As i said before,cops are no longer makeing the destinction between an actual criminal with reason of suspicion and just an average joe who make a mistake or is simple exerting some "behavior". The officers here have said that they can't tell if you are commiting a crime unless they investigate for any reason. I take that as they assume almost everyone is constanly in the process of a criminal act and they are trying to find any excuse to hassle you and "catch you in the act". They say they are doing their job by investigating coffee cans because only drug dealers would ever have a coffee can in their possesion. I thought we were supposed to have the benefit of the doubt and had the basic right to not be hassled unless there is actual probable cause. Do the officers here really think that you are making the street safer by hassleing us everyday folks for no real reason. I am not trying to piss anyone off but I am truly curious. Incidents described in this thread have only started occuring in the last generation or so, what was the change. My father and many older folks I know tell me just the opposite stories of cops and how hey actually used to try and help people. Honestly, what has happened?
Cop bashing
- Thread starter AK-74me
- Start date
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20cows
Member
Ohhhh, I get it!
Hit the nail right on the head!
NEGATIVE. ONE individual here who indicates from context- don't know if he actually ever claimed to actually BE a LEO- indicated this. All those whom I know to be law enforcement officers in this conversation have had a very fair outlook.
John
Gordon Fink
Member
gunmoney said:
I think they are, whether they realize it or not. That is a big part of the problem.
~G. Fink
Daniel T
Member
My take on Mr. Fink's statement is that there are so many laws, it's nigh impossible to know if you are breaking one.
You know, I've made a concerted effort to stay out of threads like this because of the content, but I have to say: thanks to the LEOs here that are calm and eloquent, like Lawdog and Jeff White. You have my respect and my thanks for your service.
You know, I've made a concerted effort to stay out of threads like this because of the content, but I have to say: thanks to the LEOs here that are calm and eloquent, like Lawdog and Jeff White. You have my respect and my thanks for your service.
Control Group
Member
I think that's the entire problem. Or at least, a vast majority of it. First, that there are enough laws that a reasonable person can't know if they're in compliance with all of them. Second, that there are so many laws that a majority of people break, such that breaking laws is customary. Third, that this situation makes it literally impossible and entirely undesirable for the police to actually enforce all the laws all the time, or even every time a police officer actually witnesses a violation of the law.
Unlike the "cop bashers," I don't blame this on the police, who are, in general, doing what they believe to be their legitimate duty. Unlike the "police apologists," I don't blame this on the citizens ("whether they realize it or not" invalidates the legitimacy of the criminal accusation).
I blame the laws and the legal system. If you're in a society where essentially everyone is a criminal, maybe it's time to rethink your definition of criminal.
The way it is now, it's hard for your average citizen to not think of the police as an arbitrary authority, and it's hard for your average cop to not think everyone's just a criminal waiting to be caught. There's something very, very wrong with this picture.
birddog
Member
Officer: What's the coffee can for, civilian?
THR Person: To collect brass from the assault rifle in my trunk.
All my experiences with LEO's (traffic stops, insurance reports, hunting license checks) have been professional, if not "good". I'm now thinking about locking the coffee cans in the trunk, though.
TallPine
Member
Maybe Jerry Fletcher wasn't so paranoid after all ....
richyoung
Member
...I have it on good authority that LEOs are only interested in "high capacity assault" coffee cans, the coffee can of choice for gang-bangers to do drive-by caffinations. If it were not for the likes of Juan Valdez and his fellow Columbian Cartel members, Starbucks and 7-11 would NOT be able to keep our streets awash with lattes. mochas, frappachinos, and other assorted javas. So please...decaffinate. For the sake of the children!
(This message sponsored by the Coalition to Reduce Alert Criminals)
(This message sponsored by the Coalition to Reduce Alert Criminals)
thereisnospoon
Member
Rich Young
Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha
That was truly funny! Kudos to you man.
Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha
That was truly funny! Kudos to you man.
Old Dog
Member
I disagree. Transferring your view on to all citizens won't fly. Your average citizen usually thinks only of the police while driving, sighting a marked police car with running radar and glancing at one's speedometer ... Most "average" citizens do not have regular encounters with law enforcement, or at least enough encounters (aside from traffic stops or in the rare instance -- for most citizens --of becoming a crime victim) to form an adversarial opinion of LEOs.
Now, granted, those who routinely drive around in souped-up little riceburner cars, lowriders or lowered SUVs with dark-tinted windows and the rap audible for a mile away, those minorities living in high-crime areas or those folks who know that they're routinely engaged in illegal activities all may have more frequent personal encounters with the local gendarmerie and hence formed negative opinions ... but the "average" (otherwise law-abiding) citizens ... are probably too busy just living to worry about the possibility of encountering a "bad cop."
Gordon Fink
Member
What Daniel and especially Control Group said.
I’m fairly certain I violated a traffic law or two on my way to work this morning. I’ve probably violated gun-control “laws” at one point or another. I’ve inadvertently run afoul of municipal parking ordinances on multiple occasions.
None of this was done intentionally, but am I not still technically a criminal?
~G. Fink
I’m fairly certain I violated a traffic law or two on my way to work this morning. I’ve probably violated gun-control “laws” at one point or another. I’ve inadvertently run afoul of municipal parking ordinances on multiple occasions.
None of this was done intentionally, but am I not still technically a criminal?
~G. Fink
P95Carry
Moderator Emeritus
Gordon - go do the right thing - turn yourself in immediately.
Come to think of it - I'll join you - I think I crept this morning at a stop sign!
svtruth
Member
Coffee Can
I'm 57 years old and the weakness of my bladder has provided my children with endless amusement. I carry a coffee can in my truck as an emergency urinal. I suppose that squirting in it and then emptying it under the truck are violations of some laws, but better than standing against a tree at the far end of the parking lot. When you confiscate it, wear gloves.
I'm 57 years old and the weakness of my bladder has provided my children with endless amusement. I carry a coffee can in my truck as an emergency urinal. I suppose that squirting in it and then emptying it under the truck are violations of some laws, but better than standing against a tree at the far end of the parking lot. When you confiscate it, wear gloves.
Gunmoney,
Let's see, police and other LEOs enforce the laws. The laws legislated and enacted by the government that was elected by the people. The laws that can be changed and, often are changed, by the people who vote. That does not make them bad guys - does it? That is not what you meant by ‘hassled’ was it?
As far as the implication you made that LEOs no longer help people lets see if there are any examples of them doing so. Officer Joe Hardbutt arrives on the scene with his partner at a domestic violence dispute where the husband has beaten the snot out of his wife and is about to kill her. They arrest him and the wife goes ballistic and tries to assault the cops because they are harassing her man. I guess there was no help offered by the police there so maybe I see your point.
Officers hassle a local small time drug dealer who sell pot to Johnny. Johnny is then sold Angel Dust spiked pot by the same dealer, just a small time crook. Johnny smokes it and goes into cardiac arrest and dies. The kid's dad go berserk , seeks out the dealer and beats him to a living heap of flesh. The same cops who hassled the dealer by arresting him several times wind up giving him CPR to save his life and arrest him and the dad. Were they hassling or helping?.
The World Trade Center is attacked by terrorists, the towers collapse as hundreds of LEOs are killed while trying to save others. Or was that just hassling because they should have minded their own business? Even after the collapse of both towers, as fires raged (remember number 7 also collapsed due to fire) the LEOs dove right in to serve and protect! It wasn’t their job was it? Wasn’t that the job of the fire department. Yet they went right in there too with all those brave firemen.
After 9/11 thousands of LEOs volunteered for dangerous duties. Some as security, some directing traffic, some on terrorist task forces investigating the terrorist attacks, some going under cover in terrorist organizations, some as federal air marshals, some digging through the rubble of the buildings, many living at the WTC site - sleeping on cots in shifts, some just donating time after work at Red Cross coffee trucks. Many were volunteers. They got little if anything for this extra service except the ulcers, shot nerves, stress, family problems due to stress, and bad dreams that often accompany high stress jobs. Are you aware, one of the most horrific duties for which they volunteered was that of going through the WTC rubble once it was removed from the site and delivered to a NYC landfill? Their main purpose was to look for body parts - rotted, putrid body parts. Yet I never heard much praise for the LEOs who so volunteered. There were few if any TV crews filming them as they filmed at the actual WTC site. There was no one calling them heroes. Few if any praising their service. Few who even wanted to realize that such a heinous job had been demanded by the families of the lost. Few who would talk about the fact that such a job was being done by LEOs. Few who would admit or even bother to think about that such a job would imprint a life long brand of trauma in the minds of those who carried it out. (I mean because of the attitude of the public of: why think about them, that is their job after all isn't it, they are here to serve and protect!) Do you think they did this for glory, or for overtime, or because they thought it was another way to hassle people? They did it because they were and are good people who wanted to do good for the victims of 9/11. There are not many others among our citizenry who would have done likewise - most would have said that's not my job! Yet they did it for months on end. Think about that - months and months of going through the debris to look for lumps of rotted flesh to satisfy family members who demanded closure at all costs. What about the cost to those officers psychologically and physically – when do they get closure from the nightmares? Yet those same officers are the ones who would volunteer or take action to save your behind if you were somehow a victim in a terrorist attack, a bank robbery, a hostage situation and so forth.
How about the cop who helps deliver a baby or two or three. The guy on patrol in a ghetto for most of his career. The guy who gets glared at each time he passes another corner on his patrol – glared at by the ‘youths’ selling drugs and who all have guns. The same cop who was labeled a racist because he shot a kid from a certain racial group who he thought pointed a gun at him. The same guy who was labeled psycho killer by the press. The same guy who was on trial for weeks or months. It happens. The fact that he helped deliver 2 or 3 babies (of the same racial group as the kid he shot) now becomes irrelevant and it is lynching time in the press and in the eyes of the public! This is the same cop who if exonerated goes back to his same patrol and back to his same volunteer coaching job at the PAL.
Sure there are cops/leos who beat prisoners, who are racists, who steal, who sell drugs, who sell classified information, who commit heinous crimes and take advantage of being a police officer or LEO to do so. Thankfully they are usually weeded out and prosecuted. That is a big change from 20 or 30 or 40 years ago. Do you really think that cops 20 or 30 years ago were not flawed as some are today. There was not as much oversight of leos and police back then. Do you think your father's memories are correct? I think that his recall is flawed by the haze of age, it tends to soften one’s memories over time - you don't have to be real old to be so affected. Sure, today, there are lots of things that cops do badly, and there is a good number of bad cops too. The thing is that you do not hear the praises of cops sung as often as you do hear the complaints against them because the bad stuff is what sells newspapers and what riles people up. Bad stuff, war stories, make for better tales to be told and listened to. Namby, pamby stuff, that is ok for a short while, but people want to hear the dirt – that is human nature for a great many folks. The bad stuff is what people want to read about. There are also plenty of good cops and other LEOs out there; many of them do lots of good that protects and serves. There are many more doing good than there are ones doing bad. In fact the good ones often arrest the bad ones. It is, I think, the outlook of the public that has changed more markedly than that the attitudes or actions of the police have become worse.
All the best,
Glenn B
Do you truly believe that cops only harass people, if so maybe it is the outlook toward cops and other LEOs that has changed since your pop’s time and not the role of the LEOs. Why not go to the widows and widowers of those who have been killed in the line of duty while protecting the public and ask if there spouses tended to harass more or help more.
Let's see, police and other LEOs enforce the laws. The laws legislated and enacted by the government that was elected by the people. The laws that can be changed and, often are changed, by the people who vote. That does not make them bad guys - does it? That is not what you meant by ‘hassled’ was it?
As far as the implication you made that LEOs no longer help people lets see if there are any examples of them doing so. Officer Joe Hardbutt arrives on the scene with his partner at a domestic violence dispute where the husband has beaten the snot out of his wife and is about to kill her. They arrest him and the wife goes ballistic and tries to assault the cops because they are harassing her man. I guess there was no help offered by the police there so maybe I see your point.
Officers hassle a local small time drug dealer who sell pot to Johnny. Johnny is then sold Angel Dust spiked pot by the same dealer, just a small time crook. Johnny smokes it and goes into cardiac arrest and dies. The kid's dad go berserk , seeks out the dealer and beats him to a living heap of flesh. The same cops who hassled the dealer by arresting him several times wind up giving him CPR to save his life and arrest him and the dad. Were they hassling or helping?.
The World Trade Center is attacked by terrorists, the towers collapse as hundreds of LEOs are killed while trying to save others. Or was that just hassling because they should have minded their own business? Even after the collapse of both towers, as fires raged (remember number 7 also collapsed due to fire) the LEOs dove right in to serve and protect! It wasn’t their job was it? Wasn’t that the job of the fire department. Yet they went right in there too with all those brave firemen.
After 9/11 thousands of LEOs volunteered for dangerous duties. Some as security, some directing traffic, some on terrorist task forces investigating the terrorist attacks, some going under cover in terrorist organizations, some as federal air marshals, some digging through the rubble of the buildings, many living at the WTC site - sleeping on cots in shifts, some just donating time after work at Red Cross coffee trucks. Many were volunteers. They got little if anything for this extra service except the ulcers, shot nerves, stress, family problems due to stress, and bad dreams that often accompany high stress jobs. Are you aware, one of the most horrific duties for which they volunteered was that of going through the WTC rubble once it was removed from the site and delivered to a NYC landfill? Their main purpose was to look for body parts - rotted, putrid body parts. Yet I never heard much praise for the LEOs who so volunteered. There were few if any TV crews filming them as they filmed at the actual WTC site. There was no one calling them heroes. Few if any praising their service. Few who even wanted to realize that such a heinous job had been demanded by the families of the lost. Few who would talk about the fact that such a job was being done by LEOs. Few who would admit or even bother to think about that such a job would imprint a life long brand of trauma in the minds of those who carried it out. (I mean because of the attitude of the public of: why think about them, that is their job after all isn't it, they are here to serve and protect!) Do you think they did this for glory, or for overtime, or because they thought it was another way to hassle people? They did it because they were and are good people who wanted to do good for the victims of 9/11. There are not many others among our citizenry who would have done likewise - most would have said that's not my job! Yet they did it for months on end. Think about that - months and months of going through the debris to look for lumps of rotted flesh to satisfy family members who demanded closure at all costs. What about the cost to those officers psychologically and physically – when do they get closure from the nightmares? Yet those same officers are the ones who would volunteer or take action to save your behind if you were somehow a victim in a terrorist attack, a bank robbery, a hostage situation and so forth.
How about the cop who helps deliver a baby or two or three. The guy on patrol in a ghetto for most of his career. The guy who gets glared at each time he passes another corner on his patrol – glared at by the ‘youths’ selling drugs and who all have guns. The same cop who was labeled a racist because he shot a kid from a certain racial group who he thought pointed a gun at him. The same guy who was labeled psycho killer by the press. The same guy who was on trial for weeks or months. It happens. The fact that he helped deliver 2 or 3 babies (of the same racial group as the kid he shot) now becomes irrelevant and it is lynching time in the press and in the eyes of the public! This is the same cop who if exonerated goes back to his same patrol and back to his same volunteer coaching job at the PAL.
Sure there are cops/leos who beat prisoners, who are racists, who steal, who sell drugs, who sell classified information, who commit heinous crimes and take advantage of being a police officer or LEO to do so. Thankfully they are usually weeded out and prosecuted. That is a big change from 20 or 30 or 40 years ago. Do you really think that cops 20 or 30 years ago were not flawed as some are today. There was not as much oversight of leos and police back then. Do you think your father's memories are correct? I think that his recall is flawed by the haze of age, it tends to soften one’s memories over time - you don't have to be real old to be so affected. Sure, today, there are lots of things that cops do badly, and there is a good number of bad cops too. The thing is that you do not hear the praises of cops sung as often as you do hear the complaints against them because the bad stuff is what sells newspapers and what riles people up. Bad stuff, war stories, make for better tales to be told and listened to. Namby, pamby stuff, that is ok for a short while, but people want to hear the dirt – that is human nature for a great many folks. The bad stuff is what people want to read about. There are also plenty of good cops and other LEOs out there; many of them do lots of good that protects and serves. There are many more doing good than there are ones doing bad. In fact the good ones often arrest the bad ones. It is, I think, the outlook of the public that has changed more markedly than that the attitudes or actions of the police have become worse.
All the best,
Glenn B
griz
Member
Thank you to all the experienced reasonable LEOs that have posted on this thread. I'm glad that they are in the majority.
Centac, may all your coffe cans be full of dryer sheets.
Centac, may all your coffe cans be full of dryer sheets.
jlwatts3
Member
To answer the question posted above about what has changed this past generation, I believe it has to do with the War on (Some) Drugs.
This topic could fill another thread so I'll leave it at that.
This topic could fill another thread so I'll leave it at that.
TheFederalistWeasel
member
In spite of all those who have problems with LEO’s here…
And I don’t know if it matters to anyone here or not, but last night while on patrol I received a call to “smoke in the area” from dispatch on a major highway from a passerby who called 911.
We get these calls every so often from panicked residence who freak out everytime someone strikes a match around here and 99.9% are due to people burning off brush and whatnot, night falls and the cool air keeps the smoke low to the ground and it drifts for miles sometimes.
I placed myself enroute and made my way to the area.
About a mile from the location (a mile marker), which the caller reported the smoke I saw an eerie sight, full moon high on the horizon, clear sky and the unmistakable billowing, rolling column of black smoke that comes from a house fire.
Radioed dispatch and advised them to tell FD to turn the Dalmatians hat around and put big red in the wind they had a full involved structure.
I arrived just as the residents were running across their very large front yard to a neighbor’s house for help.
The first question out of my mouth was is everyone out; the female was frantic telling me her husband was trying to get the pets out of the house.
I ended up going after him, helping carry about 5 cats to a pen in the back of the yard, and then watched as the FD worked valiantly to salvage what was left of the house.
I helped carry his cats to safety.
I helped a neighbor move several more cats and some dogs to a yard across the street so the husband could stay with his wife.
I called the red cross and had to get very spiteful with the “operator” who seemed unconcerned and uninterested about sending an aid worker out, but in the end had them authorize a hotel and food and clothing vouchers in town for them.
I don’t even know the mans name
They lost everything.
Yeah all cops are JBT's looking to jack people up over empty coffee cans...
:banghead:
And I don’t know if it matters to anyone here or not, but last night while on patrol I received a call to “smoke in the area” from dispatch on a major highway from a passerby who called 911.
We get these calls every so often from panicked residence who freak out everytime someone strikes a match around here and 99.9% are due to people burning off brush and whatnot, night falls and the cool air keeps the smoke low to the ground and it drifts for miles sometimes.
I placed myself enroute and made my way to the area.
About a mile from the location (a mile marker), which the caller reported the smoke I saw an eerie sight, full moon high on the horizon, clear sky and the unmistakable billowing, rolling column of black smoke that comes from a house fire.
Radioed dispatch and advised them to tell FD to turn the Dalmatians hat around and put big red in the wind they had a full involved structure.
I arrived just as the residents were running across their very large front yard to a neighbor’s house for help.
The first question out of my mouth was is everyone out; the female was frantic telling me her husband was trying to get the pets out of the house.
I ended up going after him, helping carry about 5 cats to a pen in the back of the yard, and then watched as the FD worked valiantly to salvage what was left of the house.
I helped carry his cats to safety.
I helped a neighbor move several more cats and some dogs to a yard across the street so the husband could stay with his wife.
I called the red cross and had to get very spiteful with the “operator” who seemed unconcerned and uninterested about sending an aid worker out, but in the end had them authorize a hotel and food and clothing vouchers in town for them.
I don’t even know the mans name
They lost everything.
Yeah all cops are JBT's looking to jack people up over empty coffee cans...
:banghead:
20cows
Member
TheFederalistWease,
Hey, if those folks didn't say it or if they already did, I'll say it again. Thanks.
Hey, if those folks didn't say it or if they already did, I'll say it again. Thanks.
JohnBT
Member
"None of this was done intentionally, but am I not still technically a criminal?"
According to an article in the paper the other day, the local inner city young men have a new and different standard. You aren't a criminal until you are convicted. They specifically discussed the act of killing someone. Among their group a person is not considered a murderer until, and if, they are convicted.
My, how times change.
John
According to an article in the paper the other day, the local inner city young men have a new and different standard. You aren't a criminal until you are convicted. They specifically discussed the act of killing someone. Among their group a person is not considered a murderer until, and if, they are convicted.
My, how times change.
John
Warren
Member
This has turned into a "bash centac" thread. We do not bash members. Right?
Onto the topic: On economic grounds I have problems with government supplied policing as I do with all government supplied services. I try not to let the abuses I read about get me to wound up as I know they are a symptom of a larger problem. And if I spent my time wound up I don't think that would be good for me, health wise or good for my family to have to deal with me.
That said I have police encounters from my youth that run counter to the JBT profile.
1. Underage, drinking and drunk at the beach. All five of us were just gone on the booze. Cops show up ask our names, one cop kept getting mine wrong I did not correct him, and sent us on our way. This involved us getting into my buddy's truck and driving away. yup, the cops encouraged a drunk to get in his truck and drive a whole bunch of other drunks away. I still wonder about that one.
2. Underage, drunk and driving. Again five of us had been out drinking and were cruising about when we get pulled over. The driver is told to get out of the car and head back to the cop car. All the rest of us are panicking 'cause he is both blasted on rum and only 19 y.o.
The four of us in the car are all looking back at the cruiser expecting to see our friend hooked-up and put in the back seat. Instead, to our amazment the cop sends him away. He staggers back to the car and we all drive away.
3. Armed, stupid and doing a home invasion. Three of us decide we want to "raid" a house where a bunch of our friends live as a way to get back at them for something they did to us. It is about 2 A.M. so load up the truck and head off to buy cap guns. this was before cap guns got the orange paint on the muzzle.
So armed and wearing ski masks we burst through the unlocked front door and run their house "shooting" them. WE exfiltrate and as we are running across the street, with masks still on and cap guns in our hands a cop car passes and then pulls about 6 gees making a u-turn. It was almost an Immelman he got around so fast.
So he rolls up on us and hits the spot, and was about to jump all over us when Bill said "Hey man they're just cap guns". The cop nodded and took off.
It was then I realized I still had my mask on. I did not hit me until I woke up later that afternoon that that cop could have done all sorts of nasty to us and could have shot us.
I still wonder why he was so keen to believe Bill. I wouldn't have. If I was the cop in that situation all three of the capgunmen would have been sucking asphalt just to learn 'em that grown men don't run around with gun looking things and skimasks in the early morning hours.
I've had other encounters of course, but in only a few were the cops idiots or rude.
Onto the topic: On economic grounds I have problems with government supplied policing as I do with all government supplied services. I try not to let the abuses I read about get me to wound up as I know they are a symptom of a larger problem. And if I spent my time wound up I don't think that would be good for me, health wise or good for my family to have to deal with me.
That said I have police encounters from my youth that run counter to the JBT profile.
1. Underage, drinking and drunk at the beach. All five of us were just gone on the booze. Cops show up ask our names, one cop kept getting mine wrong I did not correct him, and sent us on our way. This involved us getting into my buddy's truck and driving away. yup, the cops encouraged a drunk to get in his truck and drive a whole bunch of other drunks away. I still wonder about that one.
2. Underage, drunk and driving. Again five of us had been out drinking and were cruising about when we get pulled over. The driver is told to get out of the car and head back to the cop car. All the rest of us are panicking 'cause he is both blasted on rum and only 19 y.o.
The four of us in the car are all looking back at the cruiser expecting to see our friend hooked-up and put in the back seat. Instead, to our amazment the cop sends him away. He staggers back to the car and we all drive away.
3. Armed, stupid and doing a home invasion. Three of us decide we want to "raid" a house where a bunch of our friends live as a way to get back at them for something they did to us. It is about 2 A.M. so load up the truck and head off to buy cap guns. this was before cap guns got the orange paint on the muzzle.
So armed and wearing ski masks we burst through the unlocked front door and run their house "shooting" them. WE exfiltrate and as we are running across the street, with masks still on and cap guns in our hands a cop car passes and then pulls about 6 gees making a u-turn. It was almost an Immelman he got around so fast.
So he rolls up on us and hits the spot, and was about to jump all over us when Bill said "Hey man they're just cap guns". The cop nodded and took off.
It was then I realized I still had my mask on. I did not hit me until I woke up later that afternoon that that cop could have done all sorts of nasty to us and could have shot us.
I still wonder why he was so keen to believe Bill. I wouldn't have. If I was the cop in that situation all three of the capgunmen would have been sucking asphalt just to learn 'em that grown men don't run around with gun looking things and skimasks in the early morning hours.
I've had other encounters of course, but in only a few were the cops idiots or rude.
- Status
