General Police Abuse Thread

[Simon_Jester]

Yanez should spent the rest of his life in jail...

I am not questioning the rightness of considering this the correct punishment for homicidal negligence by a police officer. But I do want to double-check to confirm, Thanas, that you do consider this to be homicidal negligence by a police officer, and that you do consider life in prison to be the correct punishment for that crime.

Is that the case?

Saying and doing are two different things. The fact that Yanez repeated his instruction could be interpreted to me that Castile was saying but not doing.

Here is my sense on this. The officer gave contradictory instructions. He wanted ID, Castille did the responsible thing and politely informed the officer that he had a gun. "Don't reach for it then" is fine as an instruction, but Castille still had to get his ID as per the officer's instructions (I think this is a bit people have not been communicating adequately, largely because I don't think anyone here is being dispassionate right now).

If the officer is reasonable and not panicking (which is the definition of the reasonable person--or reasonable officer--standard of law) then he should conclude that Castille was being responsible about informing him of a gun (rather than threatening him), and was complying with instructions. If the officer was not certain, he should have clarified that he wanted Castille to put his hands on the wheel or exit the vehicle with his hands up so that said officer could remove the weapon and obtain ID in safety. He failed to do this. At every single step of this stop, Yanez failed to do anything that a reasonable officer should do. He failed to do anything that I am absolutely confident that you would do under identical conditions.

He was grossly negligent, and as a result someone is dead. That is manslaughter in most jurisdictions that I am aware.

The case for manslaughter on the grounds of the police officer's extreme negligence is much stronger than the case for murder, I think. I can get behind the idea that "beyond a reasonable doubt, this was negligence resulting in a death, and therefore manslaughter" more easily than I can get behind "beyond a reasonable doubt, this was first (or second) degree murder."

---

Point of order: Finding the defendant in a murder trial to be 'not guilty' by reason of 'reasonable doubt of his guilt' is not the same as proving that the victim was guilty of some crime.

The question is not "is Castile some kind of evil scary criminal?" The question is, "is there reasonable doubt that the officer committed murder for no goddamn reason anyone can identify?"

Your argument appears to be that Yanez was beyond a reasonable doubt committing a cold-blooded killing, and shouting out exculpatory words into the recorder so that he'd have an alibi after the fact. If that is not your argument, I have no idea what your argument is.

When acting in the capacity of an officer of the law, the bar should be several orders of magnitude higher so as to prevent these situations. A reasonable person would not conclude that a dude announcing he has a gun and CCW is making a threat. A reasonable cop should be held to a much higher standard yet.

Yanez did not shoot Castile when Castile announced his possession of gun and permit. There is no evidence that he interpreted that announcement as a threat, as you imply that Yanez did.

Yanez shot Castile when Castile kept reaching towards (his pocket?) after being told three times not to reach for or pull out an object in his pocket. Could a reasonable cop believe that to be a condition under which Castile was drawing a gun? You're saying 'no.'

To be clear, it sounds as if you are saying that "I have a gun and a permit for it" is a reliable proof of non-criminal intent. So reliable that, in and of itself, the bare fact that a person says this to a police officer is proof that they would not shoot a police officer.

Am I misunderstanding you?

Should people with guns just assume that announcing having a firearm is likely to get them shot, so they'd best not even announce it? Should they ask the cop "Would you like me to step out of the vehicle, hands raised, so you can retrieve my ID and firearm?" What can they do to not be shot to death? Do your Second Amendment rights evaporate when around cops? Or only if you're one of the "scary" minorities? How could Castile have retrieved ID without reaching where the cop couldn't see clearly? Has teleporting ID been invented and I just missed it? The cop assumed he was reaching for a gun.

Once upon a time I was pulled over by a campus police officer. He asked for my vehicle registration. I affirmed that I would get it and reached for the glove compartment. I opened the glove compartment.

Abruptly, he told me to stop. I stopped.

We exchanged further words, and it became clear that he'd seen a glint of metal in my glove compartment (a tire pressure gauge, as it happened), and wanted to know what it was before I reached any further. Life went on, I got away with a warning for speeding.

Now, I'm not pretending I was in a situation where I was anywhere near death there. White guy on college campus, et cetera.

...

But all this amped-up sarcasm on your part is acting as a smokescreen for an important observation:

If you are moving in an attempt to comply with a police officer's instructions, and the police officer says 'stop,' just fucking stop. Seriously, this is a reasonable rule to use even when talking about random people. If someone asks me to do something, and I begin doing so, and they say 'stop!"... I stop. Before I ask why, before I get into an argument, I stop. There might be a handful of exceptions to that rule, but it's a pretty good rule. Very rarely is it a good idea to carry out an action against the wishes of the person who requested that action in the first place. Even more rarely is it a good idea to do that when the person in question is an authority figure.

Castile did not stop. Does this make him some sort of evil person? Obviously not. Does this make him somehow 'guilty' of any offense that any sane person would criticize anyone for? Obviously not.

But I bet there's a parallel universe very close to this one where Castile stopped reaching into his pocket, and in this parallel universe, he is alive and well. If Castile's life matters in the scheme of things, well... we can wish he'd stopped reaching into his pocket the first time Yanez said "stop."

We can also wish Yanez had taken up a career less likely to cause his hair trigger panic reactions, such as flower arranging. We can wish Yanez had been otherwise occupied and had not encountered Castile. We can wish Yavuz were not a goddamn idiot who stopped Castile for a stupid reason. We can even wish Yanez had never been born.

But I, for one, ALSO wish Castile had just stopped reaching into his pocket.

And if he had stopped he wouldn't have been able to retrieve his ID, and Yanez probably would have flipped his shit over that too. A racist, panicky motherfucker like Yanez would flip out no matter what Castile had done because black=matches description of a bank robber.

I would stop short of assuming that Yanez would automatically pull the trigger on any black person he pulled over because that black person stopped when he said 'stop' and then replied calmly, "Officer, my ID is in my pocket. What do I do?"

I mean, you can choose to assume that this would have gotten Castile killed. I would imagine it had a much lower associated probability of death

I mean, if you were in Castile's exact position (including the black skin), with a police officer who's saying "Don't reach for it!" ... what would you have done. I know damn well I would have done the same thing I'd do with my lily-white hide here and now: "Officer, my ID is in my pocket. So's the pistol. What do I do?"

Would you have made a calculated decision that reaching for your pocket is more safe than not?

At absolute minimum, the cop in this case should be relegated to desk duty, because obviously he's too paranoid to be trusted with a firearm in a possibly tense situation. I recall the cop that got fired for not murdering a man with an unloaded gun, for ascertaining that the guy had no real intention of shooting anyone.

When a cop is let off the hook for shooting someone and cannot prove that that person was an active threat, then that's the same fucking result as the dead person being declared guilty of whatever crime.

No, it's not.

If John Doe kills Joe Smith, and is declared 'not guilty by reason of self defense,' that is NOT equivalent to Joe Smith being convicted of assaulting John Doe. Because all that is established is that there is reasonable doubt. It is within the realm of realistic, plausible, reasonable possibility that John Doe was in fear of his life.

This does not make Joe Smith a killer, or a man who commits assault and battery. There may be situations where Joe Smith does something totally innocent and still, entirely by accident, causes John Doe to fear for his life... and then John Doe kills Joe Smith, and potentially gets away with it by pleading self-defense.

The equivalency you are drawing here is completely false from a legal point of view.

It doesn't even work in civil cases where the burden of proof is lighter. If you sue me, claiming I am liable for damages, and I prove that I am not liable, that doesn't mean I get to turn around and somehow sue you for being liable. Or that anyone else does, either. Maybe someone else is liable, maybe no one is liable. In and of itself, a "not guilty" verdict that exonerates me does NOTHING to prove anyone else guilty of a crime.

This goes back to police acting as enforcers of the law. They need to be held to a higher standard, for the safety of the people they claim to be protecting. If a cop arrests you without a reason, that's a criminal act. Why isn't it a criminal act to kill you wrongfully? "Suspect matches description of suspect in X crime" and then the person who was arrested in no way matches the description would be a wrongful arrest. "This guy is pulling a gun" and the guy isn't pulling a gun, same deal.

None of this has anything to do with the argument I made that you quoted.

Finding the police officer 'not guilty' is not the same as finding the victim guilty of assault.

Sometimes genuine accidents DO happen. Punishing the police, or anyone, for genuine accidents does not serve a useful purpose. Because harshly punishing people unlucky enough to experience a genuine accident does not reduce crime.

Holding people to higher standards when they fuck up does not mean that any useful purpose is served by changing the standard of proof away from "reasonable doubt" to "absolute 100% surefire alibi."

For that matter, harsh punishments and relaxed standards of due process in general don't do much to reduce crime. We already know that when talking about ordinary criminals and I don't see why it would be less true when we talk about cops. A police officer isn't going to be much more deterred by life in prison than by five years in prison; either way he loses his job and doesn't have much to come back to.

Likewise, a police officer isn't going to be more shy about shooting people he actually thinks are going to shoot him just because you relax due process on him. He won't hold fire just because he knows that a reasonable doubt as to his guilt won't save him at the trial and he's guilty until proven innocent. Because if he actually believes himself to be in danger of his life at that moment, even if he is factually wrong... well, just about anyone would prefer being judged in the defendant's box by twelve people to being carried in a pine box by six.

And with how often cops aren't so much as indicted, much less convicted, even when blatantly guilty of a criminal act there's no real motivation to not be a corrupt, abusive fuck. Cop killers rarely get off without prison time. Hell, threatening a cop will nab you more prison time than the cop is likely to get for killing you just because (and then lying and saying he thought you were going for a gun). How would you feel if someone were to hold a cop at gun-point and upon being successfully arrested with no lethal force employed successfully said the cop was unlawfully threatening him and he feared for his life? Or if someone killed a cop and got away with it by arguing the cop was attempting to use unlawful, lethal force and nobody could prove otherwise?

You're making a very interesting game-theory argument at the start of this post.

You're arguing that since police are seldom punished for crimes, they have no incentive not to commit crimes. This is a very good point. Why would police be honest, if it were safe for them to be corrupt?

Let me turn that around and ask you a similar question. Would police be able to do their jobs at all, if it were safe for people to threaten them with violence?

Criminals have extra incentives to attack and kill police officers, because police officers are a major threat to criminals' ability to operate. If there is no counterbalancing incentive NOT to do so, what happens?

As it stands, the bar for a cop's use of force being considered justified is "the cop said he felt it was justified" and that's that. We are having regular reports of cops using lethal force and it turning out the person they killed wasn't a real threat. If there's a gun actually being leveled at them, if the person is charging them... Then a case can be made. "I thought he was pulling a gun" is not sufficient. Police are almost never held accountable in this country. They cannot be trusted. They can throw a fucking flashbang into a child's crib and not be convicted. Police have a substantially higher rate of being domestic abusers than the national average. Cops that do get fired (but not convicted!) can just go get a job as a cop at another station oftentimes. Unless we pass laws specifically condoning cop-slaying, it will never give criminals the leeway cops get by default. That's a dishonest argument, and a stupid one. Soldiers in a war zone have a higher bar for lethal force than police that are supposedly protecting us. Something is kind of really fucked up here, and it isn't that soldiers have rules of engagement.

So... no need to answer the question, because it's dishonest to ask it at all. Because... Um.

Well, honestly, I'm still sincerely curious, what do you think would happen if there were literally no increased penalty or risk associated with violence directed against a police officer? If that were the only thing that changed, all else being equal? Would the rate of violence directed against the police remain broadly consistent with that directed against the populace at large? Would it be much higher? Lower?

[I would also like to see the specific rules of engagement you're referring to, and where these soldiers were posted, by the way]

Let me ask you two questions, which I think I have a right to hear an answer to.

1) In a population of three hundred million citizens and somewhere in the neighborhood of one million police officers, exactly how few individual instances of bad cops would there have to be, before you would feel safe? Please state a number you think would be reasonable, such as "no more than one per year" or "no more than two per day."

2) Would you feel safe if a dozen cases of corrupt cops were reported every week?

1) It's not just number of cases of police abuse, it's that they constantly get away with it. I don't expect a random cop to even pay attention to me because like I said: Skinny, short white guy. I'm about as non-threatening as a person can get. I'm not afraid of the police, I simply do not trust them to behave in an ethical manner.

'Safe' was perhaps a poor choice of words. To rephrase question (1)...

How few instances of cops that you believe are guilty, but who are not punished or convicted, would there have to be, before you felt reasonably inclined to trust police? Measured in "no more than one per year" or "no more than two per day" or some such rate?

2) I would feel better if the shitty cops actually faced punishment, but they do not. I would feel they are trustworthy if the so-called "good cops" worked to root out corruption and rot from within, rather than circling the wagons. Any cop that helps cover up corruption is a bad cop. Any cop who turns a blind eye to abuse is a bad cop.

It seems there are damn few "good cops" by the "work to root out corruption" metric. Hell, even if we define good cop as "doesn't turn a blind eye to bad behavior" it seems there's a shortage of good cops.

(2), too, needs rephrasing.

What is the number of "bad cops I think get away with it per year" that you would have to learn about, in order to convince you that police were untrustworthy? How many is too many? Can you give me a number?

So I guess they converge to the same question.

What is the number of "cops I think are bad, but know weren't punished" that it takes to convince you the police are dishonest?

[Terralthra]

Shortly after encountering an agitated motorist driving in front of him on July 28, 2016, Anthony found himself confronted by the police. Within seconds of exiting his vehicle after pulling Anthony over, Agent Joe Joswiak of the Buffalo Ridge Drug Task Force opened the door of Anthony’s car, screaming, “Get the fuck out of the car, motherfucker!”

Protect and serve indeed. One off-duty officer's road-rage at his perception that he was being tailgated led him to call his on-duty friend to pull over someone, drag them out of a car after "not obeying an order to exit the vehicle", that being the shouted "GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE CAR MOTHERFUCKER!" as the officer wrenches open the door. The driver was given approximately half a second to obey the order before being dragged - still wearing a seatbelt - out of the car bodily, with plenty of elbows, punches, and a knee to the back of the head.

There is simply no justification for this manner of interaction. The police's account claims that the driver was driving hazardously and making threats:

According to the criminal complaint, Promvongsa caused a road-rage incident that started about 9:30 a.m. on July 28. Promvongsa is accused of endangering an off-duty Worthington police officer, including tailgating, swerving, making hand gestures out the window and speeding up before stopping just short of the officer’s car.

The off-duty officer then met up with a fellow off-duty officer. Promvongsa sped between their vehicles, saying he was “going to get his boys and come back to get them” before speeding off, the complaint said.

After Promvongsa’s encounter with the off-duty officers, Joswiak drove in his unmarked car to where the suspect was last seen and found Promvongsa. The complaint alleges that Promvongsa swerved toward Joswiak and kept going.

Even if all of that is true - which I doubt - it still doesn't justify that officer's actions. If you can't keep your temper when provoked, find a different job.

[Alyrium Denryle]

@KS: I think all of the "innocent" cops should be gunned down while theyre protesting their treatment at the hands of the populace the pussy bitches are scared of. The fact that they have the audacity to shoot someone in front of kids is proof enough that we should fear for our safety. Maybe we should smoke blunts while we shoot them in the back. Maybe plant a gun on them. Maybe put them in a chokehold while they scream that they can't breathe. No cop is innocent: they're all a part of the Blue Wall Society and have the group think mentality of terrorists.

Hi! This is your mod speaking. WTF is this? No, seriously, WTF is this? I mean, Holy Generalization Fallacy, Batman! Not only that, it is just toxic BS and flamewar bait, which I will not permit in this thread. You will either construct a cogent argument on this that is *somewhat* civil, or action will be taken proportionate to the magnitude of your recalcitrance.

This is satire that mentions various murders at the hands of police, including details from this case AND the choke-hold performed on Eric Garner. I figured someone of your caliber would have figure that out. I guess not.

Edit: I thought THIS would have been enough :

Okay, that's going a little far, but Yanez is a jackass.

Of course it's going far... for civilians. But not cops.

No, no. It is basically identical to things I see people say seriously, and no, that second post does not at all clarify it. Try again.

[mr friendly guy]

Is there any evidence aside from Yanez say so that Castille actually reached into his pocket.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85Y_yOm9IhA

Yanez was saying don't pull it out (after Castille says I have a firearm), and Castille says I am not pulling it out.

I am hearing people just assuming Yanez's version of the event.

[Napoleon the Clown]

When acting in the capacity of an officer of the law, the bar should be several orders of magnitude higher so as to prevent these situations. A reasonable person would not conclude that a dude announcing he has a gun and CCW is making a threat. A reasonable cop should be held to a much higher standard yet.

Yanez did not shoot Castile when Castile announced his possession of gun and permit. There is no evidence that he interpreted that announcement as a threat, as you imply that Yanez did.

Yanez shot Castile when Castile kept reaching towards (his pocket?) after being told three times not to reach for or pull out an object in his pocket. Could a reasonable cop believe that to be a condition under which Castile was drawing a gun? You're saying 'no.'

To be clear, it sounds as if you are saying that "I have a gun and a permit for it" is a reliable proof of non-criminal intent. So reliable that, in and of itself, the bare fact that a person says this to a police officer is proof that they would not shoot a police officer.

Am I misunderstanding you?

Yanez went on the defensive immediately upon being informed of the firearm, did he not? He immediately became terrified?

And if he had stopped he wouldn't have been able to retrieve his ID, and Yanez probably would have flipped his shit over that too. A racist, panicky motherfucker like Yanez would flip out no matter what Castile had done because black=matches description of a bank robber.

I would stop short of assuming that Yanez would automatically pull the trigger on any black person he pulled over because that black person stopped when he said 'stop' and then replied calmly, "Officer, my ID is in my pocket. What do I do?"

I mean, you can choose to assume that this would have gotten Castile killed. I would imagine it had a much lower associated probability of death

I mean, if you were in Castile's exact position (including the black skin), with a police officer who's saying "Don't reach for it!" ... what would you have done. I know damn well I would have done the same thing I'd do with my lily-white hide here and now: "Officer, my ID is in my pocket. So's the pistol. What do I do?"

Would you have made a calculated decision that reaching for your pocket is more safe than not?

Yanez would have still remained at high probability of violent retaliation and would have probably concluded arresting Castile was appropriate at that point, and dragged him out and when the gun inevitably fell out as Yanez got his police brutality on, concluded Castile was going for it then shot him. For all Castile could have known, at least. Odds of that are at least as good as the odds of Castile trying to pull a gun after announcing he had one.

No, it's not.

If John Doe kills Joe Smith, and is declared 'not guilty by reason of self defense,' that is NOT equivalent to Joe Smith being convicted of assaulting John Doe. Because all that is established is that there is reasonable doubt. It is within the realm of realistic, plausible, reasonable possibility that John Doe was in fear of his life.

This does not make Joe Smith a killer, or a man who commits assault and battery. There may be situations where Joe Smith does something totally innocent and still, entirely by accident, causes John Doe to fear for his life... and then John Doe kills Joe Smith, and potentially gets away with it by pleading self-defense.

The equivalency you are drawing here is completely false from a legal point of view.

It doesn't even work in civil cases where the burden of proof is lighter. If you sue me, claiming I am liable for damages, and I prove that I am not liable, that doesn't mean I get to turn around and somehow sue you for being liable. Or that anyone else does, either. Maybe someone else is liable, maybe no one is liable. In and of itself, a "not guilty" verdict that exonerates me does NOTHING to prove anyone else guilty of a crime.

This goes back to police acting as enforcers of the law. They need to be held to a higher standard, for the safety of the people they claim to be protecting. If a cop arrests you without a reason, that's a criminal act. Why isn't it a criminal act to kill you wrongfully? "Suspect matches description of suspect in X crime" and then the person who was arrested in no way matches the description would be a wrongful arrest. "This guy is pulling a gun" and the guy isn't pulling a gun, same deal.

None of this has anything to do with the argument I made that you quoted.

Finding the police officer 'not guilty' is not the same as finding the victim guilty of assault.

Sometimes genuine accidents DO happen. Punishing the police, or anyone, for genuine accidents does not serve a useful purpose. Because harshly punishing people unlucky enough to experience a genuine accident does not reduce crime.

Holding people to higher standards when they fuck up does not mean that any useful purpose is served by changing the standard of proof away from "reasonable doubt" to "absolute 100% surefire alibi."

For that matter, harsh punishments and relaxed standards of due process in general don't do much to reduce crime. We already know that when talking about ordinary criminals and I don't see why it would be less true when we talk about cops. A police officer isn't going to be much more deterred by life in prison than by five years in prison; either way he loses his job and doesn't have much to come back to.

Likewise, a police officer isn't going to be more shy about shooting people he actually thinks are going to shoot him just because you relax due process on him. He won't hold fire just because he knows that a reasonable doubt as to his guilt won't save him at the trial and he's guilty until proven innocent. Because if he actually believes himself to be in danger of his life at that moment, even if he is factually wrong... well, just about anyone would prefer being judged in the defendant's box by twelve people to being carried in a pine box by six.

In my view, if a cop's killing of someone is declared legally justified that is the same as declaring the person had done something that legally warrants death or was attempting to do something that legally warrants death because police are ostensibly acting in the name of the government with the government's consent. Not "the cop says he thought the person was dangerous". In the case of Castile's roadside murder, a reasonable person would not have concluded that murder was about to be attempted by the guy who just announced that he is legally carrying a concealed firearm.

You're making a very interesting game-theory argument at the start of this post.

You're arguing that since police are seldom punished for crimes, they have no incentive not to commit crimes. This is a very good point. Why would police be honest, if it were safe for them to be corrupt?

Let me turn that around and ask you a similar question. Would police be able to do their jobs at all, if it were safe for people to threaten them with violence?

Criminals have extra incentives to attack and kill police officers, because police officers are a major threat to criminals' ability to operate. If there is no counterbalancing incentive NOT to do so, what happens?

As it stands, the bar for a cop's use of force being considered justified is "the cop said he felt it was justified" and that's that. We are having regular reports of cops using lethal force and it turning out the person they killed wasn't a real threat. If there's a gun actually being leveled at them, if the person is charging them... Then a case can be made. "I thought he was pulling a gun" is not sufficient. Police are almost never held accountable in this country. They cannot be trusted. They can throw a fucking flashbang into a child's crib and not be convicted. Police have a substantially higher rate of being domestic abusers than the national average. Cops that do get fired (but not convicted!) can just go get a job as a cop at another station oftentimes. Unless we pass laws specifically condoning cop-slaying, it will never give criminals the leeway cops get by default. That's a dishonest argument, and a stupid one. Soldiers in a war zone have a higher bar for lethal force than police that are supposedly protecting us. Something is kind of really fucked up here, and it isn't that soldiers have rules of engagement.

So... no need to answer the question, because it's dishonest to ask it at all. Because... Um.

Well, honestly, I'm still sincerely curious, what do you think would happen if there were literally no increased penalty or risk associated with violence directed against a police officer? If that were the only thing that changed, all else being equal? Would the rate of violence directed against the police remain broadly consistent with that directed against the populace at large? Would it be much higher? Lower?

The question is inherently dishonest and moronic, because attempting to kill someone is already illegal. Unless you're a cop. Then you've got a shitload of leeway. Expecting the police to have to actually confirm that a firearm is being introduced by a suspect isn't a high bar.

[I would also like to see the specific rules of engagement you're referring to, and where these soldiers were posted, by the way]

Deadly force should only be used in response to a hostile act or a demonstration of hostile intent. Deadly force is defined as force that causes or has a substantial risk of causing death or serious bodily harm.

More info can be found here
No hostile act or demonstration of hostile intent was present on Castile's end. I've seen actual war veterans that are horrified at how little discipline US police show engaging with our own citizens. Soldiers taking offense to articles that go on about vets becoming police and how bad this is because soldiers are actually taught some fucking discipline. When police training boils down to "everyone is itching to murder you" the institutional problems run very deep indeed.

'Safe' was perhaps a poor choice of words. To rephrase question (1)...

How few instances of cops that you believe are guilty, but who are not punished or convicted, would there have to be, before you felt reasonably inclined to trust police? Measured in "no more than one per year" or "no more than two per day" or some such rate?

If it were at a rate even the same order of magnitude as regular-ass Joes that would be a huge improvement. Civil forfeiture laws would need to be reworked completely, including the police paying all of your court costs when you have to sue to get your property back as well as pay for any time you had to take off work. If they cannot show reasonable suspicion that seized property of money was somehow involved in or acquired via criminal activities, the officer should be summarily terminated and charged with theft appropriate to the value of goods stolen. Including grand larceny. Fuck, throw in treble damages and raid the guilty cop's retirement fund before going into public funds.

(2), too, needs rephrasing.

What is the number of "bad cops I think get away with it per year" that you would have to learn about, in order to convince you that police were untrustworthy? How many is too many? Can you give me a number?

So I guess they converge to the same question.

What is the number of "cops I think are bad, but know weren't punished" that it takes to convince you the police are dishonest?

Do you not grok the issue? The issue is that, as it stands, there are bad cops and they can get away with it far more often than if they were not a cop. It's a risk-assessment scenario. What percent of men would randomly commit sexual assault on a random woman? Now, is it unreasonable for women to be mistrustful of strange men when they're alone with them? Same fucking concept. Even if there's a on in a thousand chance that the guy in the hypothetical woman walking from the door of her employer to her car scenario would so much as say hi the woman is not wrong to be wary of him. It is not wrong to distrust police as a matter of course when there are definitely bad ones that will almost definitely get away with it unless there's substantial video evidence, and even then it's really fucking dicey. If police forces would actually do something to rid themselves of bad cops, if the "justice" system would actually do something about bad cops, if the public would do something about bad cops... Then there'd be a possibility of even trying to start discussing how many bad cops can be out there without making every cop a risk.

Put it this way: Would you let some random jackass borrow your car? Would you let some random person have a copy of the key to your home and knowledge of where your home is? How low would the percent of people who would drive your car recklessly (or steal it) need to be for you to lend your car to a complete stranger? How low a percent of people that have zero respect for another person's property or are outright thieves would it need to be for you to entrust your keys to a stranger? Get my point here?

[Alyrium Denryle]

In my view, if a cop's killing of someone is declared legally justified that is the same as declaring the person had done something that legally warrants death or was attempting to do something that legally warrants death because police are ostensibly acting in the name of the government with the government's consent. Not "the cop says he thought the person was dangerous". In the case of Castile's roadside murder, a reasonable person would not have concluded that murder was about to be attempted by the guy who just announced that he is legally carrying a concealed firearm.

This is where you are wrong. Police are often operating on imperfect information. There can be a pretty wide gulf between "what a completely rational, sane, and well-intentioned officer perceived at the time" and "what was actually happening". The officer can be legitimately mistaken in good faith, and the shooting justified. For example, if an officer comes across a crazy homeless guy brandishing a piece of flimsy siding or aluminium dowling at another homeless guy, at night, it is pretty easy to mistake it for a sword or more rigid piece of metal, thus constituting a lethal situation. At that point, the officer could be justified in pulling his gun and shooting the dude, even though he is mistaken.

Yanez was not being reasonable, or even competent in this case.

The question is inherently dishonest and moronic, because attempting to kill someone is already illegal. Unless you're a cop. Then you've got a shitload of leeway. Expecting the police to have to actually confirm that a firearm is being introduced by a suspect isn't a high bar.

It actually is, because in a situation that actually is dangerous, it can doom the officer. Being a civil servant is not a suicide pact. And while police are far too quick to pull the trigger on black people (backed up with peer reviewed studies, including experiments), that does not change a basic fact.

Reaction time. By the time an officer is absolutely sure that someone is pulling a gun on them, the officer is doomed because it is impossible to react and pull their own gun in time to save their own life or someone else's life.

Because of this, there will always be errors, and innocent people will die. You can't eliminate them. You can reduce them with proper training and simulation, but you can never eliminate them.

This does not excuse Yanez (or many others highlighted in this thread) because he fucked up from the second he decided to flick on his lights, but in a lot of cases...yeah. What do we do with those? Charge officers with manslaughter even though they were not negligent? Fire them because they made perfectly understandable errors? Do I need to spell out the second-order consequences of that?

[Thanas]

Yanez should spent the rest of his life in jail...

I am not questioning the rightness of considering this the correct punishment for homicidal negligence by a police officer. But I do want to double-check to confirm, Thanas, that you do consider this to be homicidal negligence by a police officer, and that you do consider life in prison to be the correct punishment for that crime.

Is that the case?

Yes.

This is so fucking incompetent and ill-disciplined on part of the donut-eating retard that I cannot even fathom how this guy even made it through police training and was not failing multiple stress tests during training. I mean, the US does test its police on how they respond in stresful situations, right? (I am assuming that there is some element of stress testing done during training because I cannot fathom the US being so stupid that this is not a requirement for state agents with guns, but I don't actually know).

The shot citizen did nothing wrong whatsoever except maybe being confused due to the cops inept instructions. If this was a german cop he would be so fast in prison you would not even be able to read his full name before the judge would bang the gavel.

It is incomprehensible to me that there is even an argument about this here.

[Khaat]

Yanez lost his cool, and didn't have the presence of mind to take charge of himself or the situation.

“Put plainly, when cops mess up, the explanations offered tend to be ethical and political, when the more empirically solid explanations are much simpler than that—they are basic failures of human performance under stress,” says Jonathan Wender, a sociologist at the University of Washington and former police officer and sergeant. “We need evidence-based, human performance training that starts in the academy and continues across every career phase, so when you’re tired, scared or stressed, you still do the right thing.”

from http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... shootings/

EDIT: quote thing

[Napoleon the Clown]

In my view, if a cop's killing of someone is declared legally justified that is the same as declaring the person had done something that legally warrants death or was attempting to do something that legally warrants death because police are ostensibly acting in the name of the government with the government's consent. Not "the cop says he thought the person was dangerous". In the case of Castile's roadside murder, a reasonable person would not have concluded that murder was about to be attempted by the guy who just announced that he is legally carrying a concealed firearm.

This is where you are wrong. Police are often operating on imperfect information. There can be a pretty wide gulf between "what a completely rational, sane, and well-intentioned officer perceived at the time" and "what was actually happening". The officer can be legitimately mistaken in good faith, and the shooting justified. For example, if an officer comes across a crazy homeless guy brandishing a piece of flimsy siding or aluminium dowling at another homeless guy, at night, it is pretty easy to mistake it for a sword or more rigid piece of metal, thus constituting a lethal situation. At that point, the officer could be justified in pulling his gun and shooting the dude, even though he is mistaken.

Yanez was not being reasonable, or even competent in this case.

In this hypothetical, you would agree the cop should at least order the homeless guy to drop it, right? And I'll concede "confirm there's definitely a weapon" is a bit much... But considering how often cops get away with outright murder, I'm a wee bit pissed lately.

Hell, I'd trust police judgement more if I had any reason to believe that their training is reasonably good at consistently giving them the capacity to make solid judgements under stressful conditions. As it stands, the standard for them is lower than it would be for me.

The question is inherently dishonest and moronic, because attempting to kill someone is already illegal. Unless you're a cop. Then you've got a shitload of leeway. Expecting the police to have to actually confirm that a firearm is being introduced by a suspect isn't a high bar.

It actually is, because in a situation that actually is dangerous, it can doom the officer. Being a civil servant is not a suicide pact. And while police are far too quick to pull the trigger on black people (backed up with peer reviewed studies, including experiments), that does not change a basic fact.

Reaction time. By the time an officer is absolutely sure that someone is pulling a gun on them, the officer is doomed because it is impossible to react and pull their own gun in time to save their own life or someone else's life.

Because of this, there will always be errors, and innocent people will die. You can't eliminate them. You can reduce them with proper training and simulation, but you can never eliminate them.

This does not excuse Yanez (or many others highlighted in this thread) because he fucked up from the second he decided to flick on his lights, but in a lot of cases...yeah. What do we do with those? Charge officers with manslaughter even though they were not negligent? Fire them because they made perfectly understandable errors? Do I need to spell out the second-order consequences of that?

If the officer suspects a weapon is going to be introduced, getting his firearm is one thing. Opening fire before he is absolutely sure is another. I'm curious about how often police are injured by guns or other weapons wielded by suspects. I know that there's not really good data on how often the police open fire on someone.

[Kamakazie Sith]

Sorry for the long wait. Before I continue I wanted to clear some misconceptions up that probably were created by my own narrative - I do not think Yanez was justified at all. I got wrapped up in what could really be described as some comments from Terralthra and Napoleon that were made because they are rightly pissed at this situation. So, to clarify. I do not think Yanez was justified and if he would have been convicted of murder, let alone manslaughter, I believe he would have absolutely deserved it. Nitpicking comments made out of frustration has made this conversation a bit toxic and that's my fault so I apologize. Like I said you guys have every right to be pissed. We all should be pissed. Extreme comments are only a natural reaction to that. So, I'll continue in this discussion picking out a few things that I feel need to be addressed.

Classy source for the citation, bro.

Looking into it, he was charged by all three of them. Snopes link

Not as cut-and-dry as the white supremacist site you linked to makes it sound. Three people charging is certainly cause for alarm, so I can understand why he may panic.

Ah, my bad on the source. That was not my intention. I quickly found that and didn't read all the way through so that's on me. However, I want to point out a few things to you using your own source.

1) Three people did not charge him. From your source "He told the individuals to stop, that his girlfriend had called 911, and that he had a gun. The individuals stopped, and a few seconds passed. Scott says the teens were talking, then one of them ran around the front of the truck. The other ran down the driveway toward him, screaming. Scott warned him he had a gun, then shot him."

Only one charged him. The teen he shot. Again, from your own source "Scott [said he] fired at Cervini when Cervini ran in his direction, but the prosecution claims the young man was shot in the back, indicating he would have been headed in the opposite direction."

2) Even if three people were charging him you've said in this very thread that alarm and panic are not cause to use deadly force. Why the change? I mean shit at least George Zimmerman got roughed up a bit before he killed an unarmed black teenager.

3) Finally, my point isn't that system is fair here. My point is that with a good defense you can be acquitted even with the deck stacked against you which would likely be the case for a black man that shot an unarmed white teen.

I'm lucky enough to be a skinny, short white guy. I am among the least threatening people a cop can interact with, so the odds of being the victim of lethal force are pretty low for me. I still wouldn't trust a cop as far as I can throw their cruiser because if the cop just so happens to be a shitty cop and decides to fuck me over, there is probably no recourse because cops so very often get off with armed robbery (fun fact: you can't make them pay your attorney's fees if you sue to get your shit back-assuming it didn't "get lost") and outright murder. It is readily apparent that there are bad cops and that they usually get away with being bad cops. So long as that is the case, no cop can be trusted. You simply cannot know if they're a power-hungry dick that's pretending to be normal until you've been lulled into a false sense of security.

I was talking with one my coworkers today about asset forfeiture. The cause behind the forfeiture for the "armed robbery" that you're talking about is just incredible. With my department not only do you need to have a crime to seize money but you also need to have evidence to support that the money you are seizing is profit from criminal activity. Just seizing a pile of cash for the reason of "who would carry that much cash with them?" is just insane from my perspective and that of my coworkers. It really illustrates the huge gap in procedure, training, etc between various LE agencies in the US.

It's not confusing at all as to why. The word of cops is taken as gospel by default, and the "justice" system isn't exactly charitable toward racial minorities as a rule. As far as laws about when dealing with police abuse... You agree that those laws must be written in a way so as to hold police to a higher standard than civilians, and the laws be constructed so as to best protect civilians?

I agree that there should be a specific section dealing with police conduct so when you have a situation like Castile you won't be charging him with something that you would charge a citizen with. You'll be charging them with a violation from the police section. So, it will be written with holding police officers accountable for failing to follow policy, failing to follow their training, and violating civil rights.

Minorities, blacks especially, are more often subjected to force. Especially lethal force. They're more often "randomly" stopped by the police. It's a fucked situation. You seem to agree on that matter.

I agree that accountability is fucked. I do not agree with the title of trigger happy being given to US police as a general title. As far as use of force is concerned US police use force in approximately

I'm glad we agree that Yanez didn't handle the situation properly.

Absolutely.

I don't get how somebody can be justifiably shot by police by reaching into something when the person's demeanor was nonthreatening.

He wasn't justifiably shot. The DA determined the shooting to be unjustified which is why charges were filed. This is why I talked about the need for a specific police misconduct criminal code.

It just does not compute with me how police can be that aggressive and stupid and not go to jail for this shit.

If you have a good defense team it is easy to be found not guilty. Remember US jurors are not like your jurors.

This is so fucking incompetent and ill-disciplined on part of the donut-eating retard that I cannot even fathom how this guy even made it through police training and was not failing multiple stress tests during training. I mean, the US does test its police on how they respond in stresful situations, right? (I am assuming that there is some element of stress testing done during training because I cannot fathom the US being so stupid that this is not a requirement for state agents with guns, but I don't actually know).

Yes, they do. However, given the number of conversations you have participated in on SDN involving US police I would think by now you would know how ridiculously varied police agencies are in the US. You're talking about nearly 18,000 separate law enforcement agencies in all of the US spread across different states, territories, and districts each with their own standards, training, policies, laws, etc. So, when you say do US police train their police to respond to stressful situations the answer could be yes or it could be no depending on which agencies you're thinking of.

The more appropriate question to ask related to Yanez is does the St. Anthony Police Department conduct stress inoculation training? I do not know. Does not look like it.

The shot citizen did nothing wrong whatsoever except maybe being confused due to the cops inept instructions. If this was a german cop he would be so fast in prison you would not even be able to read his full name before the judge would bang the gavel.

This wasn't up to a judge though. It was up to a jury of 12, including two african american jurors. All said not guilty. I wonder if it had something to do with how the statute for manslaughter is written. https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/?id=609.205

It is incomprehensible to me that there is even an argument about this here.

Well, there was a discussion related to some heated statements made at the start that just got out of hand but as I clarified there is no argument from me here regarding whether or not this was justified.

Here is my sense on this. The officer gave contradictory instructions. He wanted ID, Castille did the responsible thing and politely informed the officer that he had a gun. "Don't reach for it then" is fine as an instruction, but Castille still had to get his ID as per the officer's instructions (I think this is a bit people have not been communicating adequately, largely because I don't think anyone here is being dispassionate right now).

If the officer is reasonable and not panicking (which is the definition of the reasonable person--or reasonable officer--standard of law) then he should conclude that Castille was being responsible about informing him of a gun (rather than threatening him), and was complying with instructions. If the officer was not certain, he should have clarified that he wanted Castille to put his hands on the wheel or exit the vehicle with his hands up so that said officer could remove the weapon and obtain ID in safety. He failed to do this. At every single step of this stop, Yanez failed to do anything that a reasonable officer should do. He failed to do anything that I am absolutely confident that you would do under identical conditions.

He was grossly negligent, and as a result someone is dead. That is manslaughter in most jurisdictions that I am aware.

I agree. The instructions in the manner they were given created confusion and in this case it was confusion. The problem is the jury having been shown the dash cam video, combine with a skilled defense team could easily convince them that it was not criminal negligence but an unfortunate accident or that Castile was ignoring Yanez's instructions. That's my point. Not that Yanez was justified. My point is that a good defense team can convince a jury of surprising things.

Point of information: center console or right pocket is also where most people keep their ID, which is what Yanez instructed Castile to obtain. Could Castile have clarified that he was going for his ID? Sure! But thinking clearly in the situation he was in is not his job. It literally was Yanez's job.

I did not know there was a majority on where people keep their wallet. I keep mine in my left back pocket and before that I kept it in my front left pocket.

As for the racism: I think ultimately, that is the root cause. Yanez could not tell black people apart, and as a result was psychologically primed to think that Castile was a threat. Thus comes the panic, thus comes the negligence.

Whenever it is this equation everyone thinks it is the root cause. It seems the equation for this conclusion is as simple as controversial incident involving a black man and anyone else but usually a cop. Frankly, I don't think that's good enough.

When I watch the dash cam video I see a poorly trained officer and inexperienced officer. When I read about his reasoning for the stop I see those same things. These qualities are reflected in people that are washed out -at least where I work. They do these same things in simulations against actors of the same skin color or different. I remember one recruit that straight up executed an actor that had surrendered, was on his knees and had his hands in the air. You should have seen our faces. I still can't believe he did that. When asked to explain himself he said "I thought he was still dangerous". He did not graduate.

Yanez, was looking for the suspect of a robbery (confirmed by radio chatter) that took place a few days ago and it was a robbery he had investigated and they had a BOLO (Be On Look Out) for the suspect with a video surveillance picture. Now, I'm sure we've had experiences where someone says "Hey you look like X" or "that guy looks like this guy" but to you he doesn't look that person at all.

The problem is Yanez doesn't understand what totality is. His reasoning MAY have been enough if the guy had not been in a car and it was after the robbery had just occurred and he was in the area but this was days after. He needed more than a similar looking face. He needed as a minimum similar face, wearing the exact same clothing, driving in a car of the same description, and in the general area of the robbery.

So, I can't rule out that racism didn't play a role but I don't see how anyone can conclude that it was a root cause unless I am missing something.

@KS: I think all of the "innocent" cops should be gunned down while theyre protesting their treatment at the hands of the populace the pussy bitches are scared of. The fact that they have the audacity to shoot someone in front of kids is proof enough that we should fear for our safety. Maybe we should smoke blunts while we shoot them in the back. Maybe plant a gun on them. Maybe put them in a chokehold while they scream that they can't breathe. No cop is innocent: they're all a part of the Blue Wall Society and have the group think mentality of terrorists.

Ahh Tucker. How have you been? You know your post here makes me feel all nostalgic. In a way, you're wishing for my death a second time because I count myself among the innocent officers.

I don't buy your excuses about this post either, by the way. You and Highlord Lann have both wished or have stated that you are OK with the deaths of innocent people just because they are police. This makes you a bad person. Make no mistake, the world that you two wished existed well both of you would not belong. No, you two crazies both belong with the corrupt violent cops.

US police seem to be trained to be abjectly terrified of the people they interact with, and so are hypersensitive to anything that might be percieved as an aggressive action. Statistically, having black skin is likely to be percieved as an aggressive action by US police.

Some are. Some aren't. No training that I have ever been to did such a thing but I belong to a decent department.

If the officer suspects a weapon is going to be introduced, getting his firearm is one thing. Opening fire before he is absolutely sure is another. I'm curious about how often police are injured by guns or other weapons wielded by suspects. I know that there's not really good data on how often the police open fire on someone.

In 2014 there were 1902 police injuries caused by weapons that would justified deadly force.

In 2015 there were 2173 police injuries caused by weapons that would justified deadly force.

In both of those years there were roughly 10,000 assaults against police with the use of weapons but I don't know how those are defined so that's why I narrowed it down to injuries.

If you like I can break it down for you. As for opening fire when you're absolutely sure that doesn't work when it's a firearm. Even with a firearm pointed at the person if you require them to be absolutely sure (meaning if they're wrong then go to prison) in most cases the officer would take a couple rounds before they returned fire. It's just action versus reaction and the time it takes for your brain to observe and identify threats. You just can't do it fast enough.

[Simon_Jester]

Shortly after encountering an agitated motorist driving in front of him on July 28, 2016, Anthony found himself confronted by the police. Within seconds of exiting his vehicle after pulling Anthony over, Agent Joe Joswiak of the Buffalo Ridge Drug Task Force opened the door of Anthony’s car, screaming, “Get the fuck out of the car, motherfucker!”

Protect and serve indeed. One off-duty officer's road-rage at his perception that he was being tailgated led him to call his on-duty friend to pull over someone, drag them out of a car after "not obeying an order to exit the vehicle", that being the shouted "GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE CAR MOTHERFUCKER!" as the officer wrenches open the door. The driver was given approximately half a second to obey the order before being dragged - still wearing a seatbelt - out of the car bodily, with plenty of elbows, punches, and a knee to the back of the head.

There is simply no justification for this manner of interaction. The police's account claims that the driver was driving hazardously and making threats:

According to the criminal complaint, Promvongsa caused a road-rage incident that started about 9:30 a.m. on July 28. Promvongsa is accused of endangering an off-duty Worthington police officer, including tailgating, swerving, making hand gestures out the window and speeding up before stopping just short of the officer’s car.

The off-duty officer then met up with a fellow off-duty officer. Promvongsa sped between their vehicles, saying he was “going to get his boys and come back to get them” before speeding off, the complaint said.

After Promvongsa’s encounter with the off-duty officers, Joswiak drove in his unmarked car to where the suspect was last seen and found Promvongsa. The complaint alleges that Promvongsa swerved toward Joswiak and kept going.

Even if all of that is true - which I doubt - it still doesn't justify that officer's actions. If you can't keep your temper when provoked, find a different job.

I want to reply to the rest of the things said since my last post, but do not have time right now and may not have time for quite a while. I just wanted to note full agreement that the non-police description of this event would be grotesque abuse of police power and horrible conduct by the police involved.

The police description, if true, would not be the same kind of abuse of power (since police trying to restrain a guy who actually did all of that would be reasonable if they had conducted themselves properly, which they didn't)...

But it would STILL be horrible conduct by the police, what with the "GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE CAR MOTHERFUCKER" and so on. Even if the police were attempting to detain someone they should in fact be detaining, the police behaving like 'just another gang' is never, ever okay under any circumstances.

[Terralthra]

Yeah, that's more or less what I'm trying to say there. Even if the incident occurred exactly as police describe, the conduct of the arresting officer when Promvongsa did pull over is still unacceptable.

I don't believe that the police account is believable, either. Police officers do routinely exaggerate or lie about actions of people they have abused to justify their abuse.

[Kamakazie Sith]

Yeah, that's more or less what I'm trying to say there. Even if the incident occurred exactly as police describe, the conduct of the arresting officer when Promvongsa did pull over is still unacceptable.

I don't believe that the police account is believable, either. Police officers do routinely exaggerate or lie about actions of people they have abused to justify their abuse.

I think when someone behaves like that even before physical contact was made is a pretty clear indicator that you shouldn't trust them. Conduct like that is just unacceptable. I mean tailgating is irritating but it shouldn't result in that type of encounter. I could maybe sympathize if that guy had just murdered his friend or something but even then it would still be too far.

[Napoleon the Clown]

Ah, my bad on the source. That was not my intention. I quickly found that and didn't read all the way through so that's on me. However, I want to point out a few things to you using your own source.

1) Three people did not charge him. From your source "He told the individuals to stop, that his girlfriend had called 911, and that he had a gun. The individuals stopped, and a few seconds passed. Scott says the teens were talking, then one of them ran around the front of the truck. The other ran down the driveway toward him, screaming. Scott warned him he had a gun, then shot him."

Only one charged him. The teen he shot. Again, from your own source "Scott [said he] fired at Cervini when Cervini ran in his direction, but the prosecution claims the young man was shot in the back, indicating he would have been headed in the opposite direction."

2) Even if three people were charging him you've said in this very thread that alarm and panic are not cause to use deadly force. Why the change? I mean shit at least George Zimmerman got roughed up a bit before he killed an unarmed black teenager.

3) Finally, my point isn't that system is fair here. My point is that with a good defense you can be acquitted even with the deck stacked against you which would likely be the case for a black man that shot an unarmed white teen.

I misinterpreted the article, it seems.

I simply believe that police should be held to a higher standard than civilians because, in a reasonable and prudent law enforcement office, the training will be superior to what the average person on the street can receive. How to keep calm under stress, how to identify if someone is a legitimate threat, how to deescalate a situation...

I'm lucky enough to be a skinny, short white guy. I am among the least threatening people a cop can interact with, so the odds of being the victim of lethal force are pretty low for me. I still wouldn't trust a cop as far as I can throw their cruiser because if the cop just so happens to be a shitty cop and decides to fuck me over, there is probably no recourse because cops so very often get off with armed robbery (fun fact: you can't make them pay your attorney's fees if you sue to get your shit back-assuming it didn't "get lost") and outright murder. It is readily apparent that there are bad cops and that they usually get away with being bad cops. So long as that is the case, no cop can be trusted. You simply cannot know if they're a power-hungry dick that's pretending to be normal until you've been lulled into a false sense of security.

I was talking with one my coworkers today about asset forfeiture. The cause behind the forfeiture for the "armed robbery" that you're talking about is just incredible. With my department not only do you need to have a crime to seize money but you also need to have evidence to support that the money you are seizing is profit from criminal activity. Just seizing a pile of cash for the reason of "who would carry that much cash with them?" is just insane from my perspective and that of my coworkers. It really illustrates the huge gap in procedure, training, etc between various LE agencies in the US.

Asset forfeiture even sprang to mind because a lawyer's podcast I listen to outright says not to travel with $10k+ in cash because of asset forfeiture. It's hideously fucked up, and I wish police training and policy were standardized across the country and were such that "that's a lot of money" wasn't considered adequate cause. Preaching to the choir here, it seems.

It's not confusing at all as to why. The word of cops is taken as gospel by default, and the "justice" system isn't exactly charitable toward racial minorities as a rule. As far as laws about when dealing with police abuse... You agree that those laws must be written in a way so as to hold police to a higher standard than civilians, and the laws be constructed so as to best protect civilians?

I agree that there should be a specific section dealing with police conduct so when you have a situation like Castile you won't be charging him with something that you would charge a citizen with. You'll be charging them with a violation from the police section. So, it will be written with holding police officers accountable for failing to follow policy, failing to follow their training, and violating civil rights.

Minorities, blacks especially, are more often subjected to force. Especially lethal force. They're more often "randomly" stopped by the police. It's a fucked situation. You seem to agree on that matter.

I agree that accountability is fucked. I do not agree with the title of trigger happy being given to US police as a general title. As far as use of force is concerned US police use force in approximately

I think you stepped away from the computer for a second and the rest of this sentence got left off, accidentally...

If the officer suspects a weapon is going to be introduced, getting his firearm is one thing. Opening fire before he is absolutely sure is another. I'm curious about how often police are injured by guns or other weapons wielded by suspects. I know that there's not really good data on how often the police open fire on someone.

In 2014 there were 1902 police injuries caused by weapons that would justified deadly force.

In 2015 there were 2173 police injuries caused by weapons that would justified deadly force.

In both of those years there were roughly 10,000 assaults against police with the use of weapons but I don't know how those are defined so that's why I narrowed it down to injuries.

If you like I can break it down for you. As for opening fire when you're absolutely sure that doesn't work when it's a firearm. Even with a firearm pointed at the person if you require them to be absolutely sure (meaning if they're wrong then go to prison) in most cases the officer would take a couple rounds before they returned fire. It's just action versus reaction and the time it takes for your brain to observe and identify threats. You just can't do it fast enough.

I'll grant that there's a such thing as too high a bar... But as it stands, the bar sure seems low to me. I guess training alone would make a huge impact on mistaken use of force among police, but training is so completely non-standardized across the US that it seems quite naive to think it'll happen.

It's pretty amazing how utterly random and disjointed many government functions are across the US.

[Vendetta]

Latest in amazingly scary things US police shoot on sight: Each other.

[White Haven]

Given the constant refrain (not just from you, KS, to be clear) of 'bad training, bad training, bad training' in cases like this, why are police departments still permitted to train their own officers? Instead, perhaps a smaller number of properly-funded, properly-overseen training programs would work better and, more to the point, kill fewer people. What are your thoughts on the workability of something like that, KS?

[RogueIce]

Given the constant refrain (not just from you, KS, to be clear) of 'bad training, bad training, bad training' in cases like this, why are police departments still permitted to train their own officers? Instead, perhaps a smaller number of properly-funded, properly-overseen training programs would work better and, more to the point, kill fewer people. What are your thoughts on the workability of something like that, KS?

From what I can tell, each US state has laws which mandate certain requirements for law enforcement certification. That doesn't mean it's written out in the statute, just that they establish some state agency that creates the minimum training requirements and provides certification and oversight of training academies to make sure they meet those requirements. If there's a state out there that doesn't have such a system in place, they should.

Examples: California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training, Florida Criminal Justice and Standards Training Commission, Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, New York Office of Public Safety - most relevantly to the latest discussion: Minnesota Board of Peace Officer Standards and Training

AFAIK there are no federal standards - beyond those required for federal agencies, obviously - but there are state-wide standards that are supposed to be followed. It's not each agency just handing out a badge, making a rookie ride with a senior officer for a few shifts, and calling it a day.

Of course, these standards are the minimum. Some agencies or training facilities, depending on their budget, size and expertise, may expand beyond the minimum requirements. So if "stress training" isn't mandatory at the state level, certain academies and departments may do it anyway because they can, while smaller agencies don't. But if it is mandated by the State Commissions and they're not doing it, well, that's something that needs to be reported and dealt with.

So if you want to get at the root of police training in the US, you've got to look at what each of the 50 states require as their basic minimums. And then go from there.

[Kamakazie Sith]

I misinterpreted the article, it seems.

I simply believe that police should be held to a higher standard than civilians because, in a reasonable and prudent law enforcement office, the training will be superior to what the average person on the street can receive. How to keep calm under stress, how to identify if someone is a legitimate threat, how to deescalate a situation...

I agree for the most part. Like I've mentioned before that higher standard would being held accountable to the training you receive and applicable civil rights requirements. Though something needs to be done with the trivial way local governments gut police budgets so they can fund other projects. If we agree that police training is important then we need to hold our elected officials accountable as well. When budgets get tight and/or they have special projects the police and fire budgets are usually at the top of the list to get a nice hair cut. That practice can no longer be tolerated because it effects us all.

However, the public also needs to understand that there is a time and place for things like deescalation. Establishing control and scene security will sometimes be more important but during those times threat identification should also be equally important. Like the article that Vendetta linked. That officer had zero situational awareness and that can't be tolerated any longer.

Asset forfeiture even sprang to mind because a lawyer's podcast I listen to outright says not to travel with $10k+ in cash because of asset forfeiture. It's hideously fucked up, and I wish police training and policy were standardized across the country and were such that "that's a lot of money" wasn't considered adequate cause. Preaching to the choir here, it seems.

It's usually small departments that engage in this practice. So, yeah if you're going on any long distance road trip I wouldn't travel with that much cash. I mean, it's unwise to travel with that much cash anyway even if this practice did not exist. Talk about all your eggs in one basket...

I think you stepped away from the computer for a second and the rest of this sentence got left off, accidentally...

It was some sort of formatting error but I actually intended on deleting this portion. I was going to comment on police use of force but the paper I was going to use from the Bureau of Justice is six years old and is only a survey so I decided that it wouldn't be a good point because of how old it is.

Here it is; https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/pbtss11.pdf

I'll grant that there's a such thing as too high a bar... But as it stands, the bar sure seems low to me. I guess training alone would make a huge impact on mistaken use of force among police, but training is so completely non-standardized across the US that it seems quite naive to think it'll happen.

That's because there's no accountability for training and taking risks. Really, you shouldn't be doing a typical traffic stop on someone you think is an armed robbery suspect. If Yanez had been correct and Castile was the robbery suspect and he was willing to kill Yanez could easily have been shot. My department conducted a test using our own officers. In every single encounter the suspect in a car is able to put four to five rounds on an officer conducting a typical traffic stop before they can take any meaningful action.

Pretext stops, like what Yanez was doing, are dangerous. Had Yanez conducted a high hazard stop, it would have still be an unreasonable stop in my opinion due to time lapse and lack of other matching factors, but would have been safer for all because there is no mistaken impression. Castile had no idea he was being checked as a possible suspect in an armed robbery and was under the impression that it was a typical traffic stop. Had Castile known that I have no doubt he would have kept his hands as far away from his firearm as possible and a high hazard stop is pretty clear from the get go that it is very serious.

It's pretty amazing how utterly random and disjointed many government functions are across the US.

Yeah, when you give states the right to make their own laws then you're going to have what seems like a disjointed system and that is why police training is non-standardized. Some states do not think that is important for various reasons.

Given the constant refrain (not just from you, KS, to be clear) of 'bad training, bad training, bad training' in cases like this, why are police departments still permitted to train their own officers? Instead, perhaps a smaller number of properly-funded, properly-overseen training programs would work better and, more to the point, kill fewer people. What are your thoughts on the workability of something like that, KS?

I doubt it with the current administration. Even under Obama, or any other president, you still have the issue of state independence. But, many law enforcement agencies do depend on federal government money for support so that might be an angle that could be played to adopt a consistent set of standards and usually the areas with the highest rates of police shootings, excessive use of force, etc are departments with significant budget issues because they have high operating costs. Maybe that way.

[Napoleon the Clown]

I think we've largely come to agreement, or would end up just talking circles on disagreements that are as much opinion as fact.

Ask me how much I like the fiscal austerity bullshit. I get why a lot of small towns are such sticklers about traffic violations, it's how they can even pull in some damn revenue. I can't help but feel at least some of the issues with the police come down to needing money and feeling like traffic tickets are the only way to be funded.

[Simon_Jester]

Is there any evidence aside from Yanez say so that Castille actually reached into his pocket.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85Y_yOm9IhA

Yanez was saying don't pull it out (after Castille says I have a firearm), and Castille says I am not pulling it out.

I am hearing people just assuming Yanez's version of the event.

If Yanez is lying about Castille reaching into his pocket, then this was a motiveless killing, in which Yanez had no comprehensible reason for speaking the words he was recorded as speaking.

The idea that an incompetent cop would give an order, then freak out when the suspect carried it out and double-freakout when the suspect didn't instantly respond to a command to stop carrying it out...

This is much more plausible than that the same incompetent cop randomly said words indicating the above, while having already made a decision to shoot the guy dead for no discernible reason.

Yanez went on the defensive immediately upon being informed of the firearm, did he not? He immediately became terrified?

The sequence of events, which we have from earlier in the thread, is:

9:05:52 – 9:05:55 p.m. — Castile told Yanez: “Sir, I have to tell you that I do have a firearm on me.” Before Castile completed the sentence, Yanez interrupted and replied, “Okay” and placed his right hand on the holster of his gun.
9:05:55 – 9:06:02 p.m. — Yanez said “Okay, don’t reach for it, then.” Castile responded: “I’m… I’m … [inaudible] reaching…,” before being again interrupted by Yanez, who said “Don’t pull it out.” Castile responded, “I’m not pulling it out,” and Reynolds said, “He’s not pulling it out.” Yanez screamed: “Don’t pull it out,” and pulled his gun with his right hand. Yanez fired seven shots in the direction of Castile in rapid succession.

So you can say Yanez went on the defensive and immediately became "terrified."

That doesn't mean Yanez was just as likely to shoot someone who appeared to be obeying his words as someone who appeared to be disobeying them.

Yanez would have still remained at high probability of violent retaliation and would have probably concluded arresting Castile was appropriate at that point, and dragged him out and when the gun inevitably fell out as Yanez got his police brutality on, concluded Castile was going for it then shot him. For all Castile could have known, at least. Odds of that are at least as good as the odds of Castile trying to pull a gun after announcing he had one.

As far as we can tell, Castille's calculation was:

"Is it more likely that the panicky cop will shoot me for reaching into my pocket just after I told him I have a gun, and after he told me "don't reach for it!" ? Or is it more likely that the policeman will shoot me for moving my hands the hell AWAY from my pockets?"

You're implying that this is some kind of mysterious imponderable. Like, who knows what affects your likelihood of getting shot by an armed man who tells you to do something? Maybe ignoring him is just as safe as obeying him! Who can possibly guess, right?

And I kind of sympathize, because it smacks of 'blame the victim' to say "it's a good idea to do what police officers say, rather than ignoring them, after you just told them you have a weapon." Thing is, it still is a good idea to do that. Even given that Yanez is a horrible person who should never have been born, let alone put on a badge...

Of the set of all possible universes in which Castille stopped reaching for his pocket, Castille is alive in most of those possible universes. In this universe, he's dead. That is, by any reasonable interpretation, a fact we need to understand, if this is to be anything other than an exercise in people shrieking at each other as a way of signaling their hatred of the opposing tribe.

Because ultimately, this is a large part of why a jury, including black jurors, voted to find Yanez 'not guilty.' Because the sequence of events as depicted is consistent with Yanez honestly but wrongly thinking Castille was pulling out a gun. Are we sure that's what happened? No, we are not, and cannot possibly be. But is it sufficient to raise reasonable doubt? And frankly... It kind of is.

And that is, so far, the way our criminal justice system runs. "Innocent until proven guilty." If you want to argue that negligent police officers should be considered guilty until proven innocent instead of the other way around, fine. But you need to acknowledge that you're doing that.

In my view, if a cop's killing of someone is declared legally justified that is the same as declaring the person had done something that legally warrants death or was attempting to do something that legally warrants death because police are ostensibly acting in the name of the government with the government's consent.

The logical consequence of this it is legally impossible for a policeman to make a mistake, even a mistake involving a suspect's contributory negligence, without the policeman being punished for it.

Do you think this is a desirable state of affairs?

Yes, or no?

So... no need to answer the question, because it's dishonest to ask it at all. Because... Um.

Well, honestly, I'm still sincerely curious, what do you think would happen if there were literally no increased penalty or risk associated with violence directed against a police officer? If that were the only thing that changed, all else being equal? Would the rate of violence directed against the police remain broadly consistent with that directed against the populace at large? Would it be much higher? Lower?

The question is inherently dishonest and moronic, because attempting to kill someone is already illegal. Unless you're a cop. Then you've got a shitload of leeway. Expecting the police to have to actually confirm that a firearm is being introduced by a suspect isn't a high bar.

So in other words, you're entitled to ask questions and make arguments about the incentive structures created by the status quo. But I'm not entitled to ask questions and make arguments about the incentive structures created by changing the status quo. Do I have that right?

[I would also like to see the specific rules of engagement you're referring to, and where these soldiers were posted, by the way]

Deadly force should only be used in response to a hostile act or a demonstration of hostile intent. Deadly force is defined as force that causes or has a substantial risk of causing death or serious bodily harm.

More info can be found here No hostile act or demonstration of hostile intent was present on Castile's end. I've seen actual war veterans that are horrified at how little discipline US police show engaging with our own citizens. Soldiers taking offense to articles that go on about vets becoming police and how bad this is because soldiers are actually taught some fucking discipline. When police training boils down to "everyone is itching to murder you" the institutional problems run very deep indeed.

I am pretty sure that if you told a soldier in a war zone that you had a pistol in your pocket, and they said "don't reach for it," and you reached for your pocket and they shot you... That would not be a violation of that particular set of rules of engagement.

Because if you make soldiers wait until someone physically draws the weapon they just told you you have, your soldiers will get killed.

'Safe' was perhaps a poor choice of words. To rephrase question (1)...

How few instances of cops that you believe are guilty, but who are not punished or convicted, would there have to be, before you felt reasonably inclined to trust police? Measured in "no more than one per year" or "no more than two per day" or some such rate?

If it were at a rate even the same order of magnitude as regular-ass Joes that would be a huge improvement. Civil forfeiture laws would need to be reworked completely, including the police paying all of your court costs when you have to sue to get your property back as well as pay for any time you had to take off work. If they cannot show reasonable suspicion that seized property of money was somehow involved in or acquired via criminal activities, the officer should be summarily terminated and charged with theft appropriate to the value of goods stolen. Including grand larceny. Fuck, throw in treble damages and raid the guilty cop's retirement fund before going into public funds.

Okay, so your distrust has more to do with civil forfeiture than with violence? Or are you meandering around from one issue to another?

I mean, I'm not saying you're wrong to be upset about police violence OR civil forfeiture OR both. I'm just saying, we can't have a meaningful conversation if one of us has a free license to change the subject at will.

(2), too, needs rephrasing.

What is the number of "bad cops I think get away with it per year" that you would have to learn about, in order to convince you that police were untrustworthy? How many is too many? Can you give me a number?

So I guess they converge to the same question.

What is the number of "cops I think are bad, but know weren't punished" that it takes to convince you the police are dishonest?

Do you not grok the issue? The issue is that, as it stands, there are bad cops and they can get away with it far more often than if they were not a cop. It's a risk-assessment scenario...

When you assess risks, do numbers matter? I'm not joking. I mean, I don't even understand how you can say "this isn't about numbers, it's about risk assessment!" But that seems to be what you're saying.

Furthermore, you're advancing a lot of arguments about what the public as a whole should do, based on your opinion of what the risks are, but implying that we shouldn't be "even trying to start discussing how many bad cops can be out there without making every cop a risk" until certtain (somewhat vague) reforms are in place. I say 'vague' because it's not clear what YOU think would be "actually doing something."

The reason I keep poking this subject is because it really does matter how we think about issues like this.

The problem is... it's not that simple. Because "a risk" can mean anything from "a 99% chance of horrible disaster" to "a one in a billion chance of some unforeseen and trivial event." The argument "_____________ is a risk, therefore we should do _________ to avoid _________," unless you fill in the blanks. They have to be filled in with statements like [this thing that costs so and so many dollars] or [this thing that has such and such a probability of actually happening.]

Think about the vaccine debates. Anyone can say "there's a risk of vaccines causing side effects, so the government is wrong to force me to expose my children to a risk." Phrased that way, it sounds very neat and compelling. No one should be forced to risk their child, right? Rhetorically very straightforward.

But that argument starts sounding really shitty when you fill in the blanks, because then it becomes something more like "I should have the right to expose my child to a (greater) risk, to protect them from a (smaller) risk, while also exposing other children to risk." That is... NOT so rhetorically straightforward.

ANY argument about risk can be made to sound compelling, if you strip out the numbers. You can even go around proving an argument and its exact opposite, using the same rhetorical structures. Because any time there are two risks that have to be weighed against each other, you can just play up the risk you oppose, and ignore the magnitude of the risk you're willing to take!

So... do you really want to play the "this isn't about numbers, it's about risk assessment!" card?

If not, are you willing to have a numbers-based conversation about this?

Put it this way: Would you let some random jackass borrow your car? Would you let some random person have a copy of the key to your home and knowledge of where your home is? How low would the percent of people who would drive your car recklessly (or steal it) need to be for you to lend your car to a complete stranger? How low a percent of people that have zero respect for another person's property or are outright thieves would it need to be for you to entrust your keys to a stranger? Get my point here?

If your answer is "literally zero people would have to be thieves or reckless destroyers of property," then fine- but we can talk about that. We can talk about ANY answer to the question. In my opinion ALL possible answers have interesting implications. But what shouldn't be done is to avoid the question in order to avoid being expected to be logically self-consistent with one's own beliefs.

Which brings us back to the question. What is your answer to specific questions? For example:

What proportion of police have to be untrustworthy, for you to advocate for declaring the police to be guilty until proven innocent when put on trial for wrongful shootings?

[Terralthra]

Simon, there's a possibility you're overlooking. It is highly possible that Castile had his hand in his pocket already (getting his id) when Yanez said "don't reach for [the gun]". So, now Castile has his hand in his pocket, probably with his wallet in it. Castile can't pull his hand out, nor can he maintain his current position (having a hand in one's side pocket in jeans or slacks is very uncomfortable while seated in a car, in my experience). In such a situation, what do you recommend Castile do to not get shot?

[White Haven]

I doubt it with the current administration. Even under Obama, or any other president, you still have the issue of state independence. But, many law enforcement agencies do depend on federal government money for support so that might be an angle that could be played to adopt a consistent set of standards and usually the areas with the highest rates of police shootings, excessive use of force, etc are departments with significant budget issues because they have high operating costs. Maybe that way.

What about using the states as your regional training organizations? They each have their own police forces anyway, and it'd be a lot easier to oversee and hold accountable 50 training regimes than eighteen thousand.

[Simon_Jester]

Simon, there's a possibility you're overlooking. It is highly possible that Castile had his hand in his pocket already (getting his id) when Yanez said "don't reach for [the gun]". So, now Castile has his hand in his pocket, probably with his wallet in it. Castile can't pull his hand out, nor can he maintain his current position (having a hand in one's side pocket in jeans or slacks is very uncomfortable while seated in a car, in my experience). In such a situation, what do you recommend Castile do to not get shot?

You're right, I didn't think of that possibility, mostly because I was thinking about the scenario that established the reasonable doubt in the court case.

Well, in that situation, my own reaction would probably be to freeze and say something along the lines of "yes sir, what do I do?"

I can't say if this would be better, worse, or no different from Castile's reaction, for purposes of avoiding death. Obviously, in the scenario where Castile's hand was already in his pocket before Yanez realized Castile was armed, Castile's options for defusing the panicky idiot disguised as a police officer would have been a lot worse.

...

I will note that the last time I informed an enforcement officer of the presence of any kind weapon anywhere in my vehicle (a Swiss Army knife in my pocket during the aforesaid pull-over-for-speeding incident), I mentioned this before I started moving my hands around reaching for things. So the sequence of events might have played out a little differently in that case.

But then, I'm pretty sure I was asked the question "are there any weapons in the car" or some such, directly. Which Yavez did not do, being a horrible panicky idiot disguised as a police officer. So I can't really take credit for that part.

...

I will further note that the scenario where Castile already had his hand in his pocket is a very plausible one that reflects much much worse on Yanez than the "he was reaching for his pocket" scenario, which was already bad enough and then some. The problem is disentangling what we think happened from the least incriminating probable scenario (which is the standard juries are supposed to use when deciding if someone is guilty).

I doubt it with the current administration. Even under Obama, or any other president, you still have the issue of state independence. But, many law enforcement agencies do depend on federal government money for support so that might be an angle that could be played to adopt a consistent set of standards and usually the areas with the highest rates of police shootings, excessive use of force, etc are departments with significant budget issues because they have high operating costs. Maybe that way.

What about using the states as your regional training organizations? They each have their own police forces anyway, and it'd be a lot easier to oversee and hold accountable 50 training regimes than eighteen thousand.

That might help, but some of the states would be a LOT more willing to pay for this kind of thing than others.

Plus, states tend to have much tighter and less consistent budgeting than the federal government, because they're not allowed to run deficits as a rule. That greatly increases the risk that they'll have to randomly cut a program that provides no direct short-term benefit to the state government and/or to vocal citizens. And once a program like "combat stress training for cops" gets cut, re-instating it in years when money is easier to come by is difficult.

[Alyrium Denryle]

I agree. The instructions in the manner they were given created confusion and in this case it was confusion. The problem is the jury having been shown the dash cam video, combine with a skilled defense team could easily convince them that it was not criminal negligence but an unfortunate accident or that Castile was ignoring Yanez's instructions. That's my point. Not that Yanez was justified. My point is that a good defense team can convince a jury of surprising things.

Oh yeah. Jurors are selected on the basis of being easy to sway much of the time, and... the Minnesota manslaughter statute is terrible; they don't have a criminally negligent homicide statute either as far as I can tell, and their manslaughter statute does not cover the range of mens rea typically covered by criminally negligent homicide.

Whenever it is this equation everyone thinks it is the root cause. It seems the equation for this conclusion is as simple as controversial incident involving a black man and anyone else but usually a cop. Frankly, I don't think that's good enough.

When I watch the dash cam video I see a poorly trained officer and inexperienced officer. When I read about his reasoning for the stop I see those same things. These qualities are reflected in people that are washed out -at least where I work. They do these same things in simulations against actors of the same skin color or different. I remember one recruit that straight up executed an actor that had surrendered, was on his knees and had his hands in the air. You should have seen our faces. I still can't believe he did that. When asked to explain himself he said "I thought he was still dangerous". He did not graduate.

Yanez, was looking for the suspect of a robbery (confirmed by radio chatter) that took place a few days ago and it was a robbery he had investigated and they had a BOLO (Be On Look Out) for the suspect with a video surveillance picture. Now, I'm sure we've had experiences where someone says "Hey you look like X" or "that guy looks like this guy" but to you he doesn't look that person at all.

The problem is Yanez doesn't understand what totality is. His reasoning MAY have been enough if the guy had not been in a car and it was after the robbery had just occurred and he was in the area but this was days after. He needed more than a similar looking face. He needed as a minimum similar face, wearing the exact same clothing, driving in a car of the same description, and in the general area of the robbery.

So, I can't rule out that racism didn't play a role but I don't see how anyone can conclude that it was a root cause unless I am missing something.

There are a couple things here. Cross-racial identifications are difficult because we don't actually remember people's faces, there is too much information in a face for our brains to encode them all individually. Our brains reconstruct a jigsaw of faces we have seen before, because what it stores and remembers are things like the nose shape, eyes, lips etc. It is a pretty nifty form of data compression actually. When a face needs to be identified, the brain matches the pieces it sees with the pieces in memory. The more exposure to facial features one has, the better they are at recognizing faces because it has more pieces to work from, and most people primarily interact with their own racial group.

So there is that.

On top of that is the confirmation bias. He was looking for a suspect and everything he perceived was in furtherance of confirming his own opinion on the subject. This is more likely with minority suspects, particularly when racial stereotypes get involved.

If it is not the root cause, it is a contributing factor in the *entire* causal chain.

I did not know there was a majority on where people keep their wallet. I keep mine in my left back pocket and before that I kept it in my front left pocket.

Huh. Just about everyone I know keeps theirs in their front right pocket. Why the back? That seems like a recipe for discomfort, losing your wallet from sitting down and having it pushed out, and pick-pocketing.

[White Haven]

Huh. Just about everyone I know keeps theirs in their front right pocket. Why the back? That seems like a recipe for discomfort, losing your wallet from sitting down and having it pushed out, and pick-pocketing.

Huh. Maybe a regional cultural thing? Around here, back-right is by far the most common.