IGX

In drug raids, killing any dog in the house has become almost perfunctory. In this video of a 2008 drug raid in Columbia, Mo., you can see police kill two dogs, including one as it retreats. Despite police assurance that the dogs were menacing, the video depicts the officers discussing who will kill the dogs before they even arrive at the house. During a raid in Durham, N.C., last year, police shot and killed a black Lab they claimed "appeared to growl and make aggressive moves." But in video of the raid taken by a local news station, the dog appears to make no such gestures.

Many criminals -- particularly drug dealers -- protect themselves with aggressive dogs trained to attack intruders. But shooting the animals as a matter of procedure is also dangerous. During a 2008 raid in Lima, Ohio, one officer heard his fellow officer shooting dogs in the home and mistook the shots for hostile gunfire. Thinking he was under attack, he opened fire at shadows coming from an upstairs bedroom. In that room, 24-year-old Tarika Wilson was on her knees, as she had been instructed, with one hand in the air and her other arm holding her year-old son. Wilson was killed, and the boy lost a hand. During a 2007 raid in Stockton, Calif., a police officer inadvertently wounded Kari Bailey, 23, and her 5-year-old daughter Hailey while trying to kill the family dog. (The police had shown up at the wrong address.) Last month, one officer firing at pit bulls in Minneapolis accidentally shot a fellow cop.

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Suddenly, flashing lights bathe the front lawn in red and blue. More than a dozen cops in light-gray polos, dark-gray cargo pants, and black vests flood out of the Chrysler and other unmarked cars, storming through the front gate with guns drawn. Dante drops his beer. Before he can react, a beefy cop tackles him, knocking down his 1-year-old, who screams in terror.

The police, all members of an elite Miami-Dade unit called the Tactical Narcotics Team — TNT for short — arrest Dante and his friends, and haul Khalid and Alexis off to jail as well.

The Levels were just three of the 112 people in Liberty City booked that weekend as part of a TNT operation cheekily dubbed “Santa’s Helper,” which the Miami Herald and local TV stations ate up as a feel-good story about cops keeping the inner city safe — an especially juicy tale when coupled with video of the widow of a slain officer handing out 500 toys to poor children. The Levels’ arrest led the 6 p.m. telecasts, with CBS 4 reporter Peter D’Oench hailing the MDPD for “getting kids in the neighborhood to see… the human side of the officers who love to interact with the children.” A Herald story, meanwhile, offered that the “streets of northwest Miami-Dade [will be] safe for when Santa comes to town.”

However, a two-month investigation by New Times has found that Santa’s Helper was a colossal waste of police resources. Of the 112 suspects arrested, 73 people were charged only with misdemeanor pot possession. The vast majority of the busted pot smokers were either released within 24 hours or avoided jail by promising to show up in court. Of the 73 alleged tokers, 68 of them — including Dante Level and his siblings — had no violent criminal record. If they were guilty of anything, it was smoking a joint on their own front porch.

Police say TNT, a 31-officer team that focuses on aggressive, low-level drug busts such as Santa’s Helper, is vital because their work prevents more serious drug and gang violence. Even as other units specializing in cargo and auto theft were disbanded last month to save money for the cash-strapped department, the brass left TNT and its $3 million budget untouched.

“This is a great way to capture a cross section of robbers, burglars, thieves, and dopers who shoot kids and cops and will openly spray a corner with bullets,” says Maj. Charles Nanney, head of the Miami-Dade Narcotics Bureau. “Cocaine, marijuana, and heroin availability at the street level poses the greatest threat.”

But neighborhood activists and some criminologists say letting an aggressive unit loose on small-time users does more to alienate black neighborhoods than it does to end violent crime. Santa’s Helper, they say, is a perfect illustration of how a unit with a history of corruption — and a mound of complaints about excessive force — has lost the War on Drugs. In recent years, three officers who worked with TNT, but not assigned to the unit full-time, were busted in public corruption probes. Meanwhile, 14 current squad members have combined for 40-plus internal affairs probes.

We’ve seen this over and over again. These tactics are typically justified on the argument that they’re only used on the nastiest, most dangerous drug distributors. Time and again, when local media looks into what these raids typically turn up, they find vanishingly few weapons, significant drug busts, or felony charges. In the case above, three people were charged for possessing the same joint.

The one difference with the TNT unit is that, as the story indicates, while it was initially set up to target criminals with violent histories, busting low-level offenders with the shock-and-awe bullshit is now stated policy. So they’ve dispensed with the pretense. If a few toddlers and grandmas get in the way of scaring the vocabulary out of the city’s pot smokers, well, that’s a price these cops are willing to pay.

But I suppose there’s no questioning the results. As I understand it, Miami is now basically drug-free.

DeKalb County police officer is under criminal investigation after being accused of kicking a woman who was almost nine months pregnant, Channel 2 Action News reported.

Herv100 wrote:Officer Friendly is a rare trifecta of retard, pussy, and faggot.

baffled wrote:Officer Friendly hates everyone, but especially the unborn: http://www.ajc.com/news/dekalb/dekalb-c ... 33906.html

DeKalb County police officer is under criminal investigation after being accused of kicking a woman who was almost nine months pregnant, Channel 2 Action News reported.

Raven Dozier said she was trying to help her brother calm down during a child custody issue that involved police. She said she started crying and questioning officers after a Taser gun was used on her brother.


"I was upset because I couldn't believe an officer would kick me, with my child in my stomach," she said.

Dozier gave birth to her now 4-month-old son, Levii, in an emergency C-section two weeks after the incident allegedly left her stomach bruised. The baby is healthy.

Officer Jerad Wheeler described the incident as "a front push kick to the abdomen, as he was taught to do at the academy," in his police report.

German cops fired all of 85 rounds in 2011, according to a new study written up in Der Spiegel. A Boing Boing reader translates:

"According to the German Police University police officers used exactly 85 bullets in 2011 - 49 warning shots, 36 shots on suspects. 15 persons were injured, 6 were killed. Germany has a population of about 80 million. (This does only take into account shots in connection with crimes. There were an additional 9000 shots on dangerous, sick and injured animals)."

Meanwhile, On May 5, 2011, a Pima County SWAT team fired 71 bullets into the home of Iraq War veteran Jose Guerena while his wife and four-year-old ducked for cover. That's one police department, in one county, on one day of 2011.

Police say TNT, a 31-officer team that focuses on aggressive, low-level drug busts such as Santa’s Helper, is vital because their work prevents more serious drug and gang violence. Even as other units specializing in cargo and auto theft were disbanded last month to save money for the cash-strapped department, the brass left TNT and its $3 million budget untouched.

protobuilder wrote:this shit is revolting all around

the quote below ties into the article I posted (didn't I?) about how $$ for the 'drug war' pushes departments to prioritize things like minor drug crimes at the expense of pursuing property crimes and violent crimes

Police say TNT, a 31-officer team that focuses on aggressive, low-level drug busts such as Santa’s Helper, is vital because their work prevents more serious drug and gang violence. Even as other units specializing in cargo and auto theft were disbanded last month to save money for the cash-strapped department, the brass left TNT and its $3 million budget untouched.

protobuilder wrote:The Feds shower money on you if you bust pot smokers.

They could care less if you bust home invaders, batterers, and carjackers.

No money in it.

The conversation between the reporter and the Tennessee cop in this article is just surreal.

For more than a year, NewsChannel 5 Investigates has been shining a light on a practice that some call “policing for profit.”

In this latest case, a Monterey police officer took $22,000 off the driver — even though he had committed no crime.

“You live in the United States, you think you have rights — and apparently you don’t,” said George Reby . . .

Reby was driving down Interstate 40, heading west through Putnam County, when he was stopped for speeding.

A Monterey police officer wanted to know if he was carrying any large amounts of cash.

“I said, ‘Around $20,000,’” he recalled. “Then, at the point, he said, ‘Do you mind if I search your vehicle?’ I said, ‘No, I don’t mind.’ I certainly didn’t feel I was doing anything wrong. It was my money.”

That’s when Officer Larry Bates confiscated the cash based on his suspicion that it was drug money.

“Why didn’t you arrest him?” we asked Bates.

“Because he hadn’t committed a criminal law,” the officer answered.

Bates said the amount of money and the way it was packed gave him reason to be suspicious.

“The safest place to put your money if it’s legitimate is in a bank account,” he explained. “He stated he had two. I would put it in a bank account. It draws interest and it’s safer.”

“But it’s not illegal to carry cash,” we noted.

“No, it’s not illegal to carry cash,” Bates said. “Again, it’s what the cash is being used for to facilitate or what it is being utilized for.”

NewsChannel 5 Investigates noted, “But you had no proof that money was being used for drug trafficking, correct? No proof?”

“And he couldn’t prove it was legitimate,” Bates insisted.

I didn’t realize Tennessee’s forfeiture law was quite this absurd:

He said that, while police are required to get a judge to sign off on a seizure within five days, state law says that hearing “shall be ex parte” — meaning only the officer’s side can be heard.

That’s why George Reby was never told that there was a hearing on his case.

“It wouldn’t have mattered because the judge would have said, ‘This says it shall be ex parte. Sit down and shut up. I’m not to hear from you — by statute,” Miles added.

George Reby said that he told Monterey officers that “I had active bids on EBay, that I was trying to buy a vehicle. They just didn’t want to hear it.”

In fact, Reby had proof on his computer.

But the Monterey officer drew up a damning affidavit, citing his own training that “common people do not carry this much U.S. currency.”

“On the street, a thousand-dollar bundle could approximately buy two ounces of cocaine,” Bates told NewsChannel 5 Investigates.

“Or the money could have been used to buy a car,” we observed.

“It’s possible,” he admitted.

NewsChannel 5 Investigates asked Bates if Reby had told him that he was trying to buy a car?

“He did,” the officer acknowledged.

“But you did not include that in your report,” we noted.

“If it’s not in there, I didn’t put it in there.”

So why did he leave that out?

“I don’t know,” the officer said.

The guy eventually got his money back, but only after four months, and even then only after News Channel 5 started asking questions. He was still required to come back to Tennessee from New Jersey—on his own dime—to claim it. And get this:

He had two clients where police agreed to drop the cases in exchange for a cut of the money — $1,000 in one case, $2,000 in another. In both cases, that was less than what they might have paid in attorney fees.

Miles called that “extortion.”

I’d say he’s right.

Nashville’s New Channel 5 continues to do great work on this topic (and in general, actually). One of their previous reports on forfeiture in Tennessee noted that the vast majority of drug stops on Tennessee interstates were of motorists leaving Nashville, when a drug runner would presumably be flush with cash, than heading into the city, when the car would contain the drugs. Meaning they were willing to let the drugs be sold so they could make a bust that would bring some money back to their respective police agencies.

An Epidemic of Furtive Movement

It would be a New York joke if it didn't mean that 684,000 people were stopped on the streets of New York and frisked last year. In 2003, cops stopped and frisked 160,851 people and recovered 604 guns. This proved that stop and frisked worked, even if it meant the sacrifice of the right to be left alone of more than 150,000 people.

Last year, they recovered 780 guns, proportionately negligible, which again proves that stop and frisk works. Mayor Bloomberg explains that the reason so few guns per capita were seized is that people are afraid to walk around the guns for fear of being stopped and frisked. With that rationale, the program is a rousing success no matter what comes of it.

More than half of all stops were conducted because the individual displayed “furtive movements” — which is so vague as to be meaningless.

The data also show that the police are significantly more likely to use force when they stop blacks and Hispanics than when they stop whites. This means minority targets are more likely to be slammed against walls or spread-eagled while officers go through their belongings. Even when victims are unhurt, they are likely to develop a deep and abiding distrust of law enforcement.

Let's be clear: if police could stop at will anyone they wanted, they would turn up more illegal stuff, whether guns or drugs, than they would if they were limited by something like, oh, a Constitution. Same is true if they could search houses at will. Or people traveling on airplanes.

That Mayor Bloomberg has to stretch so far to spin what he knows to be a flagrantly unlawful program is telling. He's not stupid. Few billionaires are, and even then, they have the wherewithal to surround themselves with smart people. Somebody must have mentioned to him at some point that this really isn't kosher. When the Newspaper That Shall Not Be Named Here Anymore has an editorial stating that stop and frisk is a terribly wrong thing to do, does Punch Sulzberger think it's going to change something?

What this reflects is the Mayor's relative weighing of two irreconcilable responsibilities, one to protect New Yorker's from crime, and the other to respect New Yorker's right to walk the streets without being slammed against a wall for no particular reason. When David Dinkins was hizzoner, there were bloodbaths on the streets of uptown Manhattan, and chains ripped from the necks of white folks downtown. Dinkins wasn't as inclined to promote the police rousting people at will and people screamed about the murder and mugging rates. Of course, the crack epidemic might have had something to do with it as well.

But times have changed, as has the regime on power, and the mess that existed under Dinkins, and exacerbated under his successor, Rudy "If Only I Could Be President" Giuliani, have given way to substantially reduced crime, particularly gun crime. The penalties for possession of a weapon are far more severe than they used to be, and the demographics have changed as well.

So naturally, the solution is the perpetuation of a program at whose core is the evisceration of the constitutional right to be left alone. And naysayers aside, it works, even if it means that many hundreds of thousand of people have to give up a little so that the residents of Sutton Place can sleep at night.

Because filling out forms is the highest order of government service, police officers are expected to do two things: Each time they stop and frisk someone, fill out a form. Each time they fill out a stop and frisk form, state the basis for the stop. And so they do.

This has been going on since the beginning of the program, when naive people (like me) thought 160,851 people stopped for no reason was an outrage. Now that we're closing in on 700,000, maybe it's time to be honest with ourselves. While there has been some squawking from the Newspaper Who Shall Not be Named Here Anymore, the NYCLU and a couple bloggers, there has been no massive uprising against the stop and frisk program. Bloomberg continues in his post as Ruler for Life, and Ray Kelly bobble-head dolls continue to sell like hotcakes.

Forget Mapp v. Ohio, which the uninitiated seem to think applies, and even DeBour, which provides the constitutional limits to police seizures in New York. Every lawyer, every judge, every politician, every cop and certainly every black and Hispanic, in New York knows that to walk the streets of Manhattan is to invite a stop and frisk. No, the law says they can't do it. Yes, they do it anyway. No, as the numbers climb closer to a million souls stripped of their right to walk on the street without being tossed in the name of safety, there are no cries of revolution.

There is no epidemic of furtive movements. Let's put the lie to rest, stop demanding that cops keep breaking the law again by filing false documents at the behest of the administration, and put up a big sign at the midtown tunnel: All persons subject to search.

The choice has been made and the Constitution lost. At least show New Yorkers the courtesy of being honest about it.

Blaidd Drwg wrote:

High Velocity Lie-Nap! wrote:

Blaidd Drwg wrote:No goatee, hair is clipped and I'm not a PL by any stretch. But your whining tells me everything I need to know about how genuine your concern is slappy pig.

I am not whining nor is their an iota of hysteria in my 'tone'. Your 'go run off with Johno and start a hero thread' was a little bitchy, though.

Your thread was 9 pages of useless 'entertainment' for haters (Herv liked it, that should tell you all you need to know, he thinks "The X Files" is real). It was non-informative and otherwise served no valuable purpose. Normally, I'd take zero issue with that on IGx, but we're not talking crossift here, we are talking about the people sworn to uphold the law and hold our collective public trust. Don't fret, Officer Friendly is here to make things right....much to your surprise, I am sure, we will probably agree more than not.

It serves a valuable purpose..The purpose is wake the fuck up, memorize the words not without a lawyer and NEVER EVER trust a cop. It's not required to hate the police but do not for one instant assume they have you interests in mind any more than does the IRS or TSA.

Although there will still be situations when force, sometimes even deadly force, will be necessary, getting out and talking to people in the community has always been Burbank's style. When he was an officer, his philosophy was always "How can I improve a situation?" It's the same philosophy he uses today as chief.

Blaidd Drwg wrote:Never Ever Ever Ever trust a Cop. Rule 1. It's not nefarious intent I worry about, it's incompetence.
My kids know exactly who to do and that's say..."Not without a warrant."

The reasons it 's more common?
War on Drugs, Homeland Security create a lot of mushy gushy unaccountability....big bureaucracies develop into 9 headed hydras in situations like this.

My person objections stem from grandfather's experience on the SPD in the 50's. I'm grateful he had these experiences as it opened my eyes to what really goes on.