And while we’re on the subject of Ferguson, what policy change would effect the outcome the protesters there are seeking? Short of the parousia, I don’t think there is one. Indeed, most policy changes I can think of wouldn’t change the outcome and might well be worse than the status quo.
I think that Missouri should bring its state law into accord with current Supreme Court jurisprudence but that wouldn’t have changed the outcome in this particular case.
I don’t know if the public has all the facts, but the civil lawsuit will no doubt argue lack of training regardless. The Missouri immunity law may not have anything to do with it; officers might be trained on a different standard.
Thirty years ago, we were taught that Supreme Court decisions overruled any state or local laws. At the time, Louisiana had an abortion law on the books, but Roe v Wade had overturned it. Killing a fleeing felon that violated the Supreme Court ruling was murder, and the circumstances were very narrow.
In addition, there was a federal law, “1983”, about Civil Right suits, and you could be sued personally. In the prison, there were so many federal suits the sheriff arranged for the judge to come onsite.
@PD Shaw should know the technical details.
No argument here, TB. The reason to change the. Missouri law is to avoid confusion. I’m not sure the fleeing felon rule applies in this case.
TB: The SCOTUS ruled that shooting a fleeing felon, even if justified under state law, was not a defense to a civil lawsuit seeking damages under federal law. The SCOTUS did not invalidate state fleeing felon rules. If a state feels that the public good is enhanced by not prosecuting law enforcement for shooting a fleeing felon, they can pay damages to the family (probably something like $2 to $3 million).
The main difference with abortion is one between state action and inaction. States had laws they were using to punish women and doctors performing abortions. Those laws, even in states where they are still on the books, cannot be enforced. The fleeing-felon rule involves states not prosecuting individuals. The federal government cannot force states to prosecute any crimes.
Perhaps they could try the policy of firing the entire Ferguson PD and not replace them with anyone. Since a great many people there and elsewhere think the police are the problem, just don’t have any. Post signs all around the perimeter of the town warning others that Ferguson is a no police zone, and let’s see how it works out.
It’ll be a veritable libertarian & progressive dream state!
Prof. Paul Cassel, blogging at Volokh, is skeptical of my view, but he hasn’t researched it:
“This statute is patently unconstitutional, at least to the extent that it purports to authorize deadly force to apprehend any fleeing felon regardless of the danger of that felon. While interesting issues can arise about the extent to which a criminal defendant can rely on an unconstitutional statute, my sense (without having researched the issue in detail) is that the statute will be construed to authorize deadly force only to the extent consistent with the Supreme Court’s decision in Tennessee v. Garner, that is, deadly force is permissible when the fleeing suspect posed “a threat of serious physical harm, either to the officer or to others.†”
I think Cassel wrote something similar a few months ago, so obviously he hasn’t found enough interest to look into the issue, but I don’t see any conflict between these two propositions:
It would violate the Michael Brown’s family’s federal right to seek damages if the state fleeing felon rule is used to bar recovery, and
It would violate Darren Wilson’s rights to bar him from asserting the fleeing felon rule (*) in defense of a prosecution under state murder laws.
A tax is not always a tax, it depends on the situation.
(*) Assuming there is some evidence that the rule would apply.
Icepick: I find it interesting when certain people, who claim that private gun ownership isn’t necessary because we can rely on the police, are the same people that say we cannot otherwise rely upon the police.
OK, I think Cassel is right because the Missouri pattern jury instructions require a risk of physical injury if the suspect is not arrested immediately.
http://www.realclearpolicy.com/blog/2014/08/16/missouris_rule_on_deadly_force_by_cops_1044.html
The judges apparently wanted certainty.
@PD Shaw
That is what we were taught, but I believe the means or the ability to obtain the means to carry out the act was required. It was subject to the reasonable person standard. I think it was part of the state criminal code, and it seems to have been based on an earlier case. It might have been a Louisiana state Supreme Court case.
@Icepick
The previous parish (county) Sheriff was “just a Chinaman” (his words). The drug and gang squad would concentrate in the areas with drugs and gangs which were poor and black.
When you specialize on one type of crime, you get to know that type of criminal, and they would go into those areas and harass the drug dealers. You jack (stop and frisk) anybody associated with the drug trade – buyers, sellers, lookouts, runners, etc.
You make arrests and are gaining intel, but mostly, you are making life difficult for them. Occasionally, you will jack a civilian, but you do not want to bother the local people. If it is a teenager, you might dump out his bag of weed and let him go, but it depends upon the situation.
A lot of outsiders decided to begin protesting, and Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson’s group were involved. They started calling the Sheriff a racist, and in his thickest Chinese accent said, “How can I be racist? I am just a Chinaman.” He then pulled all patrols from the area, and they would only respond to 911 calls. Within a few days, the locals wanted the outsiders gone and the patrols back.
Some years later, a few of the people in the unit were stealing drug money. He fired them, and they may have been arrested. He then shut down the entire unit. NOPD on the other hand …
If it is a teenager, you might dump out his bag of weed and let him go, but it depends upon the situation.
Yeah, saw some of that when I was younger, heard about more. I remember one case where a couple of guys, say 17, were given all the money to buy beer & booze for a big beach party. They got pulled over on the way over and the cops made ’em pour it all out. The guys in question said it took 45 minutes and that they were in tears for all the wasted alcohol. They even begged the cops to take it, not as a bribe, but just to save it.
Ah, good times, good times!
Reportedly, the two cops just kept snickering at the guys while they poured – bastards! Lolz!
Watching CNN’s riot porn. They’re lamenting the fact that the police & Fire & Rescue are pulling out. What the fuck were they expecting? Not to mention that the entirety of CNN’s broadcast crew and producers hate the police and want them all indicted and hung. Christ Almighty, but the levels of stupid can only be measured used mathematics developed for measuring astronomical phenomena.
But it was all worth it for the split screen shot on CNN of the President urging the POLICE to remain calm, while the other screen showed “peaceful demonstrators” throwing Molotov cocktails at police cars. Utterly, totally, amazingly priceless.
Who doesn’t hate the police?
Dave, I thought the site looked better before the update. But I’ll get used to it.
Yeah, me too. I’ll try to tinker with the cosmetics but it’s hard to find time to work on the looks of the site other than on weekends. At least as long as I have this downtown gig. They’ve asked me to stay until the middle of December.
The good news is that the new theme is responsive which means that it changes its geometry depending on the geometry of the device on which you’re viewing it which should make the site easier to view via phones and tablets. That wasn’t the reason for my change–it was a security update–but it’s a side effect of the change.
I liked the aesthetics of the old look better, but this is much more readable. I’m getting older, so the latter matters more.
Ben Wolf
Who doesn’t hate the police?
I do not hate the police, but I hate what they have become. I also hate hearing people complain about what they have become, but then, do nothing when they have the chance.
Democrats could have gotten rid of the federal programs giving military arms to local police, federal funds to local police, laws criminalizing local crimes, civil forfeiture, and many more. Instead, they whine about the police being racist.
Interestingly, the racist police forces keep the black and brown undesirables out of their white communities, but I am not supposed to notice. Too bad, I am not a Republican, conservative, or right winger, and I do notice.
Forty to fifty years ago, the left decided to use criminal tactics, and they began supporting criminals. They covered this by claiming they were trying to free innocent people and end police brutality and corruption. The right countered with the War on Drugs. Poor communities are more vulnerable to crime, and therefore, they have had to pay the price for this foolish nonsense.
The problem with innocent people going to jail was the indigent defender programs. Most are overwhelmed, and they recommend plea deals. This was true then, and it is true now. With a good indigent defender program, some guilty get away, and the innocent go free. In the cases where somebody goes to jail for a crime he/she did not commit, they got away with something else.
Today, the War on Drugs has made this almost impossible. With the sentencing restrictions and three strikes, the prosecutor can get a plea deal for very harsh crimes even with a good lawyer. If you lose at trial, you are f*cked, and they have the system stacked against you.
Police work deals with violent people, and it is often brutal. It is not to be done using the Marquess of Queensberry rules, and you need people who do not pull out a gun every time a fly farts. What you need are people who can tell the difference between civilians and criminals, and you need people who have a high tolerance for dangerous situations.
Being a criminal is a job like any other job, and a criminal understands what is included. A data entry person can get carpal tunnel syndrome. It is a risk of the job, and you accept the risk. A criminal can get a beat down. It is a risk of the job, and you accept the risk.
A lot of the corrupt is the result of drugs. It is either the police becoming involved in the drug trade, or it is the police department earning money through the War on Drugs. There are a number of federal programs that incentivize drug arrests, and therefore, drug arrests become a revenue source for the department.
All this ties together in the purpose of the police department. It is to protect the community from criminals, and as a public entity, it is also to serve the community. This can be done in several ways.
One thing is to understand that a convicted felon is probably going to be a lifetime criminal. The best way to keep him from becoming a lifetime criminal is to keep him from becoming a convicted felon. The best way to keep him from becoming a convicted felon is to not arrest him for a felony, and it would be even better to not arrest him at all.
The problem is that not arresting somebody is harassing them, and this has been deemed to be unacceptable and possibly racist. At one time, you could just dump out a bag of weed and tell the teenager what you could do, and if you knew the area, you might mention his mother or grandmother. If he is a hardcore gandbanger, you run him in, but you can tell the difference between a gangbanger and a wanna be.
Today, you have to arrest him, and he winds up with a felony conviction. This has been going on for years, and the people that you get to enforce the laws are people who are good at following the procedures. They cannot tell a gangbanger from a wanna be, but it would not matter. If they find a bag of weed, they make an arrest or be accused of being a racist.
Today, you have people that try hard and mean well. They can pass standardized tests, and they know all the procedures. Their job has been classified as objective, and they can do it objectively. Unfortunately, it is a subjective job, and they do not know how to make subjective judgements.
Your take on it is very interesting, TB. Doesn’t the approach you describe though rely on the existence of community and family members who will keep the kids in line? What good is the threat of telling mothers and grandmothers if they aren’t going to enforce any consequence for drug use and theft?
I’m not disagreeing with your assessment of the problem with arrest and incarceration for first offenses- just wondering whether the old way of handling these things is still even possible. Taking the current case as an example, the kid robbed a store, roughed up a store employee and a cop, and his family has said nothing except that he was a big teddy bear. Makes it hard to think that appeals to the kid’s fear of the wrath of mama would have done any good.
@CStanley
Today, the problem is that both sides have gotten so entrenched it would take something extraordinary to change things. The War on Drugs has changed the way prosecution works, but few middle class people have a clue that it is nothing like Law and Order. The only way to convince people is through direct or indirect experience.
In my examples, I use mothers and grandmothers because they were emotional and authority figures at that time, but it was all situational. Putting a foot in somebody’s ass was another tool. You just made sure to not leave bruises or have a good story. If the statute of limitations had not run out, a lot of people here and at OTB would put me under the jail. Abu Ghraib was a resort compared to most US prisons, and back then, OPP was a rather unpleasant place.
The Sheriff did a lot of community outreach. This was mostly for political purposes, but it was also to promote the department against NOPD bullshit. If a school or community center needed to be painted or cleaned, he would send a supervised work crew. He would provide meals for nursing homes for the holidays. We would also provide security. This was done in the poorer areas, and they got to know us.
I did a lot of this, and as a white boy from the suburbs, I got exposed to a lot of poor black people. It was a different experience because these were the folks who cared about their community, and a lot of them were women. I met the best and the worst, and I learned the dynamics of those communities. If we were in the upper income areas, the dynamics would have been different.
(This is how I ended up living in the black areas of town. It was cheaper. I could rent one side of a shotgun house, and by that time, I never noticed being around black people. Of course, white people would rarely come over.)
A side note: NOPD would usually stay out of the projects. The people did not like them, and they had a good reason. NOPD was corrupt. At one time, NOPD was working for the drug dealers, but then, they decided to run it themselves. There was at least one contract put out on a person who filed a complaint with Internal Affairs.
Between the informants in the prison and the ones on the street, I knew a lot that was going on in the city. It would take NOPD months to learn information that they could have learned in a day if they would have asked us, but they were assholes.
In the end, there is no one-size-fits-all. It is subjective based upon community and situation. I do not know the specifics of Ferguson. Thirty years ago in one of the New Orleans project areas, a guy going into a corner store, roughing up the owner, stealing cigars, casually strolling in the middle of the street, and doing it in the middle of the day is a different situation from a simple robbery, an armed robbery, or a burglary.
Thirty years ago, I could find this guy at any time. Somebody knows who the hell he is. This probably is not his first time roughing up people, and if I know the area, somebody will rat him out. If I am going to confront him, I make sure I am going to be in control of the situation. If not, I do not engage.
To a person not familiar with New Orleans poor areas, especially around the projects, this probably seems like madness. In the nice, comfortable, safe middle class suburbs, this may be madness, but at the time, it was not.
The goal should be establishing positive feedback loops. It does not matter how justified Officer Wilson was. A negative feedback loop has been established, and I do not think it was worth it. Calling everybody racist has a similar effect, but the white liberals do not live in these communities. Of course, white liberals pay the racist cops to keep the undesirables out of their communities.
And so it goes.
TB- I grew up in Algiers (from 6th grade through high school, anyway, ’76 through ’82) so all of that rings true. Though we lived in a relatively safe suburb, those places aren’t nearly as sheltered as are most American suburbs. It was quite a rude awakening when we moved there from the northeast (I’d literally never met a black person before.)
I’m guessing you were with Jefferson Parish and the Chinaman was Harry Lee?
@CStanley
I grew up in Jefferson, but I worked for Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office. I moved about three blocks from the St. Thomas projects, and my family thought I lost my mind. There was gunfire every night, and the crack whores were everywhere.
New Orleans and Jefferson were night and day.