THE POLICE PROBLEM

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    The police problem is that police are policed by the police. Cops are accountable only to other cops, which is no accountability at all.

    99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.

    When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.

    When police are fired — which is all too rare — they leave with 'law enforcement experience' and can easily find work in another police department nearby. It's called "Wandering Cops."

    When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.

    Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.

    The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.

    All this is a path to a police state.

    In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.

    Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.

    That's the solution.

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Our definition of ‘cops’ is broad, and includes prison guards, probation officers, shitty DAs and judges, etc — anyone who has the authority to fuck over people’s lives, with minimal or no oversight.

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RULES

Real-life decorum is expected. Please don't say things only a child or a jackass would say in person.

If you're here to support the police, you're trolling. Please exercise your right to remain silent.

Saying ~~cops~~ ANYONE should be killed lowers the IQ in any conversation. They're about killing people; we're not.

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It you've been banned but don't know why, check the moderator's log. If you feel you didn't deserve it, hey, I'm new at this and maybe you're right. Send a cordial PM, for a second chance.

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ALLIES

!abolition@slrpnk.net

!acab@lemmygrad.ml

r/ACAB

r/BadCopNoDonut/

Randy Balko

The Civil Rights Lawyer

The Honest Courtesan

Identity Project

MirandaWarning.org

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INFO

A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions

Adultification

Cops aren't supposed to be smart

Don't talk to the police.

Killings by law enforcement in Canada

Killings by law enforcement in the United Kingdom

Killings by law enforcement in the United States

Know your rights: Filming the police

Three words. 70 cases. The tragic history of 'I can’t breathe' (as of 2020)

Police aren't primarily about helping you or solving crimes.

Police lie under oath, a lot

Police spin: An object lesson in Copspeak

Police unions and arbitrators keep abusive cops on the street

Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States

So you wanna be a cop?

When the police knock on your door

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ORGANIZATIONS

Black Lives Matter

Campaign Zero

Innocence Project

The Marshall Project

Movement Law Lab

NAACP

National Police Accountability Project

Say Their Names

Vera: Ending Mass Incarceration

 

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
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Officers showed up at the home and found a man struggling with a woman over a knife. An officer opened fire and struck the man, killing him at the scene. Only later did they discover the man who was killed lived at the home and was struggling to fend off the woman who had broken into his home.

Police say Brandon Durham, 43, had called 911 and reported multiple people outside his home shooting, then told the 911 operator that someone had entered his home through the front and back doors and he was locking himself in the bathroom.

He also told the 911 operator that he was home with his 15-year-old daughter, according to police. Officers kicked open the door after arriving on scene and hearing someone screaming as well as damage to vehicles parked outside the property, police said.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/22065771

Never give the cops your phone.

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C.H. had reported that her stepmother sold her to be raped for $100 when she was 17 years old. The buyer, she told the sheriff’s department, wasn’t just anyone — it was Police Chief Larry Clay. While he was in uniform and on duty. The first time, against his department-issued vehicle. The second, inside a police office.

Clay, 55, and the stepmother, 27, were both charged with sex trafficking of a minor.

It was the second time in Gauley Bridge’s history that a police chief had been charged with child sexual abuse. The first time, in the late 1990s, nearly 100 people had protested the arrest, declaring their loyalty to the chief.

This time, too, the chief was adamant about his innocence. Clay, who declined to comment to The Washington Post, hired an attorney and pleaded not guilty. C.H.’s furious stepfather told his neighbors that C.H. was just an angry teen, lying to get her stepmother in trouble.

Archived at https://archive.is/9L2T9

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MCNAIRY CO., Tenn. (WMC) - A state animal cruelty investigation has resulted in the arrest of a now-former McNairy County Sheriff’s deputy, who is accused of shooting multiple dogs to death while tasked with ensuring the animals were okay.

According to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, 24-year-old Connor Brackin is charged with seven counts of aggravated cruelty to animals and eight counts of reckless endangerment.

The animals were reportedly the subjects of an animal welfare concern call made on November 4.

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Sgt. Sébastien Plouffe threw part of the 14-year-old motorcycle accident victim's skull into a ravine in 2021 after being chastised by the victim's mother for the way law enforcement handled the scene of the accident.

Plouffe, who lied about his actions on a report, admitted the truth a few days later when the family attempted to retrieve the skull part in order to cremate the victim. He returned to the location of the ravine and attempted to search for the missing piece of bone, but was unsuccessful. A larger search was conducted at the scene with additional officials, and the skull part was eventually located.

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The original on Washington Post is paywalled. And my usual solutions of bypassing wasn't working. Sorry for the MSN wrapper.

In Gauley Bridge,” prosecutors told the jury, “Larry Clay was the law.”

C.H. had reported that her stepmother sold her to be raped for $100 when she was 17 years old. The buyer, she told the sheriff’s department, wasn’t just anyone — it was Police Chief Larry Clay. While he was in uniform and on duty. The first time, against his department-issued vehicle. The second, inside a police office.

Clay, 55, and the stepmother, 27, were both charged with sex trafficking of a minor.

When Clay spent his shifts doing nothing but parking his cruiser and waiting for speeding cars, Pack was asked to counsel Clay on taking more initiative. When Clay hastily pulled a gun on a hiking tourist, Pack was told to coach him on being less impulsive.

The family was struggling to keep the electricity and water paid. Then, her stepmother approached her with a way of getting cash, an idea from Clay.

“He brought it up to her that he was sexually interested in me,” C.H. said. “We needed the money for bills.”

C.H. tried to describe it without feeling it. Her head being forced down. Then her body on the hood of the chief’s car. “He was raping me,” C.H. testified. “Did you say anything to him during this?” Herrald asked. “Too scared,” C.H. said, balling her hands in her lap.

She testified that she saw Clay give Naylor-Legg the cash. She would later learn it was $100.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/21996789

Summary

The Oklahoma City Police Department faces backlash after body-camera footage showed Officer Joseph Gibson forcefully throwing 71-year-old Lich Vu to the ground during a traffic stop on October 27.

Vu, who has bone cancer, reportedly suffered a brain bleed requiring surgery and remains hospitalized.

The incident began with a language-barrier dispute over a U-turn citation. Vu’s family and local Vietnamese American leaders have condemned the officer’s actions, calling for his termination.

Police placed Gibson on administrative leave, pledging a thorough investigation into the incident.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/18517823

Day 2 of posting my fav Extra Fabulous comics so Zach doesn't have to: Good Cop Bad Cop

(No cum)

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sheriff is the new county based daddy

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A slide show presentation titled, “Gun PowerPoint 2,” covers training on engaging targets when in street clothes. The instruction advises students to yell “‘Drop the gun!’ while drawing and firing on the target.” Also under the title, “Engaging Targets,” the training suggests that “videos, cameras, phones, and witnesses” are targets to engage presumably to limit “Monday morning quarterbacking” from the public.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/21657306

The woman was wearing clothes so no headlines for her.

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On Sept. 12 at 8 a.m., came across a stopped vehicle with hazards on the left shoulder near John Hanson Highway and got out of his cruiser to help.

"Are you here to help her?" Sgt. Warrington asks the man.

"No, she's taking me to the hospital," he responded.

Moments later, he fires a single shot at the passenger who says he was getting a hat blown onto the road.

"Oh my God, what did you do? What did you do?" the driver screams out.

"He had a gun!" Warrington says.

"No, I don't have a gun!" the man shouts, lying on the roadway.

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According to the news source, some of the posts stated, “I am sorry. If you support the Democratic Party, I will not help you” and “The problem is that I know which of you supports the Democratic Party, and I will not help you survive the end of days.”

In another post, according to WHIO, Rodgers wrote that people would need to “provide proof of who you voted for” before rendering aid.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/21422219

Revealed: officers appear to hold Michael Kenyon, 30, to hot pavement in July, causing third-degree burns

On 6 July 2024, a day when temperatures in Phoenix, Arizona, reached 114F (45.5C), Michael Kenyon was walking to his local store to buy a soda when two officers of the city’s police department stopped him.

They hastily told him he was being detained, Kenyon recalls, without clearly stating why. Two more officers arrived.

Surveillance footage from across the parking lot, which was viewed by the Guardian, shows the 30-year-old on the pavement soon after, with several officers on top of him and holding him down. Once they lift Kenyon off the ground after roughly four minutes, he appears limp.

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He's finally arrested.

Minneapolis police are now facing heavy criticism for not arresting Sawchak before the shooting even though he had multiple complaints.

Members of the Minneapolis City Council, including Mayor Jacob Frey, pointed blame at the Minneapolis police department for not acting on any of the prior complaints against Sawchak and failing to arrest him immediately after the shooting. https://newsone.com/5658819/white-man-shoots-black-neighbor-minneapolis/

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Three changes created this shift: Overdose deaths became a national crisis. Law enforcement agents grew more effective at targeting physicians and pharmacists they thought were over-providing opioids. And legislatures and pharmacies pressured pharmacists to use prescription drug monitoring programs, known as P.D.M.P.s, big data systems funded in part by the U.S. Department of Justice.

P.D.M.P.s are surveillance technologies initially created for law enforcement. They generally compile personally identifiable information about all controlled substances (not just opioids) dispensed to patients in a state and feed it back to law enforcement and health care providers. Law enforcement uses P.D.M.P.s to track physicians, pharmacists and patients, and health care providers use them to track medications patients receive. P.D.M.P.s lack privacy protections applied to other health care data.

Use of P.D.M.P.s changed pharmacists’ routines and relationships by incorporating surveillance into patient interactions. When pharmacists refuse to dispense opioids to patients who need them or call the police on patients, they route them toward illegal drug supplies or into law enforcement territory. The result: people with substance use disorders are dying at alarming rates, and some patients with untreated chronic pain are turning to suicide. Pharmacists protect themselves from becoming law enforcement’s targets, but they put their patients in harm’s way.

Archived at https://ghostarchive.org/archive/8XrQU

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Your privacy is important. Protect yourself from Google with the FreeTube app.

The Supreme Court denied hearing Novak's case Feb 2023 effectively making parody illegal in the United States.

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