I give this a 10 on the honking hoot scale.
Posted on 08/10/2013 7:15:45 PM PDT by marktwain
With a .45 caliber legally strapped to his side, Jordan McManus decided to photograph the federal courthouse in Phoenix last night, realizing he would probably draw attention from police, especially after reading about Raymond Michael’s experience last May.
But he was still a little surprised when a police helicopter hovered over him with a spotlight as two patrol cars pulled up next to him and another two cops approached him on foot.
They immediately tried to disarm him, but he refused to let them do it as it is legal to open carry in Arizona.
Then they tried to pat him down, which didn’t make sense considering he was already showing a firearm. But he wouldn’t let them do that either.
“You’re carrying a firearm and taking a picture of a federal building,” the cop exclaimed, trying to justify the pat down.
Then they demanded to know who he was, but didn’t get anywhere with that either.
Here is a portion of the exchange:
“Am I being detained right now?” McManus asks.
“Absolutely you are, yes,” the cop responds.
“You have reasonable suspicion that I committed a crime, right?
“Well, I’m concerned …”
“You’re concerned. Are you detaining me?”
“I am,” he says weakly.
“Under the suspicion that I committed what crime?”
“I don’t know yet. You’re not giving us any information.”
And there you have the reason why police are always demanding to see people’s identification even though the people are not breaking the law. It gives them a hope that if they run your name through their system, they will find a bench warrant and have an excuse to arrest you.
(Excerpt) Read more at photographyisnotacrime.com ...
“I suspect that you are not, and never have been, a peace officer.”
I still have respect for most of them, unlike you. And a good friend of mine is a cop, a good one, now retired. The vast majority of them are not the enemy, unlike some would like to make them out. There are a lot of cop haters on certain threads. Wonder why.
“It will be talked about by the police involved for years, as an amusing anecdote.”
Yeah, right. You’re delusional.
Talk to your police friend. I mean it. I think he will back me up. This is exactly the kind of thing police talk about, because it is unusual and breaks up the monotony.
“Good, then get out of this country and move to a better police state.
You should have T-shirts made, and head to D.C....
You’ll make big bucks.”
I’d make good bucks in any state. It was a really good line, if I do say so myself. You sound just like a liberal. Don’t want to live in this country because you don’t like something about it? Then move to another country where you’ll do better. Bye, bye.
I give this a 10 on the honking hoot scale.
“This is exactly the kind of thing police talk about, because it is unusual and breaks up the monotony.”
I worked at a law firm years ago when young, and moonlighted at my best friend’s bar on the weekends. She had a new alarm system hooked up that if you pushed a buzzer under the bar, the alarm rang over in the police dept. Someone told me it was there, but as I was part-time I didn’t know much about it. One afternoon, a bunch of biker types came into the bar, proceeded to drink, and when I could see they were starting to get loaded, I cut them off, very nicely. Well, the didn’t take it nicely, got belligerent and one kept making like he was going to jump over the bar at me. So I pushed the buzzer alarm.
The police came over, guns drawn, put one up to the head of one of the biker’s and the cops’ adrenaline was coming out of their pores. I told them what had been happening and they kicked the bikers out of the bar. Meanwhile, they were all real po’d with me. The alarm buzzer was for robberies in progress or the like I learned later, and I was supposed to use the regular phone line for less serious problems. These guys were all hyped up expecting the worst, and I blew it, because I didn’t know better. These cops were real upset with me because they thought something really bad was going down and it made them go into fight mode unnecessarily. After I explained my ignorance about the alarm, they calmed down and forgave me (I knew one of them). So don’t tell me how going out on a call is just a lark for Cops to alleviate boredom. They don’t want to put their lives in potential jeopardy unnecessarily any more than we do and they never know the exact circumstances of any given call.
“You sound just like a liberal.
I give this a 10 on the honking hoot scale.”
Oh, you mean you ARE a liberal? Then go over on DU, or on Huffington Post, or the like.
Yeah, right. I have been a peace officer, and a lot of them do get perturbed at false alarm calls.
A whole lot of them talk about the unusual calls for years afterward. This was not a dangerous call. No officer drew their gun. They were polite. The citizen was polite.
Let us see if any other former officers agree with me or not.
Could you give us a helpful list of things we shouldn’t photograph? I grew up in America, not the USSR, so I’m still a little rusty on the concept of being on a public sidewalk, and committing crime by simply swinging my camera in the wrong direction. Thanks!
If he were making a “phony point”, nothing would have happened, no police would have shown up and we wouldn’t be talking about it.
Good lord, I’d heard people who think like flaglady exist.
As an aside, is it extreme of me to say we ought to have live camera’s on all courthouses, police stations, jails etc.? I mean they are up in our grill storing phone records, google searches etc. (in case it’s ever needed). Maybe we ought to have the chance to watch the watchers.
Obviously joking...sort of.
Didn’t Bush say about the terrorists “they hate us for our freedoms”. I can’t help but wonder, do you think they like us now?
Some departments are already experimenting with police wearing cameras.
A retired police officer that I know predicts that all police will be required to wear cameras and have them on while on duty, within a decade.
I think he is right.
“THE Rialto study began in February 2012 and will run until this July. The results from the first 12 months are striking. Even with only half of the 54 uniformed patrol officers wearing cameras at any given time, the department over all had an 88 percent decline in the number of complaints filed against officers, compared with the 12 months before the study, to 3 from 24.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/07/business/wearable-video-cameras-for-police-officers.html?_r=2&;
“If he were making a “phony point”, nothing would have happened, no police would have shown up and we wouldn’t be talking about it.”
And you know that someone didn’t call in suspicious behavior to the cops how? And he was making a phony point, as he was trying to lure the cops there. Well, I’m tired of playing in the little boys’ sandbox, so on to better threads. I leave all you cop haters to your own devices, your big big guns, I won’t say where I think you think they are located. Enjoy yourselves.
30 years ago you failed to pay a parking ticket. With fine & fee, that'll be 30 years and $20K.
“30 years ago you failed to pay a parking ticket. With fine & fee, that’ll be 30 years and $20K.”
With today’s computer systems... That is not a laughing matter.
Ever occur to you that maybe he’s interested in architecture? Or maybe he’s just a camera bug. Or maybe it’s proportions and ratios: phi, orthogons and all that. Or maybe he likes to piss assh*les off.
You seem to think that everybody who takes a photo is up to no good. You can get the same pic on google, or maybe even the website of the county or court. Hell on zillow or bing you can get an aerial photo.
Point is: you don’t know jack. You are a victim of the culture of fear.
+100
Point is: you don’t know jack. You are a victim of the culture of fear."
I think we should cut flaglady a little slack. She had a bad experience with a false alarm call to police when she was young.
“...enough gunpowder for it to fire itself.”
Hahaha. I see a cartoon. One arm pops out and holds a pin to the primer, another arms pops out and hits it with a hammer.
My name is Phuk Yu, I’m from Korea.
Maybe the cops will upgrade
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