Posted on 12/01/2003 8:42:08 AM PST by TomServo
Then I guess you lose the bet. Brother is an Army MP, family friend is a cop.
I've had few run-ins with the cops. Any I've had (as a result of speeding or some other stupid thing on my part) have been handled by the police in a polite manner.
I'm not saying there aren't nasty cops out there, but most aren't. Of course, I never attacked an officer either. In that instance, I'm sure my experience would have been different. And rightfully so.
Perhaps a bit over the top, yet I'm sure that every day in different jurisdictions some officer(s) encounter high powered weapons, pipe bombs and technology used for nefarious purposes.
Every once in awhile it's every officers 'turn' to encounter such things. That's been my exprience anyway.
When I come to power every police officer will be required to take judo and sombo. And the lateral vascular neck restraint will be made policy.
Thank you for the well wishes, a very Merry Christmas to you and yours.
The fact remains that you immediately jumped to the "musta been JBTs" conclusion for a case that clearly did not merit the charge. And now you're trying to defend your claim.
Um, no I am not trying to "defend my claim" or whatever. I WAS trying to discuss what I see as a disturbing trend nationally with you, but you are quite tunnel visioned on "JBT's" You are extremely defensive about something, but I really don't care what that may be. I'm also done talking to you.
I'm sure pepper spray is on the top of that list. There are places that make you sign a release before eating hot pepper salsa let alone having it sprayed in your face and airway. I'm sure this was a bad day for the cops involved and that they feel awful. Cops are given the tools they need to do their job and they use them strictly in accordance with their training and department policies.
We should never(almost never) blame the cops. How many people even know what the policy on use of deadly force is within their own community? My guess is not many. Unfortunately those same people have lot's of opinions to share.
If you don't like SWAT teams in your county budget, go to town meetings and be vocal about it! Be accurate too! Use statistics to back up what you say. Get to know your town cops. Get to know your police chief. If you are not a lawyer or a politician, they usually like to talk to you.
Unfortunately you can do everything by policy and procedure and still get sued.
All those baton strikes sure look scary doesn't it? In the old days a cop would crack you once across the skull and that was usually enough. Or he'd take out his black jack and open up your head. That usually ended it too. But now cops are not allowed to hit folks in the head, they have to keep doing those body blows and jabs. Usually it has no effect on people who are doped up or mentals. Looks brutal though. I've been inadvertently hit myself by officers swinging sticks. Other than leaving a bruise I hardly knew I got hit.
Every body seems to long for the 'old time' cops. Night sticks were the weapons of old timers. We just don't use them like they did.
Time for new sticks. Cattle prods. Shock 'em and drop 'em. No fuss, no muss. Looks pretty too.
You're probably correct.
From tracer the other thread:
Spraying a grossly obese subject with pepper spray and then cuffing him is a prescription for disaster via positional asphyzia.While the man by his behavior may have appeared "unresponsive" to the spray as a consequence of possibly being a veritable polypharmacy, the OC, an inflammatory agent, likely caused his respiratory system to produce its own Niagra Falls of mucus, saliva, and perhaps lymph.
My guess is that he died of pulmonary edema- and drowning-related respiratory and circulatory failure -- secondary to positional asphyxia caused by an already "winded" subject being handcuffed and allowed to remain in the recumbant position, all aggravated by cardiovascular effects of acute and chronic ingestion of cocaine.
We had several similar deaths in Colorado Springs a few years back -- violent subjects who'd been pepper-sprayed and who had to be restrained.
The CSPD changed its training and methods for restraining such prisoners, and there haven't been any such deaths since.
In an encounter with the cops, you set the dynamics in motion, not the cop. If you choose to roll a big rock from the emotional top of the hill, expect the landslide forthwith.
I suspect that would be the norm in many areas around the country.
My own personal experience with the local hut-huts is that they entered my home a few months ago (while I was at work) demanding to search it for weapons because of an anonymous tip that someone was firing a rifle from the back window into the greenbelt. They bravely surrounded my wife, weapons drawn, when she came out to get the mail. (Of course, MY house doesn't back up to any greenbelt.) Last week they were all edgy trying to bust a perp at my parents home a few miles away. Wrong address there too. Last month they were buzzing my house with a chopper looking for a teenage kid in the greenbelt. Had the IR unit on the chopper, blocked all the entrances to our neighborhood...HUT HUT HUT! And to think, the kid DIDN'T have night vision, armor piercing rounds or even a machine gun! I believe he did have a cell phone though.
There's no such thing as a % reality factor. I based my statements on the experiences of a few very good friends of mine that are police officers. It doesn't mean every traffic stop, domestic abuse call, or robbery results in coming up against the items I listed, but it does happen. One of my friends partner was killed last year on New Years eve - responding to a roudy party. I'm sure his widow wishes he wore the darth vadar equipment, as well as his two young girls.
Another friend worked his way through the ranks, from undercover, to chief. Some of his experiences are enough to straighten your short and curlies. Personally, I could never put up with the stress of being a cop, so when they want to have all the proper equipment they think is necessary, I say let them have it. If their authority is abused, there are recourses, but to short change them on safety is unacceptable.
I know you're only partly serious, but I have to wonder whether it would actually work. The problem will always be with guys like this, who are so hopped up that the shock, or whatever, either won't stop them, or would kill them.
I knew a cop who got shot in the face by a lady he'd just hit with a stun gun. She was drugged up and suicidal, and he told us, "all it did was make her mad."
(As for the cop, he obviously survived. It was a .22 cal pistol that hit him full in the face. Lucky for him the bullet was deflected downward by the cheekbone, and was stopped by his teeth. A quarter inch hight, it probably would have been deflected up, into his brain.)
Again, not the cops, but the steering committee controlling the cops. I bet you're going to vote in the next district attorney race now aren't you?
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