Miami officers sentenced to prison in planted-gun shootings

Associated Press ^ | 10-29-03

[Brian S]

Four Miami police officers were given federal prison sentences ranging from about a year to three years Wednesday for planting guns after questionable police shootings or lying to cover them up.

Prosecutors asked for sentences as long as 11 years in the city's biggest police corruption scandal in nearly two decades, which was blamed on anti-crime units under pressure to halt a rash of deadly tourist robberies in the mid-1990s.

[Atlas Sneezed]

Bang

[Guillermo]

Pigs.

I understand prisoners do not take kindly to pigs who are sent to prison.

Hopefully that idiot cop from Ohio who pointed his gun at a 9 yr old will be in a similar situation soon.

[dasboot]

GOOD!

[Lurker]

3 years for multiple charges of falsifying evidence.

Ridiculous. Any other citizen would be looking at 20 years.

Cops who do this kind of s*** should be strung up.

L

[yarddog]

I remember a case nearly 30 years ago when a Montgomery Alabama cop shot a Black perp. It was later determined that the gun found beside the dead guy had originated in the police evidence locker.

I had some minor dealings with a couple of Montgomery undercover cops and discussed the case with them. It turned out that the shooting was completely justified. The criminal had a knife and attacked the cop. The cop knowing that shooting a Black man at that time was just about guaranteed to cause problems had planted the throw down gun.

I don't know what the final outcome was.

[lepton]

Well, they were close to the right answer...missed by THAT much.

[WackyKat]

I had some minor dealings with a couple of Montgomery undercover cops and discussed the case with them. It turned out that the shooting was completely justified. The criminal had a knife and attacked the cop. The cop knowing that shooting a Black man at that time was just about guaranteed to cause problems had planted the throw down gun.

You present that story as if you believed the two cops. You don't think maybe they were covering up the coverup?

[Slings and Arrows]

Hopefully that idiot cop from Ohio who pointed his gun at a 9 yr old will be in a similar situation soon.

Got a link to this story, please?

[Pilsner]

A number of local officers worked as extra security, or transport officers, in a major "Mexican Mafia" trial involving a number of defendants. After the trial a number of them purchased commerative knives with "Mexican Mafia Trial" or some such engraved on the blade. One officer proudly showed me hers, but commented "Of course the inscription limits its utility as a 'throw down' knife."

[yarddog]

As a matter of fact I am reasonably sure they told me the straight story.

[coloradan]

Tell me, do you think citizens would face 1-3 year sentences for doing what these officers did, except the officers did so under color of authority?

[Guillermo]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1010268/posts

[Slings and Arrows]

Much obliged.

[Stew Padasso]

Somehow I doubt Joe Citizen would be treated the same. You know, this is the sort of crap that leaves one with no confidence in our courts or LE.

On the other hand, if you follow this stuff it is only par for the course for arrogant LE operating within a corrupt system. Enjoy it while you can government Goons!

[old patriot]

I am really beginning to think that you are anally fixated on this police thing. You appear to be completely out of touch with any reality when all that seams to attract your attention is the FEW cases statistically, of a cop gone bad. There are a lot more things in life to be concerned about than one ill, and your entire focus is to point again and again to the same problem.

What do you have to say about the police that are killed in the line of duty and their family's are left without support? Are there no good police, or do you just have a hard-on for these protectors of the public safety?

Old Patriot

[coloradan]

My point isn't that these are cops gone bad. My point is that the cops are treated differently than citizens under similar circumstances. Yes, there are good cops and there are bad citizens. But I would like to leave caste systems to India.

[old patriot]

Caste systems are not here in America except in certain States that have outlawed capital punishment. Cases in point are the Menendez brothers in CA, and the Subway killer in NY. Because these states believe that society fails individuals and, as such, cause these scum to go bad, they should not be punished as they should be.

Another point should be made about how cops that do end up in prison are not treated the same as the regular citiczen by the prisoners. Far be it to say that they have easy time to serve. And if they do end up there, they deserve what they get.

And, you have still not shown an overwhelming case for a special caste system here in America toward the police. If anything, the statisical evidence shows just the opposite. So, where is the reason for your argument or simple statements that there is a caste system here in America? One or two cases over the hundres of thousands of police is statisically not registerable. So your point being what?

Old Patriot

[old patriot]

The shootings carried racial overtones because all 11 officers tried in the predominantly Hispanic city were Hispanic and four of the five targets of police gunfire were black.

Here is the real story. Rather than it being a case of cops being treated differently because they were cops, they were given lighter sentences by a jury of their same race for charges of crimes against another.

When ANY minority commits a crime, it can never be attributed as a hate crime or racism, as that is always reserved to White Heterosexual Male European Homophobic Christians. Only whites are considered guilty first of racism. What about the caste system that the Dems, Libs, and Moderates have created for all those individuals that they claim they are trying to help by quotas and afermative action programs? Cannot these individuals succeed on their own merit in the ring of personal performance? This is the real story that is never discussed.

Old Patriot

[coloradan]

I could give you many more examples in which the racial angle is absent. They aren't rare, such threads occur once or twice a day, but you already are getting tired of the two or three threads I have bumped you to as it is.