[News] The USA Police State will never satisfy its lust for beating, gassing, and imprisoning minorities

I can not see shooting a Lab. Hell I had my German Shepherd pop his head out of my truck and lick a State Trooper in the face. I told the trooper, "If you were a County Mountie, he would have bit you."
 
Isn't it becoming standard policy to kill all dogs present in order to remove their influence?

I am asking this as a serious question...whether dogs are considered "threats" and therefore SOP would roll this into the neutralization of any such "unpredictable" threat prior to engaging the situation.

--Patrick
I really hope you're joking.
 
I haven't ever brought it up in here because I uh, think human lives are way more valuable than a dog's life, but the police kill an absolutely staggering number of dogs. They are absolutely indiscriminate and shoot any dog they can point a gun at in every single situation humanly possible. Dogs in carriers, tied up, loose that don't belong to any suspect, dogs on leashes yards away from the situation. If there's a dog anywhere in sight or sound of a police officer, they will shoot it a dozen times as fast as humanly possible. If you have a dog, pray that you never encounter a police officer, since there are very few times a police officer sees a dog that he doesn't empty a clip into it. If this turns your opinion against the police canine murder squad, then welcome to the club.

I'm exaggerating above, but not by much.
 
The cause is the same aggression factor.

Of course, unlike with killing minorities, an officer can lose their job for killing a dog.

That said, if there's a drug raid on your home, even if it's the wrong house (which seems to happen more often nowadays--probably just an increase in number of drug raids, which will increase the error percentage) and you have a dog, they're probably going to shoot it on sight. They bust in, they don't know if it's dangerous, they shoot. Oh, and your babies. Make sure to have flash grenade protection on the crib or your baby's gonna die. And make sure your insurance covers doors, because the police aren't going to pay for it after their "oops". A guy in my town had the police break down his door in the night and beat him on a drug raid--wrong house. It happened three times. He had to pay to have his door fixed each time, and his own medical bills. When he sued after the third time, then they arrested him. Don't know what ever came of that. And to get back on topic, take a guess what his ethnicity was.
 
The cause is the same aggression factor.

Of course, unlike with killing minorities, an officer can lose their job for killing a dog.

That said, if there's a drug raid on your home, even if it's the wrong house (which seems to happen more often nowadays--probably just an increase in number of drug raids, which will increase the error percentage) and you have a dog, they're probably going to shoot it on sight. They bust in, they don't know if it's dangerous, they shoot. Oh, and your babies. Make sure to have flash grenade protection on the crib or your baby's gonna die. And make sure your insurance covers doors, because the police aren't going to pay for it after their "oops". A guy in my town had the police break down his door in the night and beat him on a drug raid--wrong house. It happened three times. He had to pay to have his door fixed each time, and his own medical bills. When he sued after the third time, then they arrested him. Don't know what ever came of that. And to get back on topic, take a guess what his ethnicity was.
Wasn't the constitution supposed to prevent shit like that?
 
Wasn't the constitution supposed to prevent shit like that?
War on Drugs.

Which is so prevalent that people can prank each other online by calling in drug raids if they have a person's address. It's happened twice to some Let's Play guy; can't recall his name.
 
The cause is the same aggression factor.

Of course, unlike with killing minorities, an officer can lose their job for killing a dog.

That said, if there's a drug raid on your home, even if it's the wrong house (which seems to happen more often nowadays--probably just an increase in number of drug raids, which will increase the error percentage) and you have a dog, they're probably going to shoot it on sight. They bust in, they don't know if it's dangerous, they shoot. Oh, and your babies. Make sure to have flash grenade protection on the crib or your baby's gonna die. And make sure your insurance covers doors, because the police aren't going to pay for it after their "oops". A guy in my town had the police break down his door in the night and beat him on a drug raid--wrong house. It happened three times. He had to pay to have his door fixed each time, and his own medical bills. When he sued after the third time, then they arrested him. Don't know what ever came of that. And to get back on topic, take a guess what his ethnicity was.
http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-apologies-to-cops-who-beat-me-up-no-reason/
 

fade

Staff member
Some quick math (I love math).

1.1 million full time police in the us: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_enforcement_in_the_United_States#Number_of_police

The official police homicide number is about 400/yr, but there's evidence it's more than that: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-many-americans-the-police-kill-each-year/ as an example that gathers some research together. Let's say that there are 800 police homicide/yr, which is probably way more than there are. That's a safety margin of 2, and given that there are ~17k homicides in the US/year, that's saying the police are responsible for 5% of them, which seems quite high.

By the official numbers,

100 * 400/1,100,000 = 0.035% of police officers engage in fatal killings, all other things being equal

By the safety margin of 2

100 * 800/1,100,000 = 0.07% of police officers engage in fatal killings all other things being equal.
or 7 out of every 10,000 cops will kill.

I cannot find any numbers easily on killings that are unquestionably justified (i.e. officer's life is in clear, immediate danger). Would be interesting.

100 * 17k/313.9M = 0.005% of people in the us kill, or 5 out of every 100,000 people.

Looks like roughly 150 officers are killed in the line of duty each year, or

100 * 150/1,100,000 = 0.01%, or 1 in every 10,000 police officers will die in the line of duty.

In 2011, there were 4,609 work related deaths in the US: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupational_fatality

100 * 4609/313,900,000 = 0.001%, or 1 in every 100,000 people will die in a work related fatality.

To sum up this gross overgeneralization:
  • A cop is 7-14X more likely to kill than the average american.
  • A cop is 10X more likely to die on the job than the average american.
None of this is presented with judgement. I was genuinely curious.
 

fade

Staff member
That's why I gave a safety factor of 2. I'm disinclined to believe the police are responsible for greater than 5% of the homicides in this country. There's only so much suppression you can get away with, and I think that assuming the police only report half of the officer-involved shootings is an extremely low estimate. You could argue an under-reporting of homicides, but again, I took that into account. The official numbers are in the 15k range, and 3rd party estimates are in the 18k range. I split the difference, and as a safety margin pushed toward the 18k end.
 

Necronic

Staff member
Looking at that wiki page. wtf is going on in fisheries?? Those fatality rates are truly shocking.

ed: Ah ok, we're including the "deadliest catch" stuff. Wonder what the numbers look like if you separate the onshore fisheries from offshore fishing.
 
Demonstrators in the St Louis area tried to shut down I-70 to protest the Governor's refusal to appoint a special prosecutor in the Michael Brown shooting case. So far, the Governor has stood behind the local prosecutor who has ties to the police community. (via The Washington Post)

Police were able to keep the demonstrators from shutting down I-70, though this did result in a fairly striking image:

(via Fox2Now)
 
Since it's probably relevant, what the fuck? (Warning, guy gets shot.)

For those worried, he's going to be ok.

I'm of two minds about this. The only mistake this guy made was he got out of the car. Clearly that's no reason to shoot somebody. But at the same time, I can see how, from the cops perspective, his actions could maybe be perceived as threatening.

I feel bad for both people involved. For the driver for getting shot (the cynic in me wants to say shot for being black, but I don't think there's enough evidence to claim race was a factor) and for the cop whose career is most likely ruined (possibly rightfully so, I don't know him) for being too jumpy and quick to fire.

That the victim is going to be ok makes this easier not to rage about, though I still hope he sues the shit out of the department.
 
They told him to get his license--what was he supposed to do? Don't get it, he's non-compliant, but then he goes to get it and they shoot. Not to mention, he's out of the car, and they yell to get out of the car. It's just bizarre.
 
The only mistake this guy made was he got out of the car.
It looks like he got out of his car because he was going to the store when the cop pulled up to him.


I feel bad for both people involved. For the driver for getting shot (the cynic in me wants to say shot for being black, but I don't think there's enough evidence to claim race was a factor) and for the cop whose career is most likely ruined (possibly rightfully so, I don't know him) for being too jumpy and quick to fire.
Not only is the cop out of a job, he's been charged with "assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature". (via CBS News) Keep in mind that this police officer used lethal force on a man who was trying to comply with the officer's instructions and again when the man was backing away with his arms raised -- all because the police officer suspected him of not wearing a seat belt.
 
It looks like he got out of his car because he was going to the store when the cop pulled up to him.




Not only is the cop out of a job, he's been charged with "assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature". (via CBS News) Keep in mind that this police officer used lethal force on a man who was trying to comply with the officer's instructions and again when the man was backing away with his arms raised -- all because the police officer suspected him of not wearing a seat belt.
The officer claimed he shot because he thought the victim was diving back into the car. Which is still fucked up and a totally wrong reaction (he didn't look like he was 'diving' to me) but I can see how possibly it could be construed that way. The officer is completely at fault here, I don't doubt that, I just don't think he had malicious intent. That doesn't lessen the fact that he shot at an unarmed man, I'm just saying I can conceivably see how that mistake is made, especially if you go into a situation assuming you're going to get shot at, which unfortunately a lot of officers do.

So maybe I should have communicated that better. I think the officer did a bad thing (that could have turned out a whole lot worse, thankfully it didn't) but I don't necessarily think he had intention to do a bad thing. He still did the bad thing though, and at the very least probably shouldn't be in a position where he holds the authority to draw a weapon and fire it at someone for going for their license.

So yeah, pretty fucked up situation.
 
I can't believe people that are like "I feel for the officer", poor him, he didn't get FUCKING SHOT.
I actually agree with Charlie in this case. What the hell was that guy supposed to do? He got shot for following the officer's directions and all over a seatbelt violation. Throw the entire book of the law at this guy.
 
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