The LEO thread

[Vrede too]

Video Shows Police Pepper Spraying 84-Year-Old Woman, Tasering Son
Officers pursued the woman’s son after he ran a stop sign, police said.

... Seconds after Smith is sprayed in her face, she falls to the floor and her hands are secured behind her back. Other video shows her son being hit with a stun gun as he stands with his hands in the air....

White cops, black victims, of course.

[Seth Milner]

The officer spraying the pepper spray was a black female.

The guy ran a stop sign, why did he fail to stop?

Because he ran, the cops, at that point doesn't know if he had just committed a crime; they go to his home where his mom and he get confrontational.

I can't see spraying the old woman, unless something happened we did not see; but the son would not heed the command to get down.
At that point, LEO's have leeway to stun.

[O Really]

What a fine example of how much is wrong with race/LEO relations and why it's never as simple as the "he shoulda went down" people try to paint it. Let's start with the "bad guy." He's out at 3:30ish a.m., and I'm thinking there aren't a lot of others out in Muskogee at that time, so a black guy cruising around is likely to be noticed. At the stop sign, we've got a likely reason as to why he ran it - he knew it was the middle of the night, nobody was around, and he didn't see any cops - and he had been drinking. But here's where the first part of his stupidity shows up - he's carrying a gun, apparently illegally, knew he'd been drinking and had supposedly been a black guy all his life. A smarter person would have been driving the speed limit and done a dead stop at the sign. Of course, cops know that drunk people sometimes drive excessively carefully so he might have gotten stopped anyway, but running the stop sign was stupid. Now to the cops - no way of knowing this, but I wonder if the cops stop everybody they see rolling a stop sign late at night, or might they have ignored the Lexus rolling it? Or maybe the guy didn't even slow down - the article doesn't say. So the guy gets skeered because he knows he's drunk and has a gun and there's blue lights behind him and he takes off. Second burst of stupidity, but happens all the time. Cops chase him to his Mom's house. Now, it's the middle of the night, right? What options do the cops have? Assuming they aren't getting fired on, they can check to see who lives there. They can call in from outside, but apparently they made a forceful entrance. They're met by - an old lady who is understandably skeered and has no idea what the cops are there for or what her kid did. Stupid shows up here for the cops - they can't manage to contain a frightened unarmed old lady without spraying her? Seriously? Meanwhile, the guy, who may still be drunkish, sees his mom getting attacked, which probably doesn't help his cooperative attitude. Each action prompts a reaction, and the next thing you know, you've got your cops' pictures on national news being the "bad guys" simply for what they see as "doing their job." But both the guy and the cops never really gave a thought to options or consequences of what they were doing - they just reacted. But of everybody involved, one has to ask, if you've got one drunk guy, one old lady, and a couple of well-trained professional members of Muskogee's best who may very well have the "protect and serve" motto on their car, then who carries the most responsibility for containing and controlling the situation for the best ending for everyone - including the cops and the police department?

[Vrede too]

You've got the order a little wrong due to the way the story is presented. They first tased the son, then Mom came out to see what was going on. I won't justify what the son did and kicking in the door may have been warranted. However, the cops tased a man that had his arms up and pepper sprayed an 84-year-old woman that was no threat at all. The son will be held accountable for his criminal actions and should be, but the cops should be, too. I'd guess that the son will be penalized, two cops will maybe be punished, and then the son and Mom will get a nice chunk of change from the taxpayers.

[O Really]

Thanks - I stand corrected. However, as you pointed out, there was still the spraying of an unarmed frightened old lady gotten up in the middle of the night with people yelling. Baaaaaad incident management.

[billy.pilgrim]

What a fine example of how much is wrong with race/LEO relations and why it's never as simple as the "he shoulda went down" people try to paint it. Let's start with the "bad guy." He's out at 3:30ish a.m., and I'm thinking there aren't a lot of others out in Muskogee at that time, so a black guy cruising around is likely to be noticed. At the stop sign, we've got a likely reason as to why he ran it - he knew it was the middle of the night, nobody was around, and he didn't see any cops - and he had been drinking. But here's where the first part of his stupidity shows up - he's carrying a gun, apparently illegally, knew he'd been drinking and had supposedly been a black guy all his life. A smarter person would have been driving the speed limit and done a dead stop at the sign. Of course, cops know that drunk people sometimes drive excessively carefully so he might have gotten stopped anyway, but running the stop sign was stupid. Now to the cops - no way of knowing this, but I wonder if the cops stop everybody they see rolling a stop sign late at night, or might they have ignored the Lexus rolling it? Or maybe the guy didn't even slow down - the article doesn't say. So the guy gets skeered because he knows he's drunk and has a gun and there's blue lights behind him and he takes off. Second burst of stupidity, but happens all the time. Cops chase him to his Mom's house. Now, it's the middle of the night, right? What options do the cops have? Assuming they aren't getting fired on, they can check to see who lives there. They can call in from outside, but apparently they made a forceful entrance. They're met by - an old lady who is understandably skeered and has no idea what the cops are there for or what her kid did. Stupid shows up here for the cops - they can't manage to contain a frightened unarmed old lady without spraying her? Seriously? Meanwhile, the guy, who may still be drunkish, sees his mom getting attacked, which probably doesn't help his cooperative attitude. Each action prompts a reaction, and the next thing you know, you've got your cops' pictures on national news being the "bad guys" simply for what they see as "doing their job." But both the guy and the cops never really gave a thought to options or consequences of what they were doing - they just reacted. But of everybody involved, one has to ask, if you've got one drunk guy, one old lady, and a couple of well-trained professional members of Muskogee's best who may very well have the "protect and serve" motto on their car, then who carries the most responsibility for containing and controlling the situation for the best ending for everyone - including the cops and the police department?

Bingo

[Seth Milner]

But both the guy and the cops never really gave a thought......

There's your bottom line.

[Vrede too]

Between asthma, COPD, heart conditions and the frailty of old age, pepper spraying an 84-year-old can easily be deadly. :cussing:

Aside: Heard from an RN that was there - Our now disgraced, bipolar, former Henderson County Sheriff, before he was Sheriff, once pepper sprayed a restrained patient in the Pardee ER. He was going to do it again when a tiny female RN told him that she'd break his arm if he did. He didn't.

[billy.pilgrim]

But both the guy and the cops never really gave a thought......

There's your bottom line.

One has the right to be a dumbass

We pay the other one to think

[Seth Milner]

.... a tiny female RN told him that she'd break his arm if he did. He didn't.

I love it!

[Vrede too]

Tell Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson:

“Terminate and refuse to renew immigrant detention contracts with private prison companies.”

DHS Reviewing ICE Use of Private Prisons

[O Really]

Report of prisoners enjoying the "amenities" and "good life" in jail...
https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/aspi ... 54655.html

[Seth Milner]

Report of prisoners enjoying the "amenities" and "good life" in jail...
https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/aspi ... 54655.html

Put dominant animals with weaker animals . . .

[Vrede too]

Why lying, violent, racist, asshole cops are so confident they can get away with it:

Two Chicago cops face firing decade after off-duty beating captured on video

[Vrede too]

Girl on bike sues after off-duty officer throws her down (with video)

... Officer Williams still works for the department ...

Tillman, then a 10th-grader, and her brother, Eric Branch, 16, were heading home from a fast food restaurant and cut across the Tacoma Mall parking lot on their bicycles on May 24, 2014....

Tillman asked Williams why they were being stopped, and he said they were “causing a disturbance” and trespassing, the complaint said. Police have since declined to clarify what that disturbance entailed....

As Williams took out a pad of paper, Tillman started to pedal away.

“Williams erupted and began brutalizing this 15-year-old girl,” the complaint said.

The video shows Williams grabbing the girl off the bike and pushing her against a car. He then grabbed her hair and threw her to the ground.

He used his stun gun on her, “sending painful electric shocks” through her body, the lawsuit says.

Tillman’s brother tried to help his sister, and Williams threatened him with the device, the complaint said. The other security officer grabbed or shoved the boy to the ground and handcuffed him. Both siblings were booked into a juvenile facility.

Tillman was charged with assaulting an officer, resisting arrest and obstruction, but the counts were later dismissed, her lawyer said.

Her lawsuit alleges that the department fails to train, investigate or discipline its officers who use force, so it’s become a common practice to the point that it’s encouraged....

Black girl, 15 years old, lying white cop, 2 years, no disciplinary action, likely hit to the taxpayers.

[O Really]

Say what you like about cops just "doing their job" or "lives on the line" or whatever, the juxtaposition of two articles today from different places is astounding. (1) guy has shotgun and handgun, points shotgun at cop. Cop manages to arrest him without shooting him. Coincidental possibly that the perp is white, but how many articles have we read where a black guy was shot because the cop "thought" he might have been armed? (2) Cop confronts guy armed with handgun, who threatens to shoot the cop. Cop recognizes a "suicide by cop" situation and gets the guy to drop his gun. Gun was not loaded, but cop couldn't have known that. Two other cops came up and shot the now unarmed guy dead. Cop gets fired for not shooting the guy. Question of the day - what race was the perp?

[Sometime Lefty]

He did not drop the gun. When the other two cops arrived he started walking towards them waving the gun. Of course he was shot. At that point the only color that mattered was the color of the gun.

[Vrede too]

Just heard a radio story about this. The first on the scene was still probationary - 9 months on the job. He thought he was talking the guy down and did not shoot. The other 2 that arrived later were more experienced and, as Sometime Lefty says, the guy then started pointing his gun at the cops and they shot him. The probie did not shoot. However, he thinks he did the right thing and that the other cops did the right thing - they all just had different information to act on. The probie was fired and all the lawyers he contacted said there's nothing he can do about it. Also, the dead guy's gun was unloaded.

[O Really]

And yet...another black guy gets gunned down while the white guy points his shotgun at the cops and walks (well, OK, gets perp-walked) away. I don't think it's coincidence. It may be cops are more afraid of black people with guns than white people; if that's a valid fear, let's see some stats. It may be that when a black guy says "I'mma gonna shoot you mo-fo" that the cops believe him, but don't believe the white guy who says something similar. Who knows? But almost everything can be justified if narrowed down to just one moment of an entire scene. Cliched example, Zimmerman, who probably was really afraid for his life at the time he drew his gun - but is it reasonable to ignore all that went on before and led to that moment?

Sure, it's easy to say it's the color of the gun, not the person, but without doubt cops are getting more trigger-happy. More likely to shoot first and refuse to answer questions later. And those shot are disproportionately black people.

[O Really]

Not to make fun of another sad incident, but this has got to be the worst headline regarding the latest black kid getting shot...


The Independent (UK)

OHIO
"Police shoot dead 13-year-old boy with BB gun"