"The officer involved will face no charges" - Police thread

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > "The officer involved will face no charges" - Police thread

Zeitgueist: Aug 8, 2003; by Ralp

Detroit police officer who killed sleeping seven-year-old no longer facing charges

"The Guardian posted:

Authorities won�t pursue a third trial of a Detroit police officer who fatally shot a seven-year-old girl during a night-time raid that was filmed by a reality-TV show, a prosecutor said on Wednesday.

Aiyana Stanley-Jones�s mother has been notified that Wayne County prosecutor Kym Worthy will move on Friday to dismiss the only remaining charge against Joseph Weekley, a misdemeanor count of reckless use of a firearm.

The girl was shot in the head while she slept on a living room couch in May 2010. Police were accompanied by a camera crew from The First 48, which recorded it from the outside, not inside where Aiyana was killed. The shooting was not considered intentional.

Weekley�s first trial ended without a verdict in June 2013. His second ended in October with a hung jury. During it, the presiding judge dismissed a charge of involuntary manslaughter.

Worthy called it �unfortunate� that Judge Cynthia Gray Hathaway dismissed the felony manslaughter charge, leaving only the misdemeanor count. It carries a maximum punishment of two years in prison.

�Under the law, her decision cannot be appealed,� Worthy said in a statement.

Aiyana�s grandmother, Mertilla Jones, said in a statement on Wednesday that �it feels like the system� failed their family.

Jones called Gray Hathaway�s dismissal of the manslaughter charge �even more insidious, given the fact that a seven-year-old child was killed while she was sleeping�.

Weekley�s attorney, Steve Fishman, said the prosecutor�s decision was �courageous� and �a correct one�.

The disappeared: Chicago police detain Americans at abuse-laden 'black site'link

quote:

The Chicago police department operates an off-the-books interrogation compound, rendering Americans unable to be found by family or attorneys while locked inside what lawyers say is the domestic equivalent of a CIA black site.

The facility, a nondescript warehouse on Chicago�s west side known as Homan Square, has long been the scene of secretive work by special police units. Interviews with local attorneys and one protester who spent the better part of a day shackled in Homan Square describe operations that deny access to basic constitutional rights.

Alleged police practices at Homan Square, according to those familiar with the facility who spoke out to the Guardian after its investigation into Chicago police abuse, include:

Keeping arrestees out of official booking databases.

Beating by police, resulting in head wounds.

Shackling for prolonged periods.

Denying attorneys access to the �secure� facility.

Holding people without legal counsel for between 12 and 24 hours, including people as young as 15.

At least one man was found unresponsive in a Homan Square �interview room� and later pronounced dead.

From the previous Police Reform thread(credit SedanChair):

Policing is broken in the United States. Instead of carrying out their purported mission "to protect and serve," police are encouraged to adopt a suspicious, adversarial mindset toward citizens. Unaccountable police unions defend their actions, however extreme. Departments use Homeland Security funds to requisition ever-escalating levels of military equipment, including LRAD sound weapons and mine-resistant MRAP armored vehicles.

This is a thread to post and discuss police abuses and essential reforms to policing.

Police Unions

Unions are good. However, when unions are used to shield the actions of a body empowered to use deadly force in the course of detaining citizens, abuse is the inevitable result.

Community Policing

This is a vaguely defined term we see a lot. Police should be encouraged to walk beats instead of cruising through them, to think about solving problems in ways other than making arrests, and to live in the communities where they work.

Community Oversight

quote:

On one side of the debate, there are those who assert that internal review and control is the only way to manage the problem of misconduct. Basically, they argue that the involvement of citizens without intimate knowledge of law enforcement procedures and legal limitations will only muddle the review process. As professionals, law enforcement administrators must be held accountable for training and discipline to prevent misconduct. They must remain above the political fray in order to ensure their freedom from the vagaries of political influences. In any case, other avenues of review or redress, such as civil litigation, legislative investigative powers, and the mass media, already exist. In an era of fiscal conservatism, citizen review appears to be an expensive extralegal appendage to the existing system of internal investigations.

Yet those on the other side argue that under democratic systems of checks and balances, no one should be left to judge him- or herself. The wide-ranging powers and discretion of law enforcement officers and their vital position as gatekeepers of the criminal justice system make it imperative that members of the public have a means of redress if officers abuse their powers and seek protection from scrutiny behind the so-called blue wall of silence. As such, bringing an external, community-based perspective to the problem of law enforcement review will promote positive behavior, ensure greater accountability, and deter malpractice.

Each of these opposing arguments has a place in this important debate.

No they don't. Leaving all review up to internal processes is a guaranteed recipe for corruption and impunity. Community oversight boards need the power to fire officers. This is tied to the power of police unions.

Always-on Body Cameras

As seen from the Williams shooting footage above, dash cameras can provide valuable evidence of police abuse. The ubiquity of camera phones is also a valuable tool to protect citizens; police know this and often try to destroy the evidence collected by them.

Please post the following: