Free Republic

Newly released body camera footage shows a police officer shooting an unarmed man in an Arizona hotel after the man sobbed and pleaded with officers not to shoot him. The graphic video, which was released after a jury on Thursday acquitted the officer of murder and manslaughter charges, stoked outrage on social media and renewed calls for reforms in law enforcement.

Since I’m a public finance economist, I realize I’m supposed to focus on big-picture issues such as tax reform and entitlement reform. And I do beat those issues to death, so I obviously care about controlling the size and power of government. But I like to think I’m also a decent human being. And this is why I get even more agitated when politicians and bureaucrats engage in thuggish behavior against comparatively powerless citizens. Some of the worst examples of government thuggery are the result of “asset forfeiture,” which happens when governments confiscate the property of people who haven’t been...

Indiana police say two officers have been placed on administrative suspension after they used a stun gun on an unruly child at a home day care.A news release from the mayor's office and the Martinsville Police Department said the officers responded to reports of a 10-year-old who was out of control at Tender Teddies Day Care Tuesday night, reports WRTV in Indianapolis...The department says that when the officers arrived the boy was out of control, hitting and kicking and refusing to listen to them.The department says the officers used a stun gun and slapped the boy to subdue him.

<p>A 93-year-old Central Texas woman was fatally shot at her home by a police officer when after she allegedly brandished a gun, the Hearne Police Department said Wednesday.</p> <p>Pearlie Golden, a longtime resident of Hearne who was affectionately known to her neighbors as Ms. Sully, was shot Tuesday night by Officer Steven Stem, Robertson County District Attorney Coty Siegert said. Stem was responding to a 911 call about a disturbance involving a woman with a gun.</p>

Twenty people have been shot and killed by police in New Hampshire since 2000; 19 others have been wounded. Eleven of those fatal shootings were in the past three years. And in nearly all of the cases, investigators found the shootings to have involved justified use of deadly force by the officers involved. That's typical, according to Charles Reynolds, a retired New Hampshire police chief who is a national expert in the use of deadly force by police. The standard for determining whether the use of deadly force by police is justified is not based on hindsight or the officer's...

The NSA isn’t the only government agency raising concerns about electronic privacy. Local police departments are coming under similar scrutiny—not only for using spying technology, but for hiding their use from the public. At least 25 police departments now use what is known as “Stingray,” a briefcase-sized box that swallows up cell phone data within a mile radius. More than one in three large police departments are also using license-plate readers, which can record every plate—even on a four-lane highway—from vehicles going at speeds of up to 150 miles per hour. […] But the two technologies raise broader questions about...

SOUTHWEST MIAMI-DADE, FLORIDA - All Gilberto Powell, 22, a five foot tall man with Down Syndrome, wanted to do was walk a half block home from a friend's house, but this was enough time and distance for the police to intervene. Police "followed" Powell because they noticed a "bulge in his pants." He was not happy to see the cops; this was only his colostomy bag (which police ripped from his body). Powell was then beaten down in the street by police, leaving him bruised and battered from blows to the face. The beating officer insisted Powell ran, but Powell...

Years ago, members of my extended family were gangsters connected with the Genovese crime family. They had the ability, which they used, to place people in favored positions within the New York City Police Department. I know this, because my father was offered one of those slots. --SNIP-- It's the old problem of "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?"—"Who watches the watchmen?"

Jonathan Meister was retrieving some stuff he was storing at an ex-roommate’s home when he looked up to find several members of the Hawthorne Police Department approaching. The South Bay man claims officers didn’t give him a chance to explain what he was doing before placing him in handcuffs, beating him and using a stun gun to shock him into submission. The problem began when police reportedly misunderstood Meister’s attempts to speak in sign language as threatening gestures.

“A Burleson County Grand Jury declined to indict the man who shot and killed Burleson County Sheriff’s Deputy Adam Sowders who was serving a search warrant in December,” kbtx.com reports. “Investigators were executing a search warrant at Henry McGee’s mobile home near Snook when the shooting happened.” The shooting didn’t just “happen.” “Henry McGee admitted to shooting Deputy Sowders before sunrise on December 19th while the deputy and other investigators were serving a no knock search warrant for drugs at McGee’s mobile home near Snook. Magee’s Defense Attorney Dick DeGuerin says his client thought someone was breaking into his home...

An interactive map of botched SWAT and paramilitary police raids, released in conjunction with the Cato policy paper "Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids," by Radley Balko.

The University of the Incarnate Word is a highly-rated Catholic college in San Antonio, Texas. It is hardly a hot bed of campus violence. When senior Robert Cameron Redus was pulled-over last Friday by campus police for “erratically speeding,” it is unlikely he had any clue of how tragically the stop would end. The campus police department contends Redus, an honors student set to graduate in May, grabbed the officer’s steel baton during a struggle. Not in dispute, however, is that Redus was shot five times by the officer, at close range, leaving him dead and the University scrambling to...

FULL TITLE: 'Oh you're gonna shoot me?' The sarcastic last words of straight-A student shot dead by college cop after being stopped for speeding University student Cameron Redus, 23, was shot and killed by a campus police officerAccording to police, the officer tried to pull Redus over for driving erratically and speedingThe two pulled into the parking lot of Redus' apartment blockMinutes later, Redus was shot 'four to six times' by CarterRedus was a straight-A student set to graduate in MayAlamo Heights police and Texas Rangers are investigating the shootingCarter is on administrative leave during the investigation A witness says...

Norman Gurley, 30, is facing drug-related charges in Lorain County, Ohio, despite the fact that state troopers did not actually find any drugs in his possession. Ohio passed a law in 2012 making it a felony to alter a vehicle to add a secret compartment with the “intent” of using it to conceal drugs for trafficking. Gurley is the first actual person arrested under the law. WKYC in Northeast Ohio covered the arrest, with no notable journalistic skepticism whatsoever: They pulled over the driver for speeding, but then troopers noticed several wires running to the back of the car. Those...

Mother of minivan of kids shot at by police speaks out against'terrifying individual' police officer The mother who led New Mexico police on a dramatic chase that culminated in their shooting at the minivan she was driving with her children inside has spoken out about the incident. Calling one of police officers a 'terrifying individual,' Oriana Ferrell, 39, wrote in a letter penned from her prison cell last month and published in the Taos News yesterday that she drove away from police repeatedly to protect her children. 'A uniformed officer can shoot three bullets at my van and be considered...

Two sheriff’s deputies in Northern California shot and killed 13-year-old boy who they thought was carrying an assault rifle, only to find out that the gun the teen was holding was a toy, police and family members have said. The officers, on patrol Tuesday in Sonoma County, reported seeing the boy carrying what appeared to be a black AK-47, reports the AP. A photo made public after the tragedy show a toy weapon with a black magazine cartridge and brown butt.  Sheriff’s Lieutenant Dennis O’Leary told reporters the deputies called for backup and repeatedly ordered the boy to drop the...

Several residents at the “Garden of Eden” sustainability garden in Arlington, Texas, claim that local police raided their farm because they thought tomato plants were marijuana plants. The police reportedly damaged the garden's property and the crops during the Aug. 2 raid, which included a SWAT team (video below). “They came here under the guise that we were doing a drug trafficking, marijuana-growing operation. They destroyed everything,” said garden owner Shellie Smith to WFAA-TV. Apparently, an undercover officer and a helicopter surveillance crew believed there was probable cause that the wrong kind of plant was being grown in the garden and...

Arlington, Texas — A family with a passion for gardening and conscious living was raided by the Arlington SWAT team early Friday morning. All 8 adults present in the house were initially handcuffed at the gunpoint of heavily armed SWAT officers, including the mother of a 22 month old and a two week old baby who was separated from her children during the raid. I had a chance to interview Quinn who gave me his first hand account of the raid and the background behind it all.