Police Accountability

asroc · Dec 12, 2014

nighttimer said:
Are you trying to get me to justify vandalism?

No, I wasn't and I don't know how you'd even get that idea.

You posted a misleading headline without context, implying those cops pulled a gun on peaceful protestors just for shits and giggles, because that's what cops do or something. I provided some context, saying the cop drew because he and his partner were assaulted and a crowd was advancing on them, which you don't deny happened. Then you posted other excerpts of the article, alleging the officers did not identify themselves and were instigating vandalism. So I wanted to know just how exactly that invalidates my post. It doesn't matter if they were instigating anything or if getting made somehow made them inept and thus they deserved getting beaten, if someone assaults you and you're surrounded by a whole bunch of people who you can reasonably assume want to hurt you, you are justified in drawing your firearm.

Not everything the police do is wrong and not everything the protestors do is right.

Okelly65 · Dec 12, 2014

nighttimer said:
Are you trying to get me to justify vandalism?

If you go undercover there's always the risk you might get the covers pulled off. Obviously, these two officers were not Donnie Brasco.

Assault is assault is assault even if the assaulted are two inept cops. Somebody should probably go to jail for thumping on them. However, if they were instigating the vandalism and the script got flipped on them, then they brought the beatdown on themselves.

Sucks to be them.

I happen to agree. Some Police officers think they should be treated like they were special. Sadly, just like the military, danger, being shot at, and a lack of safety in the course of doing their duty is part of the job.

They forget this and law makers wanting votes coddle them with laws aimed at making an unsafe profession safe and pampered often at the expense of the constitutional rights of civilians who are supposedly the bosses of said lawmakers and police.

Assault is already against the law, and no special legal provisions should be made elevating the severity of the crime because of a victim possibly being a law maker or police officer. that kind of coddling leads to elitism and makes public servants feel they belong higher on the social chain than the public they are supposed to serve not rule over.

rugcat · Dec 12, 2014

Here's another example of the lovely protesters in Oakland. Note the delightful young woman on the bicycle arguing with the man who's just had his teeth knocked out by masked protesters. The man was trying to put out the trash fire started by some other protesters. He was attacked and his two front teeth were knocked out by three masked protesters who disagreed with his actions

The man who was attacked shows a level of reasonableness and understanding that is incomprehensible to me – more power to him, but I could never react that way.

“In the Bay Area, we have a corps of bullies who are running the show at these demonstrations,” Wear said. “They’re not necessarily provocateurs, but people with their own vision of change — and it includes violent confrontation.
“It was not an impassioned bunch,” he added. “These men wanted to maliciously show me who was boss, at least that’s the way it was articulated to me.”

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/johns...bruised-bullied-but-advocates-for-5951660.php

asroc · Dec 12, 2014

rugcat said:
Anything is possible, but the idea that these cops were instigating violence seems a bit counterintuitive. The cops aren't trying to shut down the protests by inciting violence and then arresting people – they are simply trying to intercept a small group of violent a-holes.

I've been watching these demonstrations on the news for days. It pretty much follows a pattern – peaceful protesters gather to make their point, some of them shutting down transportation and blocking freeways which IMO is not a great idea. (A pregnant woman giving birth and a stroke victim were trapped in traffic that tied up cars for hours.)

But whether or not these are valid protest tactics, the real problem comes with an entirely different group. They make their appearance after dark, and are always masked or have bandannas concealing their faces.

They smash windows, vandalize stores, attack police, and loot and destroy businesses – both corporate businesses and locally owned ones. They are the ones who show up at every protest rally no matter what the issue. Some are career criminals, others are simply young kids showing their hatred for police and "the man." They operate with almost total impunity.

The idea of including undercover cops in these marches is to target not protesters in general but precisely these criminals. But arresting these people in the midst of an unruly crowd is a dangerous and problematical operation. Mob mentality can turn ugly in seconds, even among those who ordinarily would not be violent. I can definitely see pulling a gun to protect oneself as reasonable under the circumstances – and let's not forget, no shots were fired, no one was injured.

Maybe it's a bad idea to do this. Maybe the police should simply let this small splinter group of protesters vandalize and loot businesses night after night. But I can tell you that people in the bay area, even those with great sympathy for the aims of the protesters, are getting pretty sick of this.

Same here. I live in a very liberal city and there was a lot of sympathy and support for the Ferguson and Garner protests, including from public officials and even the police, but it's fading.

Just a few days ago during the Garner protests, protestors blocked, among other places, an ambulance station, leaving our sister unit unable to get out of their bay to respond to a cardiac arrest. But no biggie, they had already cut off access to a major hospital earlier and nobody died, there's more than one ambulance in town and when we finally made it to the hospital the patient was still alive.
But that, coupled with trying to stand in the middle of busy highways, successfully standing on subway train tracks and generally disrupting traffic, lost them a lot of sympathy, especially since some got pissy about it and claimed they always make room for emergency vehicles and therefore this had to be a lie.

I have a lot of sympathy as well. I think Garner's death is outrageous and the officer responsible should have been indicted. But I'm having a hard time supporting people who call me a lying cop-fucker because we made their protest look bad.

Xelebes · Dec 12, 2014

I just want to note that drawing attention to conduct in the thick of violent protests is not going to help make the case for either the conduct of the protestors or the police officers unless there are dead bodies to be accounted for. More care needs to be drawn to the actions done during the preceding actions.

There is a problem with police forces sending in undercover officers trying to provoke the most violent of the protestors. Sometimes it is simply designed to bring them out so you can arrest them early, other times it is entirely political provocation. It can be very hard to tell which is which.

nighttimer · Dec 12, 2014

asroc said:
You posted a misleading headline without context, implying those cops pulled a gun on peaceful protestors just for shits and giggles, because that's what cops do or something.

No, what I posted was a link that read, "when undercover cops are pulling their gun on demonstrators" which you then followed since that is why I included the link in the first place, so let's dismiss this "without context" nonsense with the quickness.

I implied nothing. I said undercover cops (which they were) pulled their guns on demonstrators (which they did). That is not an implication. That is a fact.

All this stuff about "peaceful protestors just for shits and giggles, because that's what cops do or something?" That's editorializing and has nothing to do with me.

Asroc said:
I provided some context, saying the cop drew because he and his partner were assaulted and a crowd was advancing on them, which you don't deny happened.

I don't deny or confirm it happened. Why would I? I wasn't there.

asroc said:
Then you posted other excerpts of the article, alleging the officers did not identify themselves and were instigating vandalism. So I wanted to know just how exactly that invalidates my post. It doesn't matter if they were instigating anything or if getting made somehow made them inept and thus they deserved getting beaten, if someone assaults you and you're surrounded by a whole bunch of people who you can reasonably assume want to hurt you, you are justified in drawing your firearm.

Actually, it does matter if the cops instigated and incited the violence they ultimately got swept up by. There are laws against that sort of thing.

Under federal law, a riot is a public disturbance involving an act of violence by one or more persons assembled in a group of at least three people. Inciting a riot applies to a person who organizes, encourages, or participates in a riot. It can apply to one who urges or instigates others to riot. According to 18 USCS § 2102 "to incite a riot", or "to organize, promote, encourage, participate in, or carry on a riot", includes, but is not limited to, urging or instigating other persons to riot, but shall not be deemed to mean the mere oral or written (1) advocacy of ideas or (2) expression of belief, not involving advocacy of any act or acts of violence or assertion of the rightness of, or the right to commit, any such act or acts.”

Contrary to opinion, cops don't get to cherry-pick which laws apply to them and which ones don't. If they incite others to commit criminal acts they've poured the gasoline. They can't come back and say they had no idea anyone would light it.

asroc said:
Not everything the police do is wrong and not everything the protestors do is right.

Nobody said otherwise. But the reverse equally holds true.

rugcat · Dec 12, 2014

Xelebes said:
There is a problem with police forces sending in undercover officers trying to provoke the most violent of the protestors. Sometimes it is simply designed to bring them out so you can arrest them early, other times it is entirely political provocation. It can be very hard to tell which is which.

It's also a problem when people assume, with not a shred of proof, that's what's going on.

Xelebes · Dec 12, 2014

rugcat said:
It's also a problem when people assume, with not a shred of proof, that's what's going on.

Either case?

nighttimer · Dec 12, 2014

Xelebes said:
Either case?

Probably not because everybody knows the police never use informants, snitches and agent provocateurs to inflame a situation so they can make arrests.

Or perhaps they do.

On September 17, 2011, Plan A for the New York activists who came to be known as Occupy Wall Street was to march to the territory outside the bank headquarters of JPMorgan Chase. Once there, they discovered that the block was entirely fenced in. Many activists came to believe that the police had learned their initial destination from e-mail circulating beforehand. Whereupon they headed for nearby Zuccotti Park and a movement was born.

The evening before May Day 2012, a rump Occupy group marched out of San Francisco’s Dolores Park and into the Mission District, a neighborhood where not so many 1 percenters live, work or shop. There, they proceeded to trash “mom and pop shops, local boutiques and businesses, and cars,” according to Scott Rossi, a medic and eyewitness, who summed his feelings up this way afterward: “We were hijacked.” The people “leading the march tonight,” he added, were

clean cut, athletic, commanding, gravitas not borne of charisma but of testosterone and intimidation. They were decked out in outfits typically attributed to those in the “black bloc” spectrum of tactics, yet their clothes were too new, and something was just off about them. They were very combative and nearly physically violent with the livestreamers on site, and got ignorant with me, a medic, when I intervened.… I didn’t recognize any of these people. Their eyes were too angry, their mouths were too severe. They felt “military” if that makes sense. Something just wasn’t right about them on too many levels.

He was quick to add, “I’m not one of those tin foil hat conspiracy theorists. I don’t subscribe to those theories that Queen Elizabeth’s Reptilian slave driver masters run the Fed. I’ve read up on agents provocateurs and plants and that sort of thing and I have to say that, without a doubt, I believe 100 percent that the people that started tonight’s events in the Mission were exactly that.”

It can't happen here? Surely, you jest... :rolleyes

rugcat · Dec 12, 2014

Xelebes said:
Either case?

I'm not sure what you're asking. The question appears to be where is the proof that police are not breaking the law and inciting people to riot?

This habit of some assuming police are guilty of misconduct unless they can prove that they weren't is part of the problem. I doubt that you would be enthused were you to be stopped by store security and asked to prove you hadn't stolen anything

Williebee · Dec 12, 2014

kuwisdelu said:
You'll never get proof, because that's not what we mean when we say it's about race. Race doesn't have to be a conscious motivation for it to be about race. No one even has to be racist for it to be about race.

It's about the stereotypes and presumptions and expectations we all carry with us. That baggage nighttimer mentioned.

Some additional insight re: that baggage.

It's another powerful piece of writing from by Kiese Laymon.

nighttimer · Dec 14, 2014

Our Congress doesn't work. Everybody knows that.

But sometimes it does and here's one way it did.

Congress reauthorized legislation this week that will require states to report the number of people killed during an arrest or while in police custody.
"You can't begin to improve the situation unless you know what the situation is," Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.), one of the bill's sponsors, said in an interview with the Washington Post. "We will now have the data."

The Death in Custody Reporting Act was originally passed in 2000, but expired in 2006. Scott has attempted to reauthorize the bill unsuccessfully four times since then.

The first time the bill was passed, it took years for data to start coming in, and it expired shortly thereafter, Scott said.
"It's the way government works," he said. "You're trying to get local governments to make periodic reports. It just takes some time for this to become routine."

The lack of reliable information about how many people are killed by police annually has come into focus following the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner. In place of government-provided data, crowd-sourced efforts like Fatal Encounters and one by the Gawker Media-owned sports Web site Deadspin have been created that rely on local media reports and volunteers who input information.

Fatal Encounters, founded in 2012 by Reno News & Review editor and publisher Brian Burghart, has recorded 3,010 deaths, with another 9,000 in its "development queue" where various leads from places like Wikipedia and FBI data are available for users to research.

The site sees an increase in traffic whenever a death captures the public attention, and since Sunday, Burghart said, there's been about 600 new records submitted.

nighttimer · Dec 19, 2014

Meanwhile, back in NYPD, the police accountability issue is still an issue.

Mama Said Knock You Out:

A video showing an NYPD officer apparently knocking out a Brooklyn teen surfaced on Wednesday — the same day footage of another cop allegedly stealing more than $1,000 from a Brooklyn construction worker went viral.

The officer stopped 17-year-old Marcel Hamer on June 4 in Clinton Hill on suspicion of smoking marijuana, police said.

The video begins showing Marcel Hamer lying on his back, shouting in pain with the cop's left foot planted on Hamer's stomach. He then pleads repeatedly with the cop, saying he wasn't smoking marijuana.

"You wanna get f----- up?" the plainclothes cop threatens in the opening moments of the 54-second video.

"Mister, it was just a cigarette, sir," Hamer says. "It was just a cigarette."

The knockout strike isn't caught on video but the sound of a punch is clearly heard in the recording.

"Yeah, get it on film," the cop barks to the bystander after the blow while he tries to cuff Hamer.

"Turn around," he instructs the seemingly unresponsive teen.

Hamer's apparently limp arm is seen falling onto the pavement as the cop tries to cuff him.

"You knocked him out! He knocked Marcel out!" one of the teen's friends repeatedly shouts.

Buy A Ticket for the Policeman's Ball? That'll be $1000.

The Brooklyn district attorney’s office is investigating allegations that an NYPD cop swiped more than $1,000 from a man during a stop-and-frisk, then pepper-sprayed him and his sister when they complained, the Daily News has learned.

The encounter was captured on a cell phone video, which has been turned over to prosecutors and the NYPD Internal Affairs Bureau.

“One of the most disturbing things about the video is the other cops standing around watching and doing nothing to stop the wrongdoing,” lawyer Robert Marinelli said Wednesday.

Marinelli represents the siblings who were pepper-sprayed — Lamard Joye, who claims the cop took $1,300 from his pocket, money that has still not been accounted for, and his sister Lateefah Joye, a professional basketball player in Europe, who tried to get the cop’s badge number.

“I believe that this officer made an assumption that any money Mr. Joye possessed was obtained illegally and therefore he would not report the theft. This assumption was wrong. Mr. Joye is a hardworking taxpayer deserving respect,” said Marinelli.

The brief clip begins with the unidentified cop pushing Lamard Joye against the fence of a basketball court at the Surfside Gardens housing project in Coney Island around 12:20 a.m. on Sept. 16.

Right before the recording began, according to Marinelli, Joye remarked to the cop, “Are you going to do to me what you did to the guy in Staten Island?” a reference to Eric Garner, who died in July after a cop put him in a chokehold.

What precipitated the Coney Island incident, and is not recorded on the video, according to Marinelli, were cops roughing up a young man named Terrell Haskins nearby, prompting Joye and his friends to shout, “Is that necessary?”

A group of cops confront Joye, whose arms are outstretched as he says to onlookers, “You see this?”

The cop appears to reach into Joye’s pocket and pull out a thick wad of cash.

“Gimme my money!” Joye shouts, before the cop squirts him in the face with the spray.

Joye darts off and his sister begins arguing with the cop. An onlooker is heard yelling, “How ya gonna take his money?” “That’s robbery” and “Get his badge number.”

“I went to get his badge number and name,” Lateefah Joye told The News. “I leaned over to see his badge. He pushed me away. I saw a two and a one and that’s when he pepper-sprayed me in my mouth and my whole face.”

Police work is dangerous. Just not always for the police.

Lyv · Dec 19, 2014

I thought I was about to duplicate the first story nighttimer just posted, but that is about a different black teen physically attacked by an NYPD officer.

NYPD investigating video showing officer punching teen during arrest

In the eight-minute video posted to YouTube on Wednesday, a plainclothes white officer can be seen rushing up to several uniformed officers struggling to handcuff a black boy and apparently striking him at least twice. Police said the boy is 16 years old.

nighttimer · Dec 19, 2014

Lyv said:
I thought I was about to duplicate the first story nighttimer just posted, but that is about a different black teen physically attacked by an NYPD officer.

It's been a pretty shitty month for the New York Police Department. But it's been an even shittier month for Black males interacting with the New York Police Department.

nighttimer · Jan 31, 2015

How do you create a police state?

The San Francisco Public Defender's Office is outraged after Jami Tillotson, a deputy public defender at the office, was arrested Tuesday outside a courtroom for asking a plainclothes officer not to interview her client or take his photograph.

According to a video released by the defender's office, Tillotson and her client, an African-American male, are shown standing in a courtroom hallway when the officer, who has been identified as San Francisco Police Inspector Brian Stansbury, approaches and begins taking photos with what appears to be a camera phone.

Tillotson intervenes, and Stansbury can be heard threatening to arrest the attorney. "Look, you can either step aside, he can be released in two minutes or we can make this ... " Stansbury says.

Tillotson responds, "I'm pretty sure that we're OK here. We don't need any pictures taken, thank you."

Stansbury continues: "No, you're not pretty sure. If you continue with this ... I'll arrest you for resisting arrest."

"Please do," Tillotson says, and she is placed in handcuffs and led away. Stansbury can be seen continuing to take photos.

"This is not Guantanamo Bay. People have an absolute right to have their attorneys present during questioning," San Francisco Public Defender Jeff Adachi wrote in a press release viewed by The Guardian. "A uniform does not give you a license to bully innocent people into submission. If this happens to a public defender in front of her client, I can only imagine what is happening on our streets."

A police representative told reporters at a press conference on Wednesday that the officer involved in Tillotson's arrest had a right to detain anyone who was obstructing a criminal investigation, The Guardian reported. The rep also noted that an investigation into the matter is ongoing.

According to The Guardian, Tillotson was detained for an hour before she was released. Tillotson told reporters that she was in another area of the courthouse when someone informed her that her client was being questioned. She noted that her client was in court for minor theft charges and was merely standing when Stansbury began questioning him on a matter that was not related to his court appearance.

Gradually then inevitably.

LittlePinto · Jan 31, 2015

Damn that Constitution. Always getting in the way of justice.

rugcat · Jan 31, 2015

What the article fails to mention is that the officers were investigating a totally separate crime, having nothing to do with the charge for which the attorney was representing the suspect.

They simply wanted to take a picture of him concerning this entirely different case, one in which he was not yet charged and that the attorney was not representing him for. Attorney or not, she had no right to try to prevent them from taking the picture. The officers were perfectly within their rights.

Whether or not arresting her was the best way to handle the situation is another matter. But this is about as far a cry from a "police state" as you can get.

Usher · Jan 31, 2015

There are a lot of exceptional police officers out there and some of them do the thankless task of investigating police corruption.

The trouble is most of the world police forces were formed using thugs initially (I come from a long line of police officers). And there is a culture of backside covering and pressure placed on the decent guys to make whistle blowing a very, very difficult process.

I knew a police officer who investigated corruption growing up and he consulted, visited and spent time with forces around the world. His view was it could not be beaten and all you could do was contain it.

backslashbaby · Jan 31, 2015

rugcat said:
What the article fails to mention is that the officers were investigating a totally separate crime, having nothing to do with the charge for which the attorney was representing the suspect.

They simply wanted to take a picture of him concerning this entirely different case, one in which he was not yet charged and that the attorney was not representing him for. Attorney or not, she had no right to try to prevent them from taking the picture. The officers were perfectly within their rights.

Whether or not arresting her was the best way to handle the situation is another matter. But this is about as far a cry from a "police state" as you can get.

But don't people have the right to not answer questions (or have some cop take pictures of you) if it's all supposed to be casual? It looked as if the lawyer was speaking for her client in the way that lots of lawyers would if standing right by them, same case or no. So they as a unit said no. What would be unusual about that if it were, say, a cop coming up to Donald Trump and his lawyer, with Trump letting the lawyer answer for him?

I could see the point if the person were telling the lawyer to butt out on his behalf, but it was clear that he agreed with the lawyer's advice. Was he just not vocal enough about answering for himself?

She certainly wasn't too vocal about offering him advice, imho. If it was informal, it was informal. Or are folks not allowed to speak to anyone for advice while a cop is asking informal questions, either? That starts going way too far.

Good for her for trying to give the man some good advice, because he may not know his rights.

rugcat · Jan 31, 2015

backslashbaby said:
But don't people have the right to not answer questions (or have some cop take pictures of you) if it's all supposed to be casual?

You certainly can't arrest someone for offering advice to another that they don't have to talk to the cops.

I once had something similar happened to me. I was talking to a guy who had been trying to scam free food out of a restaurant. I was in the restaurant, and gave the man his Miranda rights, and asked him if he would talk to me about the situation. Before he could answer, three people in a nearby booth who had overheard came over, said they were lawyers, and advised the man not to talk to me.

Pretty annoying, to say the least. But clearly there was nothing I could do about it.

But, if as part of an investigation, the cops are simply taking a picture in a public place, it's not at all clear to me that's is an infringement of that person's rights, nor is it clear you need the person's consent to do so.

We'd have to have a criminal law attorney weigh in on that. And if taking the picture is a legal exercise of police authority, anyone stepping in and trying to prevent the officer from doing so is indeed guilty of obstructing an investigation, if nothing else.

Hadar Aviram, a professor at UC Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, said the rights of Tillotson and her client during the confrontation appeared to be “a stickier legal issue than it seems.”

The public defender’s office is arguing that Tillotson’s client had a right to counsel. But Aviram said that for the right to counsel to apply to this situation, the officers would have to be questioning Tillotson’s client about the theft case for which she was representing him.

Police officials said the officers were talking to the two men in connection to a separate, unsolved burglary case. Esparza said that investigation is also ongoing, and that the men were not arrested.

http://m.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/S-F-public-defender-detained-outside-court-6046088.php

I personally think it was a stupid thing for this cop to have done. But as I said, the idea that it is a trampling on the constitution is or the next step in a police state is overblown hyperbole.

clintl · Jan 31, 2015

rugcat said:
What the article fails to mention is that the officers were investigating a totally separate crime, having nothing to do with the charge for which the attorney was representing the suspect.

They simply wanted to take a picture of him concerning this entirely different case, one in which he was not yet charged and that the attorney was not representing him for. Attorney or not, she had no right to try to prevent them from taking the picture. The officers were perfectly within their rights.

Whether or not arresting her was the best way to handle the situation is another matter. But this is about as far a cry from a "police state" as you can get.

I don't know. It's seems pretty dubious to me. Especially because of this part that is on the video:

Tillotson intervenes, and Stansbury can be heard threatening to arrest the attorney. "Look, you can either step aside, he can be released in two minutes or we can make this ... " Stansbury says.

That sounds like the person was being detained for the picture, in the mind of the officer. Which means, the person should be able to have an attorney intervene and represent him, doesn't it?

nighttimer · Jan 31, 2015

One should not expect anything remotely resembling objectivity from police apologists because they believe only they know when cops behave badly.

"What the cop did wasn't the way I would have done it BUT, I'm okay with him doing it."

Yeah, I'm not trying to hear any of that jive.

What the apologists didn't mention is the cops already had a picture of Tillotson's client. Why would did they need another one? Perhaps to intimidate him?

Then again, some cops simply get off on hassling attorneys whom are trying to do their jobs. Makes 'em feel like a really big man.

In an unprecedented incident, Deputy Public Defender Jami Tillotson was arrested and booked Tuesday on a misdemeanor resisting arrest charge for refusing to let a client of hers be questioned by a police investigator who was also trying to take pictures of the client, Public Defender Jeff Adachi said.

But police Officer Albie Esparza countered that the investigator, who is a sergeant, acted appropriately and it was the sergeant’s duty to detain and question the man if he thought that he was of interest to an investigation. Esparza added that the officer had the right to arrest anyone who was obstructing an officer lawfully fulfilling that duty.

The arguments were made during dueling press conferences held Wednesday by the Public Defender’s Office and the Police Department in connection with the arrest of the deputy public defender. Adachi charged that the arrest and conduct of the officer - identified as Inspector Brian Stansbury - were unlawful, and that he had no right to question Tillotson’s client without her being there.

Tillotson said her client was at the Hall of Justice for minor and misdemeanor cases of theft, which were unrelated to whatever Stansbury was reportedly questioning the client about. She said she was in another court room working on another case when it was brought to her attention that her client was being questioned and photographed. Tillotson then left the court room to inform her client that he did not have to answer Stansbury’s questions and that Stansbury had no right to be photographing him and his friend.

link

The cops have yet to explain why they needed another picture of Tillotson's client, but the arrest is an example of egregious overreach by a bullying cop. Tillotson's client wasn't under arrest and there is no reason he had to allow some plainclothes jerk to take his picture.

Stansbury has a prior history at this sort of thuggish fuckery.

According to the public defender, Stansbury was the subject of a federal civil rights lawsuit that was filed against him by another San Francisco police officer for alleged racial profiling, which is what Adachi has accused Stansbury of doing in the Hall of Justice Tuesday. The man he was trying to interview and photograph was African American.

Guess that makes Stansbury a "good cop" in the eyes of the police apologists.

frimble3 · Jan 31, 2015

The officer took pictures of this guy before the lawyer got there, while the lawyer was there, and after the lawyer left. How many did he need, of the same guy, in the same clothes, in the same setting? Or was he just 'proving' that he could take pictures and no-body could stop him?

DancingMaenid · Jan 31, 2015

Granted, I'm not an expert, but what concerns me is that it seems like arresting people for "resisting arrest" seems like it's occasionally used as a convenient way to arrest someone who causes the least bit of trouble.

How can someone resist arrest unless they are already being put under arrest? If she was threatened with arrest for obstructing an investigation, I could understand that, even if the investigation in this case is questionable. But resisting arrest implies that the police are in the process of trying to arrest you and you resist, and questioning the police is not a crime or cause for arrest in itself.

Police Accountability

Alex

practical experience, FTW

Lost in the Fog

Alex

Delerium ex Ennui

No Gods No Masters

Lost in the Fog

Delerium ex Ennui

No Gods No Masters

Lost in the Fog

Capeless, wingless, & yet I fly.

No Gods No Masters

No Gods No Masters

I meant to do that.

No Gods No Masters

No Gods No Masters

Perpetually confused

Lost in the Fog

~~~~*~~~~

Lost in the Fog

Represent.

No Gods No Masters

Heckuva good sport

New kid...seven years ago!

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