this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2023
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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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ALLIES

• !abolition@slrpnk.net

• !acab@lemmygrad.ml

• r/ACAB

• r/BadCopNoDonut/

• Randy Balko

• The Civil Rights Lawyer

• The Honest Courtesan

• Identity Project

• MirandaWarning.org

♦ ♦ ♦

INFO

• A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions

• Adultification

• Cops aren't supposed to be smart

• Don't talk to the police.

• Killings by law enforcement in Canada

• Killings by law enforcement in the United Kingdom

• Killings by law enforcement in the United States

• 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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ORGANIZATIONS

• Black Lives Matter

• Campaign Zero

• Innocence Project

• The Marshall Project

• Movement Law Lab

• NAACP

• National Police Accountability Project

• Say Their Names

• Vera: Ending Mass Incarceration

 

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283
New Mexico police fatally shot her husband after they went to the wrong house — then detained her for hours (www.nbcnews.com)
submitted 1 year ago by DougHolland@lemmy.world to c/thepoliceproblem@lemmy.world
24 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

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The wife of an armed New Mexico homeowner whom police officers fatally shot when they went to the wrong house on a domestic violence call said she was treated like a suspect, detained for hours and given few details about why officers gunned down her husband.

Months later, the Farmington Police Department still hasn’t reached out to Kim Dotson or her family since police killed Robert Dotson, 52, on April 5, she said.

She said in an interview Wednesday that she learned the officers had knocked on the wrong door that night only because her son is a police officer in the area and was able to read the dispatch log.

“I feel helpless the way all of this has happened,” said Dotson, 49, a former trauma nurse, who said she quit the profession after she tended to her husband when he was shot multiple times in the doorway of their home.

“I don’t understand how these guys get to go home to their families and they broke apart our family,” she said.

“We didn’t do anything wrong.”

Unaware that it was police officers who had opened fire, Dotson said, she returned fire — and the officers shot 19 more times into her home, according to a civil rights suit her family filed in federal district court Friday.

She was uninjured and hasn’t faced charges. …

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[–] SuddenlyBlowGreen@lemmy.world 49 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

The wife of an armed New Mexico homeowner whom police officers fatally shot when they went to the wrong house on a domestic violence call said she was treated like a suspect, detained for hours and given few details about why officers gunned down her husband.

Months later, the Farmington Police Department still hasn’t reached out to Kim Dotson or her family since police killed Robert Dotson, 52, on April 5, she said.

She said in an interview Wednesday that she learned the officers had knocked on the wrong door that night only because her son is a police officer in the area and was able to read the dispatch log.

So they tried to cover it up.

[–] DougHolland@lemmy.world 29 points 1 year ago

A recurring theme in police misconduct.

[–] Th4tGuyII@kbin.social 33 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Be me, police officer, responding to domestic violence charge

Find house, looks close enough, start knocking

Radio says it's the wrong address, nothing going on here. Stay anyway

Innocent old man fearing for his life seeing the gang outside answers his door holding a gun.

Tell the guy to put his hands u-

HE DIDN'T PUT HIS HANDS UP IMMEDIATELY! FIRE, FIRE!

Scared and traumatised wife doesn't realise we're the good guys.

She picked up his gun and returned fire. NO TIME TO EXPLAIN! FIRE, FIRE!

She realise we police, stops firing. Oh right, this was the wrong address. We can go now.

Well done boys, time to head back to the station, suck up some doughnuts, and get that paid administrative leave

We investigated ourselves and found no wrong doing.

[–] reverendsteveii@lemm.ee 32 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You don't have to do anything wrong for the cops to just show up at your house and fucking kill you. This guy. Bo Jean. Breonna Taylor. Daniel Shaver. Austin Haley was 5 years old when a cop shot him in the head and killed him. The cop was trying to get a snake out of a bird house. It wasn't a high risk situation with a violent criminal, they just don't care.

[–] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Surprised to see Daniel Shaver mentioned, he usually gets skipped. Also Duncan Lemp, and The Weavers (Ruby Ridge, which, after they entrapped Randy and bungled the investigation by sniping his son, dog, and wife while she was holding their baby, they decided to show their "prowess" by burning a bunch of kids in Waco,) Philando Castille, and MORE!

[–] wintermute_oregon@lemm.ee 8 points 1 year ago

At ruby ridge, a fbi agent was killed and the government lost the case for his death. That’s how bad the government agents acted that day

[–] reverendsteveii@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I don't agree that Randy Weaver was entrapped, but they absolutely fucked the rest of that up very badly.

[–] Madison420@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Definitely not entrapped, they attempted it certainly but he was already cm violating federal arms laws they were just trying to get more evidence. It was a shit show and three letter agencies do tend to be straight lying cunts but that much they weren't lying about.

[–] wintermute_oregon@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago

It’s a thin line. I personally think they crossed the line with weaver.

[–] gullible@kbin.social 27 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I make a minor faux pas and ruminate on it for a decade. How does one live after taking a life entirely in error? How do we allow this to happen more than once?

[–] DougHolland@lemmy.world 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Oh, thanks for this. It's something I've wondered too, though I hadn't put it into words.

When I fuck something up, I feel awful about it. I apologize. I try to make it right — and none of my stupidities have killed anyone.

How can cops care so little?

[–] snooggums@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago

Lack of empathy.

[–] wintermute_oregon@lemm.ee 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

They justify it because he was armed.

Yet we have the 2nd amendment here. It was his home.

Cops are quick to shoot. That’s a problem.

ETA: the standard is police can use deadly force to stop a threat. That means they’re in danger or someone else is. Yet they seem to see gun and shoot. We are an armed society and just seeing a gun shouldn’t cause anyone to panic.

We need a more narrow defined threat.

Im more conservative and philando Castille shows how fucked up our system is. The cop should have never shot. Both sides should have rioted over that case. That to me showed how badly we need reform

[–] SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social 27 points 1 year ago

If you're not angry enough, note that the officers knew that they were at the wrong address, and greased the guy, anyway.

[–] deft@ttrpg.network 16 points 1 year ago

Cops need to see the chair for this behavior. I don't give a fuck if it effects their abilities to do their job cause guess the fuck what! They ain't doing their job anyway.

[–] BigCow@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I really don't understand the complacency that exists in America for this kind of behavior. Police are trained to have a license to kill, every other profession this big of a duck up and your license would be revoked. I do also have empathy for Police because they are really good at their job to police(you know busting down doors shooting bad guys)....but that's not all they are responsible for and they get sloppy at their job. Traffic violations should be handled by department of transportation. Someone who is in need of help due to drugs or being in manic state should have mental health professional and/or medical response....I could go on. Also look at all the other countries in the world who are still able to police their population without decking out their officers with a full arsenal.

[–] snooggums@kbin.social 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

They are not trained.

They just do whatever they want.

[–] SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social 9 points 1 year ago

"Killology" is training, though.

[–] _cnt0@feddit.de 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

When reading stuff like this I always have to think about Overlord and the Browns motto: Kill first, jump up and down on the carcass later.

When have the police devolved into minions of evil?

[–] douglasg14b@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

When we stopped holding them accountable?