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  • “Right now there’s nothing I’d rather be than a Brooklyn cop”

    A friend (and former student) of mine, Officer Musorov, just posted this on facebook. You might see him on the streets of Crown Heights. He makes me proud!

    “When the Rhetoric of scandal — rogue cops, racist cops, and so on —
    becomes the received idea, when we are so engrossed by exceptions that
    they seem like rules, we still send cops out, in ones and twos, into
    angry crowds, fighting families, and darkened alleys, though stripped of
    a measure of defense” -Edward Conlon

    The above statement was
    written seven years ago, but it’s just as true today as it ever was. I’m
    not going to blame anybody for what happened today, except the person
    that pulled that trigger. But when you have had weeks of people on the
    streets chanting that they want dead cops, it creates an atmosphere that
    leads to just that. Nobody should kid themselves and think that
    rhetoric like that cannot possibly harm us. Anywhere in this city, if
    somebody calls us, we will come. That’s ALWAYS dangerous, but especially
    so when you have people literally calling for blood on the streets.

    But anybody who thinks they can intimidate any of us should think
    again. We will still answer every call for service as we always have. I
    work with some of the greatest people ever, and right now there’s
    nothing I’d rather be than a Brooklyn cop.

    Thank you to everyone
    who extended their sympathies, and thank you to my extended family in
    the 71, who I know I can always count on.

  • NYPD vs. DeBlasio

    Cops turning their back on Mayor DeBlasio.

  • Two Officers Down

    Shot and killed. Ambushed in their car in Brooklyn. Earlier the killer shot his ex-girlfriend in Baltimore.

  • “If you point a gun at a police officer…”

    I mention this article by Peter Katel in CQ Researcher (alas, behind a pay wall) because, along with lots of good stuff, there’s a quote I wasn’t expecting coming from my man Norm “a liberal critic of much police strategy” Stamper:

    A video of the [Tamir Rice] shooting — showing a police car driving up next to the boy, who was shot two seconds later — demonstrates that the shooting never had to happen, Stamper concludes, saying the officer could have taken cover behind his car and evaluated the situation more calmly.

    “A more mature, experienced, confident police officer would have better understood what he was facing,” Stamper says.

    At the same time, he says Rice’s parents never should have let him outside with a replica pistol, and schools and police should ensure that children know an essential fact of life: No one seen to pose a mortal threat in the presence of police should expect to walk away, or even to survive.

    “If you point a gun at a police officer, you have punched your ticket,” Stamper says. “I don’t care if it’s a toy gun.

    Norm is right about a lot of things (like ending the drug war). Add this to the list.

  • High security walls may increase violent crime.

    This is interesting, albeit about South Africa. But the basic idea is this:

    Walls are actually making things worse. “No one can see what is happening in
    your home so no one can help,” she told the [South African] Daily News.
    They keep people from being each other’s natural lookout. And they are an even bigger barrier to social cohesion, in a country that needs it a lot.

    Further, Marks told Quartz that high walls not only fail to curb crime, they attract criminals—once inside, the criminal is as isolated as the homeowner, free to do as they please.

  • The real Michael Brown

    Yesterday I had a nice walk and dinner with a good group of cops who were to appear on CNN’s Cops Under Fire about cops who have been involved in shootings. I also met Darren Wilson’s lawyer. So I asked him a few things about Officer Wilson and Michael Brown.

    The decisive evidence? Brown’s actual skin on the slide and hammer of Wilson’s gun — pretty damning — and blood on the street showing that Brown did indeed charge Wilson where Wilson said.

    I also asked the lawyer about a picture and a video floating around the web that purport to show Michael Brown doing bad things. The picture is of Michael Brown with guns, drugs, and money. That *is* Michael Brown. [Correction, that is *not* Michael Brown.] The video of “Michael Brown” beating down a defenseless person is *not* Michael Brown.

  • What about “fruit of the poisened tree”?

    From NPR:

    The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ruled that police officers don’t
    necessarily violate a person’s constitutional rights when they stop a
    car based on a mistaken understanding of the law.

    The court said the officer made a “reasonable mistake.” Hence it’s not an unreasonable search and seizure.

    The case involved drugs found after a traffic light for one broken brake light in a state where one broken brake light isn’t a traffic violation.

    How can police claim ignorance of the law as a defense?

    Strange, I say. Eight of nine supreme court justices disagree with my take.

  • Pot is in the news

    From the LA Times:

    Tucked deep inside the 1,603-page federal spending measure is a
    provision that effectively ends the federal government’s prohibition on
    medical marijuana and signals a major shift in drug policy.

    The
    bill’s passage over the weekend marks the first time Congress has
    approved nationally significant legislation backed by legalization
    advocates. It brings almost to a close two decades of tension between
    the states and Washington over medical use of marijuana.

    Also, I think more significant, as as reported by USA Today:

    Marijuana use among teens declined this year even as two states,
    Colorado and Washington, legalized the drug for recreational use, a
    national survey released Tuesday found.

    Of course we can’t be certain till we try it, but all evidence (seen in the
    US, Portugal, and the Netherlands) seems to show that ending
    prohibition does not increase drug use. This is a big deal because the effect of prohibition versus regulation (ie: legalization) on drug use really is the core issue related to people’s support of the drug war.

    If ending the drug war lowered drug use — and it’s a big “if” but it’s certainly a possibility — would you still support the war on drugs. Is the war on drugs worth fighting for it’s own sake simply because drugs are wrong? Even if that same drug war causes more people to take and be harmed by drugs?

    If you can’t conceive of how ending the drug war could reduce drug use, consider these factors, in no particular order:

    1) Kids love doing what they’re not supposed to do.
    2) Peer pressure is stronger when you’re doing something illegal. To protect yourself, there’s greater pressure to implicate everybody.
    3) Drugs can be dangerous. Honest education is better at reducing harms than “just say no” and cracked eggs on a frying pan.
    4) I’ve yet to meet anybody who says they would love to try heroin, if only it were legal and regulated. People do or don’t take drugs for many reasons, the law seems pretty low on the list. 

    5) Prohibition doesn’t actually work. Drugs are not hard to get.

  • Baltimore Officer Down

    From the Baltimore Sun:

    Groman and another officer approached the car from the driver’s side
    and another officer approached from the passenger’s side, police say in
    charging documents. Officers directed the driver, Tavon Sullivan, to get
    out of the car, police say, and he sat on the sidewalk.

    Police say Jones, sitting in the back seat, refused Groman’s orders to exit.
    Groman told Jones to show his hands, which were in his jacket pocket and
    waistband, according to Maj. Stanley Branford, commander of the
    Homicide division, but Jones did not.

    Police say Groman told Jones
    he would be tased if he didn’t comply. Groman pulled out his Taser just
    as Jones pulled out a black Rossi .357-caliber revolver, police say in
    charging documents.

    Detectives said Monday they do not know who fired first. No officers fired a gun, police said.
    After Groman was struck, police said, Jones ran out of the car and was chased by two officers.

    Police say Jones ran into a backyard and was scaling a fence when an officer
    hit him with his Taser, allowing police to arrest him.
    …

    “We’ve had marches nationwide over the fact that we have lost lives in
    police custody,” [Commissioner] Batts said. “I wonder if we’ll have those same marches
    as officers are shot, too.”

    It’s worth noting that 1) Yes, cops get shot at even in situation where the shooter has no realistic chance of getting away with it. 2) No officer fired a shot. And this includes even after the suspect shot an officer and was trying to run away. I mention this because if cops really were out there to murder black people, this would have been a fine chance to get away with a freebie. But that’s not the way police officers think. 3) Had the officer drawn his gun instead of a the less-lethal Taser, well, who knows what would have happened? But the Taser didn’t help keep Groman from being shot. 4) Had the officer drawn his gun, no doubt some people would be complaining about an officer drawing his gun for no good reason.

    Officer Groman is expected to “recover.” But as I’ve said before, you don’t ever completely recover from something like this. My thoughts are with him

  • “Why aren’t more Christians speaking out against Lindsey Blansett?”

    Lindsey Blansett killed her 10-year-old son by stabbing him and bashing him a rock so he could “go to heaven” rather than face a life full of “suffering and pains.” I haven’t heard anybody blame Jesus Christ for this woman’s actions. But I’d bet she was driven by her own mistaken perception of Christian ideology. I suspect that she considered herself a Christian. But Christians don’t stab and bash their children with rocks. An effective shortcut to heaven? That, I can safely say, is a misreading of the Bible.

    So where are the Christian priests condemning Blansett’s actions? To date, I have seen no statement from Bartholomew, His Most Divine All-Holiness and Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek-Orthodox Church. Does this mean 23-million Greek Orthodox, myself included, secretly condone Blansett’s actions? Of course not. Some times homicidal people are just crazy.

    I mention this because it really is no different than blaming all Muslims (or Islam itself) when self-proclaimed “Islamic” terrorists kill people. We don’t blame all Jews (or Judaism itself) for the actions of Baruch Goldstein. Nor do we blame Christianity for Lindsey Blansett. See, when you kill innocent people, you’re not a good follower of any religion. That really should go without saying.

    Merry Christmas!