St. Paul police defend skyway arrest; charges dismissed

Pioneer Press ^ | 8-28-14 | Mara H. Gottfried

[kiryandil]

saying a video doesn't tell the whole story

Who you gonna believe - The Pleece, or your lyin' eyes?

[kiryandil]

but it wasn’t private property. it was in a public skyway. apparently a rest area where people can sit down, as on a park bench.

I think you're confused, camle.

DesertRhino built his "unmarked back porch" to the exact specs of a Minneapolis-St Paul public skyway. Hordes of people end up on his back porch all the time.

See?

[kiryandil]

Check out how the backward Romans treated THEIR citizens:

As the [Roman] soldiers are stretching their prisoner out with thongs about his wrists to secure him for the scourging, he [St Paul] asks a question that transforms him from victim to master of the situation. "Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn't even been found guilty? Though from the Augustan age the Lex Julia contained an absolute prohibition on binding or beating a Roman citizen, Paul's qualified statement accords with later practice (Sherwin-White 1963:72-73; compare Acts 16:37). The centurion is dismayed and immediately reports Paul's Roman citizenship to the tribune. The tribune verifies it by a simple question to Paul, which the apostle answers in the affirmative. To wrongly claim Roman citizenship was a serious, even capital offense...

Guess we must be peasants, then, since we can be bound or beaten on a whim by the Owners' lawdogs, for "resisting".

At a minimum, us peasants will be made to eat dirt, with our hands cinched tight behind us.

[TurboZamboni]

When must you show ID to police?
http://www.kare11.com/story/news/local/2014/08/29/when-must-you-show-id-to-police/14825985/

MN has no “stop and identify” specific law

[GGpaX4DumpedTea]

“Maybe he means he pays a lot in property taxes.”

Me too! Also, I notice I did not get a reply to my ‘Why’ question to ‘camle’.

[TurboZamboni]

St.Paul Mayor Orders Review of Downstown Skyway Arrest

http://www.twincities.com/crime/ci_26433870/st-paul-skyway-arrest-should-be-probed-by

[exhaustguy]

It might be because the bank actually invited people to take 5 minutes to rest in their comfortable chairs.

http://www.startribune.com/local/stpaul/273348971.html

[camle]

ok gg. here’s your response:

i tend to support the police because they do a lot of good work runnign in criminals...theirs is a thankless job, and although there are some bad cops, we need to think of all the times they do te right thing for you and me.

i’ve had a lot of dealings with the police, and they have all been positive, and i’ve been caught red-footed way over the speed limit, and not been given a ticket. most have good judgement in difficult positions.

when someone hurts you or your family who do you call to deal with it?

when you come home to find that your house has been robbed, who do you call? when that drunk slams into the sid of your car, who arrests him?

imagine a world without the police?

i was pulled over in wisconsin by a local cop because i was driving a cop magnet. apparently he was havign a bad day. after a bit of a discussion, he helped me find my way (I was more than a bit lost) and we ended up shaking hands.

if i have a question about firearms carrying, i ask the cops, and i have never gotten a rude, nasty or wrong answer.

would you want his job? alternating from extreme boredom to life threratening?

you are, of course free to have your own opinion about the police, but i tend to respect the rank and file.

[GGpaX4DumpedTea]

Thank you for replying. I know most LEO’s are good cops. I may even know that better than you do.

My son is a deputy sheriff, and has been president of his FOP, he is involved with state and national FOP. That being said, my son is every bit as ‘conservative’ as I am. And he doesn’t pull punches when dealing with ‘grievances’. He is not afraid to slap a fellow LEO when it is necessary,

I have had many encounters with LEO’s for many reasons. Most have been more than reasonable. When they aren’t, as in the case of this skyway arrest, I see them as unreasonable. I will not support the bad cops. I will support the good cops.

In Ohio the sheriff is the highest police authority in the state. The Ohio Highway Patrol gas authority on state highways and state lands (parks and such). My son, as a deputy sheriff, has authority anywhere in the state.

He has had encounters with the highway patrol, and ‘won’. They are sometimes ‘bad’ LEO’s. Some city LEO’s are also ‘bad’ LEO’s.

The majority of the LEO’s out there are good cops. But not all.

I refrain from coming down on the side of the LEO’s when I see stuff like the St Paul case.

[camle]

gg:

i tend to agree, in this case, from what we’ve been told, it sure doesn’t seem to reflect well on the local LEOs. but it also seems that the local rent-a-cop started it by coming up to the guy, sitting on an unmarked bench telling him that that he isn’t allowed to sit on that particular bench. sure sounds like rousting to me. i wouldn’t have gotten up either.

i was once threatened with arrest for parking alongside the curb at 0300. i was told that that area just happened to be a no parking zone. no signs, no yellow curb, etc..i told them to go ahead and tow my car, and we’ll see how the lawyers handle it in the morning.

by sundown the next day, there were signage, and yellow paint on the curb that remain to this day.

you can’t enforce a restriction without reasonable notice

[skinkinthegrass]

the Viagra Badge, strikes again.

[TurboZamboni]

St. Paul man arrested in skyway was in public area, city prosecutor says

http://www.twincities.com/crime/ci_26462438/st-paul-man-arrested-skyway-was-public-area

[camle]

doesn’t look good for the cops.

[Jim Noble]

Quote from Fred Reed: "Speaking as one who has spent many, many nights patrolling with cops in black regions, I know well why the blacks feel this way: “Hey, you! Yeah, you, with the beer in your hand. Pour it out. You can’t drink in public. I said pour…it…out.”

[TurboZamboni]

Pioneer Press photog told to stop shooting in “private” St. Paul skyway

Footage of Chrie Lollie’s controversial arrest in the St. Paul skyway raised questions about the public/private status of that area.

Though both the First National Bank Building’s Facebook page and St. Paul city ordinance suggest the seating area where Lollie was arrested is open to the public, the experience of Pioneer Press photographer Ben Garvin supports a different conclusion.

http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/2014/09/pioneer_press_photog_told_to_stop_shooting_in_private_st_paul_skyway.php

no freedom of the press allowed in the skyway either.

[camle]

just saw the article....thanx

[Diamond]

If the police don’t have probable cause that a crime has been committed, what gives them the authority to demand ID from anyone?

I am a private process server. On one occasion I was attempting to serve a subpoena to a women at her residence in a fairly nice subdivision. There were vehicles in the driveway but no one answered the door. I suspected that someone might be home, but just in case no one was home I decided to wait in my car on the street in front of her house so that if/when she or someone did come home I could attempt to serve it to her or, if someone else, to inquire as to her whereabouts. I waited in front of the house for about an hour and 15 minutes.

As it got dark a police car slowly arrived with lights flashing and parked behind me for about five minutes with the lights still flashing. I turned on my interior lights, got out my process server ID and when the cop came up to my driver side window I put my hands on the steering wheel so that he could see them, all as a courtesy to him.

He asked me for my ID, and though I believe that I had no obligation to show him my ID, I did so anyway because I had a purpose in mind. He asked me what I was doing there and I told him. To make a long story longer he told me to wait there and he went to the front door and knocked. She opened the door to him and after a minute or two motioned me to come, and I served the subpoena to her at the front door. Her calling the cops on me actually helped me get her served.

I wholeheartedly agree with you that if the police don’t have probable cause that a crime has been committed they don't have any authority to ask for ID. If indeed these skyways are public property as some comments here have it, and not private property as some comments have it, the guy might want to consider suing the police department and the individual cops for false arrest and imprisonment, and assault and battery, since all the charges against him were dismissed.

As for resisting arrest, in my experience I found that the best way to do so is to use passive resistance. Just sit down on the ground. Mileage may vary with individual cops, but for some reason they don't generally seem to view someone sitting down on the ground as a threat.

Cordially,

[PeterPrinciple]

“The problem is I’m black, that’s the problem. No, it really is, because I didn’t do anything wrong.

---

I have been pulled over in traffic for no reason. But my response is different. I never think the cause is because the color of my skin. I just learned to avoid that town and situation.

I have been a business parking lot to watch fireworks and been told to move. My response is fine, your choice but you just lost a future customer and I told them so.

I just can imagine being told through out your youth that you are a victim...................

[DoodleDawg]

Still don't know if what he was doing was illegal.

If it was not illegal then why the need to tell him to move along? And what if the other two 'disorderly conduct' citations were for similar reasons? If I am sitting in a public area doing absolutely nothing wrong then I don't expect to be harassed by police and rent-a-cops. Or are we now living in a society where what is legal depends on the mood of the cop at the time?

[DoodleDawg]

I just can imagine being told through out your youth that you are a victim...................

In this case he was. He was doing nothing wrong and was hassled for it. So yeah, maybe he was a bit of a jerk about it and yeah, he dropped the race card. But neither one is illegal, and the second one was probably valid in this case.