this post was submitted on 24 May 2024
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THE POLICE PROBLEM
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The police problem is that police are policed by the police. Cops are accountable only to other cops, which is no accountability at all.
99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.
When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.
When police are fired — which is all too rare — they leave with 'law enforcement experience' and can easily find work in another police department nearby. It's called "Wandering Cops."
When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.
Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.
The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.
All this is a path to a police state.
In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.
Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.
That's the solution.
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Our definition of ‘cops’ is broad, and includes prison guards, probation officers, shitty DAs and judges, etc — anyone who has the authority to fuck over people’s lives, with minimal or no oversight.
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• A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions
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• Killings by law enforcement in Canada
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• Know your rights: Filming the police
• Three words. 70 cases. The tragic history of 'I can’t breathe' (as of 2020)
• Police aren't primarily about helping you or solving crimes.
• Police lie under oath, a lot
• Police spin: An object lesson in Copspeak
• Police unions and arbitrators keep abusive cops on the street
• Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States
• So you wanna be a cop?
• When the police knock on your door
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Because all cops are bastards. The system is working as intended.
There was a case here in Sweden where the Swedish police was tipped off on a potential paedophile by an American agency that had trawled through Yahoo email and found suspected CSAM. Swedish Police essentially swatted this man, assaulted him early in the morning, while he was in his bed sleeping, took him away without telling him what was going on; he thought he was being kidnapped. Eventually when it was made clear that the materials were private photos of him and his 30 year old boyfriend getting it on, they faced no repercussions.
The reasoning behind it? The police were masked so they couldn't single out who was responsible for the assault. Of course they knew who was present, but since they didn't know the actual perps it'd be unfair to investigate properly because that'd put them all under unfair suspicion, and it obviously wouldn't be reasonable to punish all of the police present.
But it's perfectly okay to beat the shit out of someone they think is a paedophile, and honestly it's probably because he's of middle-eastern descent.
I've tried and failed to find an article telling this story. Do you have a link?
It honestly wasn't as covered as it ought have been. SVT has a couple of articles, as well as an outlet called Kontext Press.
There's also three articles on Kontext. I hadn't heard of Kontext before, and was thus rather suspicious of the whole thing; it all sounds too American to be true. SVT however is a very reputable source.
It's all in Swedish. I've tried and failed to locate sources in English before. This event wasn't reported on nearly as much as I personally would've liked to see. My impression of Swedish police has always been a positive one, but this kind of thing is beyond unforgivable.
Please don't spread misinformation.
Knock yourself out, sweaty.
that's not all cops, not even close.
All cops participate in a system of state-sponsored cruelty, racism, corruption, and violence. Their purpose is to suppress minorities and the poor in the interest of capital. Any cop who participates in this system is culpable for its outcomes even if they personally did not engage in unlawful or cruel behavior.
So yes, all cops are bastards.
I'm not sure by now but I used to think that some of fresh cops may be all right and they usually get removed from cops soon.
At least, I can imagine how one can want to do good until they're shown and/or involved in the actual crap on their first day or month of work.
I know of non-US corrupt police practices that boils down to "order something illegal to be done in a group with a newbie". If ey refuse it's goodbye immediately, if ey agree however reluctant ey is already a criminal and if something happens ey can get accused and get a jail. This makes every cop a possible target and they are very loyal out of fear, it seems