RoR: Forum

Not All Cops are Opportunistic Bullies, Just Too Many.

A year later, it was almost 9PM when the public bathrooms close in NYC parks. I was in the Village, so I ran one block to the Washington Square Park urinals. I ran past a cop car on the way. Again, the lights and sirens. I stood there jumping up and down holding my crotch about ready to wet myself while the cops threw the contents of my pockets, my radio and valuables on the ground. Again, I asked why I was being stopped. The said they had a "description of a white guy in the area." Imagine that, a white guy in Greenwich Village. What a bizarre coincidence! They let me go. But the restroom was now locked. So I peed in the corner, and was left to do so unmolested.

Although I am white, with blue eyes and a ponytail, I speak fluent Spanish. In early 1996 I was working at night, living in the South Bronx, (effectively a neighborhood of Spanish Harlem,) when a local trouble-maker attempted to pick my pocket. I did have $500 dollars in one pocket, but he picked my empty wallet out of the other. I didn’t immediately notice that the wallet was gone. When he bumped me I had patted my cash by habit and thought nothing of it. The bodega manager, who ran me a tab, (a bodega is a small private general store) told me what had happened. I thanked him and calmly took my money and my dinner home. I went back out looking for the pick-pocket. I found him back at the same bodega (with cash he’d have been off to buy smack) and I went up to him without a word and patted him down. He pulled a pair of scissors on me. The bodega owner feared we might topple his shelves. We took it outside. I said, go ahead, but kill me with the first stab, or I will kill you. I got the wallet back, with a lot of noise, but I got it back.

It wasn’t that the wallet was of any value. Rather, I knew that if word got out that I could be robbed, then I would be robbed, repeatedly, probably to death. The following day I went to the local police station to file a complaint. I had called them the night before, but after pulling up in front of my building, they went away without ringing my bell. (Think U.N.) The officer at the desk basically asked me why "a person like you" was living in that neighborhood. Later that evening, I got a knock on my door from someone I didn't know. He said he was one of the dealers who ran the drugs on the block. He gave me his card. He told me he didn’t like trouble, and told me to come to him if I had any other trouble. His card had two phone numbers on it. In 1996, that was impressive.

In 2002, I was living in Inwood, the very upper tip of Manhattan. It was just after 11PM, which I know because the Simpson’s had just started on Fox. I heard a loud bang in the hallway that sounded as if someone had dropped a hundred pound metal plate on the floor outside my apartment. The thought occurred that it was a gunshot, but I said no, and went back to watching the show. I heard what sounded like a woman cursing in Spanish, and then again, and this time knew, another gunshot. I called 911. They said that it had already been reported, to stay inside and the police would knock. Within 9o seconds the building was crawling with police. I heard a knock at my door. There were two police officers, crouched, guns pointed at my face. I had answered with my hands up. I said I had called it in. They said they knew (they had my address from 911, apparently) asked if I was okay, which I was, for the circumstances. They said stay inside, someone would knock in ten minutes. I waited, and two detectives right out of NYPD Blue, a fat Italian guy and a sexy Puerto Rican lady in street clothes knocked on my door and asked to come in. I could see down the hall that the shooting was across from me, two doors down. They asked my name, what I’d heard. I said that I thought it was a lady cursing in Spanish between the shots. I said, “So he finally killed her?” They said no, he was dead.

(End Part II)

Ted Keer, 10 November, 2006

(Edited by Ted Keer
on 11/10, 11:40pm)

Post 21

Friday, November 10, 2006 - 11:29pm

And All Good Cops are Underpaid

I did not know the poor gentleman who had so recently lived across the hall from me. I knew him from his two dogs which were his pride and joy and which I liked to pet in the elevator when he took them out on walks. Most of the time he was accompanied by his two young sons, probably six and eight years old, who scampered about while the dogs strutted dignifiedly down the street with the deceased following along as if he were on the leash. A week before the shooting, I had seen him, the boys, the dogs, and a woman whom I assumed to be his wife a block from our building. The boys were scampering and the dogs were strutting as usual. He was dutifully being dragged along behind and she was alternately berating him in one ear then, as he turned to avoid her abuse, she trotted around to the other ear and began deafening that one in turn. I watched them approach from a block away, thinking that someone was going to trip and get tangled up in the leashes, or to be more honest, I thought he was going to trip her on purpose. I had never seen such a look on a married man’s face. My exact and literal final thought as we passed and I saw him for the last time was that someday he was going to kill her.

Well, just one week later the marriage was over, but it was not with the settlement that I had expected. I found out from neighbors that they had long been separated. The boys only visited him, hence our encounters always on the elevator with the dogs. She was a harpy. She bought the gun. She came over and shot him to death unprovoked. She left the dogs alone with his dead body on the floor and it was her whom I had heard flee past my door down the stairs beside my apartment seconds after the second shot. She fled the country, most likely to the Dominican Republic and then perhaps beyond. They hung up posters in my building: “ASESINO” “MURDER” “Cash Reward.” I still have the poster. About an hour after the shooting, I tried to leave the building. You would have thought every cop in New York City was there. They didn’t want to let me “leave the crime scene.” I said I needed to buy milk. But the sexy detective said it was okay. I bought a gallon of milk and two forties of O.E., which means eighty ounces of malt liquor in two bottles. So far as I know, she was never caught.

Later that year in the summer I left the house one Sunday evening to get a steak and some ingredients for dinner, but I didn’t have any cash. As I crossed the street to go to the ATM, again with the sirens and the lights. After 15 years of police harassment; after my lover Jay was shot dead in a botched car-jacking which the police refused to investigate, but which was solved when the murderer’s own mother turned him in; after being stopped by every cop in the precinct where I had lived in the South Bronx for being the wrong color, until every single pair of cops on patrol had met me and frisked me for having blue eyes; after getting sick in the waiting room at the dentist - not from the after effects of the drilling but from watching the Rodney King beating on the overhead TV and hearing the other white patients say the “nigger deserved it;” after getting so enraged that I told a cop if he wanted to arrest me to go ahead and do it and when he asked why I was angry I told him just to tell me which god-damn form I had to fill out to get his permission as a white man to live in that neighborhood; after two decades of proof that the police are not necessarily my friend, I stood there and had them frisk me and ask me “just to tell where the bag of coke was” and they wouldn’t take me down to the station while the local business owners who all knew me watched me spread up against the wall. I stood there and held my tongue. I offered to show them my I.D. that I lived in the building from which they had followed me. They apologized and said that they were "just doing their job." And I asked them if they had caught the lady that had killed the guy in 507 yet. They knew it was sarcasm, apologized again, and drove off.

I am, through my brother-in-law, distantly related to Daniel Faulkner, (pictured above) the otherwise unknown victim of the celebrated confessed-cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal. I listened and watched as dozens of Cops' funeral corteges passed by my workplace on Broadway after 9/11. I have friends and family who have served and died in the military. I have seen cops behave with amazing wherewithal and dignity under the most trying circumstances. And I have seen pigs for whom the name pig was invented. And I have never been more relieved that that night when I opened my door to have two cops pointing their revolvers in my face. Can I respect a cop? Why not, if he deserves it?

Ted Keer, 10 November, 2006

(Edited by Ted Keer
on 11/10, 11:39pm)

(Edited by Ted Keer
on 11/10, 11:41pm)

Post 22

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 8:01am

I sanctioned Hong and Joseph.

As regular readers here know, I am both an anarchist and a criminal justice major in college.

Of all the posters here, only Joseph Bidinotto and I have a professional insight into these problems. Everyone else can merely pontificate.

Until September 30 of this year, I was a safety officer at my publicly-financed college which also has an active No Smoking Ban on the entire campus. I agree: it is the nanny state. This same administration placed a sign in front of boulder forbidding climbing on the rock. The nannies know no bounds.

That said, anyone who thinks that police officers are, or should be, philosophers is asking pigs to fly. Indeed, some pigs have wings, but they come that way to the force and they stand out in many ways from their peers, often being socially isolated from their colleagues. The anarchist science fiction writer Vernor Vinge charactured the Michigan State Police in a very positive light. The MSP is famous for their esprit de corps. They have no "jelly bellies" but to get along, you have to go along. That means, enforcing all the silly laws that the politicians enact -- because if the police can pick and choose which laws to enforce, we live not in a democracy, but in a police state.

If you do not want to obey a law, don't pass it. The example in Post 15 of the "police" lowering the speed limits is an example of such political ignorance. Your city administration, your councils, your boards make the laws. You choose to live in society. Run for office. Get involved. Vote in every election. Become a community leader. It is still a process that you have to agree to.You can complain that such laws violate your rights, etc., etc., but you decide how much of this you want to go along with. No one forces you to live in a society with speed limits or smoking bans. The woods are right over there. Pack your gun, Daniel Boone, and live as free as you can.

The police just enforce the laws -- and by nature (by the rigorous demands of physical reality) police officers are statistically the very kind of people who enforce laws. To expect otherwise is to fall into the subjectivist fallacy of primacy of consciousness which expects people to use "free will" to change the facts of reality.

Sociologists make all kinds of excuses for people. Criminals are poor, oppressed, ignorant, retarded, impaired, disempowered, etc., etc., etc. I have little sympathy for the arguments because these same kinds of people become police officers (soldiers, forest rangers, etc., etc.) Some kinds of people are naturally given to aggressive behaviors and the ones who choose socially-approved outlets tautologously win social approval. Even the philosophers among them -- and I know a couple professionally -- choose to enforce the law: they do not choose which laws to enforce. That still leaves you with such people. Just take the traffic ticket and say "Thank you, officer."

A moderating social context would be anarcho-capitalist society, where such individuals would be shunted into less obnoxious channels. For an example, see the episode in Alongside Night where the boy does not want to evacuate with everyone else, but wants to find his girlfriend, and the security guard says, "O.K., let's see if we can find her." ... but that would be science fiction...

Dr. Tibor Machan often posts "collectivist objectivist" essays where he repeats the common wisdom in the most obvious ways. I am sure that he did not expect any negative reaction. Personally, I agree with the premise: there is no such thing as a victimless crime. That said, does the State have the right to step in to protect juveniles from abusive home lives? If your parents let you smoke cigarettes, is it OK for them to teach you to play Russian Roulette? Once a year... at Christmas, say,... after all, we have a big family... lots of kids and cousins... someone kills themself... It's none of the government's business how we raise our children... Or, does the government have a compelling interest in the inherent safety of all of each person?

You cannot smoke until you are 18. You cannot drink until you are 21. You can drive at 14-16, depending on the state. If you kill someone, you can (and likely will) be tried as an adult, regardless of your age... assuming you are over the age of "infancy" however that may be defined. In some states, you cannot have sex with anyone more than five years younger than you, unless both of you are over 18. It is tough making laws for "everyone" and I am working on a term paper for my criminal justice seminar class that addresses the metaphysical problems in just exactly that. Until and unless I pull an anarcho-rabbit from the government's top hat, my advice to you is to go to Google Videos, search for "Chris Rock police" and pay attention.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 11/11, 8:34am)

Post 23

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 8:32am

That means, enforcing all the silly laws that the politicians enact -- because if the police can pick and choose, we the people live not in a democracy, but in a police state. If you do not want to obey a law, don't pass it.

Michael, you and I often disagree; but here, you absolutely nail it.

"...because if the police can pick and choose, we the people live not in a democracy, but in a police state."

Absolutely right. To demand that the police selectively enforce laws is to advocate subjective law, whereby armed government employees unilaterally decide how to employ their power, and when, and where, and against whom.

Is that what anyone really wants?

Trashing "the police" as a group is analogous to "killing the messenger." All that a police presence does is bring the reality of laws, good or bad, into our lives. Some of those laws are vital to our lives and safety, and thank goodness that there are brave men and women who become law enforcement agents. Other laws are terrible incursions on our rights. But don't blame the "messenger" when, in doing his law-enforcement job, he brings to your door the wake-up call that there's a bad law on the books.

Blame instead your goddamned neighbors for demanding the goddamned law.

Post 24

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 2:34pm

Michael E. Marotta wrote:

> Everyone else can merely pontificate.

Michael, if you find my observations to be simply pompous and dogmatic ranting, please feel free to ignore them. However, I would like to state for the record that I do resent that characterization.

Looking through the last 23 posts, this discussion is ranging all over the place and I am having a difficult time trying to identify specific points of view or find a common thread. But it is clear that it is touching a nerve in everyone!

Robert Bidinotto wrote:

> To demand that the police selectively enforce laws is to advocate
> subjective law, whereby armed government employees unilaterally decide
> how to employ their power, and when, and where, and against whom.

Robert, I certainly understand and agree with you. In fact, I doubt that anyone in this discussion is actually advocating selective enforcement of the various laws by the police; certainly not me. It is clear that the police are only the enforcement for (as I said at the end of my previous post) laws which are the province of the constitution and legislature. If this is so, then I think you are wondering how there can be so much ill will directed at the police? I think the answer lies in the personal viewpoint an individual adopts with respect to the various branches of government. Some of the people on this list are very defensive of the reputation and respect to be accorded to the police while others are highly critical of their actions and have diminished trust that they will consistently act in our best interests. I suggest that the difference may be related to whether you view the police as an autonomous body that is "only doing its job" or see them as just a piece of a monolithic system that creates and enforces the laws.

In my case, I do not see the police as sovereign but as an arm of the government that is responsible for all the bad (as well as the good) laws. If the police get ill will and lack of respect directed their way, it is due in great measure to their being on the front line interfacing with the public rather than hiding in an office somewhere. When a legislator passes a bill making it illegal to smoke, for most people it's just so many words on paper. But when the police come to fine or arrest you for smoking, it's personal! As I tried to make clear in my last post, I can certainly intellectualize on the matter and trace the chain of events back to the legislators and even to my "goddamned neighbors" for voting the way they did. But in the moment, as you confront the cops, where is your emotional response going to be directed? Now, if you actually see the police as "only doing their job", then I agree that it would be wrong, both intellectually and emotionally, to resent their lawful actions. On the other hand, if you see the police as just an extension of the governmental system responsible for injustices and rights violations, then I think this type of response is appropriate - so long as your emotions don't cloud your ability to reason and analyze. Do you see the point I am making? For some of us at least, it is not a difference of kind, but only a difference of degree if you direct your emotional anger at the police, the legislators or your neighbors. Underneath this response, we may still be talking about the same thing. I'll even go so far as to intellectually agree with those of you that think the level of ill will directed at the police is unjust. That is why, in post #15, I outlined a solution that I think would go a long way towards eliminating the abuses of the system and reduce the source of these negative feelings.

Now, let me veer back to issues of injustice. As Robert said, we don't want a system where the police "selectively enforce laws". Well, in my state of Washington a seat belt law was passed years ago which mandated that everyone had to buckle up. However, despite passing the law, police officers were instructed (by whom??) not to enforce it and this lack of enforcement was common knowledge. After a few years, officers were apparently instructed that they shouldn't stop anyone for failing to wear a seat belt but could ticket those without a seat belt if stopped for some other offense. Then a couple of years ago the fines for not wearing a seat belt were massively raised to over $100 and the "click-it or ticket" campaign started where the police were instructed to stop everyone that was spotted without a seat belt. So much for objective enforcement of the laws.

I really hate having anything on my head. Because of this, I rarely wear a hat in winter and won't use the hood on my jacket when it rains. I love to ride my bike and long ago did an analysis of the risks of not wearing a bike helmet (factoring in my agility and level of alertness) versus the discomfort using one would entail and opted not to use the helmet. Well, my friends in WA know what's best for me and have passed a bike helmet law. However, the police seem to be ignoring it - for now. So I have a choice. Do I continue to enjoy my bike riding without the helmet or stop riding, which is what I would do if forced to wear one. I choose to continue riding, although a bit of the fun is eliminated each time I see a police car and wonder if today is the day I become a criminal. Where is the appropriate place to anchor my resentment? I have plenty to go around. Maybe Chris Rock can help me figure this out.

Regards,
--
Jeff

Post 25

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 2:50pm

Jeff,

You advocated having competing police agencies. Imagine that one agency, called the Republicans, wore badges shaped as elephants. Imagine that another agency, called the Democrats, wore badges shaped as donkeys. What do you think relations between those agencies would be like? And who would adjudicate disputes between them? Think of Souter, Kennedy & co.

The answer is:
(1) Repeal all non-criminal (i.e., victimless) illegalities.
(2) Remember that the benefit of the doubt never goes to the cop, given any prima facie evidence of wrongdoing.
(3) Cops should be paid in the mid six figures, but be subject to dismissal without cause. No one has the "right" to be a cop.

Ted

Post 26

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 3:00pm

I like the police, get along just great with them. I have been pulled over many more times than I have been ticketed, probably about 5-to-1. Always, “Sir,” or “Officer.” I communicate points that demonstrate that I was trying to be aware and follow the rules. My answer to “Do you know what the speed limit is?” is “Yes, it’s sixty, except for the limit forty five work zones a few miles back. I was trying to go the limit, sorry if I missed being in another reduced zone.”

I managed my own apartments for thirteen years. These were pretty rough and I used the police at least once a month. They were terrific. Everything from getting cars towed to handling violent individuals. I court-evicted two or three-dozen people over that time. The courts were great; my lawyers were cheap and competent. (Evictions are easy to do yourself, but for just $100 I always hired the lawyers. I wondered how they made any money at it—must be that they would expedite, get in front of a judge with dozens of actions at a time.) The Deputy Sheriffs would come to forcefully remove all persons from the apartment and supervise my removal of all contents to the sidewalk for public picking, (unless the tenant was there with truck, which they never were.) Nice memories.

My city has a contract with a van-camera operator that takes a picture of you speeding, night or day, and mails you the picture with a letter and a fine. You can see yourself and resolve which shirt you have on, and your plate is clearly captured. The easily intimidated write a check and mail it before the date on which the fine doubles. Catch is: The letter is unconstitutional as a citation. Per some technicality, no actual citation occurs until a cop in person presents you with a written citation and court date. This is confusingly stated in the letter, and stated in terms and imagery that suggests: “The step before your appearance at the bench under warrant… is us at your front door.” I have ignored two of these, and ignored all the follow-up, serious-sounding warning letters, which have now stopped. (One ticket is over two years old and the other almost a year old.) Yet I call the police all the time. And ask them to come to my house to tow cars, to ticket people making noise, loosing their dogs, etc. I have probably had the cops over six or eight times in those two years; the last time was less than a week ago. I tell them my name, my address, and yet they have never once mentioned the tickets.

Post 27

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 3:12pm

Ted Keer wrote:

> You advocated having competing police agencies. [...]
> What do you think relations between those agencies would
> be like? And who would adjudicate disputes between them?

Ted:

As I outlined in my post #15, the executive branch of the government, currently responsible for enforcement, would be redirected to regulate the private competing police agencies rather than deal directly with individuals and businesses. They would have the responsibility and authority to insure that these agencies operated within the framework of the objective laws of the country and did not exceed their authority or abuse their power. Of course this system has all sorts of opportunities for abuse, but no more than the current system. I think a restructuring like this would produce many benefits, but I just do not have the time right now to write a detailed analysis of the problems and benefits of such an approach.
--
Jeff

Post 28

Saturday, November 11, 2006 - 4:18pm

Jeff,

I suppose you are then advocating something like farming out prisons to private contractors? I misunderstood you to be advocating anarchism. I think yours and my suggestion can be integrated then.

Ted

Post 29

Tuesday, November 14, 2006 - 5:49pm

Ted Keer hit the nail on the head:

Imagine that one agency, called the Republicans, wore badges shaped as elephants. Imagine that another agency, called the Democrats, wore badges shaped as donkeys. What do you think relations between those agencies would be like?

Answer A:

That is why we have a Food and Drug Administration, under Civil Service, created by Congress, administered by the President, both of those elected by the people under the Constitution. If we did not have government regulating businesses, they would be selling poison. So, we "police" them. Among the heroic police enforcers who keep businesses in line have been Elliot Spitzer and Rudolph Giulini, the former a Democrat, the latter a Republican, though they seem to get along well enough.

Giulini is famous for busting the junk bond raider, Michael Milken, who cheated investors and the nation out of half a trillion dollars before he was caught. America is a "free enterprise" nation, but we are not an anarchy where any greedy businessman can bilk the public with a crooked scheme.

This is the American political tradition that Richard Hofstadter described, based on individual liberty, free enterprise, and opportunity moderated by the government. Similarly, Ayn Rand built on the ideas of Max Weber who said that in every society, government is the one agency lawfully empowered to use force. Without government, we would have anarachy and dog-eat-dog competition where the rich oppress the weak by cheating them in unregulated markets.

Answer B:

As long as they were Republicans and Democrats -- or police forces of any kind -- there would be open warfare until one achieved a monopoly of force. However, if they were market entities, like Ford and GM or like Ted and Mike, then they would do everything they could to avoid conflict. I assure you that for a private security firm other people's money is not worth killing or dying for. Killing and dying usually involve "ideals" like fatherland, motherhood, nation, state, religion, god, right, wrong, law and order, society, justice... things you cannot hold in your hand.... Ayn Rand called them "floating abstractions."

Post 30

Saturday, November 25, 2006 - 12:50am

Michael,

You obviously haven't spent much time in the South Bronx. Sneakers and train tokens were worth killing over, and wrong looks at other guy's girls. Obviously these are not the agencies that you would want, but who would stop them?

a past resident of E 138 & Brook Ave, open air drug capital of the Western World

Post 31

Monday, January 1, 2007 - 7:42pm

This is a complex question. Some law officers are corrupt, some are incompetent, and some chose the profession because they are bullies. But most are good people who joined up hoping to put away the really bad guys – the robbers, thieves, and killers. Most find their heroic vision quickly becomes burned out by bureaucracy. They feel under siege by criminals on one side and sleazy defense lawyers on the other side – unsupported by politically motivated administrations and disappointed by less than effective prosecution. Their life is on the line and they feel can only count on one another. They have to deal with the worst people in our culture and even good people lie to them on a regular basis.

Tradition has resulted in what is a military-style organization for the law enforcement – loyalty and obedience are built into the structure. If you were a cop, what laws would you refuse to enforce? Would you refuse to enforce all laws that fall outside of the strictly limited constitutional model (which would get you fired in days) or only those where enforcement would cause the person in front of you real harm (dragging innocent victims of to a gulag type of thing) or somewhere in-between?

That, to me, that is the interesting but very scary issue Tibor raises. When does one refuse to obey a ‘lawful’ but immoral and unconstitutional order or law? Many of the founding fathers risked their lives, and some lost all they owned in the fight for independence. I’m not in law enforcement but when do I decide to refuse a ‘lawful’ order and throw myself into legal jeopardy? It isn’t time yet – but when is it? Steve

Post 32

Monday, January 1, 2007 - 10:34pm

I’m not in law enforcement but when do I decide to refuse a ‘lawful’ order and throw myself into legal jeopardy? It isn’t time yet – but when is it? Steve

Whenever you think that the order is so perverse, it needs to be challenged AND you are willing to pay the consequences. There is no moral mandate to disobey a lawful (but illegitimate) order, if doing so puts you at risk of being arrested, especially if your act of civil disobedience is unlikely to have any measurable impact.

- Bill

Post 33

Sunday, July 20, 2008 - 2:10am