AZ Police Officer Acted "Within Policy" Assaulting 15-Year Old Girl...

[there4eyeM]

It is a principle of US justice that all citizens be treated with respect by their law enforcement agents. Further, everyone is considered innocent until proven guilty.
This cop did not even attempt to arrest this girl in a respectful, peaceful fashion. If there was a risk involved, the benefit of the doubt goes to the innocent party, not the servant of the people. Police may represent authority, but they are not THE authority.
My attitude toward the police is largely formed by seeing my father work through over twenty years as a police officer and, again, I insist he would have been outraged at this character.

 

[paulitician]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKkFoSt6aKQ]Police State 2012: No Need to Wait, It's Already Here - YouTube[/ame]

 

[MikeK]

[
MikeK: Whatever weaponry the cops have now that they didn't have before? It is simple: so they are not out-armed and out-gunned by the people they have to confront.

Each of the fifty states maintains a National Guard -- which exists specifically for the purpose you've presented. The fact that a would-be despot like George W. Bush deployed the National Guard in his unlawful invasion of Iraq does not negate its essential purpose, which is to prevail in the kind of civil disorder you're talking about.

We don't need a National Guard in addition to domestic police who emulate the same level of potential force. Because that kind of situation occurs as a de facto police state in waiting.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

I am not dismissing anything. I am debating and refuting what you are saying. You are the one dismissing things. You also haven't got a clue about debate and refutation.

Except you have not refuted anything. Let me demonstrate to you how to refute an argument.

• The police don't need a photograph of the suspect or a video of the crime to arrest someone.

No one ever said they need a photograph, They do, however, need probable cause. You do not even know what the ploice knew when they pulled up. You are assuming that they had all the information available in the 911 calls. They didn't.

• She was identified not by miscellaneous passers by, but by her mother.

Even if the person there was her mother, the police had no way of knowing that when they arrived. Even if the woman said "My daughter just tried to kill me," all police no is that she is a woman making some sort of claim. They are not psychics, they don't know anymore than you did when you first watched the video. In fact, they knew less, because they did not see the fight in which the girl they knocked to the ground was losing.

• Who was on the ground after the girl walked away, despite the fact you all say it was the mother assaulting the girl.

We did not say the mother was assaulting the girl, we said the girl was loosing the fight. Since the woman in the video, if it was her mother, outweighed her, and had the advantage of strength, it only makes sense that she was winning the physical confrontation.

• In that case, why was the mother left on the ground when the girl walked away.

Left on the ground? I couldn't see where the woman was because there was a car in the way. Since that same car also blocked the girl from view even though shoe, obviously, stood up and walked away, there is every possibility that the woman was also standing out of view behind the car. You really should stop dramatizing the facts unless you have an ability to see through cars on videos.

• She had been identified by the school who reported her and probably gave a description, including her clothing.

The school described what she was wearing? Do you have proof of this? Even if they did, how do you know they got it right? Do you have any idea how often two eyewitnesses provide the same description of the someone when they are asked to do so?


I will give you a hing, it is less than once in the entire history of police asking for descriptions.

• They knew who the suspect was, and she was told to stop.

Because they were, as you already demonstrated, psychic, and knew for a fact that the people who were standing around were not accusing an innocent person. You still have not demonstrated how they knew this, but they did.

• She didn't, which gives them the right to use the means necessary to take her into custody.

You got that half right, then completely wrong. First, she didn't stop. Personally, I wouldn't stop either if someone yelled at me from behind, which is why people have actually had to chase me down to return things I dropped. That said, she actually turned around to see who was calling her, perhaps because the police officer used her name, and got a shoulder in her face as a result.


By the way, police do not have the right to do anything to apprehend a suspect. They have the authority to use reasonable force to do so, and have the responsibility to make sure that they are not putting themselves, the public, or the people they are trying to apprehend, into unreasonable danger. Given the fact that the review board recommended a 4 day suspension after reviewing all the facts, including the ones you are making up, I would say that this officer did not fulfill his responsibily.

• She was pushed, that's all, pushed.

She was tackled. That is a lot more than a push, I used to play football, I know the difference.

• And fell to the ground, was then tackled and cuffed.

She was knocked to the ground. She was not tackled after she was on the ground, watch the video.

• Not much different than happens everyday on the practice football field at any high school.

The difference is that on a football field people expect to get tackled, don't fall onto concrete, and still get injured, even though the people hitting them are comparable in both age and size. This was a teenage girl getting slammed by an adult male who had at least 25 kilos on her without the gear and the Kevlar vest he is wearing.

• She was NOT INJURED.

No injuries that they are aware of is not the same thing as no injuries.

• No injuries, so it was not as brutal and violent as people want to make out.

Ever watch a an MMA match? Those rarely result in injuries, but no one ever comes away from one thinking they are not violent. This was brutal and violent, her lack of injuries just means she was lucky.

• It was not the act of a police state.

It was the act of a cop who exceeded his authority and ignored department policy.

• It was reasonable given the circumstances.

If that were true there would have been no suspension. In fact, I am willing to bet that this particular officer has a long history of excessive violence, because it usually takes a clearly defined pattern of escalating problems before a review board will recommend a suspension. Yet you are defending him, and trying to argue that his use of force was justified, even though I can clearly prove it wasn't.

_______________________________


That, Esmeralda, is how you refute something. You don't refute me by repeating specious arguments that have already been refuted, and then claim you are not dismissing my position because you keep repeating things that are are already disproven.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

When you guys start talking 3rd Reich, authoritarian/totalitarian government, police state, our diminishing freedoms, etc., you prove what nut cases you are. Not one of you has the tiniest, itty bitty idea what it is like to live in a real police state, what it is like to live in a totalitarian government. Your American freedoms are not dinimishing. You have no idea what it would be like if they actually were. You're just a bunch of ranting, intellectual babies. No one with any real intelligence would take you seriously.

The police don't need a photograph of the suspect or a video of the crime to arrest someone. She was identified not by miscellaneous passers by, but by her mother. Who was on the ground after the girl walked away, despite the fact you all say it was the mother assaulting the girl. In that case, why was the mother left on the ground when the girl walked away. She had been identified by the school who reported her and probably gave a description, including her clothing. They knew who the suspect was, and she was told to stop. She didn't, which gives them the right to use the means necessary to take her into custody. She was pushed, that's all, pushed. And fell to the ground, was then tackled and cuffed. Not much different than happens everyday on the practice football field at any high school. She was NOT INJURED. No injuries, so it was not as brutal and violent as people want to make out. It was not the act of a police state. It was reasonable given the circumstances.

You are all completely biased against the police. I think it is hilarious how people in the US like to dislike the police. You'd just love to live in a country without police I bet. If so, then move to Somalia and see how you like anarchy.

I am well aware that the U.S. is not at this time a police state. And one does not need to live in a police state to know and to understand what a police state is -- and how they come about.

A police state arises in one of two ways; either subsequent to a political or military coup or via an incremental process during which the various components are gradually and imperceptibly assembled. Then one morning you wake up and there it is.

I've been around long enough to have watched many changes come about in American law-enforcement. Most of these changes are by themselves seemingly small and insignificant, but when viewed as a collective whole they occur as manifest militarization. And when you add the fact that the federal government routinely subsidizes most state and local police agencies with funding to purchase all sorts of equipment which is absolutely redundant for the purpose of domestic policing you can add the term, centralization. The most recent example of this distribution of military equipment to domestic police comes in the form of 2,700 armored vehicles, such as those being used in Iraq and Afghanistan. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMCKefg0zmw"]2700 Armored Vehicles Purchased for Police Departments by DHS - YouTube[/ame]

I can recall when the average police officer was armed with a .38 revolver. Now they carry fifteen shot automatics, the need for which has almost never been demonstrated. Many ordinary police officers carry M-16 assault rifles or H&K machine guns in the trunks of their computer equipped vehicles.

If you believe the sanctity of the home, the so-called "castle" principle, is still in effect, along with the "probable cause" requirement for arrest, I urge you to go here: Botched Paramilitary Police Raids | Cato Institute

and here: SWAT Fever: It's Epidemic (Sorry About The Dogs) - Raw Fisher

and here: No-knock "drug war" warrant = dead dogs, ruined home - Gordon Wagner - Open Salon

and here: More Militarized Than the Military | The Agitator

. . . and educate yourself.

One needn't be paranoid to be concerned with the changes taken place in the character and functional potential of our domestic police agencies. \

As mentioned, it comes about gradually. One vaguely perceptible step at a time. Then one day you wake up and there it is.

Then what do you do?

MikeK: Whatever weaponry the cops have now that they didn't have before? It is simple: so they are not out-armed and out-gunned by the people they have to confront. If they have riot gear, it is because people riot and are dangerous. Should the polic, trying to control something like the LA riots only have small pistols? No body armor? That's ludicrous. If they have automatic rifles now it is because the criminals have them. You are not even dealing with reality. Even UK cops, who used to only carry batons, now carry guns and automatic weapons and have everything else the US cops have because society has become more violent and high tech. They are only keeping up with what they have to confront in the modern world.

As far as American leaning toward some kind of totalitarian police state: absolutely ludicrous. Nothing of the sort is happening. In fact, it is more of the reverse. Things are much better for the average law abiding citizen then they were in the 50s, for example. Much better.

Most of the people they confront are unarmed, want to explain to me why they need MRAP vehicles? When was the last time a cop car was attacked using an IED in the US?