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To Prevent Another George Floyd Tragedy, We Must Fix Police Unions
The Federalist ^ | June 3, 2020 | Daniel Buck

Posted on 06/03/2020 7:51:01 AM PDT by Kaslin

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To: Lurker

Look up what homicide means. They didn’t say he was murdered.

The coroner can give his opinion. The defense will hire medical experts who can question everything.

The coroner hired by Saint Floyds family claims to be quite the medical examiner expert every time he has been on tv for years. He was a medical examiner in New York city for one year back in the 1970’s. He was fired for being incompetent.

The jury will decide.


61 posted on 06/03/2020 10:42:04 AM PDT by shelterguy
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To: Kaslin
"No one wants to watch an innocent man suffocate under the knee of a cop while bystanders plead for his life. "

So much wrong with this statement. Firstly, he wasn't "innocent." He was trying to pass a forged bill. He was high on drugs. He was convicted of armed robbery in Texas.

How less "innocent" can you be?

Secondly, he didn't "suffocate" because the cop's knee was on his neck. It appears he had trouble breathing and had a heart attack because he was dosed up on Fentanyl which will cause breathing problems and heart attacks.

Yeah, the Cop was being an @$$hole cop, but it's looking like he didn't actually kill Floyd. The cop may have triggered the heart attack by arresting him, and the knee didn't help anything, but what the cop mostly did wrong is not realize Floyd wasn't faking as so many arrested people do.

62 posted on 06/03/2020 10:42:44 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: shelterguy

“ The coroner hired by Saint Floyds family claims to be quite the medical examiner”

The Hennepin County Medical Examiner called t homicide, too.

“The jury will decide.”

Yep. And the only open question is what degree of homicide this cop is going to prison for.

L


63 posted on 06/03/2020 10:46:44 AM PDT by Lurker (Peaceful coexistence with the Left is not possible. Stop pretending that it is.)
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To: grey_whiskers

“”””””””You are using strawmen to represent the prosecution, which demonstrates your bad faith. “”””””””””””

The prosecution said he was guilty of murder immediately.
The mayor fired them all immediately.
They didn’t bother waiting for any investigation at all.

Like you, they have never heard of due process.

They got you fooled immediately. You have been on the “guilty until proven even more guilty” from the first minute.

Are you unable to wait for all information and facts to be available before declaring the cop guilty?


64 posted on 06/03/2020 10:52:03 AM PDT by shelterguy
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To: Vermont Lt
Declaring that everyone should be “nice” to each other might feel OK, but it doesn’t address root causes.

What do you see as the root causes?

This is what I think is the primary cause, but I would be interested in hearing what you think it is.

65 posted on 06/03/2020 10:53:03 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: Vermont Lt
Declaring that everyone should be “nice” to each other might feel OK, but it doesn’t address root causes.

Everything I ever learned in Life, I learned from "Road House"....

"Be nice, until it's time not to be nice."

66 posted on 06/03/2020 10:54:55 AM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: grey_whiskers
That in and of itself, does not make "The Cause of Death"™ the policeman all by himself -- by default, as it were. But the reason, that isn't enough to clear the policeman either, is two fold.

It occurs to me the simplest way to clear the policeman of causing his death is to get a volunteer to submit to 9 minutes of a knee on his neck. Or even better, multiple volunteers.

Once it is demonstrated that keeping a knee on someone's neck won't kill them, then the cause of death must move on to something more substantial, like having a heart condition while taking Meth and Fentanyl.

If the knee didn't kill him, it must have been something else.

67 posted on 06/03/2020 10:58:53 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: DiogenesLamp

I think the root causes (for this stuff) is the screening for the police departments.

When you are a policeman you are going to face a lot of bad people on the worst day of their lives. They will run from you, fight you, lie to you, and try to do anything to get away. (Yes, they might even try to kill you.)

The majority of these people are going to be minorities. That is not racist; it does reflect the reality.

The key is to screen your people so that they do not carry their distrust of a black or hispanic person from one event to the next. It doesn’t mean give up situational awareness. It does mean that you need to treat EVERY interaction on its own base. THAT is a difficult thing to do.

When complaints are made about cops the need to be reviewed seriously. Yes, there are a ton of complaints that are not valid. They need to be addressed and published.

When there ARE serious complaints and the LEO is found to be acting outside their training, they need to be addressed.

The fact that the guys in Minn. had so many complaints did not shock me, it was the content of the complaints. Cops being involved in multiple shootings and live threatening events is rare—even in a big urban setting.

This particular problem lies with the municipalities and police unions. There ARE cities where they work together to get rid of the bad guys.

Finally, cops need to know when to turn off the “cop” attitude. I know of Emergency Room MDs who have been stopped, detained, and put up against the wall because they were driving in a white neighborhood at night. That shit has got to stop.

Again, this is a training issue.

I know I am not racist. I don’t think I know anyone who is. I know that in my career (not in law enforcement) where I my actions could have been interpreted as racist. When they were pointed out, I did not have a clue—and took steps to change the behavior. I was honestly surprised.

But the people accusing me of it thought it was a conscious act.

Changing perceptions on either side is difficult.

Those are the areas where we could start right away. We could then move into the equal justice part of the equation—dealing with prosecutions, bail, and other “process” issues. And not to make things “easier” on criminals—but to treat white criminals the exact same as the black ones. Because in the processing, arraignment, and trial portion of the judicial system there are some scary issues that have more to do with the lawyers and judges than it does the criminals.


68 posted on 06/03/2020 11:15:37 AM PDT by Vermont Lt
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To: Lurker

“””””””Yep. And the only open question is what degree of homicide this cop is going to prison for.”””””””””

It is good that you can keep an open mind and not prejudge the outcome. HaHaHa.

It only takes one honky on the jury to set him free.


69 posted on 06/03/2020 11:25:54 AM PDT by shelterguy
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To: DiogenesLamp
Better yet, have either the accused policeman or his attorney get a knee on his neck for 9 minutes straight.

if it's so harmless, they have nothing to fear, right?

70 posted on 06/03/2020 11:26:08 AM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change with out notice.)
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To: Kaslin

...and qualified immunity.


71 posted on 06/03/2020 11:27:13 AM PDT by Arones (When Leftists are in a minority, then they look for other ways to win.)
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To: Vermont Lt
You see the root cause as a problem with the police system. I see the existence of such an extensive police system as a reflection of the underlying problem.

The underlying problem is that people aren't being taught right from wrong. Too many grow up in fatherless households, or in households with worthless fathers whom themselves were not taught properly as children.

And the government has exacerbated the problem by funding all these dysfunctional households which continue to produce dysfunctional offspring.

I don't think police training is the primary problem. I think too many criminals is the problem.

Also I think the lopsided representation of blacks in crime, especially young black males, is a great portion of why the police tend to focus on them.

72 posted on 06/03/2020 11:28:33 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: shelterguy
LOL!

What part of "public trust" and "optics" did you miss?

The nine-minute video on the spot is damning as far as PR goes.

That justifies the firing.

And with the video the cries of "wait for more information" -- like both the state's coroner and the family's coroner agreeing that this is homicide, as another poster pointed out -- seem increasingly out of touch with reality.

73 posted on 06/03/2020 11:29:01 AM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change with out notice.)
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To: euram
...but why doesn’t ANYONE ever suggest that blacks themselves change their behavior...

https://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3851448/posts

But, it it is impossible to avoid contact with cops.

74 posted on 06/03/2020 11:30:51 AM PDT by Arones (When Leftists are in a minority, then they look for other ways to win.)
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To: grey_whiskers
Better yet, have either the accused policeman or his attorney get a knee on his neck for 9 minutes straight.

That is actually a good idea. I'm pretty sure that if he thought it would clear himself, he would do it in a heartbeat.

if it's so harmless, they have nothing to fear, right?

Do you think a knee on your neck will kill you in 9 minutes? I'm inclined to doubt it, but I would like to hear from people who think it will so they can explain to me how it kills someone.

75 posted on 06/03/2020 11:32:22 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: DiogenesLamp

The problem is, a single run of the experiment is inconclusive because there are so many variables, including the weight of the knee presser, the body position of the prone guy, the exact placement of the neck, the level of stress at the time (a heart pounding under the tension of an arrest might be more vulnerable than in a courtroom), any personal health conditions not known at the time and undiscoverable through autopsy (doctors on other sites have suggested a number of them, but I didn’t save that link), so on.


76 posted on 06/03/2020 11:35:02 AM PDT by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change with out notice.)
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To: grey_whiskers
The nine-minute video on the spot is damning as far as PR goes. That justifies the firing.

I agree with that. That was too much force for too long. I think the cop was being an @$$hole who wanted to prove to everyone *HE* was in charge. He should be fired.

But i'm not sure he caused Floyd's death by putting his knee on his neck. I think he contributed to Floyd's death by triggering the heart attack, and then not realizing Floyd wasn't faking.

If a fair jury finds him guilty, I would regard it as an reasonable outcome, because a man did die in his custody, but I think more from neglect than intent.

77 posted on 06/03/2020 11:36:23 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: grey_whiskers

If there is a police officer shooting the automatic response it to put the officers on administrative leave until a full investigation has been completed.

Here all cops were fired immediately. All of them.

Have you ever seen that before? When the somali cop shot the white woman he was still on the payroll for many months afterwards. Can there be a more clear case of murder than leaning over your partner to shoot a civilian who is unarmed and reporting a crime?

Did you go nuts on that one? Of course not. The media told you to wait for due process to happen and don’t prejudge.

You have been parroting the media talking points since the minute this took place. I sure hope you never end upon a jury.


78 posted on 06/03/2020 11:36:58 AM PDT by shelterguy
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To: z3n
I’ll see your teachers unions, and call with the police unions. Show or fold

Indeed.

79 posted on 06/03/2020 11:37:09 AM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: grey_whiskers
The problem is, a single run of the experiment is inconclusive because there are so many variables, including the weight of the knee presser, the body position of the prone guy, the exact placement of the neck, the level of stress at the time (a heart pounding under the tension of an arrest might be more vulnerable than in a courtroom), any personal health conditions not known at the time and undiscoverable through autopsy (doctors on other sites have suggested a number of them, but I didn’t save that link), so on.

You are making my point for me. The question is whether a reasonable man would expect such a tactic to result in a death, and it's looking like the answer is going to be, barring extenuating circumstances of which a man could not be expected to know, "no."

A reasonable man would not have thought that such actions would result in a death for a normal ordinary man. No mens rea, no murder.

80 posted on 06/03/2020 11:40:17 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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