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Law Enforcement and its abuse of power


Ser Scot A Ellison
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There are probably worse things going on, but this story still makes me furious. There already seems to be a certain level of contempt of regular citizens by the police. And then one of those citizens gets swept up in some sort of minor criminality and that person is now fair game to treat less than human.

I'm all for having less armed police and less use of police in general when they are not necessary. I simply don't trust them to be the "hero with the gun," And "hero with the gun" arguments are often flawed in general, applied to the police or not.

Video shows Colorado police officers laughing over bodycam footage of 73-year-old woman's violent arrest

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/27/us/loveland-police-officers-video-use-of-force/index.html

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Karen Garner, who has dementia, was arrested last June for walking out of a Walmart in Loveland, Colorado, with $13.88 worth of items, according to an amended lawsuit filed Sunday. Police were called and the arrest left Garner with multiple injuries, including a broken humerus, a dislocated shoulder and a sprained wrist, according to the lawsuit.

The amended lawsuit names the city of Loveland and five officers as defendants. The initial lawsuit was filed on April 14. CNN obtained body camera footage of the arrest from the office of Garner's attorney, Sarah Schielke.

The amended lawsuit also includes a video that shows three officers -- Austin Hopp, Daria Jalali and Tyler Blackett, who are named in the lawsuit -- laughing as they begin to watch the body camera footage of Garner's arrest, according to Schielke.

The family released a statement Tuesday saying they were devastated because Garner is a "human being" that was treated by Loveland police like an "animal."
"We are physically sickened. We are angry. Our hearts could not possibly ache any more," the statement read. "Once fiercely independent, happy, carefree and a great lover of the outdoors, she is now fearful, distrusting, reclusive."

 

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Footage from the newly released video was shot in the Loveland Police Department's booking area shortly after Garner's arrest last June.
Hopp gives Jalali a fist bump when asked how the arrest went.

"Well, I thought it went great," Hopp says, adding, "I think we crushed it."

Later in the video, as officers begin watching, Jalali, who assisted in the arrest, says body camera footage is "like live TV."

Blackett responds by saying, "the bodycam show," as someone giggles.

"Bodycams are my favorite thing to watch. I could watch livestream bodycams all day," Jalali says.

But as the three of them continue watching, it appears Jalali becomes uncomfortable with the video.

"Can you stop it now?" she asks.

"What?" Hopp asks.

According to a YouTube transcription of the video, Hopp then asks, "Are you ready for the pop?" as Jalali covers her ears.

"Hear the pop?" Hopp asks.

The pop refers to something in the video, but it's not clear what that is.

"I hate this," Jalali says.

"This is great," Hopp responds.

"I hate it," Jalali says.

"I love it," Hopp fires back.

 

 

Edited by Martell Spy
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1 minute ago, Martell Spy said:

There are probably worse things going on, but this story still makes me furious. There already seems a certain level of contempt of regular citizens by the police. And then one of those citizens gets swept up in some sort of minor criminality and that person is now fair game to treat less than human.

I'm all for having less armed police and less use of police in general when they are not necessary. I simply don't trust them to be the "hero with the gun," And "hero with the gun" arguments are often flawed in general, applied to the police or not.

Video shows Colorado police officers laughing over bodycam footage of 73-year-old woman's violent arrest

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/27/us/loveland-police-officers-video-use-of-force/index.html

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Footage from the newly released video was shot in the Loveland Police Department's booking area shortly after Garner's arrest last June.
Hopp gives Jalali a fist bump when asked how the arrest went.

"Well, I thought it went great," Hopp says, adding, "I think we crushed it."

Later in the video, as officers begin watching, Jalali, who assisted in the arrest, says body camera footage is "like live TV."

Blackett responds by saying, "the bodycam show," as someone giggles.

"Bodycams are my favorite thing to watch. I could watch livestream bodycams all day," Jalali says.

But as the three of them continue watching, it appears Jalali becomes uncomfortable with the video.

"Can you stop it now?" she asks.

"What?" Hopp asks.

According to a YouTube transcription of the video, Hopp then asks, "Are you ready for the pop?" as Jalali covers her ears.

"Hear the pop?" Hopp asks.

The pop refers to something in the video, but it's not clear what that is.

"I hate this," Jalali says.

"This is great," Hopp responds.

"I hate it," Jalali says.

"I love it," Hopp fires back.

Yes, I linked that up thread.  There is no way to exuse the actions of the officers.

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Just now, Karlbear said:

That is a pretty weak source - the mom telling the story she was told from the other girls while she wasn't there. 

The girl was her former foster child and was at the house for a birthday party seem to be facts that the home owner did not question, and which clearly strike against the "followed home to be jumped" narrative, at least in regards to the young woman in pink who Bryant attempted to stab. Given that she also called her former foster mother, for all we know she's the person who first called the police.

Just now, Karlbear said:

But I'm not sure that matters with SYG. Legally that gives a LOT of latitude. Its a stupid law, but its important to point out how legally Bryant was probably in the clear. 

Once we remove the castle doctrine from the equation due to the fact that the young woman in pink was not in fact on the property when attacked by Bryant, what matters is that the young woman standing off the property holding a dog was not a threat. Stand your ground has no bearing. 

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1 minute ago, Ran said:

The girl was her former foster child and was at the house for a birthday party seem to be facts that the home owner did not question, and which clearly strike against the "followed home to be jumped" narrative, at least in regards to the young woman in pink who Bryant attempted to stab. Given that she also called her former foster mother, for all we know she's the person who first called the police.

Could be! But I wouldn't take a lot of the fight over a clean house to be particularly gospel. 

1 minute ago, Ran said:

Once we remove the castle doctrine from the equation due to the fact that the young woman in pink was not in fact on the property when attacked by Bryant, what matters is that the young woman standing off the property holding a dog was not a threat. Stand your ground has no bearing. 

The fun thing about SYG is not whether you, @Ran, think they're a threat or even if the person with the knife started the fight. All that matters is that the person felt like their life was in danger. This has happened repeatedly and has legal precedent, including in the Martin case.

Its a really shitty law! But it also applies here. 

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16 minutes ago, Karlbear said:

The fun thing about SYG is not whether you, @Ran, think they're a threat or even if the person with the knife started the fight. All that matters is

that the person felt like their life was in danger.

In danger from an unarmed person who was off the property, holding a lapdog in their arms, after multiple police had just arrived on the scene?

Camera footage just makes this one too clear that a stand your ground defense wouldn't have flown. In any case, it's an affirmative defense, and Bryant won't be relying it as she's not going to be posthumously charged with attempted murder or worse.

 

Edited by Ran
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7 minutes ago, Ran said:

In danger from an unarmed person who was off the property, holding a lapdog in their arms, after multiple police had just arrived on the scene?

Camera footage just makes this one too clear that a stand your ground defense wouldn't have flown. In any case, it's an affirmative defense, and Bryant won't be relying it as she's not going to be posthumously charged with attempted murder or worse.

 

I'm saying that if the police weren't there and Bryant had stabbed the other woman SYG would have been a likely good defense. 

And because it's based on how the person feels, camera footage is not as useful as you might think. 

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Perhaps you can better understand the levels of, at best, skepticism and disgust with which we have to look at yet ANOTHER murder by a white cop of this black child you are determined to vilify as deserving of being shot, if you look at these:

"Policing Is Not Broken, It’s ‘Literally Designed to Work in This Way"

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/28/opinion/police-reform-America.htmlaction=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage&showTranscript=1

"California Man Dies After Officers Pin Him to Ground for 5 Minutes
The death of Mario Arenales Gonzalez came one day before a former Minneapolis officer was convicted of murdering George Floyd. Body camera footage was released on Tuesday."

One really cannot believe cops about these ever-increasing numbers of claimed justified violence and murder, when it seems far more often than not, if these cases ever get any scrutiny beyond the cops' reports, they have behaved in murderous manners, and almost always too, in unjustified violent manners, doing everything from beating to rape and extortion.

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25 minutes ago, Karlbear said:

I'm saying that if the police weren't there and Bryant had stabbed the other woman SYG would have been a likely good defense. 

Actual evidence would have to be presented she acted in self-defense. Her feelings alone were not going to be sufficient. The Treyvon Martin case was a horrible thing, but everyone agrees that there was some kind of scuffle before the shooting. The young woman with the dog was a bystander to the immediate event when Bryant rounded on her, forced her back against the car, and attempted to stab her. All in front of a police officer. While Bryant no doubt had some kind of grievance, it's impossible for me to see how anyone can believe she had a genuine self-defense claim against the woman in pink. Against the first girl, possibly, since she was in fact on the property and the words being exchanged aren't clear. 

 

25 minutes ago, Karlbear said:

And because it's based on how the person feels, camera footage is not as useful as you might think. 

It's not in fact based on how someone feels. That's just one piece of evidence, and a very weak one under the circumstances without other supporting evidence.

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1 hour ago, Karlbear said:

I'm saying that if the police weren't there and Bryant had stabbed the other woman SYG would have been a likely good defense. 

And because it's based on how the person feels, camera footage is not as useful as you might think. 

Generally, in SYG situations, if one party deescalates by retreating, the other party cannot chase the other party and continue the attack.  The girl in pink left the area, stood next to the police, and wasn't agressive at all before being attacked by Bryant.  I don't see how you can argue that Bryant was standing her ground in this case.

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The whole accepted wisdom of "shooting a leg is more likely to miss, therefore you should aim for centre of mass and make sure you kill the person" has been around and standard policy for decades now, but I'm also not at all convinced it's actually right.

Assuming both people are on level ground, how on earth is shooting with a downward trajectory that will intersect with the ground shortly after the person you're trying to hit more likely to hit bystanders then a shot parallel to the ground which is going to travel significantly further before falling to the ground?

I can see that when indoors where the shooting is on a higher level and the floor isn't sufficiently tough to slow a bullet much, but thats going to be very rare as the angle it hits the floor at isn't directing most of the force into the floor.

I don't think it's reasonable to assume it's accurate just because police have been saying it is for a long time. Some police think the idea of having any hesitation towards shooting a child is bad and train to eliminate that reluctance, so they don't get a ton of trust from me.

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19 minutes ago, Mudguard said:

Generally, in SYG situations, if one party deescalates by retreating, the other party cannot chase the other party and continue the attack.  The girl in pink left the area, stood next to the police, and wasn't agressive at all before being attacked by Bryant.  I don't see how you can argue that Bryant was standing her ground in this case.

There are at least two cases in Florida that disagree with that generalization that I know of that weren't the Martin one. 

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6 minutes ago, karaddin said:

The whole accepted wisdom of "shooting a leg is more likely to miss, therefore you should aim for centre of mass and make sure you kill the person" has been around and standard policy for decades now, but I'm also not at all convinced it's actually right.

Assuming both people are on level ground, how on earth is shooting with a downward trajectory that will intersect with the ground shortly after the person you're trying to hit more likely to hit bystanders then a shot parallel to the ground which is going to travel significantly further before falling to the ground?

I can see that when indoors where the shooting is on a higher level and the floor isn't sufficiently tough to slow a bullet much, but thats going to be very rare as the angle it hits the floor at isn't directing most of the force into the floor.

I don't think it's reasonable to assume it's accurate just because police have been saying it is for a long time. Some police think the idea of having any hesitation towards shooting a child is bad and train to eliminate that reluctance, so they don't get a ton of trust from me.

You don't just shoot the body because its easier to hit, if you shoot someone in an arm or a leg they are not incapacitated.  Also ricochets are less predictable. If someone else is in your line of sight you can choose not to fire, if you shoot hoping to hit the ground if you miss, it can go anywhere. 

For the record I have never ever carried a firearm, and would resign if forced to do so. But I know a lot of people on the armed units. 

Edited by BigFatCoward
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3 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

if you shoot someone in an arm or a leg they are not incapacitated. 

I tend to disagree with this, if only based on what I saw on the farm, of hitting a charging bull or other dangerously behaving animal, or missing the killing shot when hunting.  Unless suffering from rabies, for instance.

So far no one has claimed this murdered kid was high on meth or something that keeps people from feeling initially a wound / maiming.  So far.

 

Edited by Zorral
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Just now, BigFatCoward said:

You don't just shoot the body because its easier to hit, if you shoot someone in an arm or a leg they are not incapacitated. 

For the record I have never ever carried a firearm, and would resign if forced to do so. But I know a lot of people on the armed units. 

But surely in the case of a teen running at someone else with a knife and police only a few metres away, shooting them in the leg is going to cause them to stumble at least if not fall over and buy time to close the distance and restrain them with non lethal force? 

Given your firearm units are specifically called out when needed, I'd expect the situations they get involved in to be the higher risk scenarios where that approach might make more sense.

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7 minutes ago, Karlbear said:

There are at least two cases in Florida that disagree with that generalization that I know of that weren't the Martin one. 

Can you provide a cite?  The person chased down a fleeing person and was still able to successfully assert a SYG defense?  I doubt it.

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29 minutes ago, karaddin said:

But surely in the case of a teen running at someone else with a knife and police only a few metres away, shooting them in the leg is going to cause them to stumble at least if not fall over and buy time to close the distance and restrain them with non lethal force? 

Given your firearm units are specifically called out when needed, I'd expect the situations they get involved in to be the higher risk scenarios where that approach might make more sense.

If someone is running at someone with a knife and they have a gun they are shooting to incapacitate.  The risk of not doing so is too great.  

To your second point yes, our firearms officers are far better trained I'd imagine than your average American officer with a gun. And normally are deployed due to specific job, with Intel and risk assessments and briefings before involvement. 

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50 minutes ago, Mudguard said:

Can you provide a cite?  The person chased down a fleeing person and was still able to successfully assert a SYG defense?  I doubt it.

Let's see: there's the guy who saw someone else's house being robbed, went out of his house and shot them both  with a shotgun:

Quote

 

In November 2007, a Houston-area man pulled out a shotgun and killed two men whom he suspected of burglarizing his neighbor’s home. Joe Horn, a 61-year-old retiree, called 911 and urged the operator to “ ‘Catch these guys, will you? Cause, I ain’t going to let them go.’ ” Despite being warned to remain inside his home, Horn stated he would shoot, telling the operator, “ ‘I have a right to protect myself too, sir. The laws have been changed in this country since September the first, and you know it.’ ”

Two months earlier, the Texas Legislature passed a Stand Your Ground law removing a citizen’s duty to retreat while in public places before using deadly force. In July 2008, a Harris County grand jury declined to indict Horn of any criminal charges.

 

Here's one where a guy opened fire into the car while it was driving away because as far as he knew they could have jumped out and opened fire:

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 In Louisiana early this year, a grand jury cleared 21-year-old Byron Thomas after he fired into an SUV filled with teenagers after an alleged marijuana transaction went sour. One of the bullets struck and killed 15-year-old Jamonta Miles. Although the SUV was allegedly driving away when Thomas opened fire, Lafourche Parish Sheriff Craig Webre said to local media that as far as Thomas knew, someone could have jumped out of the vehicle with a gun. Thomas, said the sheriff, had “decided to stand his ground.”

Louisiana’s Stand Your Ground law was enacted just a year after Florida introduced its law.

 

So @Ran, as nonthreatening as that dog was, here's one that's even less threatening - a dog leash. Oops!

Quote

In April, 22-year-old Cordell Jude shot and killed Daniel Adkins Jr., a pedestrian who walked in front of Jude’s car just as Jude was pulling up to the window of a Taco Bell drive-thru in Arizona. Jude claimed Adkins had waved his arms in the air, wielding what Judge thought was a metal pipe – it was actually a dog leash. Jude shot the 29-year-old Adkins, who was mentally disabled, once in the chest. As of May, an arrest had not been made in the April 3 shooting. Arizona passed a Stand Your Ground law in 2010.

And then there's this exact one: a guy chased a person for over a block and stabbed him to death:

Quote

 In January, a judge in Miami tossed out a second-degree murder charge against Greyston Garcia after he chased a suspected burglar for more than a block and stabbed him to death. The judge decided the stabbing was justified because the burglar had swung a bag of stolen car radios at Garcia – an object that a medical examiner at a hearing testified could cause “serious harm or death.” The judge found Garcia was “well within his rights to pursue the victim and demand the return of his property.”

All from here: https://www.propublica.org/article/five-stand-your-ground-cases-you-should-know-about

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Cordell Jude was convicted of manslaughter.

The Garcia case (no relation, BTW!) involved him chasing a person who had stolen a bag of radios that weighed 4-6 pounds, who then turned on him and attempted to hit him with the bag, and Garcia then stabbed him. He had a right to try and recover his property, the thief did not have the right to try and brain him with a bag of heavy (stolen) objects, and apparently this gave him the right to defend himself.

If the woman in pink had stolen the dog from the household, and then swung it by its legs to try and club Bryant over the head with it, the cases would indeed be similar, though.

 

Edited by Ran
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8 minutes ago, Ran said:

Cordell Jude was convicted of manslaughter.

Yay! The other cases still stand.

8 minutes ago, Ran said:

The Garcia case (no relation, BTW!) involved him chasing a person who had stolen a bag of radios that weighed 4-6 pounds, who then turned on him and attempted to hit him with the bag, and Garcia then stabbed him. He had a right to try and recover his property, the thief did not have the right to try and brain him with a bag of heavy (stolen) objects, and apparently this gave him the right to defend himself.

If the woman in pink had stolen the dog from the household, and then swung it by its legs to try and club Bryant over the head with it, the cases would indeed be similar, though.

How do you know she didn't? 

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1 hour ago, karaddin said:

The whole accepted wisdom of "shooting a leg is more likely to miss, therefore you should aim for centre of mass and make sure you kill the person" has been around and standard policy for decades now, but I'm also not at all convinced it's actually right.

Assuming both people are on level ground, how on earth is shooting with a downward trajectory that will intersect with the ground shortly after the person you're trying to hit more likely to hit bystanders then a shot parallel to the ground which is going to travel significantly further before falling to the ground?

I can see that when indoors where the shooting is on a higher level and the floor isn't sufficiently tough to slow a bullet much, but thats going to be very rare as the angle it hits the floor at isn't directing most of the force into the floor.

I don't think it's reasonable to assume it's accurate just because police have been saying it is for a long time. Some police think the idea of having any hesitation towards shooting a child is bad and train to eliminate that reluctance, so they don't get a ton of trust from me.

Because bullets can and do ricochet when they hit the ground.  They don’t necessarily stop.

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