Is there any way citizens and LE can come together and make it work like it is suppos

[The Real Hawkeye]

How does one not have live ammo at a shooting range? How does that translate into prohibiting packing a handgun?

The range was outside. You don't have to bring anything in the actual building but yourself, and maybe a pen to sign in, but they even have pens for you if you don't have one. And, if we are packing, we are not packing unloaded weapons, thus the notification and request for permission.

 

[Harve Curry]

working together...........

Geographically people have a much different interpretation of the right to keep and bear arms. Where you grow up and what your parents, teachers and peers believe in is pretty much what you'll beleive in the rest of your life. Couple that with becoming a policeman/LEO, going through training at a police academy, reinforcing a limited or no belief in the Bill of Rights/2nd Amendment and training the young officer in "LAW enforcement" and not much in the Bill of Rights, authority goes to their heads.
Around here I've seen alot of corruption in US Forest Service, BLM, G&F, county, city, state LEO's. Pretty much the gamut. At the same time there are some good ones, but they don't seem to be running the show. After awhile even some of the guys that could have been good blend in. I don't think you can fix it.

 

[Art Eatman]

One thing that doesn't seem to be addressed in these threads is that many "young beginners" in law enforcement have no idea as to the moral aspects of many of our laws. They grew up with them, and these laws are just taken for granted as being righteous. After all, they were passed by a legislature or the Congress, right?

If a kid grows up in a household where his parents believe only police should have guns, won't he tend to think that, as well? If he becomes a cop in a juridiction where the Chief and the City Council think that way, what do you expect of his attitudes and behavior?

In his mind, he thinks he's doing right. This sense of righteousness continues through his career.

Not just guns; same for drugs and many other aspects of human behavior and the attitudes about our body of laws that affect them.

How can the individual policeman not be some amount of reflection of our society at large? We live in a time of publicly-discussed rudeness. Cheating is reported to be common in schools and not really looked down upon. A woman in NYC books millions of dollars per year for seminars on Ethics to middle-aged businessmen.

And those problems exist among the "nice" people. Soccer moms' husbands and kids--and the moms themselves, I'd venture. Consider what must be dealt with in the much-discussed Urban Ghettos and the sub-cultures therein.

Overall, I'm amazed the LEO-citizen problems aren't worse than they are.

And danged if I have any politically-viable answer.

Art

 

[mnrivrat]

Well, just how is it supposed to work ...?

Very Simple - Mutual Respect

I have respect for people in authority when they treat me with respect.

 

[Optical Serenity]

Art, good post....

One more thing that I have seen directly so often is that very few people get to wear a police uniform, but everyone at some point is a regular joe shmoe. My point being, for us cops, most of us have a good perception of how we were before being sworn in. I know many people have a misconception that we are all soy burger eating, liberal, anti-gunners. Quite the contrary, around here, I don't know one police officer who isn't an NRA member, very pro-2nd ammendment, and enjoys the same beer & hotdogs you guys do. In fact, here most of us have range memberships, and help teach firearms classes to general public. We are extremely conservative, or very much a liberatarian. I know only a very small handfull of liberal / Democrat police officers.

A lot of the time, the public sees me in costume and they automaticly assume I am this stereotype anti-gun, anti-everything police officer. For some reason, they believe I make the laws, rules, policies. When in reality, i have nothing to do with that. People who take a minute to get to know me, find out that I'm not any of those things.

Don't prejudge people and perhaps give them a chance. This is what we do. Every call we go on, is a new face, new person, new thoughts, new morals... I go from the extreme worst felon, to a grandma that means no harm, but just messed up. It happens, and we know that. The public should look at us more as humans too...

Why do we use M16's and flashbangs? Because its part of our job. No one asked us if the general public should have full auto weapons or supressors. In my opinion, lets be more like Israel, no gun laws. Who cares? I personally have no issue with it. I know plenty of officers and non-officers who have class 3 weapons, I don't care.

People get mad because of HR218 and the fact that in this state I can carry my weapon anywhere, and since I'm FAA certified, even on airplanes? Well, I didn't make those rules, but there are specific reasons they exist.

I think people sometimes forget the reason law enforcement exists...We are the ones who deal with that which you do not want to deal with. Almost like garbage collectors...If it stinks, is nasty, and can hurt you, guess what? I'm the guy you call.

I'm not saying anyone is perfect, because as humans, we all err. But I'm saying that just as everyone here thinks we as police officers should give people a fair view and chance, same goes with the public to us. A lot more warnings would be given out if people just realized that they made a mistake, and I'm not there to personally take it out on them. If people just said "damn, I messed up, won't happen again" instead of "Who the hell are you to be telling me what to do?" things would go way more smoothly...

Ok, off the soap box, why can't we all just get along?

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

I think people sometimes forget the reason law enforcement exists...We are the ones who deal with that which you do not want to deal with. Almost like garbage collectors...If it stinks, is nasty, and can hurt you, guess what? I'm the guy you call.

Well, if people felt at liberty to carry arms without being assumed to be a bad guy, most of us would be perfectly happy to chip in with the bad guys from time to time. We would need a MUCH smaller police force if we didn't have these police state laws and attitudes. Someone is hold up somewhere with a gun? Police can request that men show up with their weapons and help out. You'd be swamped if you made that request. I guarantee you'd have more guys with guns than you'd know what to do with. If you wanted to limit it to a call for all available men with military experience (or who have passed an approved training course), that would work just as well. You'd still be swamped with guys and their weapons. But you don't do that, so you cannot complain that you have to carry all the weight and we should appreciate that.

I'm not saying anyone is perfect, because as humans, we all err. But I'm saying that just as everyone here thinks we as police officers should give people a fair view and chance, same goes with the public to us. A lot more warnings would be given out if people just realized that they made a mistake, and I'm not there to personally take it out on them. If people just said "damn, I messed up, won't happen again" instead of "Who the hell are you to be telling me what to do?" things would go way more smoothly...

Actually, if it's all the same to you, I'd prefer that you treat everybody exactly alike according to the law rather than showing favoritism towards those whose attitudes you approve of. It's called tyranny when you do otherwise.

 

[kbr80]

I think people sometimes forget the reason law enforcement exists...We are the ones who deal with that which you do not want to deal with. Almost like garbage collectors...If it stinks, is nasty, and can hurt you, guess what? I'm the guy you call.

Did someone MAKE you become a LEO? NO, you applied and got hired because you wanted the job.




TRH, good post, and mirrors my opinions on the subject. There has to be away to work together, because if that does not happen, we will eventually, all of us, cop and citizen, not like the eventual outcome.

 

[sacp81170a]

/vent mode on/

As a part-time LEO, I can tell you that it makes me mad to see stupid, politically correct rules passed that then require me to use the power of my uniform, badge and sidearm to tell someone to put out a cigarette. I was always taught that the first level in the continuum of force *is* the uniform.

When politicians continue to put the weight of government and the threat of force that can be escalated to a lethal level behind their pet social engineering projects, respect for the law will continue to deteriorate. I try to use as much discretion as possible, but when the anti-smoking nazis, anti-gun nazis, and anti-freedom nazis keep trying to use law enforcement for their own purposes rather than what we should be doing, I have to step back and reconsider who it is I'm working for.

Who is responsible for this situation? Ladies and gentlemen, everyone who votes for a freedom hating politician and fails to vote for the ones who remember that this *used* to be a free country.

/vent mode off/

 

[TallPine]

Who is responsible for this situation? Ladies and gentlemen, everyone who votes for a freedom hating politician and fails to vote for the ones who remember that this *used* to be a free country.

Unfortunately, there are no good options to vote for, unless one "throw's their vote away" on someone who "can't" win.

If it stinks, is nasty, and can hurt you, guess what? I'm the guy you call.

If I do call "you" - it will likely be just to write up a report after I have dealt with the situation myself, since I am at least 30-40 minutes away from a deputy response.

OTOH, I could just "SS&S"

 

[Optical Serenity]

First off, I'm very happy and damn proud of my job and profession. That being said, the reason we can't have "men at arms" come and help us out, is due to one word: liability. I have no problem asking for help, lets go... If there is an active shooting, here in GA we've had plenty of situations where citizens have stepped up and taken care of a situation. Not a problem, and it won't be...

Seems to me like whatever states you guys live in are just more restrictive than what we deal with here.

If it wasn't for lawyers, lawsuits, and a money hungry law suit happy public, who are extreme liberals, we could possibly have more public participation. Hence why here in GA we have a lot of citizen's police academies... When people go through that, they see things from our perspective, and see that things are not always as they seem. Also, and most important, people are taught how to respond to certain situations. Works great in the end. You should see if there is a citizen's police academy in your area...

And as far as treating everyone the same, of course that is done to the highest level it can be done. But, no one here would want us as cops to treat the law as 100% black and white. If that was the case, people would get locked up all day long. NOT because we feel the need, but because YOU have voted in lawmakers who have passed laws that now YOU are in violation of. Officer discretion is a large part of the job, if you really want me to treat everyone the same, every situation the same, well, my zone is going to need 200 more officers, and three more jails. That can't happen, as removal of discretion is tyranny.

I don't tell a doctor how to do his job...

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

Optical Said: And as far as treating everyone the same, of course that is done to the highest level it can be done. But, no one here would want us as cops to treat the law as 100% black and white. If that was the case, people would get locked up all day long. NOT because we feel the need, but because YOU have voted in lawmakers who have passed laws that now YOU are in violation of. Officer discretion is a large part of the job, if you really want me to treat everyone the same, every situation the same, well, my zone is going to need 200 more officers, and three more jails. That can't happen, as removal of discretion is tyranny.

No. When police have discretion, this is in contradiction to the rule of law. It becomes the rule of men, which is the definition of tyranny. If what you say is true, then by all means arrest us all. Let's see how long society can function with everyone but the cops, judges and politicians in jail. That's the point. You are setting yourself up as a little tyrant when you decide who the law will apply to and who it will not, based on whether you like the person's attitude, or based on anything other than the law and its violation.

 

[AZRickD]

If you want results, a whole lot of laws which target peaceful citizens have to be repealed.

Let's git bizzy.

Rick

 

[Cosmoline]

The problem has its roots in mindset. There are a lot of cops around these days who think of their jobs as analogous to fighting a war. They think of themselves as a kind of soldier fighting enemy troops in a war zone. The citizens become mere "civilians." Both Hollywood and DC have done their best to push this attitude. DC comes out with "the war on XXXX" and pushes its paramilitary agenda not just among its own police forces but among locals as well. Hollywood portrays cops as a "thin blue line" without which helpless civilians would be overrun by ravening monsters. The media eat this up, as well. We just witnessed an example of this when news sources went hog wild with rumors and third hand accounts of the violent crime situation in New Orleans. Every shot in the night was a "sniper attack" and every group of young black men a gang. The nonsense spewed by the likes of Gossman "killology" advocates doesn't help matters either.

 

[MechAg94]

I think more relaxed traffic enforement would be a good start. Stop using traffic enforcement to raise money. I always find it amusing and distirbing when I and a group of cars are driving peacefully and safely down the road. Suddenly, a police car comes in view and everyone around me slams on the brakes and gets all nervous even though they are not doing anything wrong. Or when there are 3 cars within a 1/2 mile of each other going a few miles over the speed limit on a 6 lane highway. A cop comes along and drives up to each of us waving for us to slow down. WHY? There was no safety issue. We weren't going but 10 MHP over or less. Why bother us at all? Should I feel lucky we weren't pulled over and issue tickets? I don't. I was just pissed off.

I think it is like Prohibition. When laws are needlessly intrusive, the general public will tend to lose respect for the law and law enforcement.

I have also seen and read of a lot of poeple who get all pissed off at cops claiming their rights were violated when they were misbehaving and acting like complete a$$holes and verbally assaulting the cop. That is bull???? and my hat goes off to the officers who have to endure it.

On the whole, I think the problems are with government not police officers. Police officers are just the most visible representatives of government and take the bulk of the abuse.

 

[beerslurpy]

When politicians continue to put the weight of government and the threat of force that can be escalated to a lethal level behind their pet social engineering projects, respect for the law will continue to deteriorate.

People have been complaining about this since the 19th century. Libertarians have been complaining, that is. The socialists are obviously pretty happy with this.

Frederic Bastiat said (in 1851 France, no less):

Try to imagine a regulation of labor imposed by force that is not a violation of liberty; a transfer of wealth imposed by force that is not a violation of property. If you cannot reconcile these contradictions, then you must conclude that the law cannot organize labor and industry without organizing injustice.

Socialists look upon people as raw material to be formed into social combinations. This is so true that, if by chance, the socialists have any doubts about the success of these combinations, they will demand that a small portion of mankind be set aside to experiment upon. The popular idea of trying all systems is well known. And one socialist leader has been known seriously to demand that the Constituent Assembly give him a small district with all its inhabitants, to try his experiments upon.

In the same manner, an inventor makes a model before he constructs the full-sized machine; the chemist wastes some chemicals — the farmer wastes some seeds and land — to try out an idea.

But what a difference there is between the gardener and his trees, between the inventor and his machine, between the chemist and his elements, between the farmer and his seeds! And in all sincerity, the socialist thinks that there is the same difference between him and mankind!

 

[geekWithA.45]

Frankly, the burden of proof of worth is on the cops.

It just won't work any other way, and the decay of the public's goodwill is a decent proxy measure of the degree to which they've failed at that.

This is a serious problem, as the police, in order to be effective, MUST HAVE THE PUBLIC'S GOODWILL.

As for what the public can do, it comes down to all the usual suspects:

-Get educated
-Speak up
-Vote up.

The police must clean up their act before the citizens can meaningfully sit down at the table with them.

Attempts to engage the public while their house is NOT in order is really an attempt to get the public to buy into the corrupt situation as is.


I guess I'm feeling snarky today.

 

[RealGun]

I guess I'm feeling snarky today.

Full moon.

 

[EghtySx]

What most people don't understand is that it isn't up to police officers what gets enforced, its your politicians that you elect that make laws...not public safety people...

You make em sound like robots.

 

[sacp81170a]

No. When police have discretion, this is in contradiction to the rule of law. It becomes the rule of men, which is the definition of tyranny.

The only problem with this is that because we have so many nitpicky laws on the books, you better just stay home and stare out the window, because if we tried to enforce every single one, you wouldn't be able to walk out your front door without violating some ordinance. Case in point, we did a safety check point on Saturday night, and because Arkansas law requires you to carry current proof of insurance in your vehicle and so many people ignore this requirement, we probably wrote 100+ tickets in the space of a couple of hours.

Did this make the streets safer? Probably not, because everyone's license plate that I ran came back with current insurance. But, I wrote the tickets because they didn't have the proof with them. The statute requires them to provide proof of insurance to the court or pay a $100 fine. Could I have used discretion when I found out they had insurance? Probably. Did it piss a bunch of people off and make them complain that all we were doing was trying to increase revenue? YOU BETCHA.

Stop using traffic enforcement to raise money.

Amen, brother. THR, are you completely familiar with all the details of the traffic code in your state? Do you want to be pulled over and ticketed every time you violate some obscure portion of that law, or would you rather have the officer use judgement and understand that you aren't aware of every detail and just give you a friendly warning? Where is the tyranny in that? Until you can understand that unnecessarily hassling otherwise law abiding citizens breeds disrespect for the police and the law, you'll never understand the fine line we walk in law enforcement.

I'm willing to bet that you're currently in violation of several laws at this very moment, and since we're a government of laws and not men I expect you to be a good citizen and go turn yourself in tomorrow morning.

 

[FeebMaster]

The only problem with this is that because we have so many nitpicky laws on the books, you better just stay home and stare out the window, because if we tried to enforce every single one, you wouldn't be able to walk out your front door without violating some ordinance. Case in point, we did a safety check point on Saturday night, and because Arkansas law requires you to carry current proof of insurance in your vehicle and so many people ignore this requirement, we probably wrote 100+ tickets in the space of a couple of hours.

Did this make the streets safer? Probably not, because everyone's license plate that I ran came back with current insurance. But, I wrote the tickets because they didn't have the proof with them. The statute requires them to provide proof of insurance to the court or pay a $100 fine. Could I have used discretion when I found out they had insurance? Probably. Did it piss a bunch of people off and make them complain that all we were doing was trying to increase revenue? YOU BETCHA.

Thank you for defending our freedom. You're a hero.

 

[The Real Hawkeye]

Sac, read my last post again. You didn't seem to understand my point. The situation you describe, where everyone is in violation of one law or another at any given time every day, and the cops can pick and choose which citizens to give a hard time over the violation, is the very definition of tyranny, and the very opposite of the rule of law.

I am not blaming you, in this instance. The problem is with the fact that 1) everyone is in violation of a number of laws every day, and 2) that cops have discretion over who they are going to actually apply the laws to. That is a case of one plus one equalling the very definition of tyranny.

 

[JohnBT]

"The police must clean up their act before the citizens can meaningfully sit down at the table with them."

Referring back to the post on crime in Baltimore. there are too many people who will never sit at the table - I know, never say never, but I'll say it...NEVER. I grew up in downtown Baltimore and it was nice in the '50s and early '60s. I went to high school 15 miles from the D.C. line and now I've lived in downtown Richmond for 30+ years. There is a large part of the population that is out of touch and I don't see that the police department can bend over backward far enough to get those folks to the table, any table. Ha, maybe the interrogation table. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of good folks around, but some of them are so twisted (white, black, punk rockers, rednecks, it's all kinds of people I'm talking about.)

FWIW, just today we, me and the neighbors, had a real nice talk on the front porch with the detectives going door to door working on the case of the missing VCU student that's been in the news the past 2 weeks. They found her car 2.5 blocks away with an Ohio plate on it and their dog led them to a house across the street - it's not them, maybe a visitor. They interviewed their nephew for 3 hours and turned him loose, but arrested the guy's roomate/temporary boarder because of an outstanding felony warrant from another state. They're working hard and are very polite. They were even polite to the couple when they searched their house last night at 12:30ish. They didn't tear anything up, just looked in closets and large spaces, etc.

John

 

[Pilgrim]

I think more relaxed traffic enforement would be a good start. Stop using traffic enforcement to raise money. I always find it amusing and distirbing when I and a group of cars are driving peacefully and safely down the road. Suddenly, a police car comes in view and everyone around me slams on the brakes and gets all nervous even though they are not doing anything wrong.

Guilty consciences perhaps? I admit that when I see a police car I check my speedometer. I don't automatically slam on the brakes though.

I worked traffic enforcement in the small town in CA I worked for. The town's main street was a 1% downgrade after coming off of a 4% downhill run. The speed limit on the main street was 30 mph. The speed limit on the 4% grade was 55 mph. Despite three signs coming into town warning of the 30 mph speed limit, it was no great feat to write four tickets an hour if I wanted to for driving 50+ mph in the 30 mph zone. And I'm a slow writer.

The excuses offered were pretty lame. The most common was, "I didn't see the speed limit signs." When I reminded them the California Prima Facie speed limit in a business zone where no speed limit signs exist is 25 mph, the standard response was a blank stare. I'm sure every one of these drivers would have raised holy hell with their police departments if drivers drove through their neighborhoods 25 mph over the speed limit, but it was no big deal to do it in someone else's town.

For those of you not familiar with the California Central Valley, it is subject to severe dense fogs where the visibility often drops down to fifty feet. However, it is not uncommon for the highway patrol to have to get on the highways and create rolling roadblocks to force people to drive at a safe speed.

I taught traffic safety for violators for several years at the community college. Over 90% of the class was there for speeding. After a couple of years of teaching, I started to get repeat customers. During the class I projected on the screen a newspaper article of a traffic pileup in the fog in Selma, CA about six years ago which involved something like 85 motor vehicles including four big rigs. I think there were four deaths. The highway patrol officer investigating the pileup reported that visibility was 50'.

I asked my classes what they thought was safe speed for 50' visibility. The usual answer they gave me was 30-40 mph. After reviewing reaction times and stopping distances on wet pavement, they were universally shocked to discover that safe speed in 50' visibility was closer to 10 mph. They agreed that it was highly unlikely that the drivers of the 85 vehicles in the Selma pileup were driving 10 mph.

During the Selma pileup discussion, I had one student, a mature woman, ask me if she could be excused from the discussion. It seems her husband was one of the fatalities in the Selma pileup. I didn't recall if she was one of the 90% who was in the class for speeding, but I'm sure she was.

 

[beerslurpy]

I know firsthand that many cops consider their jobs to be babysitting of adults.

However, I think it would be better for police to remember that those they are attempting to babysit are in fact adults. Adults are responsible for the outcomes of their own actions. It isnt your responsibility to protect us from ourselves. It is your job to apprehend us when we harm others.

I realize that the lawbooks currently arent consistent with my old fashioned view of the world, but that is how it should be.

And every cop that tells you that speeding laws are about safety instead of revenue is either lying or very stupid.

I must note that CA has made quite a few strides in the right direction in this respect with the traffic survey rules (there is a rule for measuring average speeds and using it to determine the legal limit) and the bars on certain sorts of speed traps (airplanes, stopwatch tricks, etc). Unfortunately things are still pretty rotten in the other 49 states, from what I have observed.

 

[ecbaatz]

The Surpreme Court

How about the head LEO announcing that the LEO/.gov have no legal responsibility to protect anyone except those being held and informants ?

It does not come from the head LEO. It came from the Surpreme Court. They ruled that the police is not there to provide protection for the individual but for society. Why do you think I carry?