Baltimore Riots

[LDF]

I honestly don't recall the full logic of it, but as I heard it explained they have very little liability - "they" being the police officers - for what happens in that van so long as you can't prove they intentionally created that situation, which seems doubtful unless someone fesses up.

 

It is telling, though, that the commissioner has essentially already said they know that the injuries are the fault of the officers. Legally speaking, it seems like the big question is whether it was malice or negligence.

 

it is one and the same.

 

when the person is in the property of the police, it is the police responsibility to ensure that person safety. when one is in the van, there is ways to secure the person.

 

otherwise it is negligence.

[EvilMonkey]

if the van / patrol car has cameras, pull the tape.

 

just to clear this thing up, yeah he may be trying to injured himself, to the point of killing oneself. self preservation of the human factor, will only go so far..... just throwing that out there.

There is no reason it couldn't have been both. With the tense relationships between police and some of the communities lately, and this guys previous record, it isn't inconceivable that he thought he could 'rough himself up' and get a big payday. Where it could have veered is if the cops realized that was what he was doing and then tried to give him a little help with the rough ride. Not saying it is likely, but not as far fetched as some will say.

[StrangeSox]

look at his rap sheet

he was in a car accident!

he had spinal surgery a week ago!

he did it to himself!

[EvilMonkey]

look at his rap sheet

he was in a car accident!

he had spinal surgery a week ago!

he did it to himself!

You really do have a reading comprehension problem, don't you.

 

It does happen.

http://wgntv.com/2015/02/19/man-caught-on-...-blames-police/

Edited April 30, 2015 by Alpha Dog

[StrangeSox]

Just poking fun at the litany of excuses that are popping up. "Sources" and "reports" over the last few days said first that he was in a car accident recently and then that he had spinal surgery last week. Now it's "oh he broke his own neck trying to make it look like a police department with a long history of violence roughed him up."

[NorthSideSox72]

You really do have a reading comprehension problem, don't you.

 

It does happen.

http://wgntv.com/2015/02/19/man-caught-on-...-blames-police/

This is a perfect illustration of what I said earlier - tape it all. Expose the bad actors whether they have a badge or not.

 

[StrangeSox]

That is something that police unions have strongly opposed.

[NorthSideSox72]

That is something that police unions have strongly opposed.

They can oppose all they want, and that works sometimes at the department level. But state law trumps, so states could very well write laws to force this. Unions have pull at that level too, but police unions alone will have a hard time fighting this particular thing, at this point in time.

 

 

[Balta1701]

They can oppose all they want, and that works sometimes at the department level. But state law trumps, so states could very well write laws to force this. Unions have pull at that level too, but police unions alone will have a hard time fighting this particular thing, at this point in time.

Of course, police unions can also do this.

[StrangeSox]

Baltimore police illegally detained many protesters, public defender says

 

Nearly half the people arrested during the unrest that roiled Baltimore on Monday night were released Wednesday night, and the city public defender's office contends they were held in cramped and dangerous conditions.

 

Deputy Public Defender Natalie Finegar said 101 people were released from the city's jail around 7 p.m. local time Wednesday. Few if any of them understood why they were arrested in the first place, she said.

 

"It looks like a lot of folks were just flat-out illegally detained, from our perspective,” Finegar told the Los Angeles Times in a brief phone interview.

 

Finegar, however, believes most of the people released on Wednesday should not face criminal charges. Many of them, she contends, were simply traveling through the affected areas and were swept up by police in the wild scene.

 

One man, she said, was walking home from work wearing a Best Buy shirt when he was stopped by police.

 

We’re watching folks come out with medical issues who have been denied medical care. We’re hearing 15 women being held in a cell that only seats eight," Finegar said. "They haven't been able to be in touch with their families or their employers. Some of them may have lost their jobs."

 

Sounds like the some of the same actions that got the Chicago PD in trouble over the 2003 Iraq War protests and cost the city $11M.

 

[Jenksismyhero]

There was an interesting case just recently, an Albuquerque officer (their department has had issues the last few years) beat a subject for literally no reason, then told his fellow officers to "go live" with their lapel cameras after and acted all nice. What made him chargeable? The probationary officer who was also there on the call gave him up to the department, gave a statement. Interesting.

 

 

It's really a very small expense. Each of those simple cameras are like $20 a piece. Some cable, a computer, and a video archiving software package. For one police station that's probably $2000 total, which is nothing unless it is some super-small rural department. The cars might be different, as the cameras are cheap but I'm not sure how the archiving works, but I'd think it wouldn't cost a ton. Probably a lot less than the laptop/MCATs they have in the cars anyway.

 

Eh, I think it'd be way more than that. I have a case now against a Chicago municipal entity and while they're big, the contract was worth millions and millions and it's ongoing. And it's a broke as s*** system that requires a ton of maintenance and doesn't work a good percentage of the time. I'm not confident at all that a public entity on a tight budget is going to buy a good system.

 

edit: and let's be honest, the real concern here is the grey area between a cop just being a dick and a cop committing a crime or at least an action worthy of a civil suit. NO ONE likes cops. Everyone, especially in places like Cook County, LOVES to hand out money when a big corp/municipal entity is the defendant. There would be a s*** ton of lawsuits for the weakest of weak claims. You'd get all sorts of claims for emotional distress based on verbal abuse. That's a cost that also factors into this, even if in some cases the police are exonerated.

Edited April 30, 2015 by Jenksismybitch

[StrangeSox]

The solution to that hypothetical problem is for cops to stop being dicks and verbally abusive to the point where it justifies civil settlements.

[Jenksismyhero]

The solution to that hypothetical problem is for cops to stop being dicks and verbally abusive to the point where it justifies civil settlements.

 

I'm sure in the vast majority of cases you're right, but in some areas, with some people, not so easy.

[StrangeSox]

The police finished their internal investigation of the incident today. Freddie Gray appears to have been killed his head slammed into a bolt in the back of the van.

 

Freddie Gray sustained his fatal injuries inside a police van when his head slammed into a bolt in the back of the vehicle, a Baltimore TV news station has reported after claiming to have received multiple briefings on a police report and the interim findings of the medical examiner’s office reviewing the 25-year-old’s death.

 

There was also an additional stop made by the van that was not reported until police found private security cameras that showed the stop. No word yet on what occurred.

 

The report comes as police revealed a previously undisclosed stop made by the van after Gray’s arrest had been discovered by investigators, and senior officers announced they had completed a criminal inquiry into his death.

 

“The second stop has been revealed to us in the course of our investigation and was previously unknown to us,” Baltimore deputy police commissioner Kevin Davis said at a press conference. Davis said the stop was filmed by a private CCTV camera.

[NorthSideSox72]

Eh, I think it'd be way more than that. I have a case now against a Chicago municipal entity and while they're big, the contract was worth millions and millions and it's ongoing. And it's a broke as s*** system that requires a ton of maintenance and doesn't work a good percentage of the time. I'm not confident at all that a public entity on a tight budget is going to buy a good system.

 

edit: and let's be honest, the real concern here is the grey area between a cop just being a dick and a cop committing a crime or at least an action worthy of a civil suit. NO ONE likes cops. Everyone, especially in places like Cook County, LOVES to hand out money when a big corp/municipal entity is the defendant. There would be a s*** ton of lawsuits for the weakest of weak claims. You'd get all sorts of claims for emotional distress based on verbal abuse. That's a cost that also factors into this, even if in some cases the police are exonerated.

On the second point, my opinion is if everything is filmed, there will be fewer lawsuits of that kind, not more. People trying to make a buck because a cop called them a bad name are going to look like fools and have their cases thrown out, and lawyers will stop taking the cases because they can't make money.

 

[caulfield12]

Thats what most drivers of expensive cars are doing here in China....installing their own internal mini cameras because there are a number of "con artist" pedestrians, riders on electric scooters or bicyclists who will deliberately throw themselves against the side or in front of a BMW Mercedes or Audi and argue in the street for hours while a crowd develops and the guy with money is often forced to pay something to get out of the situation.

 

One video the guy even brought fake teeth aloong to scatter on the street....he got picked up by numerous street cams a well...the officer kept on pointing out there was no blood and they showed him the video so he sheepishly walked away after lying in the street and blocking traffic for 15 minutes.

 

 

With cameras, 95% of that type of trick/hoax is eliminated.

[LDF]

 

this situation in Balt will not be fixed, overnight, however, if the PD in the nation use this, what happen in Balt, what has happen in MO, this might be the first steps to fix something that has needed to be fixed.

 

be aggressive Balt, do the right thing, and many will look at you with a knowledge that the msg got across. let other city PD follow suit.

[Jenksismyhero]

On the second point, my opinion is if everything is filmed, there will be fewer lawsuits of that kind, not more. People trying to make a buck because a cop called them a bad name are going to look like fools and have their cases thrown out, and lawyers will stop taking the cases because they can't make money.

 

It would be the exact opposite IMO. As soon as a cop looks like he's being mean, Cook County jurors would find fault. The amount of questionable/iffy excessive force claims would rise, not fall. And even for the 50 that exonerates a cop, the 1-2 that are bad will be all over the news and make the department look bad. There's very little for the PD to gain by doing that.

 

edit: im talking metro PD's btw. Downstate, where people are less likely to find fault in government or companies because they're less jaded, maybe not. But in major cities with groups of people who have distrust of government/police departments, no way. They want a reason to nail the CPD and they'll view video/evidence in that light. Hell, they already do.

 

We had a case a few years ago where officers knocked down a mom who was "protecting" her son while he was being arrested. The cops got a little physical, but she was all over them, and they basically knocked her down to the floor and she suffered a herniated disk and had some medical issues, all brought on by her own actions really. She/we (Plaintiff in that case) got over 2 million. The jurors couldn't wait to make them pay. We've had a few excessive force cases and the PD's settle pretty quickly because they don't want to take the risk of getting the case to a jury.

Edited May 1, 2015 by Jenksismybitch

[farmteam]

It would be the exact opposite IMO. As soon as a cop looks like he's being mean, Cook County jurors would find fault. The amount of questionable/iffy excessive force claims would rise, not fall. And even for the 50 that exonerates a cop, the 1-2 that are bad will be all over the news and make the department look bad. There's very little for the PD to gain by doing that.

 

edit: im talking metro PD's btw. Downstate, where people are less likely to find fault in government or companies because they're less jaded, maybe not. But in major cities with groups of people who have distrust of government/police departments, no way. They want a reason to nail the CPD and they'll view video/evidence in that light. Hell, they already do.

 

We had a case a few years ago where officers knocked down a mom who was "protecting" her son while he was being arrested. The cops got a little physical, but she was all over them, and they basically knocked her down to the floor and she suffered a herniated disk and had some medical issues, all brought on by her own actions really. She/we (Plaintiff in that case) got over 2 million. The jurors couldn't wait to make them pay. We've had a few excessive force cases and the PD's settle pretty quickly because they don't want to take the risk of getting the case to a jury.

Totally disagree. Cops do plenty of awful things, Freddie Gray a prime example. But they also face a mountain of bulls*** excessive force suits where the only way the Plaintiff even gets a couple grand out of it is because it's he said/she said and it's not worth the city's cost of fighting it. More cameras = more cases getting dismissed earlier (summary judgment) = number of excessive force claims go down.

[greg775]

Not a bad article from a cop's perspective.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/29/opinions/mos...lice/index.html

 

As far as the news that Gray was killed by hitting his head on a bolt in the back of the car, the cops couldn't have shoved his head into that on purpose. I mean unless they were flat-out intent on committing murder.

[caulfield12]

They were flat out intent on giving him a very rough ride but didnt anticipate there was a possibility of actually killing him...negligence, yes, intentional murder, that would be impossible to prove unless officers turned on each other and placed all the blame on one in particular.

Edited May 1, 2015 by caulfield12

[LDF]

They were flat out intent on giving him a very rough ride but didnt anticipate there was a possibility of actually killing him...negligence, yes, intentional murder, that would be impossible to prove unless officers turned on each other and placed all the blame on one in particular.

 

i don't buy that, negligence vs intentional murder, i hate to get into the semantics of this, but they, the officers took it upon themselves to commit murder, when they walked that line of abuse. now, many, including lawyers will debate this in the upcoming months that it was negligence or unintentional, an accident. yes, however not for this, they, the PO crossed that line when he started on the road of police abuse. they knowingly broke the law of the land and murder was the result. there is no, oops i mean didn't mean that.

 

so let me emphasis this, they knowingly broke the law and this was the result.

[farmteam]

i don't buy that, negligence vs intentional murder, i hate to get into the semantics of this, but they, the officers took it upon themselves to commit murder, when they walked that line of abuse. now, many, including lawyers will debate this in the upcoming months that it was negligence or unintentional, an accident. yes, however not for this, they, the PO crossed that line when he started on the road of police abuse. they knowingly broke the law of the land and murder was the result. there is no, oops i mean didn't mean that.

 

so let me emphasis this, they knowingly broke the law and this was the result.

Depends on the Maryland statutes regarding reckless indifference. I could definitely seeing this being that, based on the generally agreed upon "rough ride" scenario. Just negligence won't cut it for murder.

 

[LDF]

Depends on the Maryland statutes regarding reckless indifference. I could definitely seeing this being that, based on the generally agreed upon "rough ride" scenario. Just negligence won't cut it for murder.

 

in a normal situation, i would agree, but they are PO's have more inherent responsibilities to protect the prisoner. they gave up that "reckless indifference" when they knowingly crossed that line, the line to break the law.

Edited May 1, 2015 by LDF

[greg775]

Not trying to make light of this, but CNN sending Geraldo Rivera to cover this is insane. People were yelling at him, pushing him. I'm really surprised somebody doesn't rip his toupee off his head. It would be legendary TV and in a riot I think that kind of behavior would be possible.

Not condoning it but I half expected the one kid yelling at him to rip that toupee off.