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Category: Police

  • New York closes seven prisons

    This is noteworthy in its rarity. Keep in mind that New York is one of the few states that has de-carcertaed over that past decades (and no, crime has not gone up).

    Notice too how most of the article is about jobs and the economy, not crime.

    Notably, Mr. Cuomo spared several large prisons in the northernmost section of the state, where lawmakers had warned of possible economic ruin if the prisons were closed, and he did not shut down any maximum-security prisons, which have no surplus of beds.
    …
    Over all, the closings will allow the prison system, which currently houses about 56,000 inmates, to shed about 3,800 of its 64,000 beds.

    The governor’s office said closing the seven prisons, which together operate at about 70 percent capacity, and moving the inmates to other facilities would save $184 million over the next two years.

  • Today on CNN

    Me. At 2:45pm Eastern Time. Stream Team with Fredricka Whitfield. A mega 5-minute segment.

  • John McAndrew Sr.

    Western District Officer McAndrew retires after 50 years of service. From the Sun:

    He had no idea that he would carry this passion for 50 years of service. Asked how many police commissioners he had served under, McAndrew smiled, and said: Everyone.

    (anybody know his sequence number!?)

  • “Real Men Get Their Facts Straight”

    From the Village Voice, debunking everybody from Ashton Kutcher to CNN and the New York Timeswho repeat the absurd claim that there are “between 100,000 and 300,000 child sex slaves in the United States today!”

    We examined arrests for juvenile prostitution in the nation’s 37 largest cities during a 10-year period.
    …
    Law enforcement records show that there were only 8,263 arrests across America for child prostitution during the most recent decade.
    …
    Compare 827 annually with the 100,000 to 300,000 per year touted in the propaganda.

    The nation’s 37 largest cities do not give you every single underage arrest for hooking. Juveniles can go astray in rural Kansas.

    But common sense prevails in the police data. As you move away from such major urban areas as Los Angeles, underage prostitution plunges.

    And keep in mind that while a 17-year-old drug addict busted for turning tricks in Baltimore is not, shall we stay, on the straight on narrow. She is not a child sex slave.

  • Really?

    Generally I support the goals of prison reformers. Prisons are not supposed to be torture chambers that destroy the lives of all who enter. So I support efforts to make them better. But in my book I compare that to asking for comfier seats on the train to Auschwitz. It’s kind of missing the big picture.

    But this guy seems truly delusional. From The Week:

    Yes, we have a prison problem, but Moskos assumes that prisons are just violent holding cells, a theory that “has been thoroughly discredited.” Unlike the “judicial brutality” he proposes, correctional facilities “expend resources for 24/7 custody, care, rehabilitation and retraining” to help criminals come back to society.

    What world is he living in?

    Turns out he’s the policy and compliance director for the Minnesota Sex Offender Program.

    According to the Star Tribune:

    Minnesota has civilly committed 554 men and one woman to the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP), designed to treat paroled sex offenders until they are no longer dangerous. … But the system’s spiraling cost and lack of measurable success are causing growing unease. Twenty four offenders have died, but no one has been permanently released.

  • Research Methods

    Research Methods

    “Come now, E.B.! It’s time for us to venture out and continue our study of early 21st century society…”

    “Aww. Can’t we just stay in and do our research online?”

    “I’m afraid not… to truly understand a people and culture, we must walk among them! Document their daily routines and observe them in direct face to fact interactions.”

    Fine advice from Jim Meddick’s excellent Monty.

  • Retribution on Bernie Madoff

    The New York Timeshas an article about the absurd sentence (150 years) Madoff received. Why is absurd? Not because he doesn’t deserve it. It’s absurd because Madoff was then 71 years old! Seems to me a good defense of flogging:

    Judge Chin’s recollections resurrect all the anger, shock and confusion that surrounded Mr. Madoff’s crimes, and provide a rare peek at the excruciating pressure faced by a judge who had to balance the law, the public’s emotions and his own deeply held beliefs while meting out a sentence that was just and satisfied the court’s need to send a message.
    …
    “I’m surprised Chin didn’t suggest stoning in the public square,” [Madoff said].
    …
    Judge Chin noted in the interviews that 20 or 25 years would have effectively been a life sentence for Mr. Madoff, and any additional years would have been purely symbolic. Yet symbolism was important, he said, given the enormity of Mr. Madoff’s crimes.
    …
    But he decided that a term of 150 years would send a loud and decisive message. He felt that Mr. Madoff’s “conduct was so egregious,” he said, “that I should do everything I possibly could to punish him.”
    …
    By the time Judge Chin entered his chambers on the morning of Monday, June 29, he had decided what his draft was missing, he said. In explaining how the 150-year sentence was symbolically important, he had neglected to include a third, crucial reason: retribution.

    “A defendant should get his just deserts,” Judge Chin remembers thinking.
    …
    Judge Chin read his passage on retribution, which, after the length of the sentence itself, appeared to have the greatest impact. In the headlines and news accounts that followed, the words “extraordinarily evil” seemed to be everywhere.

    No rehab. No bettering of the soul. Punishment.

    In New York, a 150-year sentence would, should Madoff live to be 221-years old, cost me and other good citizens of the Empire State more than $7 million. There has got to be a better way.

  • Don’t “Come Here!”

    One cop I worked with would constantly get into foot pursuits. For the rest of us, it was kind of annoying, especially for those of us who hated running. What frustrated me was that these pursuits were entirely preventable. The problem was this officer would see a kid he wanted to stop and say, “Come here!” Naturally, not being a fool, the kid would take off running.

    If I wanted to stop somebody, I would calmly walk right up to him and grab him. If I wanted to talk to someone, I would politely ask, “Can I talk to you for a second?” and lead him away from his friends. I can’t remember these tactics ever failing.

    Here is some good tactical police advice from, of all places, Mother Jones:

    Consider why barking the command “Come here!” doesn’t really work. Thompson explains in his article,

    You have just warned the subject that he is in trouble. “Come here” means to you, “Over here, you are under my authority.” But to the subject it means, “Go away—quickly!” The words are not tactical for they have provided a warning and possibly precipitated a chase that would not have been necessary had you, instead, walked casually in his direction and once close said, “Excuse me. Could I chat with [you] momentarily?” Notice this question is polite, professional, and calm.

    And it works.

  • “Whoop whoop whoop”

    That’s the bullshit detector going off after seeing this:

    Expert: 40,000 – 50,000 slaves currently in U.S.

    How much you wanna bet he just made up that number?

    Being exploited for cheap labor does not automatically mean you’re a slave.

    Have we forgotten what slavery was?

  • You live a jackass, you die a jackass

    “Police: ‘Jackass’ star Ryan Dunn was drunk and driving over 132 mph.”

    I guess it’s not surprising. But it is sad. I love Jackass!