In case you were wondering, there is literally nothing you can’t get away with as a cop:
es, Cleveland police Officer Michael Brelo stood on a car and shot 15 times at the vehicle’s unarmed black occupants seconds after he and fellow officers first riddled the car with bullets in 2012 — but the shooting was justified, a judge ruled Saturday.
Concluding just one of several police use-of-force cases that prompted recent outrage in Cleveland, a Cuyahoga County judge decided that Brelo was not guilty of voluntary manslaughter and felonious assault in the deaths of Timothy Russell and Malissa Williams following a 22-mile car chase.
Emotions among people upset at the verdict ran high outside the Cleveland courtroom. One woman wept inconsolably on its steps.
Some people held up signs and chanted “no justice, no peace” outside the courthouse doors, heard in recent months in places like Ferguson, Missouri, and New York, where massive demonstrations sprung up after African-Americans died at the hands of white police officers.
“All I know is that I don’t trust police no more. No police. None,” said Malissa Williams’ brother Alfredo Williams. “I can’t recover from this. …This verdict isn’t real. This verdict is fake.”
Absurd. “The threat had not been stopped.”
There was no fucking threat.
Tom Levenson
F**k f**k f**k, oh to hell with the asterisks, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck fuck.
aimai
Horrifying.There is literally nothing a (white) police officer can do that will be taken seriously or treated as a crime. Their fear always justifies everything–even in an obvious case of mistaken identity and criminally stupid hysterical overreaction on the part of the police. If they are acting alone their fear is considered justified, and if they are acting in a mob the fear of the others is taken as reason enough for each member to act in whatever manner seems fit. There was no gun in the car. The passengers were completely innocent. Waiting five minutes and not shooting them to death would have revealed that they were no threat.
Big ole hound
My mistrust of any clown with a badge has grown to the point where if this old guy is ever asked about anything my answer will be to request a lawyer. The sad thing is I hate them just as much.
Hunter Gathers
Michael Brelo feared for his life, and therefore his actions were justified. Evidently, the first question on the job application to become a police office is ‘Are You A Gigantic Pu$$y?’
Persia
My best friend is a lawyer and she has always said talk to no cops without a lawyer. Basically be Mike in Better Call Saul.
Davis X. Machina
I saw that on TV.
No. Wait. That was the end of Bonnie and Clyde.
PhoenixRising
The car backfired.
137 shots.
Meanwhile, Tamir Rice died 6 months ago and still no charges. Coverage of the protest/funeral, which the judge knew was scheduled when he released the Brelo verdict: http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2015/05/tamir_rice_rally_at_impett_par.html#incart_maj-story-1
My dad’s father, who died in 1965, was a patrol officer and then a detective and then a union officer at CPD. My dad, and my 4 aunts, grew up in a 3BR house in West Park that their father and his brother–also CPD–built themselves.
For the first time in 19 years, I’m glad my dad didn’t live to see this day.
greennotGreen
You know how all Muslims are expected to speak out against the extremists and black leaders are supposed to speak out against the rioters? Where are the good cops speaking out against the murders?
Walker
My understanding is that Ohio has called out the National Guard in anticipation of protesters. And the judge preemptively admonished protestors in his ruling.
Meanwhile, Texas is just letting the biker gangs blow off steam.
Chris
“You don’t know how lucky you are to live in a free country, not like all these horrid little countries where the government can do anything it wants to you and no one can do anything about it,” the conservatives keep telling me.
JPL
Horrific
Tom Q
As much as we think juries are too apt to let cops skate free, I think judges are a worse hope. A friend of mine prosecuted a case against cops (one that got some national attention). The cops opted for a no-jury/judge set-up, and, in the words of my friend (who prosecuted in absolutely good faith), “the judge decided to ignore the evidence”.
How long before we start talking about the police/judicial complex?
Ruckus
@Big ole hound:
I’ve known lawyers and cops and the thing they tell me is you never, ever give away information. You only answer the question asked if you want to. But your best defense is to not answer. Ask for a lawyer. Always. Even if you can’t afford one. A shorter version is Shut The Fuck Up. When the cop asks you if you know how fast you are going, say yes or no, not how fast you were going nor how fast you think they want to hear. I’ve heard this for decades and for me, now, it is even more important. And I’m an old white guy. Can not imagine being black, especially black and under 60, and really especially being a black male and under 30. It doesn’t compute that just being black makes you deserve a death sentence for breathing.
Take this case. The cops had fired numerous shots into the car, they say they feared for their lives but this guy jumps on the hood and fires and fires directly into the windshield and the occupants. He didn’t fear enough for his safety that he could jump directly into any possible line of fire? Of course that was fucking impossible as they were unarmed. And cops wonder why people hate them and don’t trust them. There may be good cops, I’d like to think there are. I see stories about them every once in a while. About one hundredth of the ones I see about them shooting an unarmed black man. Or beating the shit out of an old lady on the street, or……..
I think violent crime is down only if you don’t include the cops shooting unarmed people.
Baud
So a judge, not a jury. I’m assuming the cops waived their right to a jury trial knowing how the judge would come up. Probably an elected judge. Not to say a jury would have convicted either.
Calouste
“The threat had not been stopped.”
Well, the police officer thought that the threat had not been stopped, and that is the only thing that matters any more in legal America. Facts no longer matters, common sense no longer matters, just how someone (well, the right someone) perceives something. See further Hobby Lobby, Stand Your Ground, etc.
Betty Cracker
@Persia: I loved that scene. He didn’t even say, “I want a lawyer.” Just answered every question with, “Lawyer,” in a flat monotone while subjecting the questioners to his shark-like gaze.
Big ole hound
@Baud: My guess is cops will take a judge over a jury every time.. The scaredy cats in blue want one of their own not 12 people who just might not “fear for their lives” when a “suspicious”car stops.
PhoenixRising
@Baud: Yeah, we all have a *right* to trial by a jury of our peers, which was spelled out to prevent the powerless from being sentenced by one powerful person.
Tim Russell and Marissa Williams, who were driving a car that backfired in front of a Cleveland police station while paranoid (are you paranoid if they’re really willing to fill your car with hot lead?), didn’t have a right to their executioners being tried by a jury, though.
“Cleveland had the first Black mayor of any major American city
And the first mayor of an American city who set his hair on fire, twice, while dedicating a bridge…”
Frankensteinbeck
@Hunter Gathers:
Apparently, yes. I know someone applying to be a police officer. I thought they would be rejected because of military PTSD paranoia. The police interviewer said that was a bonus. They wanted someone who was already scared of being attacked at all times.
Patrick
@Walker:
And not a damned thing has happened to Cliven Bundy. What a great message to send!
El Caganer
@greennotGreen: Well, they would if there were any murders. But if everything is justified, there’s nothing to speak out against. See how easy it is?
Mary G
I have no words. Just nausea.
Patrick
Does anybody know if the Dept of Justice can step in? Were the civil rights violated?
shell
I’m a 59 year old white woman and I’m starting to become scared of the police.
kc
@shell:
I’ve seen a video (think it was posted here, infant) of a cop tasing an elderly white woman at a traffic stop because she didn’t comply fast enough.
Davis X. Machina
Perhaps the phrase should say “Law or Order”.
The usual formulation is becoming an oxymoron.
gene108
Somewhat related to the powerful are above consequences for their actions:
http://blog.thomsonreuters.com/index.php/parents-lost-daughter-mass-shooter-now-owe-220000-suppliers/
The comments from the gun-nuts are truly horrific. Not one shred of empathy for the victim’s parents. There’s no compromise anymore in this country. The other side needs to be beaten in elections over and over again, until they have no choice but to crawl off into the dark corners of society and out of the public sphere.
D58826
Well maybe if they had used the grenade launchers or tanks that the US military has provided someone might decide that was a bit excessive
D58826
One more reason to ‘trust’ your local police
Article is on Huffington
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/05/22/atf-report-warned-military-government-membership-outlaw-motorcycle-gangs/
PurpleGirl
I stopped trusting the police years ago. I would walk past the 114th Precinct in Queens on my way to the subway. I saw cops about to go on duty ‘sleeping’ in their cars because they left home (from Nassau or Suffolk counties) so early to avoid traffic on the LIE. I told one friend that it felt they were an occupying force — not local and never grew up locally, they knew nothing of us. My friend (btw a Jewish, black, Hispanic woman) responded that the cops have really lost it when that statement is made by a middle(is) aged white female.
That was back in the 1980s, it ain’t been improving.
WTF, the cop stood on the car and shot INTO the car. No justice, no peace!
MomSense
This is truly disgusting. No justice. No peace.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
I was sick when I read that. I had not heard that Kasuck sent the guard, or had them stand ready of what-the-fuck ever. I suspect I need a break from the news for mental health renovation (to the extent it’s possible).
It seems OH has become the leader in “lawful” LEO executions of unarmed people with obvious melanin. This case, John Crawford, Tamir Rice – all the way back to Timothy Thomas in 2001.
James E Powell
@Ruckus:
You only answer the question asked if you want to.
Please. Don’t even do this. Free legal advice. You don’t have the competence to determine which questions to answer or not answer. No one does. Do not let your “wanting to” be your guide.
lamh36
I comment here regularly, Elon J White post regularly, ABL used to post regularly, any number of regular posters herw who are Black or P.O.C. comment here on the regular…all of us consistently talk about how the system is NOT designed to bring justice for avg Black folk. We drop comments or posts trying to give some idea of what’s it’s like and how sone things feel in the eyes of Black folk, and it never fails thst one or all of us are told, we are too cynical of the system or that we are not optimistic enough or how webe got to let the process take its course…and dan near everytime our skepticism is proven to be true and prescient.
This “verdict” doesn’t surprise me at all. It’s just a pattern that seems to continue and continue on.
In the pit of my stomach I’m really dreading to here the next news from the Tamir Rice case. If thst case goes the way of the usual pattern…smh…I genuinely fear for the reaction.
Ugh…I feel the need to cleanse my mind after this..
Monala
@PhoenixRising: The cops have, in fact, filed charges against Tamir Rice: http://crooksandliars.com/2015/05/cleveland-police-filed-charges-tamir-rice
Valdivia
This is horrible.
PurpleGirl
@kc: And of course, once the woman was tased, she couldn’t comply with any speed because the the taser sent her nervous system into chaos and she couldn’t respond.
Number one reason I don’t like taser — it isn’t that there could be pain, but the taser itself sent your electrical systems into chaos and you can’t respond, your muscles can’t answer any impulses it’s getting from the brain. I keep saying it — tasers cause a brain storm of electrical misactivity. And cops can’t seem to get that through their goddamnd thick heads – a person who you just tased can not respond or compaly with any speed, they can’t respond at all until the storm calms down. Rant over.
Cervantes
@Patrick:
Yes.
Excerpt from a statement issued jointly this morning by U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach, DoJ’s Vanita Gupta, and FBI Special Agent in Charge Stephen Anthony.
Comrade Dread
Nobody should. I think recent events have made it quite clear that in any situation that doesn’t already involve the possibility of severe bodily harm or death, that calling the police is a shitty idea.
Don’t call them unless you’re life is in danger. Don’t cooperate or answer any questions without a lawyer present. Don’t volunteer breath, saliva, blood, urine, or fingerprints unless legally compelled to.
And that will still only really keep you safe if you’re a white male.
rikyrah
@PhoenixRising:
I know I sound like a broken record, but I believe the central question in the Tamir Rice case is:
How did this obviously unqualified man get a position on the Cleveland Police Department.
I believe it’s the central question.
And answering it will cause a number of people to lose their jobs.
Which is why they’ve decide to slander and defame a 12 year old boy.
Tenar Darell
@Hunter Gathers: That’s the way they train ’em, doncha know? Training films include cops getting shot; makes ’em afeerd o’ ever body.
In regular English… if serve and protect means, “serve myself by protecting myself” then police will regularly kill unarmed, disarmed and harmless civilians.
ETA I don’t know why I’m trying to speak like a little Abner. The thought bubble in my head was just like when hock was thinking to himself that he’d rather go to hell, than give up Jim.
rikyrah
@lamh36:
I feel you, lamh.
I feel you.
rikyrah
As far as this case goes..
It went before a judge…which is all I needed to know.
The case was a fucking scam, from beginning to end.
Neutron Flux
@lamh36: There are other folks that read your comments and do not comment. That does not mean that your comments do not inform and give perspective. They do and they matter.
Ruckus
@James E Powell:
Yes I reread that after the edit time was up. You are correct, never answer any question.
And thanks for the update.
Tenar Darell
@Tenar Darell: Oh hell, it’s a FYWP moment. Not talking about a horse, but the fictional character, so Huck not hock.
Ruckus
@lamh36:
All I can say is, please don’t stop posting. Please. Some of us, that is whites, know full well that the system is fucked up. We’ve know it for a very long time and we’ve seen it get worse rather than better. I don’t know what it will take to make it better. Even in a liberal place like urban areas of CA it is bad. Maybe not as bad as other areas but it is still bad. Some are trying to make it better, some want to make it far worse. I wish I had even a glimmer of an idea how to make it better or even get it started on a better path, but I don’t. Except for one thing. Exposure. And way, way too much time. We all need your voice, we all need so many more voices.
Baud
This is hardly consolation, but it seems as if the prosecutor did the right thing at least. I don’t want to contemplate what this means for his or her career as a prosecutor, however.
I was going to quip that this is, or is near, Boehner’s district, but the same thing happens in too many places.
Tom Q
@Baud: My friend I mentioned above, who did prosecute police, said he was cut cold overnight by law enforcement people he’d known for years. He said he took the case because he knew any young person in his office wold have had his career aborted on the spot. He thought he’d built up enough credit over the years to withstand it, which in one sense he did — he’s still employed. But he has far fewer friends than he used to.
Lavocat
Hey. What can you say about this other than …
Fuck the police.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5fts7bj-so
Baud
@Tom Q: I can’t say I’m surprised. Your friend sounds like a man of principle.
Cervantes
@lamh36:
There may be those who say that to you but is it your sense that they are in the majority?
(Of those who say anything, I mean.)
Tenar Darell
@lamh36: What Ruckus said.
Lavocat
@Persia: I tell ALL my clients that the proper response to ANY AND ALL questions by ANY AND ALL police – or people who you suspect might be police (look, these motherfuckers lie & impersonate non-police, so you never can tell) – is this phrase and this phrase ONLY: “I respectfully decline to answer any and all of your questions and hereby demand an attorney”.
Period.
NEVER consent to a search of your car or your home.
NEVER admit to ANYTHING.
NEVER sign ANYTHING.
DEMAND to see a search warrant.
RECORD EVERYTHING you see a cop doing.
These fuckers do NOT protect and serve ANYONE but themselves.
They are an occupying force in modern-day Amerika.
lol chikinburd
@Comrade Dread:
Cue eff tee. “Chicken John” Rinaldi has famously said: “If a bad thing happens, and you call the cops, then you have the bad thing and cops.” Those words get less foolish every passing month.
Cervantes
@Baud:
This was Cleveland, recently the subject of a DoJ review under 42 U.S.C. 14141.
Ruckus
@Tom Q:
Doesn’t sound like very good friends.
On a somewhat OT note, in Alameda County CA which is in the south east SF bay area, some assholes entered a closed area and destroyed an inflatable dam, with a loss of several million gallons of fresh water into the SF bay. I say somewhat OT because this is the kind of behavior that makes me wonder what the fuck is wrong with people. What possible gain can come from long term racism or destruction of scarce water resources? I can’t see it, not any of it. Or the desire to kill the ACA or what the fuck ever. Where, what is the gain? To anyone. Been here going on seven decades, still don’t get it. Can anyone find any explanation that has any logic to it? Even the slightest amount?
Baud
@Cervantes:
Ah, thanks. I got my Ohio geography confused.
Baud
@Ruckus: My two-bit philosophy is that it makes insecure people feel powerful when they can hurt other people with impunity.
ruemara
@Cervantes: Yes. That is what I get. Having had a supposed liberal tell me that he was tired of me bringing race into these matters of police violence as well as another super liberal say that the struggles of women for body rights, and black people for the right to survive an interaction with police were “minor quibbles” in the face of TPP – my feeling is the complaints of black people around white liberals are tolerated, but not without exasperation over hearing about it. Most of my “friends” are white. And they are incredibly silent. Very liberal, very interested in social justice for vegans, the environment, animal rights, fair pay, unions. Black lives, eeehh, well, that’s so uncomfortable.
I don’t love them less, but I do feel a level of pain that they’re unthinkingly dismissive.
Also, the judge in this case was endorsed by the FoP for re-election just 2 years back. A little conflict of interest. http://www.cleveland.com/business/prnewswire/index.ssf?/cleveland/story/?catSetID=7002&catID=290032&nrid=281237861&page=1
Baud
@ruemara:
It sounds like their interests didn’t conflict at all.
Lavocat
This pervasive nonsense even has a name.
I thought it might be something like “white entitlement syndrome”.
Instead, it’s the much more poignant “white fragility”.
http://libjournal.uncg.edu/index.php/ijcp/article/view/249/116
If you have the time, it’s an amazing read.
Howard Beale IV
@Lavocat: What about “Am I being detained” and “Am I free to go?”
Cervantes
@ruemara:
Sorry to hear it.
Not that it matters all that much but is it people here who are telling you such things?
I had not noticed, but I’m often not really paying attention here. (Sorry.)
To some extent I think people feel unqualified to comment in detail on situations so far removed from their own. Others perhaps are severely embarrassed — as who wouldn’t be? Still others may be ignorant and completely insensitive. Not that these are good reasons for silence — not at all — but do you think there are other factors? Among your “friends,” I mean, not the public at large.
Ruckus
@Baud:
I guess I just don’t see how it makes them feel better. But then I also don’t get how assholes with more money than they could possibly spend in a hundred lifetimes have to find ways of squeezing out more from everyone else. And how they can’t keep from trying to fuck over everyone else rather than just enjoy what the hell they have already stolen.
Must be me not them.
ruemara
@Cervantes: I think people here are either smart enough not to say it or smart enough not to think it. No, these are impassioned liberals I know personally, which, has the funny effect of erasing my AA identity to them, even my female identity. Resulting in statements like that to my face. And since I try to not fight with people I know are decent, even if I disagree with them, unless it’s dangerous, I usually give them a look and leave the conversation. I’m usually surrounded by white male nerds and geeks of liberaltarian stripes. It’s hard to believe that there are people who think, feel and experience life differently than them unless it’s an academic exercise.
Tommy
137 total gun shots. The last 10-15 Michael Brelo fired from the roof of their car. I can’t even wrap my mind around it. Heck which of those two stats is the worse? At first I thought the shots from the roof of the car. But after talking a short walk, I have to say no the 137 total shots is far worse.
Ten officers were on the scene. Now somebody might correct me if I am wrong here (please do), but if each officer had a nine bullet clip (which is what I think most officers carry these days) and one in the chamber, that is 100 shots.
That means everybody emptied their clips and some reloaded another clip and kept shooting. I don’t know any other way to say it, that was a firing squad. I mean that is like a scene you see in a cheesy action movie.
WereBear
@ruemara: I’ve never understood why anyone is comfortable with hierarchical ranking of causes, and dismissal of those who aren’t “on top.” I can and do support a number of causes.
In fact, they all fit together.
Baud
@Ruckus:
I’d imagine it’s like schadenfreude, but without regard to whether the victim deserves it.
ETA: On second thought, schadenfreude tends to be more passive, while many of the folks we’re talking about actively try to cause misery to others.
grondo
I don’t know what guns Cleveland cops carry, but considering that the Glock 17 is the most common police sidearm, and has a magazine capacity of 17 rounds, that means that this guy had to have stopped to reload *twice* in order to fire 49 shots at the couple in the car. Not to mention that he jumped on the hood of their car in order to keep pouring bullets into the cabin at them. How is this not way beyond “stopping an immediate threat” and into obvious murder territory?
Baud
@ruemara:
Your experience sounds like a microcosm of the thread wars over the significance of the NSA metadata controversy.
grondo
@Tommy: “I mean that is like a scene you see in a cheesy action movie.” It was like a scene that MAKES FUN of cheesy action movies.
ruemara
@WereBear: Funny, that. It’s like you can think it’s all important without dismissing the concerns of others.
@Baud: Lord, that shite. It’s why I can’t stand the writing from GG that says things like “SPYING ON EVERYONE (could possibly be thanks to tech)”.
Gator90
The vast majority of police officers are honorable public servants, even heroes. They have incredibly difficult, dangerous jobs. They run in when others run away. Most people who criticize the police have no idea what it’s like to face such danger, or the possibility of it, every day on the job.
Or so folks on TV keep telling me. And I, a middle-aged white man whose worst-ever treatment at the hands of police was one unwarranted traffic ticket, am so very sick. Of hearing it.
Lavocat
@Howard Beale IV: ALWAYS assume that you are free to go.
Make the cop explain his actions, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO EXPLAIN YOURS.
Remember, it’s always better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Howard Beale IV: I’d politely decline to answer any questions and request an attorney. Unless I were really pissed off, in which case I’d just say “counsel,” and call one of my defense buddies. Which is what I’d advise anyone who sought my advice to do, skipping the behavior if pissed off.
Howard Beale IV
@Lavocat: But that isn’t the case when they hit the lights and pull you over-or are you saying you should never pull over if they hit the lights?
Cervantes
@Baud:
Some might say that’s a cause that pales in comparison. And yet, as observed above, “unthinkingly dismissive” is nothing to aspire to.
In other words, there may be a different way of looking at things:
trollhattan
@Ruckus:
Saw that. I can only hope it was idiot teenagers and not some numbskull with a demented political axe to grind. Teenhood can be outgrown.
Aleta
@Ruckus:
Sums it up. Every time I hear these ridiculous excuses given with a straight face, and accepted in court, I hear the unbroken chain of baldfaced lies told by confident whites to explain their violence against POC, stretching back over 200 years.
geg6
@Baud:
Oh gawd, yes. My heart aches for black people in America. I don’t know how the black people in my life get through life as gracefully as they do. And I am more and more aware of my white privilege as time goes by and I see these events and I hear and read more from black voices. I’ve come to the conclusion that this country is well and truly fucked and will never solve any of its problems until we deal with white people’s race problem.
Svensker
@ruemara:
I’m sorry to hear that. If it makes you feel any better, most of our liberal friends feel like the scales have fallen from their eyes and they see full scale racism and a full-on racist system at every turn. The people we know are mostly truly and deeply shocked — and horrified — at what we now recognize.
Tommy
@Gator90: Really. Look they fled and took the police on a 22 miles chase. Not good on many different levels!!!!
I, if a cop, would assume they had arrest warrants, weapons, drugs, or some combo of the three. When they stopped I’d be one pissed off dude. I’d also be worried about what might come next. Would they pull guns? Try to ram me with their car?
But 137 shots. Let me say that again, 137. Go lay out 137 pennies on a table, step back, and ponder how many that is for a few seconds.
This went quickly from cops maybe trying to protect themselves to a flat out execution, or as I said in another comment a “firing squad.”
Explain 137 shots to me any other way, and I am not even asking you to explain Michael Brelo getting on the hood of the car and firing the final 12-15, which sure seems to me like some fucked up shit to say the least.
Svensker
@Lavocat:
Well, yeah, if they TALK to you. If they’re too busy pumping your body full of bullets, they may not hear your questions and demands.
Cervantes
@Lavocat:
That’s a good paper. Also good, albeit longer, is her book.
Ruckus
@Svensker:
This
@Gator90:
Someone up thread said where are the good cops to oppose the killing. Yeah I don’t hear them either. I am afraid that at some point when the cops start shooting, many will shoot back and then the war is on. Wanna bet I’ll be in the cross fire? Or you? Or your kids? Look at this one event. 137 shots fired at a car in an urban area. Does anyone think that not one of them went someplace besides the car? That no one besides these two unarmed people were at risk for being killed by the police? How many rounds did a solder carry for his M16 in Vietnam? This cop had 49 at least.
Cervantes
@efgoldman:
It happens.
Tommy
@Svensker: I tried that, kind of, a few weeks ago. Did not work and I think got me an embarrassing ticket.
I was coming home from a bar 3.5 blocks from my house. Walking. Was I drunk. Yes, pretty hammered actually. Total rural area. 2 AM. In a part of my town that isn’t incorporated. This is big.
See we don’t have sidewalks in my part of town. Street lights, we pay for them. Residents that don’t pay for them with a monthly fee, there are no street lights (that was the case here).
I am 1.5 blocks from home walking on what I guess you could call a “shoulder” (we have drainage ditches, not sewer) and I tripped (wearing flip flops) a step or two into the road. I didn’t fall. Went back to walking home.
Next thing I notice police lights go off behind me. I got “pulled over while walking.” The cop asks me if I have any weapons or drugs. I say no. He asked me to empty my pockets …. and I should have, cause things went sideways.
I said nope, did nothing wrong. WTF dude! I find myself up against the car with him patting me down, one time and then a second time.
Then asked me to take a breathalyzer test. I didn’t know the law on this but I was clearly about the .08 of IL. I said nope.
We exchange have a nice night and I start to walk away and he is like where are you going? I said home. He said no I will drive you. Got home and went to get out and he said wait, I have to write you a ticket for public drunkness.
You were walking in the road (note there was no sidewalk) and went into the road and endangered safety of the public.
Next I know I am being written a ticket, which I have to appear in court, for public intoxication.
I wonder why folks don’t like the police …………
Lavocat
@Howard Beale IV: You made me laugh. Yeah, you go ahead and see what happens when you fail to pull over when a cop flags your car down. A traffic stop is a temporary detention AND YOU ARE NOT FREE TO LEAVE until told that you are by the cop. The cop has to run your plate number & VIN (stolen car? unregistered?) and then run your personal documents through a central database.
Traffic stops (in NYS) entail the requirement of producing THREE documents when you are stopped (and you better have them): 1) a valid driver’s license, 2) a valid certificate of insurance, & 3) a valid registration. You also better have a valid inspection sticker affixed to the lower left side of your windshield as well.
After the data is run, the following may happen: 1) you will be arrested & your car & your person will be searched incident to the arrest, & your car will be towed, & you will be incarcerated, 2) you will be issued traffic tickets, 3) you will be issued a warning, or 4) you will be issued an apology. At which point, so long as #1 has not occurred, you are free to go.
The best thing you can do in situations like this is to be POLITELY passive-aggressive: you are REFUSING to answer ANY of the cop’s questions – but you are not being obnoxious about it. Most cops will actually respect this (though they might also be annoyed by it, since it makes their job harder if you do not incriminate yourself).
Make that cop EARN that donut.
BBA
@greennotGreen: Frank Serpico, shot in the face. Adrian Schoolcraft, committed to a psych ward. Et cetera.
gene108
@Tommy:
You are alive to tell the tale…what more do you want?
Lavocat
@Tommy: First of all – BY YOUR OWN ADMISSION – you were intoxicated. In public. At, on, or about a public highway. THAT is probably all of the elements that the People have to prove for a finding of public intoxication.
Was the cop being a dick? Seriously? Since when are cops NOT dicks?
Was what the cop did legit? Probably.
My guess is that the cop was following you a ways back w/ his lights off (as cops are wont to do) just waiting for you to do what you wound up doing, ready to pounce.
Kropadope
@Ruckus:
Here is one. I know there have been others, including a couple chiefs of police, though the stories are hard to find.
Officers, individually, don’t tend to have very big soapboxes, so they may have a hard time getting the message out there. What I think is more important is that they demonstrate pro-peace-with-the-public attitudes in their stations and have a safe environment to do so.
gelfling545
When did our police become such delicate little flowers that they now feel threatened all the time? Apparently they become panic stricken at the sight of a person of color. I’ve known a few cops in my lifetime and, while some of them weren’t my favorite people, all of them got through their careers, city & county, without ever shooting anybody.
SiubhanDuinne
@Tommy:
My emphasis. And the whole idea of a firing squad is that no one person can be held responsible for the killing bullet. I think maybe that was this judge’s reasoning, hence the acquittal.
I’m not making excuses. The much larger issue, as people smarter than I have pointed out, is that we need to be focusing less on individual cops and more on the systemic abuses that provide such cops both cover and opportunity.
The whole thing is simply sickening. I tend to be an optimistic person overall, but damn, there have been a lot of despairing days.
Roger Moore
@Tommy:
Simple. It’s a combination of two factors: police having lousy fire discipline and being poorly coordinated. The police have an unfortunate tendency to keep shooting until their gun goes “click” rather than stopping to see the effects of their shooting. Then there was the inherent chaos of a whole bunch of police surrounding the car in a dark environment and not communicating well. When one of them decided the car was a threat and started shooting, others thought the shots were coming from the car and started shooting back. With as many police as were there, it’s pretty easy to get a bunch of them blazing away and emptying their whole magazine. IOW, it could be the result of the police being poorly trained and jumped up on adrenaline after a high speed chase rather than a deliberate decision to kill the people in the car. I don’t think that explains Brelo jumping up on the hood and shooting into the car, but it explains why the police shoot way too much way too often.
Howard Beale IV
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): When it comes to any roadside encounter, it makes me want to instrument my SUV with cameras and also place window stickers on the driver side window that says:
“Warning: This vehicle is equipped with audio/visual/geospatial instrumentation recording which is being transmitted in realtime via the cellular network to protect the United States Constitutional and state constitutional rights of all individuals involved in the instant interaction.”
LWA (Liberal With Attitude)
I’ve said this before, and I will say it again.
Sometime soon a cop will get shot in the line of duty, and we will hear an outpouring of grief and loss and tributes to a fallen hero.
But not from me-
I just can’t summon that up anymore.
I know, I know, the one who gets shot isn’t the same one, bad apples etc.
But I just don’t see any good ones any more. The good ones are the ones defending the bad ones.Whenever I see a cop, I think to myself that there is a 50-50 chance that he is a decent guy, or a thug with a badge. And the decent guy next to him will defend him every time.
Sorry if this offends people- but usually does.
It offends me more that I have come to feel this way.
debbie
@Roger Moore:
All of which is the result of less training, poorer training, and using lethal over incapacitating power.
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
All true.
But ramboing up on the hood and firing another clip…. That’s on a whole different level than too much adrenaline. Cops are supposed to learn to control their adrenaline rushes, to be professional under stress. The military taught us that, not to act in a manner to make the situation worse. Not sure if they were trying to teach that but it’s the lesson learned. And not just by me. And it worked. The military gets blamed for a lot of the police problems, I’m not fully sure they should be. I even served a short time in the Shore Patrol and the thought of overwhelming force never really was thought to be the best way to handle anything. Maybe that’s changed, it was a long time ago. But it is how the police seem to be today, unswerving obedience and overwhelming force, even when it’s totally wrong. How many people think they are under siege from the police? How many are wrong? ETA And those that look like you and me, we aren’t nearly as likely to be targets.
PhoenixRising
@LWA (Liberal With Attitude): Well…in Omaha, a 29yo mother of 3 got shot by the bad guys she was serving a warrant on last week.
She was a Big Dogs rescue volunteer, the one who phone-interviewed my family as it happens, who had fostered a number of elderly dogs as they passed out of this world.
The bullet that killed her struck just above her body armor, which hadn’t been fitting the same since she had her baby 3 months ago.
I don’t know about you, but I really wish that hadn’t happened. I also would like our national dialogue about police violence to get through the did-not-did-too-I’m-rubber-you’re-glue phase in which every death like Kerrie Orozco’s is used to justify a hail of bullets toward ‘suspects’ who have played with a toy gun, or run away from a cop who is known to beat on his traffic stops, or driven while high.
Because we’re just spinning our wheels, talking about where are the good cops and OMG police work is dangerous. Yes, all that and, per above: How in the HELL do police departments keep finding these unqualified, fearful sociopaths who can’t shoot straight while flashing back on a checkpoint in Baghdad (oops I said it) and arming them? That’s the system-level question.
Ruckus
@debbie:
More guns, bigger guns, less training, more fear of those that have reason, of rising up, even though they aren’t. Saw a couple of pics on FB the other day, the first one of the cops beating a peaceful, unarmed protester and the second of Waco and the “suspects” sitting there looking at their phones while a cop stands there with his M16 at the ready, with his back turned to them. Oh and in the first picture the person getting beat was black.
A great way to get it all wrong.
LWA (Liberal With Attitude)
@PhoenixRising:
Yes, it should be a systemic question.
But there is also value in letting the police know that even a middle aged middle class white male professional, AKA perfect GOP demographic, views them with fear and loathing.
Public shaming is a tool, along with the justice system and legislature. Police treasure their status as knights in blue, and we need to let them know that their status is tarnished, and they should feel shame.
Every. Single. One.
Should feel embarrassment and shame.
fuckwit
@Chris: We do! We live in White Middle Class Suburban America. It’s exactly that kind of “free”– meaning privileged– country!
However, black people do not live in that same country. They live in a different country, and it seems like a horrible, miserable place to be.
PhoenixRising
@Ruckus: I’m not sure either. Brelo is a Marine combat vet. It seems plausible that some experiences he had over there might possibly have influenced him, even at a subconscious level, when he chose to put himself in the role of executioner for the car that didn’t stop.
The idiot who shot Tamir Rice had emotional issues, per the small-town force that fired him before CLE picked him up…in a process that overlooked his firing AND more egregiously his statement that he was ‘looking for a more active policing environment’. (Somebody who says that, IMO, you don’t give him a gun, you give him a pat on the ass and recommend him for mall cop, no weapon.)
The dude who caused that killing was the driver, though–not even being investigated, BTW, even though he put the basket case riding shotgun in a spot to shoot a 6th grader who, had he been the hardened 20yo criminal they were told of, would have killed them both with ease from that position. And whether he has combat service isn’t addressed by any of the press on him, but he was a training officer. Who has been involved in 2 known assaults behind his badge (CLE paid big for each of them).
So. Clearly we have a culture of violence and impunity in this police department; military vets get favored in the hiring process; we cna play correlation-or-causation all day but in the end we need a civil policing culture in this country that makes it not a fit for someone who is looking for more action.
PaulW
So, just to be clear, use of excessive force will always be justified even when the base of the justification is proven false.
So you might as well empty that entire clip of bullets, psycho angry cop people, because the more you shoot the more you prove you feared for your safety and thus ensure getting away with it. Especially if you can make certain there are no survivors who can testify against you at trial.
/rage
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
Is Ted and Helen going to show up to say it’s fine for white people to kill black people? Only time will tell.
PaulW
Dear cops:
your badge is not a license to kill.
you swore an oath to serve and protect, not shoot until empty.
you argue there are good cops out there, but where are the good cops stopping the bad cops from killing the innocent? Why are the good cops constantly siding with the bad cops who kill us?
you are the problem here. you are committing acts of violence against unarmed people you already deem ‘dangerous’ without evidence. you are the ones causing the mistrust between yourselves and the communities you’re supposed to serve.
fuckwit
@PhoenixRising: That’s a deep and important question. Unfortunately it’s not so easy to answer. I’d suggest reading the Stanford Prison Experiment and Milgram’s shock experiments.
In a more practical level, I think we’ve made errors in aggressively trying to get returning combat vets jobs as police officers. Seemed like a good progressive way to take care of our veterans by trying to get them jobs when they come back, but maybe those aren’t the right jobs.
Tenar Darell
@Howard Beale IV: Those cars and/or videos actually exist. They’re mostly taken on the U.S. side of the southern border when people get pulled over at DHS checkpoints. IIRC there was a This American Life Podcast on it; this one I think.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@ruemara:
I know I sometimes say shit that people don’t agree with about the entertainment industry, but I honestly don’t understand how any white person with half a brain in this country can look at what’s going on with police departments coast to coast and NOT see the racism. I just don’t. Ignoring it or downplaying it goes beyond implicit bias and verges on flat-out racism, if it’s not already there.
Mike G
@Tom Q:
DAs and judges are often part of the same corrupt predatory racket as the cops.
In my area we had a cop forging paperwork to rack up more DUI arrests. When one of the DUI cases went to court the judge refused to allow any evidence of the cop’s forgery. (The cop was just told by her department to stop doing it, then promoted). They won’t do anything to interrupt the gravy train of DUI money into the cops/courts/jails complex.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@fuckwit:
Interesting article from a couple of years ago about the Stanford Prison Experiment — it can be argued that the “guards” were encouraged and even coached to act the way they did:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201310/why-zimbardo-s-prison-experiment-isn-t-in-my-textbook
Which, to me, is a further argument that our current way of policing isn’t what “naturally” happens when a normal person becomes a police officer. We are selecting specific kinds of people to become cops, and training them in ways that exacerbate their authoritarian and controlling tendencies.
The Stanford Prison Experimenr proved that people will live up to the expectations that others have of them, and that’s exactly what’s happening with our cops. We hire and train them in a specific way and then we’re shocked when they do what they were hired and trained to do. So maybe we need to look at who we’re hiring and how we train them before we decide that there’s no other way to have police.
Howard Beale IV
@Tenar Darell: I’ve seen enough of these that just pisses me enough six ways from Sundays.
Tenar Darell
@Howard Beale IV: Yeah, the videos are weirdly mesmerizing, then infuriating.
Arclite
@greennotGreen:
The “good” cops are waiting for the “murderers” to get off scott free so they don’t have to call them out. Now that they’ve been acquitted, they’re “officers justified in the user of force” instead of “murderers.”