Posted on 12/31/2010 8:12:10 AM PST by redreno
It appears the issue is the fact a SWAT team raided the wrong house. They went to 19 Florence when they were supposed to go to 17 Florence Street. The court case cited is the indication of individual liability in the case in addition to the liability of the employer, the city, as it was more than just a mistake.
This was a case of misconduct that might well be criminal in the following sense (from the case cited, not a comprehensive review of the incident from other sources. I don't care enough about the case to hunt it all down and spell it all out to you.) The officers applying for the search warrant lied about personally seeing the informant enter and exit the house. That would be the criminal part I could see. Lying to a judge to obtain a warrant would be perjury. It would be up to the prosecutor, district attorney, or states attorney whether to charge criminally. That would be up to them, not the cops.
Everything stems from that. They identified the wrong house, planned to raid the wrong house, then raided the wrong house all the while thinking it was the right house. For most of the officers on that call they would not face individual liability thinking they were doing the right thing. However, the named officers in the link aren't in that group.
Then finding out they screwed up, they tried to cover it up by not writing it up. This is where they went from civil immunity to personally being liable. If they had applied for a warrant without lying and had simply picked the wrong house, then admitted the mistake, they would not be personally liable. The city would have, but not the officers personally.
So, citing this as evidence the police are held to a proper standard of being sued personally, I don't get where you might think they are getting ‘over’ on anyone. Nor, is this case comparable in any way because what parallel example could you give where “But if a group of citizens did this” other than a bounty hunter, and they may, or may not face criminal charges if they could show they validly thought their person resided at the residence? They would certainly face civil liability.
All in all your example doesn't support your argument. Nor, even if it was relevant, could you apply one example to 800,000 people.
Here is a quick comparison. A group of soldiers rape and kill a girl and her family in Iraq. Are all soldiers rapists and murderers?(It would if you were a lib. Brian Depalma made a movie of it called Redacted.) No. Don't be silly. But those that would claim that you can't condemn all the military for the actions of a few can be some of the first to do the same to law enforcement. Same flawed thinking, just a different target.
No fog in my view. It’s clear and sunny.
Posts 24 and 32 cover this.
They can and do.
No, they don't. I asked you a very simple yes or no question. So, as to keep you from dodging it, I will ask it again. If you are an honest person, you will have no problem answerirng yes or no. Let's see.
Do you think that departments should be able to fire police officers for not answering questions during an internal investigation, just like regular citizens can be fired for not answering questions during an internal company investigation, regardless of guilt or their constitutional rights in a criminal investigation?
I’m not only honest, I can read. Can you? Even a two line post you flubbed. What was the second line you didn’t include?
“They can and do.”
Well, spanky. That answers the question. No dodging required. Departments can and do fire people for not cooperating. That’s why I indicated posts 24 and 32. But since you can’t seem to grasp them, I’ll quote parts of them for you here:
Post 24: “...They are required, and did, report what they did...” So in this case the officers did answer questions as required.
Strike one.
Post 32: “The police act under color of authority. If you shot someone you don’t have to say a word without a lawyer to anyone at any time. The police are required to under the Garrity Rule or they will be fired:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garrity_v._New_Jersey";
Strike two.
This shows that they are required to answer questions their department asks, and debunks your entire question. That’s why I said: “They can and do.” because:
“THEY CAN, AND DO!”
Good luck there.
Lying to a judge to obtain a warrant would be perjury. It would be up to the prosecutor, district attorney, or states attorney whether to charge criminally. That would be up to them, not the cops.
That's right ... but how often does this actually occur? In my opinion, (1) not nearly often enough, and (2) much less frequently than it does for citizens under similar circumstances. Police often get a pass for this sort of thing, or a reprimand or they lose their job, in comparison to citizens who would usually be criminally charged.
Everything stems from that.
Almost everything.
They identified the wrong house, planned to raid the wrong house, then raided the wrong house all the while thinking it was the right house. For most of the officers on that call they would not face individual liability thinking they were doing the right thing. However, the named officers in the link aren't in that group.
Not so, according to the complaint:
3) After police realized they were at wrong house, they still victimized the family.
d. Even after realizing they were in the wrong house, they continued to hold Plaintiffs prisoners in their own house, all the while pointing their guns at Plaintiffs and their children;
The instant they realized they were at the wrong house, they should have holstered their guns, apologized profusely, left a calling card and left. Having not done so leaves any and every officer at the scene in the position of committing: deadly menacing, conspiracy, unlawful trespass, kidnapping, use of firearm in commission of felony, etc, with possible enhancements for use of select-fire firearms, body armor and so forth, which vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and which depend on what equipment, exactly, they had in their possession. These charges could put either of us in jail for a long time upon conviction. This is separate from and in addition to the case of the perjury that got them there in the first place, which appears to be the only point you care about.
With respect to your comparison with the military: No, the rape of one girl and the murder of her family does not taint the entire military any more than one police episode like this taints all police officers. But there are some differences. First, the military case is rather exceptional, much more rare than are botched SWAT raids so far as I am aware, and furthermore, those responsible are very much facing criminal charges for their acts. The military has clear rules that strongly penalizes such criminal acts, and they enforce them. (This isn't about soldiers, it's about the UCMJ and how it is applied.) But wrong-house SWAT raids are quite frequent, including those with innocent fatalities. SWAT raids have gone up, greatly, in the last 20 or 30 years, with no sign of abating. I have read many cases of "good shoot" when innocents in slightly questionable circumstances were killed, and the police were cleared of "wrongdoing." Yes, the ashtray was shiny, therefore, the suspect was shot. "Good job, you followed procedure; pity it was only an ashtray; we regret the loss of life." When civilians do things that result in accidental fatalities, the authorities go to no end finding some sort of criminal charge, somewhere, to charge somebody with, or legislatures ban objects (e.g. lawn darts) if they can't find anything, so at least they can charge somebody with something in the future if it should ever happen again. But the SWAT raids continue.
This fact isn't primarily the fault of the police officers or even their departments. Much of the blame lies with legislatures which spell out what sorts of things the police have to do. Congress enacted the nationwide CCW reciprocity for active and retired officers, (i.e. holding them to a different standard than citizens) but my objection to that policy lies solely with Congress (and, those who lobbied for the law) but not for officers in particular, except to the extent they lobbied to have a special law just for them. The vaunted Rule of Law is meaningless, as is for that matter equality under the law, when the laws apply differently. A white separatist could claim Jim Crow laws are Rule Of Law in the same way - we comply with the laws, and the blacks must too. But I would object to this argument as well.
Given that police officers DO act as bodyguards for legislators, one can certainly understand why such bodies might want to act favorably towards officers. There is a grand myth about "separation of powers" but the executive, legislative, and judicial branches more often play on the same team than opposing ones. When it's the word of an officer vs. the word of a citizen, judges usually side with officers, notwithstanding many cases in which officers have perjured themselves. Thanks to YouTube, some of these cases are now seeing the light, but, needless to say, when such videos are posted, the authorities often harass those who posted them, as in the case of the recent crossbow incident, or press legislatures to ban the filming of police officers generally. (Although, we're told there's "no expectation of privacy on public streets" for us, citizens who film or record officers are subject to wiretapping(!) criminal charges or similar.) Indeed the police often have dashcams that record everything they do (which I support) but they sometimes 'inexplicably' 'fail to record' some highly questionable actions.
One thing that I do blame the police for, is conducting their own investigations of misconduct. The conflict of interest in doing so is too much. But that's how it's done. Of course they exonerate themselves most of the time, what would anyone expect?
So my position is, much of the system is broken, and therefore, the police are often, or usually, doing jobs that are at odds with the sort of liberty I think is worth protecting. The comment, "F*** it, it's not my money, it's the city's" indicates the corrosive effect that the situation can press people into adopting. That's what I want to call attention to, object to, and change.
Background info about something I posted:
Wife who filmed [husband’s] arrest is targeted by police after crossbow melee
From the article:
“She added “the police here have put a lot of slanderous information about me in the newspaper. Trying to say that the only food in my house was a bowl of rice, some dried beans and some chicken bones. And that I only heat my house with 2 space heaters. This is all untrue. I even had a CPS worker come to my house and talk to me and he didn’t understand why he was there. And really if that was the truth the police would’ve taken my daughter from me right then and there. They still aren’t telling people that they took my computer and digital camera when they did their search.””
...
“She says that police refused to show her the actual search warrant before entering. Despite being there purportedly to investigate a crossbow incident, police took several unrelated items. In a clearly Constitutionally questionable seizure, police seized Shaw’s computer, digital camera and memory card. Shaw said they have still not returned them.”
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