Ongoing U.S Police Brutality and Corruption Discussion Thread

A long-time Seattle City Councilmember and former Council President is running for Mayor with police reform as one of his platform planks.

Last week, he revealed this plank with an announcement that it is one of his highest priorities, and detailed his reform policy.

"The other day, I watched the 8 minutes and 46 seconds of George Floyd's murder, and I'm going to ask voluntarily that every sworn police officer watch that 8 minutes and 46-second video, and I'm going to ask them to sign a statement that says —a very simple statement— that The Inhumane Treatment Of Fellow Human Beings Will Not Be Tolerated In Seattle."

lol he’s got Swiss cheese boomer brain

Don’t leave “mayor for five days after the child rapist resigned in disgrace” off his list of accomplishments!!

imo quitting ASAP is a point in his favour

Yesterday, he followed up with further details of how he intends to root-and-stem reform a police department that has been under a consent decree from the DOJ for *checks watch* nine years without achieving reform:

Harrell explained that SPD culture change will start by identifying "20 to 30" informal leaders; people in an organization who say "what's tolerated or not" and "what's cool or uncool."

To further this mission, I will work to personally recruit officers looking to be internal change agents, heroes within the department to help coach, train, love and inspire our officers to be the department we all deserve.

Having thus achieved internal change, he has a concrete plan to sustain it through positive reinforcement:

"If today an African American was not shot at the hands of police we're gonna celebrate today," Harrell said. "And every Friday we're gonna celebrate."

Because it would be unfair to deprive the reformed department of a weekly party if they only manage to not murder a Black person 2 days, 5 days, or 0 days per week.

He's also going to determine, "for the first time", how to address institutional racism "With the assistance of experts in technology, the developer community, data mining and the use of test cases".

Really giving Goodspaceguy a run for his money

Due to preference trading, a dude just got elected to the Western Australian state senate equivalent on the single issue of introducing daylight saving, with a total of 98 votes, before revealing that he lives in Seattle. Perhaps we can set up a job swap with Goodspaceguy.

prosecution doing decent job in chauvin trial, but i get a pit in my stomach a few times daily

it's really hard to watch

Having had a run-in with the Seattle PD when I was younger and living a life of crime, I can attest to their racism first-hand. Won't go into it more than that.

and another thing: Bruce isn't butthurt. Please put his op-ed in the paper saying he's not butthurt.

I don’t take issue with anyone questioning my proposals – there is always room for dialogue and improvement. But I do believe that selectively ridiculing these two out-of-the-box calls for culture change without including the voices of people who may support them comes from a place of privilege.

Who knows better how ineffective reform efforts have been on the entrenched racism of the SPD than someone who personally failed to reform it and continued to fund it for the past decade? In conclusion, please elect me to continue to fully fund, and pass actively useless laws to reform, the police.

To keep doing the same thing – or to focus only on punitive actions like arbitrary defunding – is to perpetuate an SPD mired in dysfunction, clinging to outmoded and racially biased norms, and led by individuals motivated by fear and division, not unity and commitment to change.

We know this because we live it: Despite a decade of Department of Justice oversight, citizen police commission review, passage of statewide de-escalation mandates, and even the anti-bias laws I passed during my City Council tenure, the culture at SPD has not changed. We still see Black and Brown Seattle residents victimized, we still see foot-dragging and refusal to adopt basic reforms.

13 year old who still played with Hot Wheels killed by pigs.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/02/us/chicago-police-shooting/index.html

this just aired recently on pbs
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/blinding-isaac-woodard/

the upshot of it was: Woodard was a uniquely powerful witness and spokesperson against racist cops because instead of murdering him, the cops merely blinded him for ... not saying "yes, sir" and before that "insisting politely that the greyhound bus driver (white) stop at the next town so he could go to the bathroom

https://theintercept.com/2021/04/05/police-shot-k9-dog-arlo-gofundme/

that is fucking ridiculous

i wonder how 73k for a dog (that they shot) stacks up against some of the human rights violation settlements Washington PD has made

https://wtop.com/montgomery-county/2021/04/pentagon-officer-charged-with-murder-in-takoma-park-shooting-that-left-2-dead/

BREAKING: Officer Kim Potter resigns after fatally shooting Daunte Wrighthttps://t.co/ozkSlSADAx

— Axios (@axios) April 13, 2021

'Every minute'

BREAKING: Brooklyn Center police officer Kim Potter has resigned effective immediately. The information comes from the police union representing the department's officers. Here's Potter's resignation letter #DaunteWright #wcco pic.twitter.com/yvSQ68sk2T

— Jennifer Mayerle (@jennifermayerle) April 13, 2021

I'm tired

it's hardly the real problem here but as a publicist it amazes me they don't take five minutes to give those kind of public statements to a crisis management agent to make sure they don't read "i've enjoyed my time murdering people here but i'm making the spot hot so i gotta jet"

Notably the police chief resigned as well, which given his own disaster of a press conference, well.

Just now:

The officer who shot and killed Daunte Wright has been charged with second degree manslaughter. Kim Potter submitted her resignation yesterday. The charge carries a maximum of up to 10 years in prison. #DaunteWright

— Omar Jimenez (@OmarJimenez) April 14, 2021

"Slash their tires so they can't drive away if you need to!" Cops in Minnesota created a warzone-like state and arrested #DaunteWright protesters, along with media covering the events in a highly disturbing night.– @JonFarinaPhoto fearlessly reports. pic.twitter.com/j12eUW3BrC

— Status Coup News (@StatusCoup) April 14, 2021

they are doing such a great job handling this latest killing by a police

"trooper-involved" "ended in the death"

DEVELOPING: Maryland State Police are investigating a trooper-involved fatal shooting in Leonardtown that ended in the death of a 16-year-old. https://t.co/cBOXVGQ2Dk

— ABC News (@ABC) April 14, 2021

at least the headline says it so why not say the same thing in the tweet

cop-speak is the worst. what was the one case where they shot and killed someone and the official line was "the deceased was killed by a bullet"

Things could escalate in Chicago today.

BREAKING: The video of Adam Toledo will be released at 2:30pm today, according to Mayor Lori Lightfoot

— Eileen O’Gorman (@Eileen_OGorman) April 15, 2021

More context:

Chicago is releasing bodycam video of the police killing of #AdamToledo, who was a 13-year-old boy.

Police claim there was an "armed confrontation" and shot him in the chest. The mayor says she saw "no evidence whatsoever" that Toledo shot at police.

(Photo: Elizabeth Toledo) pic.twitter.com/RuqToA9z5X

— AJ+ (@ajplus) April 15, 2021

btw, word is already going out around here - please do NOT share that video, once it's public

please.

Police claim there was an "armed confrontation"

Police are perfectly capable of characterizing having a small rock thrown at them from a distance as an "armed confrontation".

chauvin case wrapped up testimony, closing statements monday

Hands up, as the officer instructed.

toledo footage is exactly as bad as you'd expect.

Fuck the police.

I just have no idea what to say beyond “I’m worried about early next week.”

(I haven’t watched any of these videos.)

For any of you who want to know about what the video of Adam Toledo shows but do not want to see the video or any images of it, we've created that version of the story for you. @BlockClubCHI https://t.co/ewFHDT4d5H

— Dawn Rhodes 😷 (@rhodes_dawn) April 15, 2021

murder

FFS there is no end to this shit

By the way, remember when police departments were caught using cutouts of kids and pregnant women for target practice? The line of targets was called "no more hesitation."

This is what "no hesitation" policing gets you.https://t.co/RSGVICbnbd pic.twitter.com/4pULHk68GG

— Radley Balko (@radleybalko) April 15, 2021

Fucking sickening

The cop who shoots pictures of his own children... pic.twitter.com/fmr8AL7WcC

— Cameron (@ComfortableCam) April 15, 2021

Chris Benoit Police Training Method

fucking chickenshit headline writers "appears to show" toledo with his hands raised fuck you

no bump to this thread?!?!? i realize the work is just beginning but it seems worth noting
guilty guilty guilty

i've seen people wondering exactly how and where and with whom he'll be incarcerated -- and how he'll survive

and you know, fuck him forever; i will never ever shed a tear about his fate. but also it is pretty fucked up how we accept the twisted logic of prisons

He’ll survive in protective custody, probably getting treated like a king by the guards.

xxp decent amount of discussion in US politics thread. grateful for this verdict, as stated by many, not 'justice' but some accountability at long last. george floyd square was mellow, solemn, and celebratory tonight. hope the cops don't riot tonight, since they instigate almost all violence here and everywhere