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A school not far from me recently suspended a 5th grader for throwing pinecones that he claimed were "hand grenades" (and no, he didn't hit others with the pinecones, he was only throwing them at a tree).
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
We have the red and blue wires crossed or something.
The case he used looks to be about the size of a three ring binder, not a briefcase. I imagine it fit in his backpack. AFAICT, it's a (large) pencil case.
A better bomb than this would be briefcase sized. A better bomb than briefcase sized would be suitcase sized.
I went and looked at the case he used and it is typical briefcase-sized. So... ticking briefcase?
Again, I'm not saying the kid should have been suspended, beaten, arrested, or anything like that. I'm just saying that wasn't the best idea.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
Things everyday kids have in their everyday backpacks: pencil cases, calculators, elastics, tape, markers...
Let's tape a calculator to a pencil case, bombs on Macguyver weren't much more sophisticated, or realistic... What's missing? explosives. Would some boneheaded school admin really not know the difference? Or approach it sensitively? At least we can be happy they didn't shoot this poor kid and ask questions later.
I'm actually willing to cut the school a lot of slack. Teachers don't necessarily know what a real bomb looks like. I'm fine with better safe than sorry.
Where this goes south for me is after things were determined to be kosher halal, we still get about a dozen people power-tripping on a 14-year-old.
A school not far from me recently suspended a 5th grader for throwing pinecones that he claimed were "hand grenades" (and no, he didn't hit others with the pinecones, he was only throwing them at a tree).
And the worst thing about that story is the tree totally had it coming.
Where this goes south for me is after things were determined to be kosher halal, we still get about a dozen people power-tripping on a 14-year-old.
Should have never gotten that far, at all.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
So, okay, it was a beeping pencil box? (The photo I saw made the case look larger, thanks CNN.) He probably should have told the teacher in advance.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
He probably should have told the teacher in advance.
I want to make a joke about how since this didn't happen, high school is clearly falling down on the job of crushing your independence and making you fear authority.
The people building, and hyping (as evidenced by the article you linked), such products are doing more than querying forums, they're trying to change policy without trying to objectively look at what such things would do beforehand.
So you're chastising me for their sins...? I think you lost the plot on this one.
The case he used looks to be about the size of a three ring binder, not a briefcase. I imagine it fit in his backpack. AFAICT, it's a (large) pencil case.
So you're chastising me for their sins...? I think you lost the plot on this one.
You aren't designing the thing, you can't pass those stupid regulations, why do you think I've been talking about you? I've been told I'm being PA (against whom?), blamed for chastising people here when I wasn't even talking about them, what the hell is going on?
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
And in other news, this is how the Stockton PD did a black teenager for jaywalking. Even though he was in tears. Queue up all the excuses about how police have such a "difficult job", "put their lives on the line everyday", etc. Because you know ... arresting a kid for jaywalking while trying to catch the bus to get home is really that f*cking serious.
Stockton, Calif., police are under scrutiny after a video posted to YouTube Wednesday showed a total of nine officers ganging up to arrest a black teenager for jaywalking, the International Business Times reports.
In the beginning, one officer approached the teen, presumably to write him a ticket for jaywalking to catch a city bus. The teen, however, continued walking to the bus, and the officer responded by grabbing the young boy and pulling out his baton.
Eyewitnesses told the Times that the officer hit the teen several times before backup came.
Video footage shows an officer restraining the teen. At one point the officer presses the baton against the teen's shin. The officer appears to hit the teen in the face, and the teen eventually seems to start crying. One woman observing the encounter can be heard shouting, “It’s a f--king kid! Get off of him! He’s been jaywalking! Leave him alone; he didn’t do anything wrong.”
The officer can be heard telling the kid, who is curled up in a ball, to “stop resisting.”
The teen eventually sits up and can be seen holding his face in his hands. Police backup arrives, and the officers wrestle the boy to the ground, while others circle to close off the area. In the end a total of nine officers were involved in detaining the teenager, who was handcuffed and taken to a police car.
This right here is a prime example of what I'm speaking about when I say that some white people are just in abject denial when it comes to their racially biased attitudes. This woman sees an elderly black man leaning on a golf club as a cane while on his daily 10 mile walk. She completely convinces herself that he swung it at her as a weapon and struck a stop sign while she was driving by. She then pulls over, gets out of her vehicle, and demands he drop the golf club. He refuses saying he hasn't done anything wrong and demands another police officer come as a witness. She eventually arrests him for "investigation of unlawful use of a weapon and obstructing a police officer". Even when presented with video evidence from her own dash-cam that this 69-year old man was simply standing on the corner leaning on his golf club while waiting on the traffic signal to change ... she continued to insist she had done nothing wrong ... and that the Seattle PD discriminated against her because she was white when they fired her delusional ass.
This right here is quite telling. At 1:03 into the footage she has this to say ...
Originally Posted by Crooked Ass Cop Cynthia Whitlatch
You just swang that golf club at me!
Mr. Wingate indignantly replies "I did not!"
Originally Posted by Crooked Ass Cop Cynthia Whitlatch
Yes you did. Right back there! It was on audio and video tape. Put it down!
But interestingly enough, at 6:25 into the dash-cam footage she has this to say ...
Originally Posted by Crooked Ass Cop Cynthia Whitlatch
I am going to stop this video and restart it immediately so that i can review the very first part to see if anything is captured on video of him swinging that golf club at me as I turned the corner.
But wait? Wasn't she downright adamant that this old man had "threatened" her with the golf club while she was detaining him? Didn't she tell him that she had him on "audio an video tape" doing all this? But now she has to check the footage so if anything is there. Riiiiggggghhhttttttt!!!!!!
In any event, from the article ....
Seattle police Officer Cynthia Whitlatch was fired Tuesday over her arrest of an African-American man carrying a golf club as a cane, in what Police Chief Kathleen O’Toole labeled a case of biased and overly aggressive policing.
The closely watched decision stemmed from Whitlatch’s arrest last year of William Wingate, then 69, whom she accused of swinging the club as a weapon.
O’Toole sustained findings by the department’s Office of Professional Accountability (OPA) that Whitlatch violated department policies regarding bias, discretion and de-escalating confrontations.
But O’Toole modified findings that Whitlatch had no basis to stop Wingate or use minimal force while detaining him, determining the evidence was inconclusive.
Whitlatch, 48, defended herself throughout the internal investigation, insisting she acted properly. She also portrayed herself as the victim of discrimination because she is white.
O’Toole, in her termination order, cited Whitlatch’s defiance, noting that even in hindsight, Whitlatch had failed to recognize her misconduct and the damage it had done to community trust.
“Without this ability to learn from your mistakes, understand how you can improve and do better, and recognize your own errors, you are unable to effectively function as an officer,” O’Toole wrote.
O’Toole said Whitlatch’s response dissuaded her from considering Whitlatch for a lengthy suspension, disciplinary transfer to a unit that doesn’t interact with the public and removal from the sergeant’s promotional registry.
Whitlatch’s actions previously sparked strong condemnation from the community, including a February march of protesters carrying golf clubs as canes.
Ron Smith, president of the Seattle Police Officers’ Guild, issued a statement Tuesday, saying, “I am disappointed that Chief O’Toole caved into the enormous political pressure surrounding this case.”
Smith said the guild now will take up whether to file an appeal.
Wingate was arrested July 9, 2014, while on his daily 10-mile walk, using the golf club as a cane. Whitlatch stopped him on Capitol Hill and, according to official accounts, claimed Wingate swung the club in a threatening manner, striking a stop sign, while she was driving past in her patrol car.
The two engaged in a heated verbal exchange, captured on patrol-car video, in which Wingate denied swinging the club. Wingate was booked into jail for investigation of unlawful use of a weapon and obstructing a police officer.
O’Toole’s termination order noted Wingate showed no recognition of Whitlatch when she stopped him, saying “huh?” and “what’s going on” during the encounter.
Whitlatch raised her voice and repeatedly demanded Wingate put down the club, while he never acted in an “aggressive or threatening manner,” O’Toole wrote.
City prosecutors pursued only a weapon charge, and Wingate agreed to a continuance of his case, under which the misdemeanor charge would be dropped in two years if he met court conditions.
Prosecutors later moved to dismiss the entire case after a former state representative raised questions about the arrest. A judge accepted the dismissal, and the Police Department’s deputy chief, Carmen Best, ultimately apologized to Wingate for his arrest and returned his golf club.
Whitlatch’s racial views subsequently emerged as an issue when it was disclosed that, within two months of the arrest, she posted a comment on her Facebook page in the aftermath of riots in Ferguson, Mo., over the fatal police shooting of an African-American man on Aug. 9, 2014. In her post, she criticized “black peoples (sic) paranoia” in assuming whites are “out to get them.”
The OPA had already looked into that matter, referring it for supervisory counseling.
But Whitlatch’s overall racial views led to an internal recommendation that she be fired over the encounter with Wingate. She claimed during the internal investigation that she was being targeted because she is white, and noted Best and the judge who dismissed the case against Wingate are both African American.
O’Toole, in the termination order, wrote that she was troubled by Whitlatch’s belief the decisions were race driven and “not the legitimate factual and legal analysis by thoughtful and dedicated public servants.”
“Your perceptions of race and other protected categories appear to be so deeply seated that they likely impacted the authoritarian manner in which you treated this man and your refusal to deviate from that approach towards an individual whose actions did not warrant such treatment,” O’Toole wrote.
An earlier department report noted Whitlatch had been previously disciplined and counseled for “unprofessional conduct,” including a verbal reprimand in 2002 over a traffic stop and a written reprimand in 1998 stemming from a personal dispute over $1.04 at a retail store.
Whitlatch told the OPA she detained Wingate after she heard a “big clank,” saw Wingate hit the sign with the golf club and deemed it was a “threat toward a police officer.”
She said she initially didn’t intend to arrest Wingate, but that he was “extremely hostile” and “more obstructive than almost anybody else I’ve ever dealt with.”
In a second OPA interview, Whitlatch acknowledged that she didn’t see Wingate actually make contact with the stop sign, but saw a motion, heard a clang and saw Wingate “glaring” at her.
It occurs to me, this is what got Michael brown killed. Considering we're talking about jaywalking, I wonder if Stockton is into milking its residents under the guise of broken windows policing.
Altogether possible. What I found most striking was the complete lack of empathy for the kid. I mean he was literally sitting there crying. Face full of tears. He was not behaving aggressively at all. And at no point did that give ANY of them reason for pause.
Yes, why would I think you're talking about me when you're responding to me and things I've said in my posts?
I still wasn't "chastising you", I wasn't even talking about you with the "spray and pray" comment, I was talking about the legislators but you assumed it was somehow about you.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
It occurs to me, this is what got Michael brown killed. Considering we're talking about jaywalking, I wonder if Stockton is into milking its residents under the guise of broken windows policing.
Pretty sure that reaching in and clocking Wilson is what got him killed.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
Pretty sure that reaching in and clocking Wilson is what got him killed.
It would appear that Brown reaching all the way across Wilson's entire body from outside the vehicle to supposedly try to grab a gun that was holstered on his right hip in the tiny space between his body and the center console is a more believable scenario for you than Wilson simply hassling Brown and Johnson for jaywalking and getting pissed when they didn't immediately comply when he told them to "Get the f*ck on the sidewalk!". Ferguson statistics on black residents being 95% of those ticketed for jaywalking be damned. Example after example in this very thread of cops getting entirely out of pocket over non-compliance ... NOT threatening behavior ... be damned. Ok.
And it would appear that when Wilson claimed that this 6'4", 292 LB dude was "beating" him to within an inch of his life like this ...
Originally Posted by Darren Wilson
I felt that another of those punches in my face could knock me out or worse ... I've already taken two to the face and I didn't think I would, the third one could be fatal if he hit me right.
... you know to the point where it almost left a mark on the opposite side of his face from where Brown was standing. I guess that's a more believable scenario for you than Wilson simply lying. Ok.
And after Wilson drew his weapon, pointed it at Brown, and threatened to shoot him per his own words ... Wilson's story that Brown then said "You're too much of a p*ssy to shoot me!" is a more believable scenario for you than Brown grabbing Wilson's gun at that point to try to keep himself from getting shot. Ok.
Not that making a kid cry over jaywalking is appropriate, definitely way overboard and out of line... but is it ok to say, meh, I don't have to listen when a cop tells me to stop? When I'm doing something illegal, even trivially so, do I get to decide whether to stop and get my $15 citation, or not bother? Then what power does the law have, at all, in society?
One of the things that was posted back when those bikers had a riot, is when the cops showed up, those bikers sat themselves by the curb and stayed sat. Meek as mice. It contrasted to another event where rioters ran away and needed chasing and macing.
I get your point. All I would say is look at the video. The kid had already stopped. He had been detained at that point. He wasn't going anywhere. Not even trying. He was just sitting there crying. As the officer hit him a couple of times with the baton even though he was posing no threat to him whatsoever. All because this "officer" insisted that he needed to be arrested for jaywalking! All because the kid went into the street trying to catch a bus to get home. Because a young teen just being out on the corner would have been preferable for this cop I suppose. In any event, I think it's quite clear that the so-called "officers" showed considerably more lack of judgement than the kid. Just saying ...
Queue up all the excuses about how police have such a "difficult job", "put their lives on the line everyday", etc.
Allow me to defend the argument there is a difficult job going on here, but perhaps not in the way it's most often used.
Andi's excellent post focused on compliance. You can cover almost the entirety of what cops want you to do with this one word.
We give cops three tools to achieve compliance.
1) Yelling at you
2) Beating the shit out of you
3) Shooting you
Without even getting into the quality of the tools, when it comes to the strength of the tools, they do a poor job covering the continuum of scenarios faced by cops, at least in terms of matching the strength of the tool to the severity of non-compliance.
As far as quality goes, number two is inherently flawed. The natural response to it isn't compliance, it's to defend yourself.
Perhaps ironically, the tool is most effective on those who need it the least: those who won't really defend themselves. A beating will achieve compliance in record time. This falsely incentivizes use of the tool. For those who have a more natural response of defending themselves, the available tool is no longer a beating, it's a beating so ****ing hard the person loses the will to maintain basic survival instincts.
To put it another way, the tool works best only when it's either
1) Not needed
2) The severity of non-compliance calls for you to go on the verge of killing the person.
Not a whit of what I said justifies what went on there, but considering how broken the toolbox is, I can't say I'm surprised the house is falling apart.
As a final thought, if you're a cop, and the prosecutor decides to take you down, what pictures do you want them showing the jury, the ones with two or three tiny holes, or the one where the person's face is so swollen they're unrecognizable?
I still wasn't "chastising you", I wasn't even talking about you with the "spray and pray" comment, I was talking about the legislators but you assumed it was somehow about you.
Is it your job to pass legislation or establish policy?
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
As someone who has agreed we need to repeal dumb laws, I think you know what I meant.
I've seen jaywalkers get cleaned off streets with a spatula, it isn't a "dumb law".
Also, in some municipalities it's illegal to simply walk around carrying a golf club (I know it is in Gatlinburg TN), not sure about Seattle. Also, didn't this happen last year? I was thinking, "Did this happen again?", but no, it was the same incident.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
Lately people around here are apparently dying to take offense at something, everyone having a bad week?
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
They're charging the kid with trespassing and resisting arrest (natch). With the former charge its impossible to tell if its a case of an untold story or trumped up charges.
Whatever you like, Shaddim. If you'd like to willfully ignore my point and your past comments, be my guest.
Did that cop go too far? Yes. Is jaywalking a "dumb law"? No.
That, too, is a deflection.
Get the sand out of your crack.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
Allow me to defend the argument there is a difficult job going on here, but perhaps not in the way it's most often used.
Andi's excellent post focused on compliance. You can cover almost the entirety of what cops want you to do with this one word.
We give cops three tools to achieve compliance.
1) Yelling at you
2) Beating the shit out of you
3) Shooting you
Without even getting into the quality of the tools, when it comes to the strength of the tools, they do a poor job covering the continuum of scenarios faced by cops, at least in terms of matching the strength of the tool to the severity of non-compliance.
As far as quality goes, number two is inherently flawed. The natural response to it isn't compliance, it's to defend yourself.
Perhaps ironically, the tool is most effective on those who need it the least: those who won't really defend themselves. A beating will achieve compliance in record time. This falsely incentivizes use of the tool. For those who have a more natural response of defending themselves, the available tool is no longer a beating, it's a beating so ****ing hard the person loses the will to maintain basic survival instincts.
To put it another way, the tool works best only when it's either
1) Not needed
2) The severity of non-compliance calls for you to go on the verge of killing the person.
Not a whit of what I said justifies what went on there, but considering how broken the toolbox is, I can't say I'm surprised the house is falling apart.
As a final thought, if you're a cop, and the prosecutor decides to take you down, what pictures do you want them showing the jury, the ones with two or three tiny holes, or the one where the person's face is so swollen they're unrecognizable?
The part I highlighted above is precisely on point. It's why to this day I still think anyone who claims that Rodney King was at fault for the severe beatdown he suffered because he wouldn't "comply" with the officer's instructions to put his hands behind his back is a f*cking idiot. If 4 grown men are raining down baton blows all over your body including your head anybody's natural instinct would be to cover up and protect yourself! In any event, regarding this incident itself I think this is quite illuminating ....
The video was posted by witness Edgar Avedaño, who gave his account of the incident on his Facebook page.
"The kid got stopped for jaywalking when he barely stepped out of the bus he was two feet away from the sidewalk when the cop stopped him for 'jaywalking'," he wrote. "He didn't have to hit the kid with the baton & no need to call about 20 cops."
Stockton Police Department Joe Silva said: "If everyone would just learn to comply with the lawful orders from police officers and not try to hold or grab any of our weapons force would never have to be used."
The teen was cited for trespassing and resisting arrest, Silva told NBC Los Angeles.
I think that right there sums up the fundamental disconnect between minority communities and the police. The former is focused on the profound lack of judgement/temperament of officers for hassling them over BS. Whereas the latter is focused on the minimal non-compliance of the person being arrested.
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