Again not sticking up for these guys. But the visibly armed suspect would get more attention from me on a call like this as he is the one most able to kill me. Just the way you have to think to make it home at the end of your shift. Once things are figured out and tensions are calmed then the cuffs can come off.
Pat
Understand an agree, I am just saying that plus video confiscation is what is upsetting to many, IMO.
Agree with you that is upsetting. We do not have a right to stop people from recording what we are doing.
Pat
I handled a situation exactly like this one. I did not handle it the same way.
Upon arrival, I advised the homeowner I would take care of the situation and asked him to put his long gun back in the house before other officers arrived. The tresspasser had his dick in the dirt, not the homeowner.
During my career I could not care less who videotaped what I was doing. If you wanted to get my good side though, you had your work cut out for you.
That is exactly the perspective we expect if our paid public law enforcement everything should be above board. The interactions I have had with officers would be ones they would be proud to have on the news, very professional.
An officer destroying evidence deliberately ought to carry a heavy criminal penalty and loss of job RTFN.
One of the few posts I have seen from you in GD which I agree with Pat.
It’s instances like this, and cops like those which cause a larger portion of the population to distrust and dislike the police.
It may be the case of a few bad apples, but who knows…
Very sad. I hope both of those guys are collecting shopping carts outside of WalMart in a few months time.
Am I reading this right? The membership has indicted these guys based on a media report and a ~30 second video snippet?
There usually are standards in place at the time of hire. After that the police unions take over.
Property owner makes stupid error confronting trespassing biker with firearm. Placing some random spike strips along the trail with leaves or brush covering them work well. I’m not a fan of wire strung across private trails but have seen them in place and hit one while riding as a teenager.
Lots of interesting points in this discussion. I find the farther away from cops the better in my life. Just to add my father was a career cop and I have no record, traffic or otherwise.
It has nothing to do with unions. Having worked at both union and non union departments the fitness standards are not higher at one or the other. The only thing that does seem to matter is rather its local vs state. Generally Troopers have higher fitness standards than local PD’s. Damn some people here want to blame everything on unions even global warming. Give it a rest.
Pat
Yes, I am. Telling the lady to turn her camera off is something that should have never crossed his mind. As far as the other stuff I agree that there is nothing in evidence to support it.
The act of forcing her to turn off the camera and that he deleted the file is bad enough on its own to justify termination. The reason I say this is because our job requires integrity. I am sure you have heard of the Brady Office case. Basically its case law showing an officers personal file can be used against him when ever issues of honesty violations have occured. An officer then can’t reliably testify in court making him or her useless. You can get away with some serious mistakes like wrecking a patrol car and still keep your job but if you lie or try to cover something up you’re gone.
Pat
I would recommend all citizens begin wearing these:
http://www.brickhousesecurity.com/category/hidden+cameras/body+worn+cameras.do
Yeah, I think when Google Glasses take off and everyone and their grandmother is recording everything in site we might see some changes . . .
If I was dispatched to handle this call, I would tell the person with the camera to make sure they got my good side.
If you are doing nothing wrong, being videotaped is not an issue.