Milwaukee Police Chief Edward Flynn is smarter than your average flatfoot. Generally considered a progressive in the police world, he’s the type of chief who should at least be embraced by the political left. But Milwaukee is one of the latest police department to be sued by the ACLU for racially disparate policing. But Flynn refuses to de-police the city’s most violent streets. For this, Flynn gets heat from all sides: Republican senators, the anti-police crowd, and conservative Sheriff David Clarke (the Milwaukee County Sheriff better known for his Trump-loving cowboy-hat wearing general buffoonery).
Most recently, Flynn didn’t take kindly to lawsuits from the ACLU making him and his police department out to be the bad guys. This is worth watching. “Disparity is not the same as bias,” Flynn says. That’s an important point that needs to be said loud and clear. If not, we abandon those most at risk. Here’s an edited six minutes of Flynn:
Flynn understands the political equations. He frames the right questions. He give the right answers. And he can talk about “ellipses” of social problems, explicit and implicit biases, negative social indicators, evidence-based policing, and the history of racist policing in America. As my father always said, if you get criticized for all sides, you must be doing something right.
On April 15th, an off-duty Baltimore cop shot and killed a man. “Witnesses” said, according to WBAL:
The officer was having an argument with the man outside the store and the man ran away toward the store.
“As he was running in the store the police shot him, boom. When he got in the store, the police (officer) got over top of him, but once he seen us run up there, he tried to pause and say, ‘Stay right there, don’t move,’ and then he called for the ambulance,” a witness said.
It’s a pretty detailed account. Yes, says this good citizen, who of course prefers to remain anonymous. A cop chased and shot another black man in the back. But luckily these good Samaritans — and at great personal risk — followed the cop in the store to make sure the cop didn’t deliver the coup de grâce. Is hero too strong a word?
This is how false narratives gain traction “Hands up, don’t shoot!” (Which was also a lie.) After all, all cops wake up every morning thinking, “who can I shoot today?” and Baltimore cops in particular love killing innocent people.
This WBAL story does note, really an afterthought:
Police said witnesses inside the store, including clerks, told them that the suspect announced a robbery in the store.
Police are reviewing surveillance video.
But really, who you gonna believe? I mean, this wreaks of a police cover up, store owners cowering in the face of police pressure, and the bad word of police against the good word of criminals.
Luckily, in this case there was video. Good video.
Reporters, in their defense, can’t verify that a witness was there. But they could try a bit harder. In places like Baltimore “witnesses” appear after every police-involved shooting. And the story is always that the cops killed a surrendering man. Hands-up-and-shot. It’s nothing new. I’ve been keeping an eye on this for the past 17 years. And in Baltimore it’s never happened. Not once. Sure, it could happen. But it hasn’t. And you’d think that might matter. (When I was in the academy a housing cop was accused of this but luckily shot this criminal through the criminal’s pants’ pocket and the criminal’s hand. But what if he hadn’t been so luckily in missing center mass?) And during that time there have been 4,422 murders.
Eight times out of ten, the “witness” didn’t see it; and nine times out of ten, they’re lying. (And the 10th time? Well, I’m glad there’s video.)
In this case it’s not just the “witness” was wrong. Sometimes reasonable people can disagree on what they see. It’s that the witness’s story was 100 percent anti-police fiction and still reported as very possibly true.
A cop is in the store and a guy comes in a pulls a (turns out to be fake) gun and a knife. He tells the cop to kick it out (or whatever the kids are saying these days when robbing people). Presumably, after rubbing the customers, he would rob the store.
And yes, if you try and rob a cop, you get shot. Nothing wrong with that. And cops in Baltimore (unlike many cities) are required to carry a gun off duty while in the city (and permitted to in the rest of the state). When I took out my trash, I was packing.
And, as usual, the video showed exactly what police said happened. Of course you generally only hear about the exceptions. And you should hear about the exception. But you don’t have to base your worldview on them.
Again, Commissioner Davis had the cop’s back, as he should. From the Sun:
“He did the absolute right thing,” Davis said of the officer.
Davis said the officer acted appropriately and courageously. He said a witness in the shop told him he felt his life would have been in danger if the officer had not acted.
…
Davis on Saturday also criticized some media outlets who quoted people at the scene who identified themselves as witnesses and gave what he said was false information.
Davis read an excerpt from a Baltimore Sun story in which a man said Howard “ran in the store for safety.” A second man said the officer started “fussing” with the Howard, who cursed at the officer before the officer drew his weapon.
Davis said several other outlets spoke to the men, but that their accounts were false. He called the reports “absolutely erroneous and irresponsible,” and said the two men “lied about what occurred.”
The department released surveillance video outside the store that shows the officer walking into the shop, and Howard crossing the street just behind him, contradicting the witness accounts.
In their later story, after the video was released, WBAL dropped the “witness.” Given everything that has happened in the past year in Baltimore, maybe the lying “witness” should have been mentioned.
The evidence in this case shows the shooting to be accidental, and possibly negligent, but not criminally so. “This shooting is not justified, but also not criminal.”
I don’t know if I buy the stutter-step no-double-tap explanation. But at least the legal concept is sound. Something can be wrong and not criminal.
In fact, the only charges are against the paralyzed victim with the dead wife. [Update: Charges were dropped. He died.] This seems kind of mean. And there are no national politicians weighing in. Just a small local protest. Al Sharpton must be previously engaged. (As is often the case, this unnecessary shooting happened in California.)
Officer Feaster claims he didn’t know he shot Thomas:
No, no. … I don’t think I shot him. I wasn’t even pointing at him but the gun did go off.
Let’s leave aside whether Feaster is the world’s best shot or the world’s worst cop. Perhaps it doesn’t matter. The question I have, the question any reasonable police officer might have, is why the hell did he draw his gun in the place. What made this cop so afraid that he felt the need to approach a crashed presumed drunk driver with his gun drawn and shot the man trying to get out of the wreck? The guy was going to run? What use is your gun in that case? A car just flipped. What exactly was the threat?
In the same vein, a reasonable police officer wonders, as did Levar Jones complying with orders, why he got shot. Why did cops feel that innocent Jonathan Ayers was a lethal threat while driving away? Why is a man not carrying a gun a lethal threat when he drops his hand?
Why did all these police officers see non-existent threats? Why were they so damn afraid? (I’m tempted to add “…these days,” but maybe it’s always been this way. I don’t know.)
In the face of danger you need to act but not overreact. You need courage, not fear. There’s a line I always liked in Birds Without Wings:
His courage was not the foolish kind of a young and silly man. It was the courage of a man who looks danger in the face, and forces himself not to flinch.
Hell, a little fear can be a good thing; you don’t want to be blasé in the face of danger. It starts in the police academy. “Stay alert, stay alive!” It’s a good lesson. Even “make a hole” isn’t so bad when it’s put in the context of situational awareness. But too much fear becomes paranoia. And that’s not conducive to good policing (or a happy life).
Here are some of the videos cops watch in the police academy. Some I saw myself. Others are more recent. They’re all on YouTube (which didn’t even exist when I was a cop). I guarantee you that every last one one of these has been watched in some police academy somewhere. Every cop I know knows 1) Dinkheller.
And 2) here’s that woman cop getting her ass kicked trying to arrest some big guy. His daughter is there. The cop kind of came back, but never recovered.
Go on. Watch them. Watch them all. It won’t take but 10 or 15 minutes. I’ve cued them all up to the key moment. It’s a parade of snuff films (though many of the cops do live, somehow). Can you watch all of these and not perceive threats and car stops a bit differently?
18) Out-of-shape fathers with their 16-year-old sons? Could always be cop killers.
And to cops these aren’t just abstract videos. There are people I know, friends, some taught in the academy, who were shot and lucky to live. Others, the pictures on the walls, weren’t so lucky.
Certainly cops need some of this. Some people are willing, even eager, to kill police. You can’t go on the job as a pacifist. But at some point fear isn’t healthy. It isn’t good for the job. It can even make the job less safe.
And I worked in a dangerous post. It made me less afraid. You face danger a few times, and you learn to respect it. Cops in the Eastern don’t squeal every time somebody steps on a leaf. But you don’t shoot at everything that moves.
But what if your work in some place without much danger? How do you stay awake, much less alert? (In my squad we could be alert and asleep!) And then, during some “routine” traffic stop or domestic — blam — something goes off script. Maybe you, the young cop who took the warrior mindset to heart, get a flashback to one of those videos in the academy where the cop got ambushed. And you think: “This is exactly how that cop got killed.”
[Cue trippy flashback music and echo]
“This officer hesitated [tated] and it cost him his life [life, ife, f…]”
“Better to be judged by 12 [elve] than carried by six [six, ix, x…].”
So you misidentify a threat, overact, and pull the trigger. You’ve screwed up because you’ve gone through life in a constant state of “Condition Yellow” because you didn’t want to slip into unaware “Condition White” in which:
You may very well die — unless you are lucky. I prefer to not depend on luck.
…
Some insist you cannot go through life using this system without becoming a hair-trigger paranoid person who is dangerous to ones self and others. I believe well-adjusted police officers can run through the color code dozens of times every day and be no worse for wear. Most experienced police officers who learn the color code realize they have been taking these steps on their own all along.
Maybe. For some. For me even. (This is why cops don’t sit with their back toward the door.) But even if constant hypervigilance doesn’t make you paranoid, it is very tiring. Exhausting, even. I don’t miss it. And stress affects some people more than others. NYPD officers are much more likely to commit suicide with their service weapon than be killed by a criminal. Why?
I don’t know the answer. I don’t like the “warrior” or “guardian” dichotomy. I would certainly put the emphasis on the latter, but you need a bit of both. You can’t let the warrior mindset take your soul.
Officers learn to be afraid. That isn’t the word used in law enforcement circles, of course. Vigilant, attentive, cautious, alert, or observant are the terms that appear most often in police publications. But make no mistake, officers don’t learn to be vigilant, attentive, cautious, alert, and observant just because it’s fun. They do so because they are afraid. Fear is ubiquitous in law enforcement.
And to those who say police need to abandon this warrior mindset for guardian mindset. Well, they’ve got an answer for that, too. And it’s not crazy. What do you do when it’s time to fight?
At some basic level policing does involve confronting and fighting criminals intent on hurting you or others. I always notice that when people talk about police reform or improving community relations, the word “criminal” will never come up. It’s as if the entire job of policing is nothing more than dancing with kids and smiling at church-going ladies in fancy hats.
See, just as the public needs to have a more realistic perspective about the “epidemic” of police killing innocent people (happens, but not too much), police need to get a realistic grip about being shot on the job (happens, including to friends of mine, but still less than cops think). Nationwide police get shot and killed about 3 times every month. That’s an annual homicide rate (cops getting killed per 100,000 officers) of under 5, which just happens to be almost identical to the national homicide rate. Of course keep in mind cops are on-duty only a fraction of the time, so cops on the job have a homicide rate 5 times higher than the national average. But hell, it’s still safer to be a cop than to live in Baltimore.
Stay alert. Stay alive. But for God’s sake stop being so damn afraid all the time.
It’s a bad shooting. (Though honestly I was expecting even worse, like an unarmed rationally behaving victim.) The mayor (now, at least) and the police chief have said the officer is at fault.
The officer who killed McDonald fits the pattern of bad cops: high activity, drug work, too many complaints. Sure, all the complaints weren’t justified, but some of them were. And undoubtedly he did a lot of bad shit that people didn’t file formal complaints about.
The allegations against Van Dyke include 10 complaints of excessive force, including two incidents where he allegedly used a firearm, causing injury. He was also accused of improper searches and making racially or ethnically biased remarks. Four of the allegations were proven factual, but Van Dyke’s actions were deemed lawful and appropriate. In most of the other cases, there was either not enough evidence to prove or disprove the complaint or the allegation was proven unfounded.
…
The data shows that it’s rare for any officers to be penalized, and white officers were half as likely as black ones to be disciplined for a complaint.
…
Apparent repeat offenders — officers with more than 10 complaints against them — represented 30 percent of all complaints, even though they made up only 10 percent of the police force.
…
That distinction [the most complained-about officer] goes to Jerome Finnigan, the subject of 68 citizen complaints in nearly two decades with the Chicago Police Department; none of the allegations resulted in disciplinary action.
In 2011, Finnigan was convicted of robbing criminal suspects while serving on an elite force and ordering a hit on a cop he thought might turn him in. At his sentencing, Finnigan admitted to having become “a corrupt police officer,” according to the Chicago Tribune. But he said the police department was aware, and for many years did nothing.
“My bosses knew what I was doing out there,” he said, “and it went on and on. And this wasn’t the exception to the rule. This was the rule.”
68 complaints and a criminal conviction and no disciplinary action?! That is rotten.
So this cop shows up on a scene and, rather than doing nothing, gets out of his car, puts himself almost in harm’s way, and kills this guy. And then keeps firing. Fires 16 shots. No other cop saw a need to shoot. Because there was no need to shoot. You contain, retreat, or make do. Then you tase this guy. Or what about having shields and a straight baton?
Anyway, will Chicago riot like Baltimore? No. For two reasons. First of all there is now legal accountability. That’s the way the system is supposed to work. You murder somebody? You face justice. Second, unlike Baltimore Mayor Rawlings-Blake and former Police Commissioner Batts, the political and police leadership in Chicago have a minimum level of basic competency.
It’s kind of funny to watch the Left completely freak out at the mere suggestion from Comey that viral videos might have an impact on police on crime. See thisand this and this:
"But he acknowledged that there is so far no data to back up his assertion…"
https://t.co/ShhyMlv50H
Mr. Comey’s remarks caught officials by surprise at the Justice Department, where his views are not shared at the top levels. Holding the police accountable for civil rights violations has been a top priority at the department in recent years, and some senior officials do not believe that scrutiny of police officers has led to an increase in crime. While the department had no immediate comment on Friday, several officials privately fumed at Mr. Comey’s suggestion.
Here’s a speech he gaveon Oct 15. It’s worth listening to (it’s just 6 minutes).
This is a thoughtful and intelligent guy. And most of his comments are far too liberal for the police world. I mean, check out what he said yesterday: Cops can learn from #blacklivesmatter. Shocking, I tell you. Shocking.
More people are being killed. And Comey is thinking. And he’s saying we need more and better data. And yeah, maybe viral videos and political fall-out have an effect on policing. Uh, of course they have an effect on policing. So let’s talk.
When Sandra Bland was asked by Officer Encinia if she, “was done,” she actually was. Officer Encinia could have issued a ticket or a warning and walked away. But he chose not to. That was a mistake. Not legally, mind you. But morally and tactically, it was stupid.
“A roadside domestic,” is how my friend and retired Baltimore cop, Leon Taylor put it. (“Code it, David-Yes.”) Yeah, my idea of a fun Friday night is seeing Leon, who happened to be in town unexpectedly, and analyzing the full Sandra Bland arrest video over a beer.
Both Bland and Encinia could have deescalated, and neither did. But it’s not Bland’s job to deescalate. She’s not paid to interact with citizens and make things safer. It’s not her responsibility. She can do whatever the hell she wants. It might end up with her getting arrested. Sure. But it’s only the police officer’s moral and professional responsibility to do the right thing.
The job of a police officer is avoid creating potentially dangerous situations and to deal, professionally, with upset people. To intentionally not do so is bad policing.
Here’s my timeline and transcript of the Officer Encinia Bland encounter. Times are based on the above video. (The transcript isn’t perfect; but it’s the best I could do.) The video starts with Officer Encinia wrapping up what seems to be a very nice car stop. (That car then pulls away from the curb without signaling, I can’t help but notice.)
1:15 Bland makes right turn onto road.
1:20 Cop makes a U-Turn.
At this point I’m wondering why he’s interested in Bland, if he is. It’s not clear if she signaled a right turn (or stopped) or not. But he never mentions this later. Is he just speeding to get coffee? I don’t know. But it does seem like he already intended to stop her. But maybe not.
Maybe he liked stopping cars so he could give drivers warnings instead of tickets. And then he’d leave feeling all warm and fuzzy. I don’t know. But you don’t really deserve credit when you pull people over for bullshit and then choose not to write them up.
I’d guess he’s pushing roughly 35-40 mph in what is 20 mph zone. At 2:00 Officer Encinia pulls up behind Ms. Bland, who changes lanes without signaling. Bland later tells Encinia, quite honestly, that she was trying to get out of the officer’s way. Technically, though, she did failed to signal a lane change.
2:40 Officer: Hello, Ma’am. The reason for your stop is you failed to signal the lane change. Do you have your driver’s license and insurance with you.
[pause or incomprehensible]
What’s wrong?
Officer Encinia checks the car’s front tag and then returns to police car by 4:23. He exits the car at 8:35. Now up to this point, except for a very bullshit nature of the actual violation, it’s hard to fault the officer for any of his his actions or demeanor toward Sandra Bland. For her part, she signals complete verbal compliance. She’s not happy. But then why should she be?
8:39 Him: OK, ma’am.
[Pause]
Him: You OK?
8:50 Her: I’m waiting on you. You… This is your job. I’m waiting on you. Whatever you want me to do.
8:55 Him: You seem very irritated?
8:57 Her: I am. I really am. I feel like you stopped me, for what I am getting a ticket for — I was getting out of your way. You was speeding up, tailing me. So I move over, and you stop me. So, yeah, I am a little irritated. But so that doesn’t stop you from giving me a ticket, so…
Now here Bland is attempting to connect. She actually thought the officer cared what was wrong. After all, he did ask, well, “what’s wrong?”
There’s a long 5 second pause before the officer says, “I’m sorry, Ma’am. I’m just going to give you a warning. Please drive safely,” and Bland drives away.
Oh, wait…. That’s not what happened. But that could have been the happy ending. But it wasn’t.
They both end up taking the low road, but it’s initiated by the police officer. This could have been the perfect time for a cop to win her over. This is how community relations start: not with a community relations officer, but with every damn interaction between police and the public.
Think of everything that has happened in the past year with police. And then think of the stupidity of this stop. And then you ask someone, “what’s wrong?” and leave them for four minutes to think about the answer? Four minutes is a long time to wait for a traffic stop warning, but it’s not crazy long (computers do go down and/or get slow). Four minutes is enough time to sit and fume and think about history and present and want to answer the question, “what’s wrong?”
Let’s rewind a few seconds:
Her: I am. I really am. I feel like you stopped me, for what I am getting a ticket for — I was getting out of your way. You was speeding up, tailing me. So I move over, and you stop me. So, yeah, I am a little irritated. But so that doesn’t stop you from giving me a ticket, so…
[four second pause]
9:09 Are you done?
Oh, no he didn’t!
See this is where things went south. She told him what was going on in her mind. She was willing to receive a ticket. But she wasn’t going to be happy about it. You don’t have to be happy when you think the cops are going to give you a bullshit ticket. Especially for some violation that was caused by the cop’s presence in the first place. You have to obey. And until this point, Bland does obey. And as a cop, that’s all I ever really wanted. But rather than calm down or even listen to Bland, the officer is as rude as you could be in three non-obscene words: “Are you done?”
It’s like the officer is saying, “If I don’t engage you, you’ll never how I really feel.” Or, “Are you through telling me that bullshit?” Or, “I want you to start talking so I can tell to shut the fuck up.” Try that with somebody you love and see how it works. Bland was compliant. She was resigned. The problem from the officer’s perspective seems to be that she wasn’t properly deferential. She wasn’t shucking and jiving:
9:11 You asked me what was wrong and I told you. So now I’m done, yeah.
9:14 OK.
9:20 You mind putting out your cigarette please, you mind?
9:24 I’m in my car. Why do I have to put out my cigarette?
9:29 Well you can step on out now.
I have no idea what Officer Encinia’s intention is here. Except for her tone, it’s her first pushback to his authority. Now don’t get me wrong, authority is important to a cop. But authority is something you receive. It’s something you earn. It’s not something you demand. And the cop quickly becomes an asshole. Why? Because he can.
I guess because she said she didn’t have to put out her cigarette in her car (though legally, she probably would have had to put out, if ordered, based on officer’s perception of safety) maybe Encinia thought, I’ll show you by taking you out of your car comfort zone. And then you won’t give me any lip. This is straight up Southpark shit.
Again, the cop is in his rights, as the Court has defined them (Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 1977), but I don’t see how he’s making himself safer by getting her out of her car. Is she under arrest at this point? I don’t know. But the Court has said that police (in a Texas case) can arrest people for even non-arrestable traffic offenses. Does that make sense? No. But it’s Law of the Land.
It’s possible Encinia knew his he could arrest on any traffic stop and chose to do so. Dickish, but legal. (Often this constitutional right is prohibited by state or local statute, but I doubt I don’t it’s prohibited in Texas). Either way, you can arrest her the moment she refuses to comply with the lawful order to get out of the car. Disobeying a lawful order is a crime. The game is rigged in police officers’ favor, I’m telling you. And that’s why you shouldn’t play.
At any time up to this moment Bland could have also deescalated. She could have said, “yes sir, sorry sir.” And probably she would have gone on her way with a warning. She made a choice. A bad choice. You’ll never win an argument like this with a cop. Nine times out of ten, on strictly legal grounds, the cop is right. And the tenth time? You’re still not going to win.
9:30 I don’t have to step out of the car.
Step out of the car
9:37 Her: No, you do not have the right to do that.
Him: I do have the right. Now step out or I will remove you.
9:45 Her. I refuse to talk to you other than identify myself.
He’s right here. She doesn’t have to make small talk. But she does have to get out of the car. There’s too much bad “know your rights” crap on YouTube. The problem with learning “your rights” on the internet is it’s often flat out wrong. Also, even if it is right in some cases, it may not apply in your case. And there’s no way to know. It depends on a lot of factors you may not know about. And the cop is under no obligation to tell you so. Sometimes, you know, there actually is a time sensitive emergecy.
The best legal advice, my advice that will never get you locked up or shot, is comply like a complying fool, do not run away, do not fight. Period. Is that too demeaning for you? Too much Ethiopian Shim Sham shucking and jiving? Well that’s up to you. But as I tell my students: pick your battles.
But keep in mind police officers do not have to give you a reason for their actions. Ever. You can ask, “why?” They are under no obligations to answer. Ever. Police never have to answer your questions. Now tactically and morally, and just as common courtesy, there are very good reasons officers should sometimes explain their actions, but legally they do not have to. And sometimes (not most of the time, mind you) there are good reasons not to.
And if you insist you have a right when you don’t, well, that’s how you talk your way into handcuffs. Or worse. At 9:48, just 7 minutes after this doomed blind date started, they start bickering like a couple that’s been in bad relationship for 170 years.
9:48: Step out or I will remove you.
Her: I am getting removed for a failure to signal?
Him: Step out or I will remove you. I’m giving a lawful order. Get out of the car now. Or I’m going to remove you.
9:54 Her: I’m calling my…
9:55 I’m going to yank you outta here (take the keys)
OK, you going to yank me out of my my car.
9:59 Get out
10:00 [calls for backup]
This is a dumb move. From a tactical perspective, what the hell is he doing? She is not an imminent threat. So you try and force her in a position where she might be? You want to force her out by yourself instead of waiting for backup that is literally a couple minutes a way. If you’re solo and want to arrest somebody or get a person out of a car (not an easy thing to do), then you, office, shuck and jive and do the Ethiopian Shim Sham until you have backup. There’s no reason to do this alone. And yet he does. Why? I don’t know. I guess because he wants to prove his dominance over her. And Bland knows that. It’s horrible policing.
Her: All right, let’s do this.
Him: We’re going to.
Her: Don’t touch me.
Him: Get out of the car
Her: Don’t touch me. I’m not under arrest, and you don’t have the right.
I can’t help but wonder if Sandra Bland would still be alive if she did actually understand his rights and her obligations in a police-citizen car stop.
10:10 You are under arrest
I’m under arrest for what?! For what?
Failure to obey a lawful order. Or just because he wanted to, based on Atwater.
Officer Encinia then calls for faster backup around 10:15. This is also horrible policing. Other officers now will race to the call. But the only reason you need backup is because you made a bad tactical decision, officer. Racing to calls is dangerous. Officers get killed. And if you make your fellow officers race to your bullshit too often, well, after a while they’re going to go really slow and stop at all the red lights. Safety first, after all.
Him: Get out of the car. Get out of the car, now!
Her: Why am I being apprehended. You’re trying to give me a ticket…
I said get out of the car.
Why am I being apprehended?
I’m giving you a lawful order. I’m going to drag you out of here.
You threatening to drag me out of my own car?
10:30 Get out of the car! I will light you up. Get out of the car!
[He’s holding his Taser. Bland complies.]
Her: Wow. You doing all of this for a failure to signal.
Him: Get over there.
Her: Right yeah, let’s take this to court.
Him: Go Ahead.
Her: for a failure to signal.
Get off the phone.
I’m not on the phone. I have a right to record this. It’s my property.
Put your phone down.
Sir?
Put your phone down. right now. Put your phone down.
For a fucking failure to signal. My goodness.
11:03 Come over here.
Her: Ya’ll are interesting. Very interesting. You feel good about yourself? You feel good about yourself? For a failure to signal. You feel real good about yourself.
Him: Come over here now.
Her: You feel good about yourself.
Turn around. Turn around now.
Why can’t you tell me why I’m being arrested.
I’m giving you a lawful order.
Why am I being arrested?
Him: Turn around.
Her: Why won’t tell me that part?
11:25 I’m giving you a lawful order. Turn around.
Why will you not tell me that part?
You are not compliant.
I’m not compliant because you just pulled me out of the car.
11:30 TURN AROUND!
Her: Are you fucking kidding me. This is some bullshit.
Him: Put your hands behind your back.
11:35 You know this is straight bullshit. And you pull this shit. Full of straight this That’s all is some scary ass cops. Y’all bitch ass is scared. That’s all it is. Fucking scared of a female.
Him: If you would’ve just listened.
See, now we’re just in straight-up bickering couple bullshit. He’s dismissive of her. She’s trying to emasculate him.
11:49 I was trying to sign the fucking ticket! Whatever.
Him: Stop moving.
Her: Are you fucking serious?
Him: Stop moving.
Oh, I can’t wait till we go to court. Ohhh, I can’t wait. I cannot wait till we go to court! I can’t wait. Oh, I can’t wait. You want me to sit down now?
12:01 No.
Her: You was going to throw me to the floor. That’ll make you feel better about yourself?
12:06 Knock it off.
That make you feel better about yourself? That’ll make you feel real good, won’t it? Pussy ass. Fucking pussy. For a failure to signal. You doing all of this. In little ass Prairie View Texas. My God, they must…
Him: You were getting a warning. Until now. You’re going to jail
Her: I’m getting a, for what?!
12:23 You can come read it.
For what? I’m getting a warning for what?
Stay right here.
Her: For what?! You were pointing me over there!
12:29 I said stay right here
Her: Oh, I swear on my life, y’all some pussies. A pussy-ass cop. For a fucking ticket you gonna take me to jail.
[Him to dispatcher: I got her under control. She’s in handcuffs.]
Her: What a pussy. What a pussy. What a pussy. You about to break my fucking wrists.
Him: Stop moving.
Her: I’m standing still. You pulling me, goddamnit.
Him: Stay right there. Stay right here.
Her: Don’t touch me. All this for a traffic ticket
13:00 [Officer 1 to officer 2]: Cover me right over here.
Him: This right there says a warning. You started creating the problem.
Her: You asked me what was wrong. I trying to tell you.
Him: You got anything on you person, that’s illegal.
Do I look like I have anything on me. This is a maxi-dress.
I’m going to remove your glasses.
This is a maxi-dress.
Come on over here.
13:20 You an asshole. You about to break my wrist. Stop. You’re about to break my fucking wrist.
Stop it.
Officer 2: Stop resisting ma’am
If you would stop, I would tell you.
13:34 You are such a pussy. You are such a pussy.
Officer 2: No, you are.
You are dinking around You are dinking around When you pull away from me, you are resisting arrest.
This make you feel good
Officer #2: I got it.
Her: This make you feel good, officer, a female. For a traffic ticket.
Officer #2: I got it. Take care of yourself.
Her: You a real man now. Knocked. Slammed my head in the ground. I got epilepsy you motherfucker
13:56 Him: Good
Officer #2: You should have started thinking about that before you started resisting
14:02 All right. Yeah, this is real good. Real good for a female. Yeah. Y’all strong. Oh. Y’all real strong.
14:09 I want you to wait right here
I can’t go nowhere with a fucking knee on my back. Duh.
And here’s it’s all over but some more shouting.
14:22 Him: You need to leave.
15:00 Sit up on your butt.
16:10 She started yanking away and then Kicked me, and I took her straight to the ground.
16:20 Officer #3: One thing, you can be sure it’s on video.
16:55 Ring got you there?
31:38 Him: She kicked me, started yanking away. I brought her down into the grass. [He did put her down in the grass, which, well, I wouldn’t say it was nice of him, but it was much nicer than bringing her down on concrete, which he could have done.]
You know the funny thing? We’re only talking about it because she killed herself (or was brutally murdered by correctional officers). This is what is messed up about the rest of the criminal justice system. Bland spent three damn days in jail for failure to obey and also, while in cuffs, kicking and scratching a cop without serious injury. And now she’s dead.
As commenter to a previous post put it: “This is a bad job by the trooper… but not the worst I have ever seen.” No. It’s not the worst I’ve seen. But, man… it is bad.
That was cute and all, before Sandra Bland died after being arrested in what was so close to being a warning for a minor traffic violation.
Three(?) times Sandra Bland asserted her “rights.” Three times she was wrong. Now she’s dead. You do have to put out your cigarette as a matter of officer safety. You do have to get out of the car. During a car stop, you are being detained. The 4th amendment barely applies. This isn’t my opinion. These are Court decisions regarding general concepts of officer safety — far more pro-cop than most cops and the public realize — that emphasize the phrase “unquestioned police command.”
Ordering people out of car isn’t like use of lethal force. The latter requires articulation of danger. The Court says car stops are inherently dangerous and thus gives officers the greatest amount of discretion to whatever they see fit. (In a similar way, the Court recognizes the “inherent link” between violence and the drug corner, which gives officers carte blanche to frisk almost everybody on a drug corner, no further articulation of danger required.)
The basic rule, especially in a car stop, is obey lawful orders. Period. Resistance really is futile. Force can used to ensure compliance. I’m not saying this is good. But it is established Law of the Land.
So it pains me to read a legal analysis in a respectable publication that is so patently, even dangerously, wrong.
First let’s get the objective facts right. Then we can talk about the subjective issues.
Jim Harrington, director of the Texas Civil Rights Project, should know better. You gotta get this right. He is wrong:
[The cop] does not have the right to say get out of the car. He has to express some reason. “I need to search your car,” or, whatever; he needs to give a reason.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
He can’t just say “get out of the car” for a traffic offense.
Uh, yes, he can! What part of “precautionary measure, without reasonable suspicion” doesn’t he understand?
Rarely is the Supreme Court so unambiguously clear. Best I can tell, it goes back to Pennsylvania v. Mimms(1977):
The order to get out of the car, issued after the respondent was lawfully detained, was reasonable, and thus permissible under the Fourth Amendment. The State’s proffered justification for such order — the officer’s safety — is both legitimate and weighty.
…
[T]he only question is whether he [lawfully detained driver] shall spend that period sitting in the driver’s seat of his car or standing alongside it. Not only is the insistence of the police on the latter choice not a “serious intrusion upon the sanctity of the person,” but it hardly rises to the level of a “petty indignity.” [quoted from Terry v. Ohio]. What is, at most, a mere inconvenience cannot prevail when balanced against legitimate concerns for the officer’s safety.
…
[T]he police officers may order the driver to get out of the vehicle without violating the Fourth Amendment’s proscription of unreasonable searches and seizures.
Maryland v. Wilson(1997) reaffirmed and extended this to the car’s passengers as well. Brendlin v. California(2007) re-affirmed again, but added some even stronger language:
We held that during a lawful traffic stop an officer may order a passenger out of the car as a precautionary measure, without reasonable suspicion that the passenger poses a safety risk (driver may be ordered out of the car as a matter of course). In fashioning this rule, we invoked our earlier statement that “the risk of harm to both the police and the occupants is minimized if the officers routinely exercise unquestioned command of the situation.” [quoting Michigan v. Summers] What we have said in these opinions probably reflects a societal expectation of “unquestioned [police] command.”
And in case you’re still hoping for a loophole:
Our conclusion comports with the views of all nine Federal Courts of Appeals, and nearly every state court, to have ruled on the question.
And no, cops don’t have to tell you anything or explain why. Maybe they should, out of courtesy or politeness or tactics. But they don’t have to. They order. You obey. So says the Supreme Court.
Tangentially, not that you asked, this is what bothers me the liberal emphasis on “procedural justice” (See Obama’s Presidential Police Report). This was procedural justice. Nothing the cop did was illegal. Could have the cop acting differently? Sure. Should the cop have acting differently? In hindsight, yes. But did the cop have to act differently? No. The law was followed. And now a woman is dead. It’s not moral justice.
Also, here’s the most complete video:
This reminds me most of all of the Henry Louis Gates arrest. You get into a pissing contest with cops, odds are you’ll lose. “Pick your battles,” I tell my students. A car stop is great place to keep your mouth shut. Seriously, right or wrong, what do you hope to gain from pissing off a cop?
If you’re left wing, watch this version (if you’re in the middle, watch the right-wing version because it provides more dialogue.):
It’s also good to watch both versions and see the political convergence of right and left come together in the face of what is a pretty morally indefensible police-involved killing.
Perhaps how this is how police are now trained, but I hope not. I do not like what I see.
These are not effective tactics (though it worries me that the officers seem well trained). This shooting also demonstrates why we should not provide police with military weapons willy nilly. The police use almost every toy at their disposal. What’s the point of having less-lethal weaponry if you never get to use it? The desire to use less-lethal weaponry — flash grenade, dog, “bean bag” — contributes to a bad death. When police shoot a guy with a knife (or two), I’m generally pretty sympathetic to police. But not in this case. I know the 15-foot rule, but this guy wasn’t about to go billy-goat ninja on the side of a mountain.
First of all, and I know we didn’t see the first few hours, but this guy was complying. At least until police fired a less-lethal round near here. But regardless, one the guy is down, you can go up to the guy with a night stick and wack him if he moves. You don’t need to fire three less-lethal rounds at his ass and sick the dog on him. Sure, he might be playing possum, but I think you can assume he won’t be fighting at 100%, if you know what I mean. You’ve already shot him and you’ve got lethal cover.
There’s something particularly morbid about shooting a dying guy with a bean bag and letting a dog bite him because he failed to comply… after you done shot him.
I’m also not at all clear why police fired a flash grenade at a complying individual. In all seriousness, could somebody please explain to me what is the S.O.P. now in training and the use of flash grenades? Is compliance no longer enough to prevent use of force?
Since 2010, ABQ police officers have been involved in 37 shootings, 23 of them fatal. By comparison, the NYPD has been involved in perhaps about 70 shootings since 2010. But, just to remind you, New York City has far more than 10 times the population of fair Albuquerque. In terms of police-involved shootings, Albuquerque is roughly on par with Baltimore, but Baltimore has much more crime.
I think this was a bad shooting.
But what really worries me is that perhaps the officers performed exactly as trained. If so, we need to change police training (and not make scapegoats of the officers).