need them, so they're being sent to incidents that don't need them b) nobody who can do anything about it gives a shit that these teams can't ratchet down to the new incidents they are being given. Proposed solution: every 2nd or 3rd SWAT deployment goes to the house of someone in their chain of command, or a member of another team. The team members never know if they are on a fake deployment or a real one. The chain of command AND the team starts caring about how the team deals with little old ladies and dogs because they might belong to someone important. And if someone thinks that constantly being on incidents that don't require them to be on a hair trigger and kill things is dulling their edge, maybe they'll stop deploying them to incidents that don't require hair trigger killing.
amerika 13y ago
As society becomes more chaotic, the cops are going to get more violent and pro-active. Look at police in Brazil and other war zones. They have to be this way, and they're not universally competent, so you get the dog-shooters and zombies volunteering for these missions as well as the regular cops. Maybe instead of blaming the tool -- the cops -- we should fix our fractured and dysfunctional society.

152 points by codyb 13y ago

Since drug war/prison system/militarized police keeps popping up on HN, I'd highly recommend anyone very interested in learning more about how this came to be to watch the documentary "The House I Live In." Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0atL1HSwi8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0atL1HSwi8 Link to site: http://www.thehouseilivein.org/ http://www.thehouseilivein.org/ It's an excellent explanation of how drug laws and being "tough" on crime have led to skyrocketing incarceration rates, trigger happy cops, and broken communities.

codyb 13y ago

This is part two of Salon.com's excerpts from the book: "Rise of the Warrior Cop: The militarization of America's Police Forces." To read the first ("Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book."): http://www.salon.com/2013/07/07/“why_did_you_shoot_me_i_was_reading_a_book_the_new_warrior_cop_is_out_of_control/ http://www.salon.com/2013/07/07/“why_did_you_shoot_me_i_was_... and the corresponding hacker news discussion of the first: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001843 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001843

yaddayadda 13y ago

My blood is boiling!

Pwntastic 13y ago
This makes me so incredibly angry, and I don't even know what we can do about it at this point
- Artistry121 13y ago
  Ask your local police department for information about their SWAT team. If its not forthcoming or postive write your local officials.
  - fixxer 13y ago
    Excellent suggestion. It is easy to feel powerless, but we have to remember that we have direct access to the most powerful system ever invented for information transfer. Time to use for something other than looking at cats!
  - slinkyavenger 13y ago
    Asking my local police department about anything like that is a good way to get harassed and ticketed.
    - danielweber 13y ago
      You definitely don't want to ask them how you file a complaint against a cop. http://www.popehat.com/2012/02/28/remember-cops-are-your-friends/ http://www.popehat.com/2012/02/28/remember-cops-are-your-fri... The video will make you mad. I'm saying that as an excuse not to watch it.
- LoganCale 13y ago
  Reading the article made me so angry I'm having a hard time even expressing my anger in words. Police officers who behave like this should be in prison and banned from ever getting a job as a cop again. The bosses who authorize and cover for them should be in prison as well. Behavior like this should be absolutely unacceptable. Instead it's encouraged and praised by the people who should be holding them accountable. I'm sure there are a few cops out there who would never behave this way, but the bad ones seem to be increasing in number rapidly. A lot of it undoubtedly has to do with the fact that their power keeps increasing, and that attracts the wrong sort of person to the job. And peer pressure and isolation from the rest of society due to their us-vs-them mentality doesn't help for the rest of them. When faced with their friends abusing power, it's easier to ignore it and let it slide rather than make waves.
- pstuart 13y ago
  What you can do is try to educate other people. A key solution is to end the War on Drugs, which is the fodder for this madness. That can only happen when the population realizes that it is a failure and that a different approach is needed. Otherwise reasonable people will say "but these drugs are dangerous and we must protect people from their harm" -- help them understand that is a fallacy and you will have made a difference.
  - hga 13y ago
    It was "the fodder for this madness", but it is now so beyond just the Drug War ending the latter wouldn't change this problem. The actual result would be way worse for those of us who aren't part of the drug culture as the police-judicial complex would struggle to avoid layoffs. Which is also part of our problem, real crime is way down (certain parts of the country excepted), yet the authorities haven't downsized in response.
    - kevinthew 13y ago
      What we could do is hold police accountable for the violent crimes they commit, shocking I know.
      - msandford 13y ago
        Good luck getting the DA to actually press charges. If the DA says it's not a crime, you don't have any standing to go to a judge for criminal proceedings. You can only sue for civil. With how corrupt things seem to be in some places, that's a definite loophole.

Simucal 13y ago

Is it standard operating procedure for SWAT teams to always kill the dogs of the homes they enter? It seems like every story I read about a police raid usually ends with the household dogs getting killed. That is the most enraging part of this story. My dog is like family to me and if someone killed him I would be absolutely devastated.

LoganCale 13y ago
Cops are cowards and are terrified of dogs, especially in high stress environments. Sometimes they kill them just to remove the possibility of a threat from them. As many people consider their pets part of their family (myself included), I'm surprise there haven't been any revenge killings of the cops involved yet. I suspect it's only a matter of time before they do it to the wrong person. Edit: Cops kill dogs so often there's a website that tracks (some) of the stories. http://dogmurders.wordpress.com/ http://dogmurders.wordpress.com/
- ekianjo 13y ago
  Wow, this site clearly shows they are not killing pitbulls or stuff like that. Labradors. The nicest dogs ever. This is disgusting.
codyb 13y ago
I also wondered that and also wonder if perhaps, for the book, raids were cherry picked which contained dog killings. Despite this, the stories which were picked are absolutely disheartening and frightening.
hga 13y ago
It does seem to be SOP and not just in SWAT raids, and answering codyb this has to my knowledge held true for years, Balko doesn't have to do much cherry picking to cite a lot of puppycide incidents. Hmmm, they might be particularly prominent because they're tangible unlike "police terrified my family and me" but didn't kill or seriously injure humans.
aetherson 13y ago

jwoah12 13y ago

Having gone to University of Maryland, I have to say that I am not at all surprised that this occurred in PG County. Every time I had to deal with county police or government for any reason, it was a miserable experience that showed severe incompetence, if not corruption. Also, they have a tank that they deploy (along with SWAT officers with shields and tear gas/rubber bullets) if students party in the streets after sporting events.

pmorici 13y ago
My car was stolen from the DC metro and was recovered by the PG county police. Trying to get my car back from them gave me the impression that the average PG county police department employee is barely literate and totally incompetent.
- jwoah12 13y ago
  Sounds about right. When my house in College Park was robbed, I never wound up getting any insurance money for my stolen property because I just couldn't string together enough competent employees to complete the process.

mr_luc 13y ago

Welp, I had to stop reading that halfway through ... ... but then I came back to the tab and finished it. So, do we know why SWAT teams are being used for regular police work like serving warrants? Is it basically because cops get to feel more like Batman when they wear costumes?

pmorici 13y ago
The old saying "when you've got a hammer everything looks like a nail" comes to mind. If you have a full time SWAT team but only need them legitimately 6% of the time what do you do with the rest of their time? In these cases it looks like the Police department's solution is to just use them for inappropriate stuff when there isn't anything better to do.
- D9u 13y ago
  In my area we have SERT police who are also regular police officers who do normal duty unless the SERT team is called up.
jkeel 13y ago
That's what I'd like to know too? I'm reminded of the old line I hear of "well, that escalated quickly". Shouldn't there be maybe a simple check from a non-armed individual (I'm thinking a nice gentleman or lady in business attire - an investigator). Seems like most people will gladly help the police if they are kind and courteous. Then if that doesn't work out, bring in standard officers (no SWAT), to discuss matters but without breaking into a house. There still seems like there should be many levels of escalation before a SWAT is called. Only if some sort of armed conflict occurs then a SWAT team is probably necessary and called in with proper escalation procedures. Why jump straight to armed conflict mode by bringing in a SWAT? Heck, I would even wager to say that RIGHT before a SWAT is called if you warn the individuals that if they don't comply, a SWAT will be called, then just the warning will be enough. Still I can't stress enough, that there should be escalation procedures. Long escalation procedures.
Tuna-Fish 13y ago
Because the person who gets to make the call is often either someone on the team, or someone who is likely friends with the members of the team, who is not fiscally responsible for the optimal use of resources, and because the officers get paid more for high-risk jobs (such as SWAT raids).

speeder 13y ago

I would like to point, that several US SWAT teams are trained by a brazillian company, that is world famous for training the best SWAT teams. The thing is: that company is THAT famous, because it has literal urban warfare veterans, here in Brazil our SWAT teams (with other names) are used to fight heavily armed (ie: bazookas, grenade launchers, armour piercing auto-cannons) drug lords. Our teams here routinely kills lots of people, out of necessity, and they consider their job war, also our most elite and violent teams, sent into the worst places, are part of the military police (that here is a "normal" police but is actually part of the army, they follow normal army rules and hierarchy, and in case of foreign war, can be sent to the other country and keep their current hierarchy level there). Here in Brazil most of it is necessity, but it is not surprise that training US SWAT here would result into something weird... Here in Brazil SWAT need to use APCs (like this: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cPqcotWunXw/UBRoaofiekI/AAAAAAAABKQ/DRxTM_cy2zI/s1600/caveiraobopepmerjln9.jpg http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-cPqcotWunXw/UBRoaofiekI/AAAAAAAABK...) to invade enemy territory, fight some seriously bloody fights with enemies armed with military weapons (like this one that a cop is displaying after capture in Rio de Janeiro: http://i1.r7.com/data/files/2C92/94A4/2C9A/D947/012C/A28F/0303/1A1A/Severino%20Silva%20-%20Bazuca%20-%20grande.jpg http://i1.r7.com/data/files/2C92/94A4/2C9A/D947/012C/A28F/03... ) Sending people trained to face this, to do regulamentation checks, or raid a party, or a amateur gambling ring, is beyond absurd and silly. Oh, the website of the company that train some US SWAT teams: http://www.cati.com.br/site/pt/?target=curso_interno&cid=27 http://www.cati.com.br/site/pt/?target=curso_interno&cid=27 the US version is broken for some weird reason, also yes, the site is very cheesy... but I know it is true because a friend of mine that works for GOE (Special Operations Group, of the São Paulo civil police) gave me the link and explained some stuff (and back then, invited me to be a volunteer fake hostage for their training)

gt565k 13y ago
BOPE? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batalh%C3%A3o_de_Opera%C3%A7%C3%B5es_Policiais_Especiais http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batalh%C3%A3o_de_Opera%C3%A7%C3... Elite Squad and Elite Squad 2, the movies, do a good job of portraying what speeder is talking about. The Brazilian favellas are run by drug lords. From my understanding, there has been a big push by Brazil to eradicate these criminals before the World Cup begins. It's quite interesting that BOPE is training US SWAT teams. Here's an interesting video of Brazil's Special Forces (BOPE) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5Y5flAuEFQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5Y5flAuEFQ

twentyfourseven 13y ago

Omnipresent surveillance, more prisons, secret courts and the militarization of the police - Obama's presidency looks like a reign of terror.

LoganCale 13y ago
These are local police departments, not under the control of the President or the Department of Justice. It's a far bigger problem than one person or one administration.
- pyrocat 13y ago
  Yeah but they were funded and trained by DHS money, training that focuses on fighting wars not peaceful conflict resolution. You're right though, it's not just one administration, this is the Bush Administrations fault as much as the Obama Administration.
- msandford 13y ago
  Sure but the executive branch is setting a horrible example by enforcing federal laws against drugs in states where said drugs are legal. If the administration and a local jurisdiction disagree on what's legal they shouldn't use the citizenry as a proxy punching bag through which they release their frustration.
- pmorici 13y ago
  "These are local police departments" But in many cases they are using equipment and training made possible by federal government largesse.

jbellis 13y ago

Relevant, an interactive map of botched paramilitary police raids: http://www.cato.org/raidmap http://www.cato.org/raidmap

jkeel 13y ago
Yippee! Only 3 in my town! (1 - Raid on an Innocent Suspect, 2 - Death of an innocent) :-/

sailfast 13y ago

This escalation seems to be due to a number of things: 1) A perceived rise in the weapons capabilities of criminals and terrorists (See: LA Bank Robbery w/ automatics and vests) 2) A great deal of 9/11 DHS money going to local enforcement grants to prevent terrorism and up capabilities (providing the weapons and armor 3) A colossal lack of judgment and an incredibly improper escalation of force employed in civilian targets. It is incredibly maddening and frustrating, but at the same time I can understand it from the Police perspective. Perhaps we can combat this with a few policy and legal related things: 1) Legislation that provides a method to sue the government for excessive force, damages, and property damage 2) Require any urban assault teams to videotape raids and make that content public to the courts to verify accounts 3) Reduce the amount of money that goes to excessive gear, armor, and weapons and free up more money for training on target judgment and force escalation. Not a silver bullet, and it won't bring these dogs, or the man with the book in the previous segment, but it could be a start.

johndevor 13y ago
How about we just eliminate them altogether? There was a time when they didn't exist and life was fine (or arguably better).
- sailfast 13y ago
  While I agree a significant down-sizing of these tactical forces is required, I think a good argument can be made for the capability of police and government leaders to call a specially trained team within a certain timeframe to combat escalated force. If a couple of guys with easily available automatic weapons decide to stroll through a shopping mall it's nice to have that option, but you don't need one in every town, and every police officer doesn't need to be in full tactical kit all the time. I'm speaking out of turn but part of it is also cultural - if you're wearing a vest and you've got the weapons and everything strapped to you looking unsociable with your sunglasses and scowl you're a badass. I gather normal blues don't get the same reaction within the community.
  - zhemao 13y ago

blhack 13y ago

This is a controversial position, and I recognize that it isn't perfect. I don't think that regular cops should have weapons. They should be primarily involved in conflict resolution only. If somebody wants to overpower a cop because they own a gun and the cop doesn't, then that person should be charged with a crime, but the cop should ALWAYS be the weaker party. And I mean no weapons. No pepper spray, no tasers. Nothing. Police departments should also take an active role in making sure that their uniforms, as well as their vehicles, are as non-aggressive looking as possible. Cops should be the people that stop to help you change a tire when you have a flat, help you get home if you're drunk, or mediate between you and the scary homeless dude that won't get off your porch. Police work should be a dangerous job, and the only people who should even be capable of doing it are people who are experts at conflict resolution, not escalation. I recognize that weapons are sometimes necessary, but I think that a cop showing up with a gun should be an extremely rare thing to see. I know there is the argument that cops are there to protect us...but from who? Unless it is a hostage scenario, when is a time that a cop is going to directly intervene in a bad guy doing something bad to me, and a is going to need their gun to do so? -- Police are protected by something called "qualified immunity", which is to say that, while in the pursuit of their job as a police officer, are not subject to the same laws with regards to assault as most civilians. I think that this should go away. If a cop assaults somebody, it should go to court, and the cop should have to prove that it was self defense. If they shoot somebody, they better be able to prove that they had a direct threat to their own life. Cops should be burdened with additional responsibilities but offered no additional rights.

kilroy123 13y ago
Some law enforcement officers have no choice but to operate like this. My dad was a Sheriff in a really remote area of California when I was a kid. He would often tell me how his closest backup was sometimes 30-45 minutes away. When he pulled someone over, or responded to a domestic dispute, he had no choice but to try to resolve any conflicts by talking. He once even told me, his number one weapon of choice was talking. I don't think he ever even had to pull out his gun once, during his career. Sadly, if you know another cop can roll onto the sene in under 30 seconds, there isn't much incentive to resolve problems without a huge show of force.

antitrust 13y ago

It sounds like the problem here is not militarization of police, but the incompetence of these particular police and the huge amount of drug-related activity going on. If people react to the end of drug prohibition the same way they reacted to the end of alcohol prohibition, the whole country will be strung out in weeks if we legalize the stuff. That's the only thing that keeps me from jumping on the legalization bandwagon. I'd support the cops in the Calvo case standing trial for total incompetence however.

blhack 13y ago
If meth is legalized tomorrow, will you start using it?
jessaustin 13y ago
If people react to the end of drug prohibition the same way they reacted to the end of alcohol prohibition... Have you ever visited the USA? Or any other area where it's legal for adults to purchase and consume alcohol? If not, I think you should do so at your earliest opportunity. It might blow your mind.
D9u 13y ago
"...the whole country will be strung out in weeks if we legalize the stuff." Some would point to the thinning of the herd aspect of allowing those so inclined to kill themselves with their drug(s) of choice... Less losers = less problems.
- antitrust 13y ago
  I am enjoying the subtlety of your Darwinian argument. One friend of mine suggests that we need to make adult play centers that have pitfalls, like dead drops, to keep people fit and alert. The kicker is that they would be placed in such a way that it would be necessary to traverse them to get to essentials like the DMV, liquor store, etc. But I guess the big question is whether you think these people on drugs will create a massive amount of collateral damage or not on their way to thin themselves out? I imagine cars crashing through walls, people passing out with their stoves on and burning down their apartments, strung-out people electrocuting themselves, that kind of thing.

jacalata 13y ago

So it sounds like a) there are more SWAT teams than incidents that need them, so they're being sent to incidents that don't need them b) nobody who can do anything about it gives a shit that these teams can't ratchet down to the new incidents they are being given. Proposed solution: every 2nd or 3rd SWAT deployment goes to the house of someone in their chain of command, or a member of another team. The team members never know if they are on a fake deployment or a real one. The chain of command AND the team starts caring about how the team deals with little old ladies and dogs because they might belong to someone important. And if someone thinks that constantly being on incidents that don't require them to be on a hair trigger and kill things is dulling their edge, maybe they'll stop deploying them to incidents that don't require hair trigger killing.

amerika 13y ago

As society becomes more chaotic, the cops are going to get more violent and pro-active. Look at police in Brazil and other war zones. They have to be this way, and they're not universally competent, so you get the dog-shooters and zombies volunteering for these missions as well as the regular cops. Maybe instead of blaming the tool -- the cops -- we should fix our fractured and dysfunctional society.