Cop in America doing a bad job, again

Grinner

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calodo2003 said:
Well, it is Thursday.

Could be justifiable, but no footage has been released yet...

https://www.yahoo.com/now/protesters-want-body-camera-video-132310830.html
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It's good that there is so much scrutiny now. Someone was complaining that they don't release the cam footage right away. @Skizzo do you know if that's a legality thing or just a policy? I think the way forward is for footage to go to an independent agency right away to foster public trust. Delaying the release always seems to look suspicious.
 

Carolina Red

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Grinner said:
It's good that there is so much scrutiny now. Someone was complaining that they don't release the cam footage right away. @Skizzo do you know if that's a legality thing or just a policy? I think the way forward is for footage to go to an independent agency right away to foster public trust. Delaying the release always seems to look suspicious.
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Release of footage is typically down to state law
 

WI_Red

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choiboyx012 said:
You're right that the victim does not respawn. But that goes for the cop too. And it's not just "a guess" as to danger. It's all the facts known at the time and the totality of the circumstances that lead up to deciding to shoot to protect your life or someone else's.
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If there was an impartial system that historically would look at each LEO involved shooting and would render a decision of justification I might me more inclined to see it your way. But that is just not the case. DA's, Unions, and cops themselves have been protecting bad shoots for decades, so LE does not get the benefit of the doubt from me. Look at how the George Floyd murder was portrayed by the Police after it happened. Look at the cover up of Laquan McDonald's murder. Look at the literal hundreds of other examples of LEO walking away with no repercussions.

If a cop is in danger I will 100 times out of 100 want him to be the one who comes away. I guess where we disagree is that you are fine with perceived danger being justification for shooting and I hold LE to a higher standard of being in actual danger.

choiboyx012 said:
Let's say for whatever reason the law changes tomorrow and LEOs can no longer shoot unless a gun is pointed at him with finger on the trigger. And the cop shall, by law, give a verbal command to "don't shoot me" before unholstering his own firearm. Even if such a law were to be implemented throughout the country charging cops with murder if they fail to do so, there will still be similar types of these police shootings. In that flight/fight, self-preservation moment you are going to do whatever you must to save your life.
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Here is where our disagreement hinges. If base human instincts drive decisions then the actor is no longer acting like an LEO, they are acting as a normal, everyday human being. If that is the case I can not deny the LEO their feeling of self preservation, but what I can deny is the assignment of the extra protections LE gets.
 

calodo2003

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Carolina Red said:
Which would fall under state law regarding body cams and FOIA requests
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Yep, it seems that this is the case in some states. Apparently some states & jurisdiction have rather arbitrary standards for releasing, standards that can be changed at the police chief level. I can see the arguments on both sides. SC was apparently the first state to mandate body cams, never knew that...

https://ktla.com/news/nationworld/release-of-police-bodycam-footage-can-take-hours-to-months/amp/
 

Balljy

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What's the rule on releasing footage? Does it vary by state or does every state have the option not to release it to the public?
 

villain

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Beachryan said:
I mean, I know nothing more than what is in that article, but there HAS to be a fair bit we don't know for such a crazy situation to have taken place.
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I'll await the body cam footage, but i'm struggling to think what can justify shooting an unarmed man 10 times.

edit - it's actually not a struggle, nothing can honestly.
 

oneniltothearsenal

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Carolina Red said:
I know the militarized departments can cut from
that part, which is why I said “moved from somewhere”, but in smaller departments that don’t have those anyway and/or are cash strapped, that will be/is a real issue to overcome.
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absolutely, but the article I linked and others note that the excessive military hardware is going to rural departments as well. Here is just one story of a town of 700 that got a military humvee (and had it stolen). Which is another issue when these departments that are smaller get military hardware they actually attract crime and make more guns available for criminals.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politic...r-military-humvees-and-assault-rifles/379470/

There should perhaps be a more centralized approach to police training and standards. Instead of letting every department do it, maybe centralize it to a statewide academy or something like that that ensures a higher level of training and more coherent policies across the board. With state or even regional/national training standards, it will be easier to hold bad actors accountable and at least attempt to address the systemic issues.

And raise the tuition to police academies to help pay for it!

Is it a perfect solution that will fix everything? Absolutely not. But it will probably lead to a lot of improvements over the current situation.
 
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Carolina Red

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oneniltothearsenal said:
note that the excessive military hardware is going to rural departments as well
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And those would fall under “militarized departments”.

There are those without that stuff. I am simply differentiating between the two.

oneniltothearsenal said:
There should perhaps be a more centralized approach to police training and standards. Instead of letting every department do it, maybe centralize it to a statewide academy
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I posted this about the topic last year...
Carolina Red said:
First part in bold is part of my point... there should be a set universal standard, as without one, Billy Bob who got rejected by the State and by the County can apply to the local town police and probably get in, meaning the people doing the local policing aren't that good.

Second part in bold is exactly what others, including myself, have already suggested, which you previously said was not feasible.
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Carolina Red said:
Well, service academies (West Point, Annapolis, etc) already give us a model... and a European country is typically roughly the size of some US state.

Beef up the statewide academies, have a set standard of policing that is taught, run it like a service academy, send graduates out to places within the state as needed.

Will it take time to replace the "old guard"? Yes. Will we wind up with a better trained police force eventually? Also yes.
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calodo2003

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Grinner said:
Oh yes...that was a fecking weird one. Did they explain it...if that is possible.
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Tweet could very well have been a fake - same last name, but reversed badge colors.

But it could have also just been deleted.

It will be interesting to look back in a year’s time on the time frame immediately after the verdict to see if there was an appreciable uptick in police shootings.
 
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