Tag Archives: Police

May 9, 2013 · 11:47 AM

Police Chief Calls Out Armed Protest Threat In Washington DC

Think Progress

A July 4 march encourages gun advocates tocarry loaded rifles into Washington, DC and knowingly break the law. Although described as a nonviolent “act of civil obedience,” organizer Adam Kokesh implied a threat of violence if “the government chooses to make it violent.” He encourages participants to peacefully submit to law enforcers but underlines that point with, “We are truly saying in the SUBTLEST way possible that we would rather die on our feet than live on our knees.”

Since Friday, more than 2,000 people have RSVPed to the march to “put the government on notice.”

In a local news channel interview pointed out by Politico, Metropolitan Police Department Chief Cathy Lanier explained that this is an open disregard for DC law:

[W]hen you cross with firearms and you’re not in compliance with the law now you’re talking about a criminal offense and there’s going to be some action by police. Obviously there has been no permit filed by the organizer and we’ve not made contact with the organizer yet. But we will, and we’ll make sure they understand that if they want to pass through the District of Columbia with loaded firearms as long as they are in compliance with the firearms laws for transportation of firearms to the District, we’re all for it. But passing into the District of Columbia with firearms is a violation of the law and we’ll have to treat it as such.

Whether Lanier’s warning invigorates or extinguishes the protest remains unclear.

Kokesh’s plans, along with a series of other open carry protests, undermines arguments made by the National Rifle Association against gun violence prevention. The NRA claims that it is unfair of the government to strengthen background checks or ban assault rifles for law-abiding citizens. Yet this protest plans to purposely break the law.

That point is missed by Kokesh. Open carry is illegal in the District, but Kokesh wants to aim his message at the federal government for attempting modest background checks supported by gun owners and non-gun owners alike.

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May 8, 2013 · 7:39 AM

NYPD: It’s too hard looking for gay-bashers

NY-Knicks

I would suspect that some members and officials of the NYPD have the same mindset as the alleged gay-bashers, hence their original statement that it would be “too hard to find them”...

America Blog

Two gay men were reportedly attacked, apparently for walking arm in arm, outside a New York Knicks game at Madison Square Garden in NYC on Sunday.

The police originally told the victims, one of whom suffered a broken nose, that it would be hard identifying the suspects since so many people were wearing Knicks shirts at the time.

Once word got out about the crime, the NYPD changed its tune and announced on Tuesday that it was looking for the suspected gay-bashers.

I’ve witnessed this kind of behavior before from the police in Washington, DC.  They have ample incentive for trying to get you not to file a crime report.  First, there’s an incentive to have crime go down, and one of the easiest ways to have crime go down is not to file a report at all.  So you’ll have police finding crafty ways of trying to convince victims not to file a

Two gay men were reportedly attacked, apparently for walking arm in arm, outside a New York Knicks game at Madison Square Garden in NYC on Sunday.

The police originally told the victims, one of whom suffered a broken nose, that it would be hard identifying the suspects since so many people were wearing Knicks shirts at the time.

Once word got out about the crime, the NYPD changed its tune and announced on Tuesday that it was looking for the suspected gay-bashers.

I’ve witnessed this kind of behavior before from the police in Washington, DC.  They have ample incentive for trying to get you not to file a crime report.  First, there’s an incentive to have crime go down, and one of the easiest ways to have crime go down is not to file a report at all.  So you’ll have police finding crafty ways of trying to convince victims not to file a report.

Another reason police don’t like to file crime reports is that if they catch a suspect, the paperwork, and the time it takes to get them in the system, and process them, is also a pain.   If you don’t catch the bad guy, you don’t have to work extra hours processing the bad guy.

And finally, if they’re going to through all that extra work to process arrestees, they’d rather do it for a “real” criminal, a murderer, rather than someone who beats the f out of gays.

In big cities, the system, and its incentives, sadly can work against victims (and against good police officers themselves).

Fortunately, NYPD seems finally interested in working on this crime.

(h/t Liberaland)

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April 22, 2013 · 6:10 AM

5 dead after shooting in Seattle’s Federal Way suburb, police say

Our elected lawmakers are scared to death of the NRA, so sadly, this sort of thing will be happening ad infinitum…

MSNBC News

Five people were killed in a shooting at an apartment complex near Seattle late on Sunday, including a suspect who was shot by officers, police said.

Officers were called to a shooting in progress at around 9:30 p.m. local time (12:30 a.m. ET) emergency call from the complex in Federal Way, which is between Seattle and Tacoma, police spokeswoman Cathy Schrock said.

Gunshots were still being heard when officers arrived at the complex, she said.

“As officers assessed the scene two males could be seen in the parking lot injured,” Schrock said in a statement.  “An officer attempted to rescue the men, and as the (police officer) approached, one of the males on the ground reached for a weapon.”

This led to police officers firing on the suspect. Three men were confirmed dead in the parking lot, and a woman and another man were found dead in a nearby apartment, police said.

No officers were injured in the incident.

While there was no word on what caused the gunfire, police said they did not think another shooter was on the loose.

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March 26, 2013 · 4:56 AM

Nebraska Cops Chase Down Man Filming Their Police Brutality

nebraska-police

PoliticusUSA

Omaha, NE police not only used excessive force while performing arrest, but they also entered a home without a warrant to confiscate video, and knocked over a woman in a wheelchair.

A young man in black can be seen filming Omaha police officers using excessive force with his phone. The suspect’s brother was filming the abuse, and shouting at the officers, “That’s abuse. It’s abuse. It’s abuse,” and at one point telling an officer to, “get your knee off his neck.” As more officers arrive, police start chasing the brother in what appears to be an attempt to confiscate his phone.

According to PINAC, “Omaha police displayed an unbridled street gang brazenness when they chased a man who was video recording them abusing his brother into a private home, confiscating his phone and arresting him to ensure their actions would never see the light of day…Police also arrested a third brother inside the home they entered without a warrant, not to mention they knocked over a woman in a wheelchair.”

The Omaha police managed to use excessive force while arresting someone, then chased the person filming their conduct into a home, which they entered without a warrant, confiscated his video of the incident, charged him with disorderly conduct/obstructing police, and just for the sake of karma, knocked over a woman in a wheelchair.

Most law enforcement officers are decent people who perform dangerous jobs to the best of their ability, but it’s videos like this one that make all cops look bad. The Omaha police conspired with the local media to make sure that the video shot by the brother was not mentioned in any news reports, but their attempted cover up was thwarted by a neighbor who filmed the whole incident from a second story window.

 Bad cops may be able to hide their brutality from the local press, but they can’t hide from YouTube.

Let this be a lesson to all who abuse their power. The cameras are everywhere, and we’re watching.

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March 1, 2013 · 4:25 PM

Jury Finds Occupy Wall Street Protester Innocent After Video Contradicts Police Testimony [Updated: VIDEO]

Police were kettling protesters on 29th Street using orange nets when they arrested Michael Premo.

I found this interesting and decided to share…

The Village Voice

In the first jury trial stemming from an Occupy Wall Street protest, Michael Premo was found innocent of all charges yesterday after his lawyers presented video evidence directly contradicting the version of events offered by police and prosecutors.

Premo, an activist and community organizer who has in recent months been a central figure in the efforts of Occupy Sandy, was one of many hundred people who took part in a demonstration in Lower Manhattan on December 17 of 2011, when some protesters broke into a vacant lot in Duarte Square in an attempt to start a new occupation.

After police broke up the action in Duarte Square, hundreds of protesters marched north,
playing a game of cat and mouse with police on foot and on scooters, who tried to slow and divide the column of marchers. At 29th Street near Seventh Avenue, police finally managed to trap a large number of marchers, kettling them from both sides of the block with bright orange plastic netting. After holding the crowd in the nets for some time, a few people managed to escape, and police rushed in to the crowd with their hands up. In the commotion, Premo fell to the ground and attempted to crawl out of the scrum. (Covering the march, I was also kettled on this block for a time, though I only witnessed Premo’s arrest from a distance.)

In the police version of events, Premo charged the police like a linebacker, taking out a lieutenant and resisting arrest so forcefully that he fractured an officer’s bone. That’s the story prosecutors told in Premo’s trial, and it’s the general story his arresting officer testified to under oath as well.

But Premo, facing felony charges of assaulting an officer, maintained his innocence. His lawyers, Meghan Maurus and Rebecca Heinegg, set out to find video evidence to contradict it. Prosecutors told them that police TARU units, who filmed virtually every moment of Occupy street protests, didn’t have any footage of the entire incident. But Maurus knew from video evidence she had received while representing another defendant arrested that day that there was at least one TARU officer with relevant footage. Reviewing video shot by a citizen-journalist livestreamer during Premo’s arrest, she learned that a Democracy Now cameraman was right in the middle of the fray, and when she tracked him down, he showed her a video that so perfectly suited her needs it brought a tear to her eye.

Continued here…

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February 14, 2013 · 8:36 AM

Christopher Dorner: cabin fire was not intentional, say police

I’ve been hesitant to write about this story due to some unresolved ambivalence on my part.

On one hand, I recognize completely that Christopher Dorner coldly murdered four people.  There is absolutely no justification for such actions by a sane and rational human being.  The question remains, however, was he sane and rational?  It seems to me Dorner had some serious psychological issues…yet…there was no talk of his psychological state.  Only that a big black ex-Navy sniper was running wild killing police officers.

This tweet summed it all up for me:

The Guardian

Sheriff’s office confirms pyrotechnic teargas canisters were launched into cabin but ‘we didn’t intend to burn it down’

Police have confirmed they started the blaze that engulfed Chris Dorner’s cabin but said the use of pyrotechnic canisters had not been intended to cause a fire.

“It was not on purpose. We didn’t intentionally burn down that cabin to get Mr Dorner out,” John McMahon, a spokesperson for San Bernardino sheriff’s department, told a news conference on Wednesday night.

The admission followed speculation and controversy over whether authorities started the blaze to trap and kill a fugitive who had killed four people and terrorised police in a bloody vendetta against California‘s law enforcers.

Forensic scientists have not yet positively identified the human remains recovered from the cabin following Tuesday’s siege but McMahon said his department had little doubt they belonged to Dorner, 33, a former LAPD officer. “We believe that this investigation is over at this point.”

Link to video: Christopher Dorner: ‘police discuss burn plan’ – audio

 

The LAPD stood down from high alert and resumed regular policing, marking the end of a week-long drama of shootouts, chases and the biggest US manhunt in living memory.

Riverside police buried officer Michael Crain, 34, a father of two gunned down last week, to the accompaniment of bagpipes after a funeral cortege was led by police motorcycles.

The San Bernardino sheriff’s department named the deputy who died in Tuesday’s siege as Jeremiah MacKay, 35, a married veteran of the force with a seven-year-old daughter and four-month-old son.

Witnesses filled in details of Dorner’s dramatic bid to escape the mountains of San Bernardino, where he had holed up for five days, but key questions were left unanswered.

A sheriff’s department spokesman declined to explain how deputies missed Dorner while he hid apparently for five days in a cabin five minutes’ walk from the command centre that was used to direct a dragnet of 200 officers.

In desperation authorities drummed up a $1m reward for information leading to his capture, thought to be the largest bounty in California’s history.

The search around the mountains east of LA had been winding down on Tuesday when two housekeepers entered the cabin. Dorner tied them up and made off in a stolen purple Nissan. One of the housekeepers freed herself and alerted authorities.

Fish and wildlife department officers intercepted the vehicle and gave chase. Dorner shot and hit their vehicle but caused no injuries. He crashed, then commandeered a silver Dodge Ram pick-up belonging to Angelus Oaks resident Rick Heltebrake. Dorner pointed a rifle at Heltebrake’s head and ordered him out.

“I did not feel like he wanted to hurt me,” said the local camp ranger. “It was clear I wasn’t part of his agenda and there were other people down the road that were part of his agenda. Unfortunately he found them and now we have one less sheriff’s deputy in San Bernardino.”

Dorner briefly shook off his pursuers by overtaking two school buses and leaving the highway, said Patrick Foy, a spokesman with the fish and wildlife department, but other units found him after he again crashed. He fled on foot to the nearest rental cabin and was swiftly surrounded.

Swat teams lobbed traditional teargas canisters into the cabin but as Dorner kept firing they switched to pyrotechnic ones. “It does generate a lot of heat. We introduced those canisters into the residence and a fire erupted,” said McMahon. Such devices were called burners, he said.

The spokesman’s insistence that the blaze was not intentional appeared to be put in question by an exchange between deputies at the scene during the scene. The exchange was heard on a police scanner and published by the journalist Max Blumenthal.

“We’re gonna go ahead with the plan with the burner. Like we talked about,” said one deputy. Minutes later another deputy’s voice said: “The burner’s deployed and we have a fire.” Social media buzzed with claims that police had sought to burn Dorner alive.

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December 22, 2012 · 2:36 AM

THE NUTS COME OUT: NRA Responds To School Shooting

Wayne LaPierre , chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association is so out of touch with reality, that he never even gave the Newtown, CT victims‘ survivors the NRA’s condolences (or his own personal condolences for that matter.)

His speech was a rambling treatise demonstrating  how more armed security personnel in schools will prevent another Sandy Hook tragedy.  He talked about how the media and left-wing organizations are demonizing his organization.

He blamed video games, movies and music videos for exposing children to a violent culture.

Simply put, the man is one sandwich short of a picnic…

The Huffington Post

The nation’s largest gun-rights lobby is calling for armed police officers to be posted in every American school to stop the next killer “waiting in the wings.”

The National Rifle Association broke its silence Friday on last week’s shooting rampage at a Connecticut elementary school that left 26 children and staff dead.

The group’s top lobbyist, Wayne LaPierre, said at a Washington news conference that “the next Adam Lanza,” the man responsible for last week’s mayhem, is planning an attack on another school.

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” LaPierre said.

He blamed video games, movies and music videos for exposing children to a violent culture day in and day out.

“In a race to the bottom, many conglomerates compete with one another to shock, violate, and offend every standard of civilized society, by bringing an even more toxic mix of reckless behavior and criminal cruelty right into our homes,” LaPierre said.

He refused to take any questions after speaking. Still, though security was tight, two protesters were able to interrupt LaPierre’s speech, holding up signs that blamed the NRA for killing children. Both were escorted out, shouting that guns in schools are not the answer.

More than a dozen security officers checked media credentials at various checkpoints and patrolled the hotel ballroom.

LaPierre announced that former Rep. Asa Hutchison, R-Ark., will lead an NRA program that will develop a model security plan for schools that relies on armed volunteers.

Continue here…

 

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December 5, 2012 · 12:15 AM

GOP Congressman’s Restaurant Accused Of Turning Away Muslim Couple

Yet another GOP faux pas.  Assuming the Muslim couple’s version of events are true, how will they ever win another election again with this sort of behavior?

Think Progress

New Orleans residents Mohammed and Talat Husain claim they were refused service at Rep. John Fleming’s (R-LA) Subway franchise in Shreveport, Louisiana. According to Husain, an employee of the chain told them to leave because they are Muslim and threw them out after an altercation. Though Husain called the police, a report was never filed. He recounted the experience to TPM:

“She asked me point blank ‘Are you Muslim?’ and I said, ‘Yes, I’m Muslim,’ She said ‘We can’t serve you’ and locked the door from inside when my wife was still inside the store,” Husain said.

The situation quickly escalated and Husain ended up calling 911. So did a Subway employee. At some point before police arrived, however Husain said the employee unlocked the door and let his wife leave but also made it clear they should take their business elsewhere.

An officer with the Shreveport Police Department arrived after that. Both Husain and a department spokesman said the officer initially patted Husain down to check for weapons. But spokesman Cpl. Marcus Hines said the officer eventually determined the situation was much ado about nothing. Department records show the officer didn’t even file a report.

Fleming’s employees deny Husain’s version of events, and claim that security tapes prove that there was no discrimination against the couple. Still, the Shreveport police are ignoring a request for an investigation by the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Fleming, a devout Christian, warned in August that the election was a choice between “competing world views” of “a godless society” or “a Christian nation.”

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November 28, 2012 · 8:08 AM

Supreme Court Inaction Boosts Right To Record Police Officers

Score another one for democracy…

The Huffington Post

On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court  declined to review a decision by the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals blocking the enforcement of an Illinois eavesdropping law. The broadly written law — the most stringent in the country — makes it a felony to make an audio recording of someone without their permission, punishable by four to 15 years in prison.

Many states have similar “all-party consent” law, which mean one must get the permission of all parties to a conversation before recording it. But in all of those states — except for Massachusetts and Illinois — the laws include a provision that the parties being recorded must have a reasonable expectation of privacy for it to be a crime to record them.

The Illinois law once included such a provision, but it was removed by the state legislature in response to an Illinois Supreme Court ruling that threw out the conviction of a man accused of recording police from the back of a squad car. That ruling found that police on the job have no reasonable expectation of privacy.

The Illinois and Massachusetts laws have been used to arrest people who attempt to record on-duty police officers and other public officials. In one of the more notorious cases, Chicago resident Tiawanda Moore was arrested in 2010 when she attempted to use her cell phone to record officers in a Chicago police station.

Moore had come to the station to report an alleged sexual assault by a Chicago cop, and says she became frustrated when internal affairs officers allegedly bullied her and attempted to talk her out of filing the report. Moore was eventually acquitted.

The lawsuit was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, which is planning a police accountability project in Chicago that will involve recording police while they’re on duty. The organization wanted to be sure its employees and volunteers wouldn’t be charged with felonies.

The 7th Circuit Court found a specific First Amendment right to record police officers. It’s the second federal appeals court to strike down a conviction for recording police. In August 2011, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled that a man wrongly arrested for recording cops could sue the arresting officers for violating his First Amendment rights.

Continue reading here…

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August 2, 2012 · 1:22 AM

Handcuffed Man Shot And Killed In Cop Car – Police Say It Was Suicide (VIDEO)

It was during the politically sanctioned “law and order” phase of our government when Nixon, Reagan, and Bush (1) touted the “war on crime” mantra that many cops were never charged  for incidents such as this one even after internal investigations.

Most officers that did go before a grand jury or judge  obtained acquittals of any wrong doing when a minority suspect turned up dead while on their way to jail or in jail….

Addicting Info

A young African-American man in Jonesboro, AR died of a gunshot wound to the head while handcuffed in the back of a patrol car.

Chavis Carter was arrested for alleged drug possession and for missing a court date on previous drug charges.

Sergeant Lyle Waterworth of the Jonesboro police department, stated that Carter was “handcuffed, double locked and searched” for weapons. Still, the officer claims, Carter managed to shoot himself in the head after a “thump” was heard from the back of the squad car.

Carter’s mother, Teresa, isn’t buying the story. First, she claimed that her son was searched twice. She said that he was left-handed, but was shot in the right temple. She also said that he had called his girlfriend after he got pulled over and told her he’d call her from jail. She believes her son was killed.

The incident is under investigation. The officer is on leave.

Here’s the video…

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