Ongoing U.S Police Brutality and Corruption Discussion Thread

weird. rookie cops in new york make a tiny fraction of that. in 2005 it was something like $22K. meaning they all commuted in from, like, nassau.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewdepietro/2020/04/23/police-officer-salary-state/

well i dunno - either it's really ballooned or the gulf between rookie salaries and the brass is huge (or both)

wow yeah - check this out:

https://www1.nyc.gov/site/nypd/careers/police-officers/po-benefits.page

one might THINK that higher salaries would attract a higher caliber of recruit...

That only works if they’re turning applicants away which I don’t think they are

imagine the sort of people who are enrolling as cops right now
either in real need of paying work or spectacularly idealistic or just brutal

this clip hits hard

Today in Charlotte cops arrested people who were providing support to protesters who were released from jail. Adding this to the list of reasons to #DefundThePolice. pic.twitter.com/xXyBgLHUPR

— nyc law grrrl (@nyclawgrrrl) June 19, 2020

this is a group performing the same work as my partner, right now - being there for people released out of jail, the second they walk out the door. the tweet describes this as "providing support to protesters", which may be accurate, but in all likelihood they are also providing support to ANYONE who is released, not just protesters. that includes people addicted to heroin who are in the middle of withdrawal when they're released and are absolutely desperate. the city, the state - they don't help these people when they get out of jail. in fact they often go out of their way to try to fuck them over on the way out by releasing them late at night, with no transportation running, after curfew, no money for a cab, etc.

and then when volunteer groups form to do the work that the state should be doing in the first place, this happens. it scares the shit out of me. i haven't heard of them doing this to any other jail support group yet, but goddamn fuck this

https://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/article243630107.html

“We’re doing this for your skin color. Are you f— blind?” a protester shouted at a Black sheriff’s deputy.

stfu, protester; you are not helping

yeah, i cringed at that, and not in the fun nathan fielder way.

but this part down below is a good description of why these jail support services are so important. this is a totally different group, but this almost exactly mirrors what i've seen with the chicago group, down to the original focus on protesters and quickly expanding to anyone released out of jail:

The jail support group had been outside the sheriff’s office on Fourth Street for weeks.

Charlotte Uprising originally started the group as a fund to help protesters bail out of jail if arrested while demonstrating in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death. More recently, the tables and tents have also become a supply station for protesters and a resource for people released from the county jail.

“Jail support provides so much for people,” ACLU activist Kristie Puckett-Williams told reporters Thursday. “It’s a welcome home party, letting them know that their lives matter. It’s also resources that they might not immediately have access to.”

Those resources include money, a ride, cigarettes, a hot meal, clothes, and access to a phone charger, Puckett-Williams said.

“This should be something that is happening all the time, not just during a protest,” she said.

i'm sure most of you are already familiar with this kind of jail support stuff. to me, it was a blind spot. the state should be doing this, not volunteers up in the middle of the night at 4am in a tent besides the county jail. i hope that these kinds of things are being considered in the wave of legislative pushes across the country right now

Those resources include money, a ride, cigarettes, a hot meal, clothes, and access to a phone charger, Puckett-Williams said.

the ride, in particular, is important. people that are released from jail are often left without any of their identification or belongings they had at the time. they might have been sent to a different police district, or seized as "evidence" and sent to the black hole of the incarceration system. often, the first thing someone needs to do is go on this crazy wild goose chase for their essential items, their keys, their license, whatever. And the people at the jail and police stations offer ZERO support. they're rude as fuck, they don't care. the released people call the police district that arrested them to inquire about their belongings, and more often than not they're just told "we don't have it, you could try checking here, here, or here. maybe." imagine being released with no belongings or money, and no support, at that moment, in the middle of the night.

anyway, what a rotten system, from cradle to grave

david brooks discussing frank wilderson's 'afropessimism' was not on my bingo card

holy shit, this seems awful. all three of these in the thread. it gets worse and worse

He was at his job as security
It was his second job
He was paying for school
Sheriffs rolled up & pulled out guns.
He ran scared.
They fired immediately.
They murdered him.
He was only 18.
His name is Andrés Guardado #DefundThePolice #killercops https://t.co/nInYExrCDO

— Memo Torres (@el_tragon_de_LA) June 19, 2020

the other two posts involve a cop smirking and laughing at the grieving family, and a nearby store owner showing how the cops broke all the security cameras at the scene

sorry, not "nearby store owner", i think that was the manager of the store where the kid was working security. :(

LASD are the worst of the worst. worse even than LAPD. just straight up criminals.

I'm sorry I've changed my mind, defunding the police is too risky

But by all means, let’s abolish the police! Would love to see a “social worker” take care of this one. https://t.co/EE2WPDKg2m

— Jason Lewis (@LewisForMN) June 19, 2020

Yeah, arrest that bear!

kuma police

not sure where to post this but there's been a fatal shooting in the CHAZ apparently. :-(

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/20/seattle-shooting-police-free-zone-chaz

Bear say Abolish the Police to Me

What's so frustrating about the CHAZ situation is that anything that happens there immediately gets surrounded by a web of disinformation, usually spread by the police, so it's very hard to get any idea of what actually happened. I'm not super hopeful that we'll find out who the shooter was or where they came from, since the cops have consistently lied about everything and they have a vested interest in implying that the shooter came from within the CHAZ.

an old injustice i hadn't heard about (from last August) is getting new attention:

More than a million people have signed an online petition calling for Aurora officials to reopen the investigation into the death of Elijah McClain — a 23-year-old unarmed black man who died in August following an encounter with Aurora police and paramedics.

The petition calls on Adams County District Attorney Dave Young, along with Mayor Mike Coffman and the Aurora Police Department, to “bring justice for Elijah,” by conducting “a more in-depth” investigation and removing the officers involved from duty....

McClain encountered police on Aug. 24 while on his way home from buying four cans of Brisk tea at a gas station in Aurora.

Officers put McClain, a Denver native and massage therapist in Aurora, in a chokehold and forced him on the ground for 15 minutes. McClain eventually began vomiting and complained he couldn’t breathe.

“There was a physical struggle,” former APD Chief Nick Metz said in October. “When (police) saw (McClain), they told him to stop. He wouldn’t stop. Again, he was wearing a ski mask, it’s 10:30 p.m. at night in a residential area, so obviously that creates some concern.”

At the time, Metz said that because McClain appeared to be in an “agitated mental state,” police requested backup from Aurora Fire paramedics, who injected McClain with the sedative ketamine to subdue his reported anxiety before driving him to a hospital.

McClain apparently suffered a heart attack, fell into a coma and died once taken off life support Aug. 30.

https://www.coloradopolitics.com/news/more-than-a-million-sign-petition-to-reopen-investigation-of-aurora-police-involvement-in-elijah/article_805cd174-a9ba-11ea-a0d3-affe65fb6dbc.html

online petition

Thought this was pretty devastating
https://www.adrianbrandon.com/stolen

i've been hearing about hearing HUGE fireworks at 2-3am almost every night
from lots of old nyc friends. lots of rumors that it was an organized thing to keep people awake in the middle of the night, and then of course lots of conspiracy theories and speculation about who was doing it (teenagers? cops? "government forces", etc)

saw this just now:

In West Harlem, 3am. NYPD putting on a show with fireworks in the background. @NYGovCuomo this is what they are paid for huh? pic.twitter.com/KKOhH5xyBl

— Jeo (@fromzerotojeo) June 22, 2020

any NYC people have any thoughts?

Sounds like psy-ops to me, which fits right in with the fucking counter-insurgency mindset among big city cops.

God it's crazy to see that footage after reading all those folks on Twitter yesterday absolutely screaming that it was impossible for this to be the cops.

lol i complained about that on the facebook neighborhood thread but in the space of 8 hours i'm beginning to believe in the conspiracy

It's fair, tbh. I have a powerful gut instinct to push back against conspiracy theories, esp when there are already enough idiots out there that love fireworks even when it isn't a year when they can be purchased dirt cheap, but that video seems pretty damning.

It’s like Peggy Olsen riding the Honda in an empty studio only not funny

In my neighborhood, the major ones are set off from the top of an apartment building just across the BQE. I wonder if there’s a way I can get a good look.

yeah, in the same "but not funny" way the cops' actions reminded me of a time i got really scared there was a mass shooting because i saw a bunch of cop cars from different agencies driving up a main urban street near me with lights on but later figured out it was the stupid "kinder time toy drive," an annual event that everyone forgets about until they have the same reaction

icymi, the nyc cops who went to shake shack never even got sick, everyone knew it, yet the police and their unions kept pushing it

interesting disparity between the url (how-nypd-faked-shake-shack-controversy-and-conspiracy-theory) and the headline (How conspiracy theories about the NYPD Shake Shack ‘poisoning’ blew up)

It was unclear why the sergeant and lieutenant escalated the situation.

Create a counter-narrative where instead of being the aggressors, cops were the victims.

the cms wouldn't let them change the slug and they were too lazy to rebuild it from scratch xp

aww covid got them jonesin bad for some good ol fashioned evidence planting huh xp

Report finds not one police department in the 20 largest American cities are compliant with international rights lawshttps://t.co/gysBJGax2z

— Jonathan "Boo and Vote" Cohn (@JonathanCohn) June 23, 2020

https://www.pix11.com/news/local-news/queens/man-with-samurai-sword-dead-after-police-deploy-taser-in-his-queens-basement

this is a cool tactic, when the data's available:

The person on the megaphone is searching up officers information on a web database and announcing how many complaints they have. #Chicago pic.twitter.com/P9njTxYuSE

— Tyler LaRiviere (@TylerLaRiviere) June 24, 2020

strong read
https://www.propublica.org/article/my-family-saw-a-police-car-hit-a-kid-on-halloween-then-i-learned-how-nypd-impunity-works

Has anyone seen a good article about whatever happened in Milwaukee yesterday? I've found a couple local stories, but they are either nearly incomprehensible or so strongly written to be in favor of the police that I can't make heads or tails about what might have actually went on. Something about a botched or half-assed police investigation into some missing girls that resulted in a suspect's house being burned down, three people shot and the girls being found again.

Wow, you really just went on TV and said that

For a moment I was like, ok Bob Kroll is gonna hide behind his normal friends. But never have I felt more "get the fuck out of my city" than when Sgt. Anna Hedberg talks about the dangers of grocery shopping in Minneapolis with her "two beautiful little girls." pic.twitter.com/K58HtbIdOK

— Wedge LIVE!™ (@WedgeLIVE) June 24, 2020

extremely disturbing re: cell phone data tracking protesters

NEW: A location data company monitored 16,902 devices at protest sites in 4 cities between May 29 and May 31.

The company then tried to predict protesters' race, age, gender, and whether they were outside agitators. Here's the story:https://t.co/Hfbi97vJGi

— Caroline Haskins (@carolineha_) June 25, 2020

what the hell is going on in Milwaukee jfc

https://medium.com/@streetlightalchemist/unheard-voices-are-police-participating-in-sex-trafficking-in-milwaukee-742880d1ac0f

On Tuesday night, the mother of one of the missing girls was able to ping the cellphone of one of the missing girls to a two story townhouse in Milwaukee. The mother, along with several others went to the property, in addition to calling police, who ignored them for 10 hours. An attempt at entry was made, and someone from within the house shot at the group, no injuries were reported. The shots were heard much louder than the phone call, and police arrived at the scene. The people within the home were taken into custody. Immediately after, the report from people on the ground starts to diverge from the police and media narrative.

WtFUCK!

I'm wary of Medium articles as they aren't well-vetted. I responded to a few tinfoil-hatty COVID articles on there a few months ago.

The sources in that Medium article are almost all Tweets, many of them secondhand, from people who weren't there (though some were from people who were reportedly there). And a lot of conclusions drawn seem a stretch based on what is known now.

I couldn't find many articles that didn't just repeat what the police said, and every other article, including this one, shows the situation is a confusing mess, where both sides can't even agree whether any victims were present in the house or if any sex trafficking was going on.

https://heavy.com/news/2020/06/watch-milwaukee-crowd-burns-down-suspected-sex-trafficking-house/

urbanmilwaukee.com seems to have the best coverage on this.

there were multiple units in the house - the people in the upstairs unit (probably not who the activists were looking for) made comments today: https://urbanmilwaukee.com/2020/06/25/residents-of-burned-home-speak-out/

This house has had 27 service calls over the last several years: https://urbanmilwaukee.com/2020/06/24/burned-home-had-27-police-service-calls/

and here's another: https://urbanmilwaukee.com/2020/06/24/activists-clean-up-around-burned-house-as-questions-remain/