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Category: Police

  • Taxed Marijuana In Rhode Island?

    There’s yet morerationality in the news today!

    Let’s stop quibbling about decriminalized marijuana for dying people and get to the heart of the matter: legalize, regulate, and tax. That’s what they’re looking into in Rhode Island. Katherine Gregg reportsin the Providence Journal:

    The measure poses a number of specific questions for study, among them: “Whether and to what extent Rhode Island youth have access to marijuana despite current laws prohibiting its use. … Whether adults’ use of marijuana has decreased since marijuana became illegal in Rhode Island in 1918. … Whether the current system of marijuana prohibition has created violence in the state of Rhode Island against users or among those who sell marijuana. … Whether the proceeds from the sales of marijuana are funding organized crime, including drug cartels. … Whether those who sell marijuana on the criminal market may also sell other drugs, thus increasing the chances that youth will use other illegal substances.”

    The resolution also cites questions about the “dangers associated with marijuana resulting from it being sold on the criminal market, including if it is ever contaminated or laced with other drugs.”

    The panel has until Jan. 31, 2010, to report its findings and recommendations to the Senate.

  • Man Burned at Burning Man Assumed Risk of Being Burned by Burning Man

    Man Burned at Burning Man Assumed Risk of Being Burned by Burning Man

    Sometimes the courts actual make the right decision.

    It seems that if you go to Burning Man and get burned by the actual burning man by walking in fire, you can’t sue.

    Fair enough.

    Lowering the Bar brought this important legal decision to my attention.

    I went to burning man once. There’s some incredibly cool art and ideas there (and no, it’s not just topless women riding bikes–though you’ll see that, too).

    It’s kind of amazing that more people don’t get hurt, given the Mad Max artistic chaos and fire and drug fueled ambiance.

    Given all the things Burning Man could have trouble with–drugs come to mind… and the fact there are tens of thousands of people congregate on what might be the least hospitable place on earth–it’s nice that at least they’re safe from this frivolous lawsuit.

    But I still cringe just at the thought of all that gypsum dust.

    [update: My wife said she thought the headline was an onion story. She adds, “I think when it says on the ticket that they’re not responsible if you _die_, you pretty much have no case.]

  • Help Wanted

    Help Wanted

    There’s a Craigslist help wanted ad for chief of the BPD’s Criminal Investigations Division. Normally you would expect this position to be in internal promotion. Justin Fenton writes about this in the Sun.

  • Rain Prevents Crime

    Duh. All cops know that. Rain keeps all the sh*ts inside. But apparently it’s breaking news to the New York Times.
    But I also think, despite what the article says, that rain reduces domestics as well. I don’t have the stats to back that up, but it’s certainly what I saw. Domestics don’t start because two people are cooped up all day. Somebody gets cut when somebody returnshome. People fight because one person is out getting drunk and maybe a little “suh’um suh’um” and then comes home.

    We it rained in Baltimore, not only would wenot like getting wet, we didn’t want our cars to get wet. And then you can’t keep the windows open and talk. So we would move from 800 Chester to under the Amtrak tracks on Broadway and enjoy the quiet.

  • Raiding Gay Bars

    40 Years after Stonewall police are still raiding gay bars? Really?!

    And looking for… er… drunk people? If you can’t be drunk in bar, my God, where can you be drunk? Apparently some police were looking for gay men to beat up.

    The Fort Worth police chief said, “You’re touched and advanced in certain ways by people inside the bar, that’s offensive…. I’m happy with the restraint used when they were contacted like that.” Can you imagine if women started using that excuse? Meanwhile one guy was put in intensive care with a serious brain injury.

    Dan Savage makes a good point related to the “Gay Panic Defense”: “Gay men don’t grope police officers when they enter gay bars.”

    I’ll go a step further and say that gay men don’t grope non-police officers when they enter gay bars.

    I have a close gay friend I know from being a boat captain in Amsterdam. Zora and I have have made a little tradition of spending Thanksgiving with him and his boyfriend in Savannah. And then maybe once every other year Bob comes up to New York to visit me.

    When Bob and I see each other we often end up in gay bars because 1) he likes gay bars, 2) I like bars, and 3) we both like pinball. Many gay bars still have pinball. So we end up at some place called Ramrod or Rawhide and drink cheap drinks. We talk and play pinball. I’ve never been groped.

    I’m sure a lot of women wished straightmen behaved so well.

  • Civil Service and Affirmative Action

    The Supreme Court ruled in Ricci v. DeStafano that a particularly bizarre form of affirmative action is unconstitutional. You can’t just throw out a test because you don’t like the results. In 2003 a firefighter’s promotional exam produced no black candidates. The city of New Haven threw out the whole exam and promoted no one.

    I’m against racial discrimination and that includes many if not most forms of affirmative action. I think affirmative action does more harm than good.

    But while I think affirmative action is generally wrong, I’m not willing to say it’s always wrong. Obama or not, we’re not living in a race-blind society. We notice race and we have to take account of race. I do think diversity is good there are some cases where race-based approaches are needed.

    White people often say, “I didn’t get no benefits because of my race.” But you have. We all have.

    Take college admissions. There are plenty of affirmative-action-like systems out there that benefits white folk. Having a parent who went to a college or held a certain job gives you a benefit. But often that college or job wasn’t open to non-whites a generation or two ago.

    Should unqualified blacks get in over whites or Asians? No. But race should be one factor of many.

    Athletes get affirmative action. And though some poor blacks benefit from this, it really benefits people who go to rich prep-schools bloated sports programs. Did your school have a lacrosse team and a swimming pool? Well a lot of schools don’t.

    I went to the same college my father did. Did I get into college because my dad went there? I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. I certainly didn’t hurt my chances. And my father got in on affirmative action because he was from the state of New Mexico. That’s geographic affirmation action. Colleges like Princeton want one student from each and every state. My dad was the token New Mexican. Perhaps, 37 years later, my wife was, too.

    But race-based affirmative action is supposed to address historic discrimination in the US. And if that is all it were, I would approve. Legal racial discrimination wasn’t that long ago. Even slavery wasn’t that long ago. To argue that centuries of racism had no lasting negative impact is crazy. And to push people to the bottom and then ask why they can’t lift themselves up is disingenuous at best.

    But… I think affirmative action should only be for black people who can trace their roots back to Slavery. Immigrants should never get affirmative action. Period. The idea that a Spanish sounding last name would give you any benefit at all is simply absurd. And women aren’t “minorities” (though a good argument could be an argument made for affirmative action for women based on historical discrimination).

    Affirmative action, when it is practiced, has become so broad that it no longer helps those people for whom it was designed. Simply being biased against white men isn’t the answer. And of course this creates resentment. Significant, real resentment.

    But when it comes to civil-service hiring and promotions, I think there are other issues. Civil-service promotional exams are as dumb if not dumber than affirmative action programs. To say that affirmative action isn’t fair somehow implies that civil-service exams are themselves fair. I don’t buy it.

    Civil service exams are a horrible way to decide, say, who should be a police sergeant (or a police officer. If you study hard for a civil-service exam you’ll do better. But does doing better on a test mean you’re a better worker? I don’t think so.

    A written exam tells you nothing what kind of cop or firefighter you will be when lives are on the line. These tests test nothing about leadership potential or collegial respect. I don’t think it matters one damn bit, in term of your competence to do the job of police officer, whether you score a 96 or a 98 on a civil service exam.

    Perhaps hiring and firing in the police and fire department should be done more like normal businesses do it. Let the bosses decide. Or ask the coworkers. While nobody is liked by everybody, if somebody is disliked by everybody, there is probably a problem there. People on the workforce tend to know who is good worker and who isn’t.

    In the meantime, I’m happy with the court’s decision. Picking on people because of their race is simply wrong. There has to be a better way.

    [update: very interesting story in the New York Times about Ben Vargas, the lone Hispanic firefighter on the winning side of Ricci v. DeStafano.]

  • I’ve been Pepper Sprayed

    There are probably hundreds of police blogs out there. Too much chaff and not enough wheat. The only police blog I actually read is Pepper Spray Me. Each post is interesting and it’s all very well written and professionally presented. I hope and assume a book is on the way. Remember the equation: police book = movie-rights staring Denzel Washington = $$$ (except of course, like in my case, when it doesn’t).

    I’m sure there are some other gems of law enforcement blogging out there, but I don’t have the patience to find them. If youknow other good police blogs–not too many posts, not too few, not predictable, tells me something I don’t already know–let me know!

    Anyway, the author of pepper spray is a bit like Bat Man to me. We run into each other every now and then in the comments section, but I don’t know who he is or where he works. But I know he’s on the side of good.

    He wrote an excellent (dare I say even touching) review of my book. Thanks, One Time! I’m glad you liked it. Keep up the good writing and stay safe.

    In 1999, Peter Moskos was a graduate student at Harvard University. He wanted to study cops, and figured the best way to do that was to cross the Thin Blue Line.
    …
    Moskos proclaims the War on Drugs a messy failure. He tells why, from his front line experience as a grunt in the war, we’re losing the fight.

    Cops and sociologists alike can be difficult people to understand. This might lead you to believe that Cop in the Hood will be twice as hard to follow. Not so. Moskos strips away hard to decipher copspeak and sociological mumbo jumbo and presents something easily digestible by the average reader.

    Whether you agree or disagree with Moskos’ views on the War on Drugs, he cannot be dismissed as your average know-nothing academic. Moskos is a veteran of a war he disagrees with. But he has walked the walk, respects the brotherhood and, as far as I’m concerned, still bleeds blue.

    Read the whole review here.

  • C.I. vs. Criminal Bribery: Ethics

    In answer to the comment section on the ethics of not helping law enforcement, my friend writes:

    1. We expect that a customer has the same right to privacy that he enjoys in his home. It’s that simple. Plus, heck from a transaction perspective… it is the same as renting an apt or an office.

    2. We actually do screen our customers more closely than any hotel (for example) in this city.

    3. We do ask customers to sign a form that, basically, states that they’re going to comply with any and all laws.

    4. If the authorities want access to any information about a customer at all… they need a warrant/subpoena. It’s that simple. No gray. I don’t care if it’s just your address or video footage of you in our building.

    5. Most often the ‘man’ wants us to provide access to a customer’s room… which we can’t do. We don’t have keys. They want this done without a warrant.

    6. Or, they want to provide a name and then want us to acknowledge if the person is renting and then provide the person’s contact information, visitation information, etc. We typically will acknowledge if someone’s a customer, in particular if the ‘man’ has something that links the person to us… but that’s it.

    7. Or, they want to bring a K9 unit to sniff outside the person’s unit so they can try to get a warrant that way. Again, my answer is no.

  • Testifying Crime Lab Techs

    In the Supreme Court round up, I’m happy that 13-year-olds can’t be forced to strip for suspicion of carrying ibuprofen. Clarence Thomas once again comes out as the dufus court jester in the 8-1 decision: “Preservation of order, discipline and safety in public schools is simply not the domain of the Constitution.” No, Sir. But strip searches are.

    What is shocking (really) is the decision, overturning 90 years of precedent, that lab analysis must testify in court. Leaving aside the constitutional issues for now, this is a hugedecision. And the court broke down in a very unusual way in its 5-4 decision.

    According to the New York Times 500 employees of the FBI laboratory in Quantico conduct more than a million tests a year. Justice Kennedy wrote in dissent: “The court’s decision means that before any of those million tests reaches a jury, at least one of the laboratory’s analysts must board a plane, find his or her way to an unfamiliar courthouse and sit there waiting to read aloud notes made months ago.” Just like a cop. And then the will be postponed.

    Constitutionally, from my amateur perspective, it seems like a sound decision (Remember that just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean the constitution is or should be on your side).

    For the majority, Scalia writes, “the best indication that the sky will not fall after today’s decision is that it has not done so already. Many States have already adopted the constitutional rule we announce today.” I hope he’s right. But the sky really may fall, at least at bit.

    How from the lab is supposed to testify? One person? Everybody?

    On this I believe the dissent when they say, “Requiring even one of these individuals to testify threatens to disrupt if not end many prosecutions where guilt is clear but a newly found formalism now holds sway.”

    Compare that with the majority opinion, “Nor will defense attorneys want to antagonize the judge or jury by wasting their time with the appearance of a witness whose testimony defense counsel does not intend to rebut in any fashion.” Really? That ain’t how it is in the Eastside District Court.

    Regardless, the court writes:

    The Confrontation Clause [of the 6th Amendment] may make the prosecution of criminals more burdensome, but that is equally true of the right to trial by jury and the privilege against self-incrimination. The Confrontation Clause–like those other constitutional provisions–is binding, and we may not disregard it at our convenience.

    I wish he was just as strict in interpreting the Fourth Amendment. I’m not a fan of the Confrontation Clause in the U.S. It makes it too hard to convict and thus contributes to a system plea bargains where innocent people plea guilty and guilty people go free. It would be better if a signed affidavit counted as an officer’s appearance. Ifthere were need to question the officer’s report, then call in the officer.

    In other countries, like the Netherlands, police generally don’t go to court (unless something is very wrong). For this (and many other reasons) their court system works much better than ours, both to convict the guilty and protect the innocent.

    But we do have the 6th Amendment and now the Confrontation Clause is stronger than ever.

    So what might happen? Somehow, of course, the system will adapt.

    More than 95% of prosecuted cases never go to trial. So perhaps for them, nothing. But even for plea-bargained cases, the state might have to be ready to go for two or three appearances before the plea bargain is accepted. Now, along with having an officer present, a lab tech will have to be present. This will cost money and further slow down justice.

    There might be more smaller labs doing work closer to the court. And there might be the need for a lot more crime lab techs who suddenly discover the wonders of court overtime pay. And you’d hate to think of overtime pay influencing theirwork. But remember that this whole case came about because of bad lab tech work.

    Maybe a lot more people will be charged with offenses related to drug. Maybe a lot more cases will be dropped. Maybe more defendants will demand jury trials and the whole system will grind to inglorious halt. Or maybe, just maybe, the sham that passes for criminal justice will continue without pause, no matter what the Supreme Court says the Constitution means, in theory.

    A dysfunctional justice system benefits nobody.

  • Right-Wing Talk Radio

    I want to listen to right-wing radio more. To hear what you guys are saying. But it’s hard. Public radio isbetter. And doesn’t have all those damn commercials.

    I don’t mind listening to people I disagree with. Actually I love it. It’s boring to preach to the choir. Give me a William Buckley or a Milt Rosenberg or an Andrew Sullivan or a Pat Buchanan. They’re all too conservative for me, but they’re smart and their intellectual discussions make the world a better place.

    My problem isn’t with conservatives. It’s with conservatives who make things up and then rally against it. I don’t like listening to idiot liberals. So why do some conservatives like to listen to idiot conservatives?

    I listed to a bit of Michael Savage yesterday but I just can’t take him. Not because he’s crazy. But because he’s full of sh*t.

    I’m all for free speech. Let Limbaugh and Savage speak all they want. But it’s the listeners I worry about. If you listen, do you really believe what they say or is it pure entertainment? I’m sure Father Charles Coughlin was entertaining too. But he was also scary.

    Many hate filled people and groups are entertaining. Just think of the Illinois Nazis in The Blue Brothers.

    A laugh riot…. Man I love that movie. But real people who spew hate andlies should be called out, dismissed, and then ignored as best as possible.

    Specifically, for starters, Obama is not a fan of Stalin and Nancy Polesi is not trying to turn the U.S. into the old Soviet Union. And I’d be, well, genuinely shocked if global cooling was a bigger problem than global warming (but I can’t vouch for that one personally).

    But the part of Savage that was really off the deep end of the deep end was when he came out against Michael Jackson lying in state in the capitol rotunda. What?!

    Savage was so disgusted with the idea that he promised that if that ever came to be, he would leave the country. I mean, can you believe those communists might honor that pederast in the capitol. Disgusting! Except, of course, nobody has ever proposed that Michael Jackson should be honored by congress.

    You can’t make sh*t up and then come out against it! Did I miss something?

    I’m against Michael Savage torturing puppies and selling their mutilated genitals online. It’s horrible. Disgusting. Just perverted. And I’m sure that crap wouldn’t be allowed in the old Soviet Union!