Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Good cop to bad cop ratio

Hmm...my information says different. Perhaps you can post a link that shows the result of the survey that indicates most police want the public unarmed.

Hmm...my information says different. Perhaps you can post a link that shows the result of the survey that indicates most police want the public unarmed.

You're as stupid as you were when you joined the board. You don't like cops - everyone gets it. But don't try and explain very complex social behavior with your 3rd grade education.

Studies of employment applications show this is not the case. Just having an arrest show up on your background check,even if charges were dismissed or a person was found not guilty can decrease their LIFETIME income by 20%. this is becoming worse with the increased use of automated resume sorting.

Every-time a cop wrongly arrest a person they are significantly impairing their potential income, and more cops need to be held accountable for the damages incurred.

It is a huge deal and I often ask where is the accountability.

Yes there are ways to protect our civil liberties for huge screw-ups but what about the little things like an arrest? Some LE have said it is better to error on the side of safety so arrest now and ask questions later but what if overturned arrests went on their record?

Yes it's a tough job but you chose it and there are tougher jobs out there so son't jump on that soapbox. There needs to be some sort of checks and balances. I don't have the answers hence the reason for the thread. A badge does not create a hero but a hero can really make a badge shine.

if it's no better then a random sample of U.S citizenry, then your hiring practices suck and you need to pick up your game...

Just for the sake of the few that don't understand how things work....I make an arrest based on probable cause. The next step is to take the individual before a Magistrate. I then have to explain to the Magistrate the facts of my case and my probable cause to support the arrest. This is all under oath. You better have your ducks in a row, or the Magistrate will decline to issue an arrest warrant. In which case you will find your self taking the person back where you got them from and telling them that you're very sorry. Civil suit to follow. With felony arrests the case will also include a preliminary hearing followed by a grand jury indictment, if the facts of the case support it. Only then do you face a trial which requires proving guilt, beyond a reasonable doubt. Sometimes mistakes are made. There is a process for exspunging an improper arrest.

Oh Lord I could rant on with this one. Most hiring, around here anyway, have been horribly politically driven. The city must have more * (insert special class here) officers to satisfy the political winds.

Sometime it can be a reasonable special consideration; such as if you a large and growing X community it might be a good idea to hire more X officers, especially if there are significant language, custom, and racial features. You may lucky and get great people. But sometimes in the rush to satisfy a quota a few less than stellar ones get through the screening process.

So, yes, Antelope Sniper, a lot of civilian hiring practices suck.

Don't get me started on training.

RG,

Sorry to hear that. However, upon reflection, I really shouldn't be surprised. Around here, many of the cops are real bullies, and many of those fit into the (insert special status here) category. There's also seem to be a few too many who fit into the "stupid bully' category. Ask them a question requiring more then two brain cells and they default to threatening to arrest you.

In this state the respect for LEO's is further degraded by some of the idiotic laws passed by our lawmakers, think magazine bans etc. As a result, if you are a non-fud member of the shooting community in this state, all LEO's must be held with some level of suspicion. The fault for this may lie with the politicians, but that doesn't change the level of damage done to the level of trust the shooting community hold for those nominally tasked with enforcing these laws.

Maybe in MA.........

Unfortunately the time and cost isn't paid for by the person making the mistakes.

The last time I was given a ticket it took me three days of missed work and lots of miles to get it dismissed. If I would have hired an attorney it would have been at my expense. I'm out time and money, cop is getting paid to lie under oath and the public is getting hosed for wasted tax payer money.
At the end of it all the cop gets his butt chewed by the judge and the judge apologized to me right in the courtroom but no other repercussions at all.

It happens all to often around here.

White Bear, I'm pretty sure that there is very little that I can say that you'd be satisfied with. It's clear to me that you've been victimized by the police and chances are good that you'll never get past it. Now, if in fact a cop lied under oath as you allege, it should be easy to prove. On my department that would be grounds for immediate dismissal. Period! It's called General Order Number 1. If you ever lie about anything and it's proven you're gone, immediately. Our integrity and credibility is valued way above any one officer. Everyone knows it. Doesn't matter what the lie involves, it's the fact that you did it. You're gone! I'm pretty sure most departments are similar. If the officer lied and was called on it in court by the Judge, nothing he says going forward can be trusted. The district attorney/ prosecutor would never put an officer on the stand with a history of lying. I suggest you ensure that this information is known publicly and discuss it at minimum with the agency involved. Or, you could just complain about it here.

I stand corrected and am glad I was in the employment lines at a time when things weren't always like this.

As to bobmar's comment about my youth and not having encountered a crooked cop and the subsequent effect on my career, it is true.

When I was young and stupid, I was not saint, by a long shot, just fortunate to not get caught. Perhaps that's why I have tried to be fair throughout my career.

As I used to teach Academy students, they possess more power over the average citizen than even the President. They can kill with their weapons, or they can destroy someone's life and their families life with their pen. It's a tremendous responsibility, particularly when a PD gives it to people with little life experience.

Ed

Most cops around my hometown are ex mil M-Ps.

100% douchebags with yankee attitudes

Naw Bobmar, I'm not one to hold a grudge. I let things go and usually too easily. Myself being "victimized" ( I never thought of it that way) is long gone and I can laugh about it now. I have no worries or fears in this world. Many people can't say that. My post wasn't a cry for compassion from others rather a request for information. I see too many people pushed around by authority figures because of lack of information on both sides.

GON 1..... I wish... If you read the end of my original post you can see the examples I used. Little to no consequences. I have no axe to grind. Many of us here on the CF complain about crooked politicians although they all cant be bad. I guess this falls into the same category for me.

Maybe we need a pitt bull thread to cool things off for our resident LE.
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.Edit to add that I have some very close friends and family that are LEO. I also very much respect the good cops on here.

Ed,

It's nice to hear from the cops who "get it". I think you hit on one of the great conundrums of police work. It required the body of a young man, but the wisdom of someone much older.

I think you hit on one of the great conundrums of police work. It required the body of a young man, but the wisdom of someone much older.

Sniper,
I couldn't agree more with that statement. I became a cop as a second career. I had been in the Coast Guard for 26 years and was in my mid 40's. I had learned a lot about dealing with people and difficult situations in my first career. It made dealing with those issues as a cop, much easier. It was experience and wisdom my younger counterparts didn't have. It wasn't their fault but you can only learn so much in 25-30 years. I don't know if I could have done the job at that age. I certainly didn't have the patience then that I do now. There's a lot to be said for youth though and it is a young mans job, physically. On my 50th birthday, I did 50 pushups, 50 sit-ups and ran 5 miles in 40 minutes. I've done it on my birthday every year since. I figure as long as I can keep that up, I'm ok. But there's no way I want to be on the street beyond 60. By then, I'm pretty sure I will have had enough.

I never made an arrest that I did not have Probable Cause to make. I preferred to present my case to the state's attorney and let them decide if I had enough Probable Cause to make an arrest. I really don't understand you guys who say you were arrested for something you didn't do, and they (LE) let you go. So then you would indeed have an arrest on your Criminal History. Off to the side of the arrest the result would be given (convicted - 10 yrs, conviction probation 10 - years) or nothing meaning the case was dropped.[i][/i] If you were falsely imprisoned that is one hell of a lawsuit you could file. Included in the damages are court costs, attorney fees and money lost being away from your job. In my career as a Law Enforcement Officer I found that most attorneys that worked in the defensive criminal system automatically assumed LE Officers lied on the stand. (They call it testilying). As a Law Enforcement Officer, once caught on the stand committing perjury, your career as a cop was done. A cop's integrity is the centerpiece of his/her existence as a cop. Once your integrity is lost because you were caught lying on the stand the state can never again use you to present evidence or testify to anything, because the defense attorney's next question would be "Officer, you were convicted of perjury on (date), is that not correct? Then why should anyone in here believe anything you have to say?" Seriously guys, as rampant you may think police corruption is today, it is NOTHING like it was before continuous supervisory presence in the form of the car cams and your body cam, and the dozens of phones that pop out as soon as the police begin to do anything official, from a traffic stop to raiding a Meth lab. News stations pay big money for recordings of a police officer abusing his/her authority - the worse the officer violated his/her oath the more the recording is worth.

Myself, I wouldn't call it rampant. I do believe from personal experience that an individual needs to know their rights and exercise them when necessary. Maybe that's the Libertarian in me....
I have not bashed cops on here. I have praised the good honest LEO. If anyone is offended by my statements, maybe it's time for a little self-reflection.

OK, I'm offended and, to make up for it, I need to shake your hand, buy you a cold beverage of your choice, and figure out how you're going to compensate for my being offended.


Seriously, I get it that there are bad cops, I get it that bad things happen to good people that could have, should have been prevented, but weren't. The vast majority of cops want to see the corruption and brutality eliminated just as much as the non-LEO's do, if not more.

It makes it exponentially harder for a good cop to do his job when the public doesn't trust them or just outright hates them. We cannot do our jobs without help from the citizens we serve.

To have some bozo like that Utah cop violate the nurse's rights and then his supervisor backs him up, makes every cops job tougher, even those who don't work in that state. This thread is a perfect example of that.

One poster, maybe in this thread, said that it's time to stop this Gestapo crap. Yes, it's wrong, yes he screwed the pooch as did his supervisor, but the Gestapo would not have waited for the nurse to go through all of the hoops, nor would they have waited for anything. Either the blood would have been drawn as soon as they walked through the door or someone would go to jail after having the crap beat out of them.

It's bad, it should have never happened but it's not Gestapo tactics. People have no idea what life is really like under a despotic government. No need to exaggerate like hormonal teenagers.

Ed

Ed. To a gentleman and true professional as yourself I would accept that beverage and hand shake but don't think that you would ever get ahead on the count.
I will and have put my life on the line for good people. You are on my list. Good day sir.