Police harassment

[Eric Kelcher]

Recently, California ran an e-mail forum (a question and answer exchange) with the topic being "Community Policing".  One of the civilian e-mail participants posed the following question:

"I would like to know how it is possible for police officers to continually
harass people and get away with it?"

>From the "other side" (the law enforcement side) a cool cop with a sense of
humor replied:


"It is not easy.  In California we average one cop for every 2000 people.
About 60% of those cops are on patrol, where we do most of the harassing.
One fifth of that 60% are on duty at any moment and available for harassing
people.  So, one cop is responsible for harassing about 10,000 residents.

When you toss in the commercial, business, and tourist locations that
attract people from other areas, sometimes you have a situation where a single cop
is responsible for harassing 20.000 or more people a day.  A ten-hour shift
runs 36,000 seconds.  This gives a cop one second to harass a person, and three
fourths of a second to eat a donut AND then find a new person to harass. This is not an easy task. Most cops are not up to it day in and day out.  It is just too tiring. What we do is utilize some tools to help us narrow down those, which we harass.

They are as follows:

PHONE: People will call us up and point out things that cause us to focus on
a person for special harassment.  "My neighbor is beating his wife" is a code
phrase we use.  Then we come out and give special harassment.

Another popular one on a weeknight is, "The kids next door are having a
party."

CARS: We have special cops assigned to harass people who drive. They like to
harass the drivers of fast cars, cars blasting music, cars with expired
registration stickers and the like.  It is lots of fun when you pick them
out of traffic for nothing more obvious than running a red light.  Sometimes you
get to really heap the harassment on when you find they have drugs in the
car, are drunk, or have a warrant.

RUNNERS: Some people take off running just at the sight of a police officer.
Nothing is quite as satisfying as running after them like a beagle on the
scent of a bunny.  When you catch them you can harass them for hours.

CODES: When you can think of nothing else to do, there are books that give
ideas for reasons to harass folks.  They are called "Codes"; Penal, Vehicle,
Health and Safety, Business and Professions...  They all spell out all sorts
of things for which you can really mess with people. After you read the
code, you can just drive around for a while until you find someone violating
one of these listed offenses and harass them.  Just last week I saw a guy
smash a car window.  Well, the code says that is not allowed. That meant I
got permission to harass this guy.  It is a pretty cool system that we have set
up, and it works pretty well.  I seem to have a never-ending supply of folks
to harass.  And we get away with it.  Why?  Because the good citizens who pay the tab like that we keep the streets safe for them.

Next time you are in my town, give me a single finger wave. That is a signal that you wish for me to take a little closer look at you, and maybe I'll find a reason to harass YOU.

Looking forward to meeting you."

[Eric Kelcher]

   A Police Officer Speaks
.  
************

    Well, Mr. Citizen, it seems you've figured me out.
   I to fit neatly into the category where you've placed
   me. I'm stereotyped, standardized, characterized,
  classified, grouped, and always typical.

  Unfortunately, the reverse is true. I can never figure
    you out. From birth you teach your children that I'm
  the bogeyman, then you're shocked when they identify
  with my traditional enemy...the criminal! You accuse
  me of coddling criminals...until I catch your kids doing wrong.

  You may take an hour for lunch and several coffee
  breaks each day, but point me out as a loafer for
    having one cup. You pride yourself on your manners,
    but think nothing of disrupting my meals with your
  troubles. You raise hell with the guy who cuts you off in
  traffic, but let me catch you doing the same thing and
  I'm picking on you. You know all the traffic laws...but
  you've never gotten a single ticket you deserve.

  You shout "foul" if you observe me driving fast to a call,
  but raise the roof if I take more than ten seconds to
  respond to your complaint. You call it part of my job if
  someone strikes me, but call it Police brutality if I strike
  back. You wouldn't think of  telling your dentist how to
  pull a tooth or your doctor how to take out an appendix,
  yet you are always willing to give me pointers on the law.
  You talk to me in a manner that would get you a bloody
  nose from anyone else, but expect me to take it without
  batting an eye.

  You yell something's got to be done to fight crime,
  but you can't be bothered to get involved. You
  have no use for me at all, but of course it's OK if
  I change a flat for your wife, deliver your child in
  the back of the Patrol car, or perhaps save your
  son's life with mouth to mouth breathing, or work
  many hours overtime looking for your lost Daughter.

  So, Mr. Citizen, you can stand there on your soapbox
  and rant and rave about the way I do my work, calling
  me every name in the book, but never stop to think
  that your property, family, or maybe even your life
  depends on me or one of my buddies. Yes, Mr. Citizen,
  it's me...the cop!

author unknown

[Burt Munro]

 sorry Eric ....  nice story but - from www.snopes.com

Origins:   Whether or not this essay was actually written by a policeman (or accurately reflects the public image of the cop on the beat), the glurgirific coda has been made up for added poignancy. According to both the Virginia State Police and the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial office, there is no record of a Mitchell Brown having served with the Virginia State Police, much less having been killed in the line of duty.

In December 1999, Bill Johnson of the Denver Rocky Mountain News ran the piece in his column, attributing it to Trooper Mitchell Brown of the Virginia State Police. He printed a retraction a couple of days later when it turned out there was no such officer with that law enforcement agency. Mr. Johnson had received the piece from a police friend of his who in turn had gotten it in e-mail. Mr. Johnson didn't originate "Lousy Cop" but was responsible for disseminating it to an even larger audience.

One of our readers mentions seeing this piece in his U.S. Air Force base's newsletter in the mid-1990s.

[TiffineyIngram]

I think it's a good essay, even if it's not that actually guy who wrote it.  Those men and women who choose to put themselves in harms way deserve our respect, not our disgust.  Sure, there are a couple of bad apples--those are the only ones we hear about--but isn't that true in all professions?  In Dallas they've done a story almost weekly on a cop who's done something outstanding, and I really appreciate it.

[Burt Munro]

No dispute from me on the need for appreciation of the vast majority of law enforcement personnel who pursue their careers for all the right reasons.  

It hit home today with news of 2 St. Louis Police Officers being shot. One died, the other in serious condition.  They were in plain clothes and interupted a drug deal going down at a liquor store. The dealer wrestled a gun away from the officer who was killed.  The officer who survived was able to get some shots off and hit the 'suspect' who died at the scene.  

The sad thing about this was that the officers were in a special neighborhood policing program designed to help take back an area that had hit rock bottom.  The area is on the rebound and the officers had established a good community relationship with a neighborhood that was sick of living in fear from crime.  The drug dealer was not from the area.  The officers were 24 and 25 years old.

Rick

[251am]

 I remember the summer in basic training, Ft.Leonard "lost in the woods" Wood, the nine weeks I was there. Three state troopers were gunned down in three seperate incidents. Routine traffic stops on the freeway. I've never thought about Missouri the same since.
There are more bad apples out of law enforcement than there are in it. Pretty obvious, but it needs to be stated. I don't like the way some officers conduct or carry themselves, even in non-threatening situations, but these folks walk around with targets on themselves. They have to be on their toes. Sometimes they get carried away, and worse. As long as I have done nothing wrong I know %99.9 of the time I'm safe. No big deal.
 However, lifting fiction and transferring it here as truth is pretty misleading, no matter how good the essay is.
Could there be a "Politics and Religion" area set up? Please?        

[Eric Kelcher]

Here I will correct it so it reflects what I was trying to say no credit given to anyone as it has been shown to be incorrect.