Police worry about their own safety after killings: 'It's a different world'....

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  • stringer bell
    stringer bell Members Posts: 26,212 ✭✭✭✭✭
    http://www.ktvu.com/news/14584068-story
    Fatal shooting of Texas deputy a sign of changing attitudes towards police

    OAKLAND, Calif. (KTVU) -- Many in the policing community say it is a tough time to be an officer, especially since last year's police killings of Michael Brown in Missouri and Eric Garner in New York.

    Many officers say there has been a more pronounced anti-police attitude across the country. It culminated last Friday with the assassination of a sheriff's deputy in Texas.

    Police officers are there to serve and protect. "They want to help save lives, they want to help people to have a quality of life," says retired Police Chief Charles Gibson.

    Gibson worked for 30 years for the Oakland Police Department and just retired after ten years as Police Chief for the Contra Costa Community College District. He's concerned about current officers.

    "They didn't sign up to get killed," he said.

    The killing of sheriff's deputy Darren Goforth in an unprovoked attack at a Texas gas station has officers watching their backs with greater vigilance.

    "To be attacked for no reason other than the fact that you're wearing a blue uniform, that's pretty scary stuff," said San Francisco Police Officer Gary Delagnes, who represents the city's police union.

    Delagnes has been with SFPD for 35 years, but says the job has changed dramatically.

    "It's at the point where, as I've told people, my 21-year-old son has indicated he'd like to be a police officer and I'm trying to talk him out of it," explained Delagnes. "I don't think it's a good time to enter this profession."

    Another case that concerns officers was last week in Oakland when a female officer was attacked by a man with a bicycle chain. She shot and killed him after, according to investigators, he struck her in the head and neck multiple times.

    And yet, some people at the scene blamed the officer, saying she didn't need to open fire.

    The changing attitude about police that some have -- which is partly motivated by issues of race and the killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner -- makes officers nervous.

    "You stop asking your oppressor don't shoot me. Quit putting your hands up, talking about don't shoot. Put your fists up and you fight back. You fight the system, and that's the only way we're going to win this," exclaimed Cadine Williams of Oakland, who was protesting at the Oakland scene after the officer killed the man with the chain.

    "It's interesting that when we have a Ferguson or a New York, all we hear is anti-police rhetoric. But when cops are murdered, the silence is deafening," said Gary Delagnes.

    Police say officers who make mistakes should be held accountable. But they add a few bad apples should not ruin everyone's reputation.

    Former Police Chief Gibson says the media is partly to blame because of the way it presents the news.

    "We don't see those hundreds of thousands of cases where the officer helped people; where the officers saved lives," said Gibson

    Despite the harsh feelings and anti-police rhetoric, officers say they know most people are in the silent majority, who supports what they do.
  • Brother_Five
    Brother_Five Members Posts: 4,448 ✭✭✭✭✭
    also... it seems ppl have very short memories... there has never been a time in this country where the police were loved and exalted universally...
    this pro-cop ? is the new ? ...
  • Ubuntu1
    Ubuntu1 Members Posts: 852 ✭✭✭
    why do ppl assume cops are necessary?

    For the same reason why you have a problem with them to begin with.
    Oh no the dudes that ? with no reason, remorse or accountability is now feeling threatened by the people they terrorize?

    They're not the same one person. They're separate individuals. They don't all ? without reason or remorse and sometimes they are held accountable when they do.

    Police officers should be criticized for their misconduct and held to the same standard as everyone else but they're no better or worse than the civilian vigilantes who ? innocent officers or other civilians. They're just people, they don't matter any more or less. It's not like they're the parents and civilians are the children and no one has any responsibilities toward them. They're not warrior machines, at least some of them some of the time are vulnerable non-offenders. That said, I hate the idea that police officers should respected as authority figures and not just as people.
    You know the risk that comes with wearing that uniform.
    Too much to handle? Go be a crossing guard ?

    You have a vested interest in their being people who are willing to take that risk or handle what they have to handle. They're not a separate species, if you think they're bad then imagine what the world would be like if there weren't people to keep 'them' (the minority who shouldn't be police officers) in check. If psychopaths or people who are willing to rob, ? , assault or violate whatever rights people should have are in the minority then we need police and if they're in the majority then, unless the minority who are against violent crime can monopolize the political power needed to keep the majority in check, I don't think it makes a difference one way or the other. If you get rid of the police you'll just have a new 'gang' that may not bother with the 'pretense' of protecting and serving or respecting everyone's rights unless not doing so is really justified and they may not be guided by public interest.
    ppl obey the laws for reasons outside of criminal sanctions and those who do commit crimes rarely get caught...

    I think you're underestimating how powerful an incentive prison is in deterring people from committing crime, even if most people avoid committing certain crimes for reasons other than not wanting to go to jail.
  • MD_PROPER
    MD_PROPER Members Posts: 1,526 ✭✭✭✭✭
    "I can't identify, with your one death
    We lose thousands over here, you speakin' one breath"
  • BiblicalAtheist
    BiblicalAtheist Members Posts: 15,668 ✭✭✭✭✭
    What's that? I can't hear your concerns over all the dead bodies you've made.
  • Ubuntu1
    Ubuntu1 Members Posts: 852 ✭✭✭
    MD_PROPER wrote: »
    "I can't identify, with your one death
    We lose thousands over here, you speakin' one breath"

    Why does one individual death matter more or less than any other individual death because the person belonged to a group where more or fewer people have been killed? Would you care less about Eric Garner if his murder was an extremely rare occurrence, if he was the only person in history to have been unjustly killed by police officers? Why do people care about people in/as groups and not as individuals?

    It's more than one police officer who's been killed.
    What's that? I can't hear your concerns over all the dead bodies you've made.

    It's not the entire police force responsible for those bodies it's specific individuals.

  • skpjr78
    skpjr78 Members Posts: 7,311 ✭✭✭✭✭
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZDDSK_yBMU
    
  • skpjr78
    skpjr78 Members Posts: 7,311 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 2015
    you can only push so far until ppl start pushing back
  • optimistic
    optimistic Members Posts: 659 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »
    MD_PROPER wrote: »
    "I can't identify, with your one death
    We lose thousands over here, you speakin' one breath"

    Why does one individual death matter more or less than any other individual death because the person belonged to a group where more or fewer people have been killed? Would you care less about Eric Garner if his murder was an extremely rare occurrence, if he was the only person in history to have been unjustly killed by police officers? Why do people care about people in/as groups and not as individuals?

    It's more than one police officer who's been killed.
    What's that? I can't hear your concerns over all the dead bodies you've made.

    It's not the entire police force responsible for those bodies it's specific individuals.

    You should ask a cop these same questions
  • So ILL
    So ILL Members Posts: 16,507 ✭✭✭✭✭
    TayGettem wrote: »
    Cops are needed the problem is they don't police eachother
    They'll know someone in there department is dead ass wrong and won't speak up abt it
    An if someone does the whole police department shuns that one cop for doing the RIGHT THING so what type of msg are they sending to eachother as well as the people

    340?cb=20131116220739
  • texas409
    texas409 Members Posts: 20,854 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Like he said he was used to folks coming up and paying for his meals treating him like a hero when in reality the only thing most cops do is write traffic tickets and arrest folks when back up of around 10 of their fellow pigs arrive. Gtfoh with this crybaby ?
  • stringer bell
    stringer bell Members Posts: 26,212 ✭✭✭✭✭
    http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2015/09/01/former-police-chief-national-anti-police-trend-is-growing/
    Former Police Chief: National Anti-Police Trend is Growing

    ST. LOUIS (KMOX/AP) – Former St. Louis County Police Chief Tim Fitch says an anti-police sentiment is growing across the country. The latest proof, Fitch says, is the killing of an officer at a Houston-area gas station over the weekend.

    Fitch puts partial blame on White House administration for its silence on the trend.

    “What have we heard from the White House?” Fitch asks. “We’ve had seven officers killed in the line of duty in the last nine days. Fourteen of them in August. I don’t think we’ve heard anything from anybody in the White House administration, have we?”

    He says the anti-police movement was fueled by U.S. Attorney Eric Holder’s remarks calling for “wholesale change” in the Ferguson Police Department before there was an investigation of the Michael Brown shooting.

    Authorities say a suburban Houston police officer, Darren Goforth, was ambushed at a gas station and shot 15 times. The accused gunman, Shannon Miles, 30, appeared briefly in court Monday in Houston. He is being held without bond. He was appointed two attorneys. A prosecutor says the shell casings from the shooting of Goforth match the handgun that was found at Miles’ home.

    Goforth, a 10-year veteran, was pumping gas Friday evening when he was fatally shot. He died at the gas station.

    Miles’ exact motive for allegedly killing Goforth is unclear.

    “The really bad thing about all this is Shannon Miles will be a hero when he gets to the penitentiary,” Fitch says. “He will be seen as a hero, and then when Texas executes him, he’ll be a martyr for some in the cause.”

    Fitch was a guest on the Mark Reardon Show on KMOX.

    Fitch says 15 of the 59 officers who were killed in the line of duty last year were ambushed – triple the number from the year before.
  • Maximus Rex
    Maximus Rex Members Posts: 6,354 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 2015

    "Day to day, you're a little more aware of your surroundings, you're a little more skeptical of people," said Rick Perine, a 17-year veteran of the Mesa, Ariz., Police Department.

    Perine said he has found himself being "hyper-vigilant"....

    Good. Now these ? ass muthafuckas are starting to experience what as we a people have been experiencing for the past 396 years.

  • iron man1
    iron man1 Members Posts: 29,989 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Assassination?
  • BiblicalAtheist
    BiblicalAtheist Members Posts: 15,668 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    It's not the entire police force responsible for those bodies it's specific individuals.

    You say that like I should care, I don't. Yeah some "good cops" are gonna get hit but that's the price they pay for a lot of them being brute callous psychopaths who think they have the ultimate say who lives or dies that night.
  • JokerzWyld
    JokerzWyld Members Posts: 5,483 ✭✭✭✭✭
    ? em. If they die in the line of duty they get a free funeral and their fam gets their pension. What about lil Ray Ray, Tyrone, and Dwayne? They get a candlelight vigil on the corner. I don't give a ? about their problems. All cops are suspicious to me, and their presence makes me concerned for my life. Under those circumstances they shoot people to death daily.
  • Ubuntu1
    Ubuntu1 Members Posts: 852 ✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    It's not the entire police force responsible for those bodies it's specific individuals.

    You say that like I should care, I don't. Yeah some "good cops" are gonna get hit but that's the price they pay for a lot of them being brute callous psychopaths who think they have the ultimate say who lives or dies that night.

    Why should individuals have to pay for the mistakes of other people? Considering how many civilians murder other civilians and how many more would be willing to if it weren't for the police, you don't want to live in a society without police officers. They may be getting paid for it but the good ones are still doing other people a service, maybe not when it comes to arresting people for victim-less crimes and the authority they're given comes at a price non-violent civilians have to pay but the overall standard of living is probably higher because of them.

  • not_osirus_jenkins
    not_osirus_jenkins Members, Banned Users Posts: 3,670 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    It's not the entire police force responsible for those bodies it's specific individuals.

    You say that like I should care, I don't. Yeah some "good cops" are gonna get hit but that's the price they pay for a lot of them being brute callous psychopaths who think they have the ultimate say who lives or dies that night.

    Why should individuals have to pay for the mistakes of other people? Considering how many civilians murder other civilians and how many more would be willing to if it weren't for the police, you don't want to live in a society without police officers. They may be getting paid for it but the good ones are still doing other people a service, maybe not when it comes to arresting people for victim-less crimes and the authority they're given comes at a price non-violent civilians have to pay but the overall standard of living is probably higher because of them.

    nah. The reason so many black men are killed is because they generalize us. Why can't we do the same. And I know for a fact my life would be better with no cops. Arm everyone you know and build villages with armies and ? . I wanna be a king.
  • Ubuntu1
    Ubuntu1 Members Posts: 852 ✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    It's not the entire police force responsible for those bodies it's specific individuals.

    You say that like I should care, I don't. Yeah some "good cops" are gonna get hit but that's the price they pay for a lot of them being brute callous psychopaths who think they have the ultimate say who lives or dies that night.

    Why should individuals have to pay for the mistakes of other people? Considering how many civilians murder other civilians and how many more would be willing to if it weren't for the police, you don't want to live in a society without police officers. They may be getting paid for it but the good ones are still doing other people a service, maybe not when it comes to arresting people for victim-less crimes and the authority they're given comes at a price non-violent civilians have to pay but the overall standard of living is probably higher because of them.

    nah. The reason so many black men are killed is because they generalize us. Why can't we do the same. And I know for a fact my life would be better with no cops. Arm everyone you know and build villages with armies and ? . I wanna be a king.

    Not all police officers stereotype black men. If there's nothing wrong with stereotyping then why do you have a problem with police officers doing it? You can't do what you criticize other people for doing.

    If some guy pulls one out on you how do you know you'll have an advantage just because you're also armed? Maybe you don't reach quick enough and he wins. Maybe you both die and shoot outs between two people or rival factions might take a lot of innocent bystanders. Maybe you can't afford a gun. Do you want to arm children? Some new gang will probably take over and the situation will be even worse.

    It makes more sense to work within the system and make sure there's an incentive for police officers to not use unnecessary force (penalizing them as you would a civilian, better training, reducing a lot of the social and economic factors that cause a lot of the more serious crimes that police have to respond to etc. The body cams weren't a bad idea). Democracy works best in practice.
  • BiblicalAtheist
    BiblicalAtheist Members Posts: 15,668 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    Why should individuals have to pay for the mistakes of other people?

    Because they work as a group, a unit, a brotherhood. The same reason they fail to see others as individuals. If they are the order citizens are to follow, then they have reaped what they sowed.
  • Ubuntu1
    Ubuntu1 Members Posts: 852 ✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    Why should individuals have to pay for the mistakes of other people?

    Because they work as a group, a unit, a brotherhood. The same reason they fail to see others as individuals. If they are the order citizens are to follow, then they have reaped what they sowed.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf5SWHPxuyI
  • BiblicalAtheist
    BiblicalAtheist Members Posts: 15,668 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »
    Ubuntu1 wrote: »

    Why should individuals have to pay for the mistakes of other people?

    Because they work as a group, a unit, a brotherhood. The same reason they fail to see others as individuals. If they are the order citizens are to follow, then they have reaped what they sowed.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf5SWHPxuyI

    Hope he knows how to duck real quick.
  • stringer bell
    stringer bell Members Posts: 26,212 ✭✭✭✭✭
    http://www.post-gazette.com/news/nation/2015/09/05/With-4-officers-fatally-shot-in-past-2-weeks-some-blame-Black-Lives-Matter-protests/stories/201509050098

    With 4 officers fatally shot in past 2 weeks, some blame Black Lives Matter protests
    Kari Lydersen / The Washington Post

    FOX LAKE, Ill. — The humid night air vibrated with the sound of cicadas and helicopters as police scoured the woods in this village near the Wisconsin border, searching for three men suspected of gunning down a local police lieutenant.

    “I hope they find them and blow their heads off,” said Jeff Peterson, 57, a construction worker doing his wash at a laundromat not far from the crime scene. “It’s time for [officers] to fight back.”

    The death Tuesday of Lt. Charles Joseph Gliniewicz, a father of four and an Army veteran known here as “G.I. Joe,” marked the fourth fatal shooting of a law enforcement officer nationwide in the past two weeks. Although the overall number of on-duty deaths is down from last year, the rash of killings is fueling a new debate over the risks of being a police officer in the post-Ferguson era of anti-police protests.

    “It’s a trifecta” that officers are facing, said Jim Pasco, executive director of the national Fraternal Order of Police. “There’s a hostile element within the community at large. There’s in many incidences a lack of support on the part of elected officials and police management. And there’s this ubiquitous social media effort to discredit all police officers because of the extraordinarily rare misconduct by a very few.”

    Add it all up, and many police officers feel under attack — especially after Darren Goforth, a sheriff’s deputy in Harris County, Texas, was gunned down while pumping gas last Friday. Harris County Sheriff Ron Hickman has called it a “cold-blooded execution” driven by the “dangerous national rhetoric that is out there today.” The rant against police, he said, “has gotten out of control.”

    This week, Attorney General Loretta Lynch addressed the spate of killings at a news conference in Washington. In addition to Lt. Gliniewicz and Deputy Goforth, two officers were killed last week in Louisiana.

    “I strongly condemn these recent and brutal police shootings,” Ms. Lynch said Wednesday, tying the shootings to other recent bursts of violence that have captured national attention, including the deaths of TV journalists in Virginia, soldiers in Tennessee, moviegoers in Louisiana and church parishioners in South Carolina.

    “It is a sad fact now that no one is safe,” Ms. Lynch said, adding, “This wide violence against all of us — regardless of what uniform any of us wear — has to end.”

    This year, 26 police officers have been killed by firearms, including two in training accidents, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund. That is the second-lowest number in the past five years, the group says, noting that the number of officers killed has declined steadily after peaking in 1975. Nonetheless, many officers and ordinary citizens think that police face new dangers — and much less public support — since black teenager Michael Brown was fatally shot by a white police officer a year ago in Ferguson, Mo.

    Michael Brown’s death spawned a national campaign against police brutality dubbed Black Lives Matter. Police accountability activists say the recent violence against officers bears no relation to their movement.

    “Nobody is held accountable for the people killed who don’t have a badge,” said Jason Ware, 20, an activist with We Charge Genocide in Chicago, where protesters marched last week to demand a civilian police accountability council. “We want more community investment, more schools, more neighborhood parks, more mental health facilities. These are all things that reduce violence,” he said. “To blame violence on people who are calling for things that actually reduce violence doesn’t make sense.”


    Nonetheless, a pro-police movement has sprung up using the Twitter hashtag #BlueLivesMatter. “Tell me again it isn’t open season on cops #BlueLivesMatter #AllLivesMatter,” tweeted author and Fox News contributor Katie Pavlich hours after Lt. Gliniewicz was found, stripped of his gun and pepper spray, in a marshy area of Fox Lake early Tuesday.

    There is no indication that race or anti-police sentiment played a role in the killing. Lt. Gliniewicz, 52, was a 30-year veteran due to retire at the end of September. He radioed dispatchers shortly before 8 a.m. Tuesday, saying he was chasing three suspicious subjects on foot. Contact with Lt. Gliniewicz was soon lost, police said. Another officer later found him with a gunshot wound.

    Dozens of heavily armed officers quickly joined helicopters and search dogs in a manhunt for the suspects, who were described as three men — two white and one black. Police said they have not made any arrests, and the manhunt is continuing. On Thursday, authorities were searching for clues in a video of the shooting turned in by a homeowner.

    Residents describe Fox Lake, a village of about 10,000 people 60 miles north of Chicago, as a close-knit town where police officers are well-liked and racial tension is rare. Doors are often left unlocked, even as summer visitors flock to the area’s lakeside cabins. “It’s like Mayberry,” said Jim Tybor, a factory supervisor who knew Lt. Gliniewicz and described him as “the most cheerful guy who was always smiling.”

    “Everyone knew him and liked him,” Mr. Tybor said, noting that his brother-in-law had exchanged friendly waves with Lt. Gliniewicz the morning he was killed.

    Most of the officers killed this year have died in similar situations. Unlike Deputy Goforth or New York City police Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, who were gunned down in Brooklyn in December by a man who boasted on social media that he planned to ? police, most officers have died in the routine performance of their duties.

    For instance, in Carson City, Nev., Deputy Sheriff Carl Howell was responding to a domestic battery call when he was killed Aug. 15. After checking on a woman who was injured, Deputy Howell went to “get the other side of the story from the other person” in the home, said Carson City Sheriff Ken Furlong. “It resulted in a spontaneous gunfight.”

    Sheirff Furlong and other police officials said the Black Lives Matter movement has not sparked attacks on police but is shining a spotlight on the quotidian risks that officers long have faced. Several pointed to past tragedies, including four officers ambushed by an ex-convict in a coffee shop in suburban Tacoma, Wash., in 2009 and two others ambushed while eating pizza in Las Vegas in 2013.

    “Your vocation, it results in you becoming a target even in your off-time,” said Sheriff Furlong, who said the biggest factor contributing to police killings is the ease with which mentally ill people can obtain firearms.