Time to get rid of police unions that encourage this type of behavior.
this post was submitted on 07 Oct 2023
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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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INFO
• A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions
• Cops aren't supposed to be smart
• 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
• When the police knock on your door
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Police union is the only union I don't support.
And the only union the right-wing supports.
Just make the unions pay liability insurance for the cops. The problem would be solved over night.
Reduce their power, don't need to remove them entirely. Every worker should have the security of one, on principle. There just need to be common sense limits to their power when it comes to such high stakes, judgment-heavy jobs as police.
Nah, fuck the police, they shouldn't have a union. They should have extremely high standards but instead they hand a gun to any moron who can go through 6 weeks of "training"
We need to apply the same level of safety regulations to police that we do to truck drivers.
Not just police unions, unions that don't do their jobs properly.
There's a building in NYC (or was before the news story anyway) with a room of teachers just sitting there doing nothing because they couldn't be fired. Some there for years.
It's insane what they protect sometimes.
That sounds doubtful
I stand corrected. I don't think this is the norm though
No, this definitely isn't. But many unions do have a habit of keeping people who should be fired for many good reasons employed.
Oh. My. Fuck!
Why do these assholes protect each other?!?!
Because they're all the same
I wonder how that interview went?
It was just a formality where they ended up trading stories about their exploits.
Probably a lot of fist bumps
Ohio.
Youngstown. It can't be overstated just how trashy that part of Ohio is.
Doesn't have enough white supremacy for an Ohio cop. Let me know when there's an update posted.
It’s overdue to create a system of licensing and certification for cops that we have for lawyers and doctors. They should be required to pass a test that certifies they understand all the laws they enforce and are then licensed to enforce the laws. Any misconduct and the lose their license to enforce the law and cannot just be rehired in the next precinct over.
Turn your body cam off during on a call? Lose your law enforcement license.