gunsmith
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"Where Moore sees cause for shame, the cops see vindication and absolution. If that attitude doesn't follow Kroeker into retirement, these cops and this community will remain at odds. Steve Duin: 503-221-8597; [email protected]; 1320 S.W. Broadway, Portland OR 97201."
I left Steve a polite phone message(gunsmith)
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/index.ssf?/base/news/1062245342237360.xml
Fear plagues the police and their mayor
08/31/03
N ow that we've established the whereabouts of chief Mark Kroeker, hounded by "intermediaries" of the mayor onto the unemployment line, we need to pursue two more troubling questions unleashed by the review of the Portland Police Bureau's officer-involved shootings:
Where were Michael Schrunk and Vera Katz? And why have we so proudly capitulated to fear?
Schrunk is the Multnomah County district attorney, Katz the lame-duck mayor who was unwilling to show her hand and afraid to show her face in Kroeker's rushed and pathetic retirement ceremony Friday.
Neither the DA nor the mayor was visible in the shooting review Kroeker complained was written in the present but mired in the past. Yet the report's findings may well predict the future unless Schrunk and the new mayor bring their authority to bear upon Portland's cops.
Alarm over police training, tactics and investigations is consistent throughout the Police Assessment Resource Center's analysis of the bureau's 30 officer-involved shootings from 1997 to 2000.
Time and again, the consultants note common practices at the bureau that are contrary to established procedure. "Among experienced police officers, it is beyond dispute that witnesses should be interviewed as soon as possible," the report notes, and Portland police don't dispute that until they need to interview an officer involved in a shooting.
Other investigative tricks are labeled "highly unusual," "an unnecessary loophole" or a "feature we have not seen in any other law enforcement agencies." And those views are apparently shared by bureau veterans.
"People have had a hard time taking a critical look at the use of deadly force," a senior officer said. "There's not administrative review in this organization. People are afraid to ask hard questions. People are afraid to hurt feelings."
Afraid to confront the obvious -- that cops make mistakes and sometimes pull the trigger when it can't be justified -- detectives have made a mess of several investigations, misplacing evidence, failing to conduct gunpowder residue and bullet trajectory tests, and refusing to record crucial interviews.
The public had no access to those investigations. Schrunk and the mayor did. Why didn't they intervene?
The mayor was not only unwilling to answer questions, but aides wouldn't say whether or not she was at City Hall.
Schrunk? He insisted, "There's been a long history of trying to get our arms around the investigations. Our big complaint has been the delay between the incident and the interview with the officer. We've almost come to blows with the union president over that."
By encouraging grand juries to critique the cops and demanding better work from detectives, Schrunk said, his office has stirred considerable resentment. Protecting the rights of the officers, he said, "is a mantra, a part of the culture. We keep asking for these interviews. We can't get them. That has to come from the chief, from the public, saying, 'This is nonsense.' "
Well, the new chief, perhaps, or the new mayor, one of whom, hopefully, has seen Michael Moore's "Bowling for Columbine."
In that Oscar-winning documentary, Moore tries to analyze why Americans are so wedded to their guns. One conclusion: Fear. Of that stranger in the night, or the phantom carjacker. White America's fear of the black man.
Just as fear drives people to buy guns, this report makes clear that it explains and validates their use by Portland police.
Fear is the root word in all the leading, prejudicial questions investigators ask in the wake of a shooting: "Were you at any time placed in fear that you might be injured? . . . Were you (in) fear for any individual, yourself or anyone else? . . . Okay, and you were afraid (the suspect) was going to run over you?"
You were? Why didn't you say so? Fear makes everything right. We can relate -- as will the grand jury.
Where Moore sees cause for shame, the cops see vindication and absolution. If that attitude doesn't follow Kroeker into retirement, these cops and this community will remain at odds. Steve Duin: 503-221-8597; [email protected]; 1320 S.W. Broadway, Portland OR 97201.
I left Steve a polite phone message(gunsmith)
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/steve_duin/index.ssf?/base/news/1062245342237360.xml
Fear plagues the police and their mayor
08/31/03
N ow that we've established the whereabouts of chief Mark Kroeker, hounded by "intermediaries" of the mayor onto the unemployment line, we need to pursue two more troubling questions unleashed by the review of the Portland Police Bureau's officer-involved shootings:
Where were Michael Schrunk and Vera Katz? And why have we so proudly capitulated to fear?
Schrunk is the Multnomah County district attorney, Katz the lame-duck mayor who was unwilling to show her hand and afraid to show her face in Kroeker's rushed and pathetic retirement ceremony Friday.
Neither the DA nor the mayor was visible in the shooting review Kroeker complained was written in the present but mired in the past. Yet the report's findings may well predict the future unless Schrunk and the new mayor bring their authority to bear upon Portland's cops.
Alarm over police training, tactics and investigations is consistent throughout the Police Assessment Resource Center's analysis of the bureau's 30 officer-involved shootings from 1997 to 2000.
Time and again, the consultants note common practices at the bureau that are contrary to established procedure. "Among experienced police officers, it is beyond dispute that witnesses should be interviewed as soon as possible," the report notes, and Portland police don't dispute that until they need to interview an officer involved in a shooting.
Other investigative tricks are labeled "highly unusual," "an unnecessary loophole" or a "feature we have not seen in any other law enforcement agencies." And those views are apparently shared by bureau veterans.
"People have had a hard time taking a critical look at the use of deadly force," a senior officer said. "There's not administrative review in this organization. People are afraid to ask hard questions. People are afraid to hurt feelings."
Afraid to confront the obvious -- that cops make mistakes and sometimes pull the trigger when it can't be justified -- detectives have made a mess of several investigations, misplacing evidence, failing to conduct gunpowder residue and bullet trajectory tests, and refusing to record crucial interviews.
The public had no access to those investigations. Schrunk and the mayor did. Why didn't they intervene?
The mayor was not only unwilling to answer questions, but aides wouldn't say whether or not she was at City Hall.
Schrunk? He insisted, "There's been a long history of trying to get our arms around the investigations. Our big complaint has been the delay between the incident and the interview with the officer. We've almost come to blows with the union president over that."
By encouraging grand juries to critique the cops and demanding better work from detectives, Schrunk said, his office has stirred considerable resentment. Protecting the rights of the officers, he said, "is a mantra, a part of the culture. We keep asking for these interviews. We can't get them. That has to come from the chief, from the public, saying, 'This is nonsense.' "
Well, the new chief, perhaps, or the new mayor, one of whom, hopefully, has seen Michael Moore's "Bowling for Columbine."
In that Oscar-winning documentary, Moore tries to analyze why Americans are so wedded to their guns. One conclusion: Fear. Of that stranger in the night, or the phantom carjacker. White America's fear of the black man.
Just as fear drives people to buy guns, this report makes clear that it explains and validates their use by Portland police.
Fear is the root word in all the leading, prejudicial questions investigators ask in the wake of a shooting: "Were you at any time placed in fear that you might be injured? . . . Were you (in) fear for any individual, yourself or anyone else? . . . Okay, and you were afraid (the suspect) was going to run over you?"
You were? Why didn't you say so? Fear makes everything right. We can relate -- as will the grand jury.
Where Moore sees cause for shame, the cops see vindication and absolution. If that attitude doesn't follow Kroeker into retirement, these cops and this community will remain at odds. Steve Duin: 503-221-8597; [email protected]; 1320 S.W. Broadway, Portland OR 97201.
