The United Police States of America

[MajGenl.Meade]

Chicago police don't seem to have changed much. They didn't care that the whole world was watching back in '68 and they still don't seem to get it

[Econoline]

Interesting note: after viewing the video, the city law dept. recommended that the city settle with the family of the deceased to the tune of $5,000,000--before the family had even filed a lawsuit. The police union says it's unfair to judge the cop because he had to make a "split-second decision"...yeah, right. Maybe the first shot was a split-second decision--but what about shots #2 to #16???

I wonder if this officer would have been charged with murder had the video not been ordered released?

Of course not. The lawyer who sued for the release of the video, and the informant inside the Chicago Police Dept. who informed him of the existence of the video are real heroes; nothing would have happened in this case if not for them.

I wonder if a killing like this would even be called to account in the days before dashcam video? That's what most Americans are beginning to wonder about their police; what have they gotten away with all the years before digital video, before cellphone cameras in the hands of bystanders?

Yes, exactly. Video is the great equalizer. This is exactly why mandatory dashcams and bodycams are so important.




ETA:

"...Officer Van Dyke..."

What a DICK!

[wesw]

well, if I was to the point of shooting someone, which I don t think had even arrived at the time he shot, I m gonna shoot at least twice, maybe three, but if the person hits the ground and you pump 13 more rounds in them, well, you might be a homicidal maniac.

if the guy had just raped your wife or something, or had taken your kid, maybe you empty the clip in his ass..., but that was a case where he coulda shot the guy in the legs a couple of times, he was obviously a good shot, he hit him 16 times....

[Lord Jim]

I see that the protesters in Chicago are trying to stop people from going shopping...

Thus far its been peaceful....

I'm sorry but the "I'm upset over a cop murdering somebody so I'm going to try to punish shoppers and store owners who had absolutely nothing to do with it" connection doesn't immediately leap out at me....

Seems to me they should be protesting in front of the DA's office, or the police headquarters, or City Hall....

Rather than attempting to interfere with other people's rights to freely engage in legal commerce and earn an honest living....

[Lord Jim]

I just saw a protester say that he is "demanding" that Rahm Emanuel be indicted...

While the image of Emanuel in an orange jumpsuit has a certain visceral appeal for me, (I ain't been a fan of his going back to his days as a Clinton hatchet man) what "crime" he is supposed to have committed in connection to this police killing is another one of those things that isn't leaping out at me....

[Econoline]

Oh, c'mon...surely you can understand that Rahm Emmanuel in an orange jumpsuit has a certain visceral appeal for many Chicagoans, too... Y'know, just on general principles.

As for disrupting shopping...as long as they keep it nonviolent, there couldn't better time and circumstance for such a protest than the appropriately-named Black Friday!

[Joe Guy]

Yes, but Black Friday's Matter to white people.

[RayThom]

Black Friday's Matter.

Edited 11:49PM
It looks like you beat me by maybe a few key stokes.

Well, we all know what Dan Quayle said about great minds.

[BoSoxGal]

Surely ALL Fridays matter? (TGIF!)

[Econoline]

[BoSoxGal]

With the major upheaval of my life in every possible way, I've let this thread fall silent. But alas, the cops haven't stopped murdering innocent citizens. (With a particular penchant for innocent BLACK citizens, of course.)

And I would really, really like to hear from anybody here why it is that unarmed police in the UK can deescalate situations with citizens - even armed citizens - and yet here our cops are shooting people 5, 6 times when they are down on the ground, constrained in a vehicle, etc.?????? What the FUCK is going on????? When the FUCK will we demand that this be stopped?????

I've worked with cops. Granted, only in 5 states so maybe it's not a good cross-section - although it was New England, the Mid-Atlantic, the Southwest, and the Mountain West. That seems fairly representative. I can tell you that many of them are jacked up over ANY chance to pull their weapons and get some 'action'. It's disgusting. It made me ASHAMED to be a prosecutor, to represent the state. I once basically dismissed otherwise sound charges against a defendant because at 5'2" she was held at gunpoint - by TWO officers - for more than 15 minutes for NO REASON other than it took her a few extra minutes to stop her vehicle. She was traveling 25 miles UNDER the speed limit - no high speed chase, no threat of any kind discernible to me. I happened to know that one of the cops was a known bully who was complained about to me by numerous citizens, and the other was his rookie ride-along.

WTF????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

HOW DO WE FIX THIS, AND WHEN???????????????????????????????

[Crackpot]

You fix it by not using so many question marks. Then I could read your post.

[BoSoxGal]

You fix it by not using so many question marks. Then I could read your post.

Seriously? From the guy whose posts are often illegible because 'i'm posting on my phone and my fingers are fat'?

That would be funny if the subject wasn't so deadly serious. Feel free not to read the post, CP.

[Crackpot]

Actually I'd like to read it but the overuse of question marks renders the post unreadable in the format I use. I would think that you would want your words to convey your message and not have it eclipsed by a cathartic need to lean on a punctuation button.

[BoSoxGal]

Actually I'd like to read it but the overuse of question marks renders the post unreadable in the format I use. I would think that you would want your words to convey your message and not have it eclipsed by a cathartic need to lean on a punctuation button.

Here's the text without additional question marks, just for you. Can you access the video links in the OP? Those show the PIG murderers doing their work.

With the major upheaval of my life in every possible way, I've let this thread fall silent. But alas, the cops haven't stopped murdering innocent citizens. (With a particular penchant for innocent BLACK citizens, of course.)

And I would really, really like to hear from anybody here why it is that unarmed police in the UK can deescalate situations with citizens - even armed citizens - and yet here our cops are shooting people 5, 6 times when they are down on the ground, constrained in a vehicle, etc.? What the FUCK is going on? When the FUCK will we demand that this be stopped?

I've worked with cops. Granted, only in 5 states so maybe it's not a good cross-section - although it was New England, the Mid-Atlantic, the Southwest, and the Mountain West. That seems fairly representative. I can tell you that many of them are jacked up over ANY chance to pull their weapons and get some 'action'. It's disgusting. It made me ASHAMED to be a prosecutor, to represent the state. I once basically dismissed otherwise sound charges against a defendant because at 5'2" she was held at gunpoint - by TWO officers - for more than 15 minutes for NO REASON other than it took her a few extra minutes to stop her vehicle. She was traveling 25 miles UNDER the speed limit - no high speed chase, no threat of any kind discernible to me. I happened to know that one of the cops was a known bully who was complained about to me by numerous citizens, and the other was his rookie ride-along.

WTF?

HOW DO WE FIX THIS, AND WHEN?

Here are those, just in case. Every citizen should see these:

[Burning Petard]

I just saw an NBC networks newscast that said so far this calendar year, according to Washington Post, 491 black males have been killed by police.

Please note that number is from a commercial information service, a DC newspaper, doing their own tally from their own and other public news sources. For more than 20 years the US Attny genl has been required by law to report to congress annually on police shootings. Never happened. Congress has not repealed the law, but has specifically not provided the funds to do the report.

(((((snailgate)))))

Errata edit. I could well have disremembered the number from the tv news item. Perhaps over 400 was total shot, not total killed. I confess I was not watching carefully, but only glanced up at the screen to catch part of the report when my half-attentive brain said to the rest of my awareness that this might be important. But whatever, the Executive branch is mandated to report these numbers accurately and Congress has acted to positively prevent funding this tally.

[Long Run]

From HuffPo:

Police killed at least 136 black people in 2016, according to a project by the Guardian that tracks police killings in America. Philando Castile became the latest addition to the list Wednesday night after an officer shot him dead.

He was the 123nd black person to be shot by police in 2016, based on a tally from the The Washington Post, which has yet to be updated to reflect his death. (The Guardian’s listing, titled The Counted, includes in its data all deaths resulting directly from encounters with law enforcement, while The Post counts only people shot dead by police.)

[BoSoxGal]

And now protests across the country and the one in Dallas ends up broken up by a sniper shooting at cops.

What a fucking world.

[Gob]

And now protests across the country and the one in Dallas ends up broken up by a sniper shooting at cops.

What a fuckingworld. country

FTFY.

[RayThom]

"... at least one body camera became dislodged from one of the officers involved in the fatal shooting..."

Those damn shitty camera clips are sooo unreliable when in a tussle.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
And this just in -- 11:30PM -- three police officers have been killed at a Texas "Black Lives Matter" rally. Really... who would have guessed this type of retaliation would happen?