this post was submitted on 22 Mar 2024
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THE POLICE PROBLEM

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    The police problem is that police are policed by the police. Cops are accountable only to other cops, which is no accountability at all.

    99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.

    When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.

    When police are fired — which is all too rare — they leave with 'law enforcement experience' and can easily find work in another police department nearby. It's called "Wandering Cops."

    When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.

    Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.

    The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.

    All this is a path to a police state.

    In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.

    Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.

    That's the solution.

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Our definition of ‘cops’ is broad, and includes prison guards, probation officers, shitty DAs and judges, etc — anyone who has the authority to fuck over people’s lives, with minimal or no oversight.

♦ ♦ ♦

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ALLIES

!abolition@slrpnk.net

!acab@lemmygrad.ml

r/ACAB

r/BadCopNoDonut/

Randy Balko

The Civil Rights Lawyer

The Honest Courtesan

Identity Project

MirandaWarning.org

♦ ♦ ♦

INFO

A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions

Adultification

Cops aren't supposed to be smart

Don't talk to the police.

Killings by law enforcement in Canada

Killings by law enforcement in the United Kingdom

Killings by law enforcement in the United States

Know your rights: Filming the police

Three words. 70 cases. The tragic history of 'I can’t breathe' (as of 2020)

Police aren't primarily about helping you or solving crimes.

Police lie under oath, a lot

Police spin: An object lesson in Copspeak

Police unions and arbitrators keep abusive cops on the street

Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States

So you wanna be a cop?

When the police knock on your door

♦ ♦ ♦

ORGANIZATIONS

Black Lives Matter

Campaign Zero

Innocence Project

The Marshall Project

Movement Law Lab

NAACP

National Police Accountability Project

Say Their Names

Vera: Ending Mass Incarceration

 

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An undercover police officer arranged to buy 2 magic mushroom chocolate bars over Instagram then opened fire within seconds, killing the driver and injuring the passenger for selling $100 worth of antidepressants. Perfectly justified.

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[–] ShadowRam@fedia.io 124 points 7 months ago (3 children)

An undercover officer had arranged to meet Edelmann in the 7-Eleven parking lot on South Maryland Avenue at 7:40 p.m. and purchase two chocolate bars infused with psychedelic mushrooms

So.. that's what your police $$$ is going towards?

Setting up sting operations over some mushroom chocolate bars?

[–] ArgentRaven@lemmy.world 63 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Not at all! Most of it goes to excessive force payoffs. And buying surplus military equipment like tanks.

[–] underisk@lemmy.ml 23 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Don't forget trips to Israel to train with the IDF.

[–] Jimmyeatsausage@lemmy.world 9 points 7 months ago

Hey, if you want to kill the most civilians for the lowest cost, you gotta train with the best!

[–] Woht24@lemmy.world 28 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

Even worse is the prostitute stings they proudly show on COPS. They pretend to be John's and make agreed deals with consenting adults and then say 'haha we're actually the police, not some guy who wanted to fuck you and you're under arrest for merely agreeing to have sex for money'.

Like what an absolute fucking waste of time, money and people's lives.

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 5 points 7 months ago

I was wondering about that camera

[–] Nomecks@lemmy.ca 10 points 7 months ago (1 children)

They stopped $1 Trillion of chocolate bars in this single bust!

[–] thesporkeffect@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago

Don't forget the street value of the drug paraphernalia (sandwich bag)

[–] girlfreddy@lemmy.ca 93 points 7 months ago

As always, ACAB.

And RIP to Andrew Edelmann. He didn't deserve to murdered by a cop.

[–] skeptomatic@lemmy.ca 56 points 7 months ago (1 children)

The 22 y/o wasn't killed, "over 2 magic mushroom chocolate bars", he was killed because he accelerated his vehicle in an attempt to flee, and came somewhat close to hitting the officer.
However, before the victim accelerated, the officer who shot the young man jumped out of the passenger door of an unmarked police truck and drew his weapon, no audio in the video.
There's a very real chance the victim did not know he was a cop, and panicked. He should be excused of that, had he lived.
The officer fucked up hard, jumping out an unmarked vehicle with no emergency lights, waving a gun around?
Fuck, I'd run over anyone who does that to me, and I think most would do similar.
Then also not practicing restraint in firing his weapon after clearly no more danger existed once the car passed him, guy's a fucking clown.
The only reason the second police vehicle (which showed up from behind just as the victim accelerated) was even hit at all is because the victim had been shot and couldn't steer the vehicle.
The cop should be charged with second degree, or at minimum some kind of reckless endangerment resulting in death, and fired.

[–] Hegar@kbin.social 31 points 7 months ago (1 children)

"over 2 magic mushroom chocolate bars" in the sense that that's what was at stake, that was the reason for the whole thing. "used as a function word to indicate the object of an ... activity" to quote Miriam Webster.

You describe quite well how the officers' plans and actions made this outcome more likely. And how these failures put them in a position to kill a kid they were only there to bust for 2 shroom bars anyway.

[–] Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world 51 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Killed someone over a god damn candy bar.

[–] originalfrozenbanana@lemm.ee 10 points 7 months ago

Filled with the devils fungus, I’ll have you know!

[–] SteefLem@lemmy.world 35 points 7 months ago
[–] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 35 points 7 months ago (1 children)

We’ve investigated ourselves and found no wrongdoing.

[–] RamblingPanda@lemmynsfw.com 2 points 7 months ago

Also we found those tasty chocolate bars and some money

[–] LodeMike@lemmy.today 18 points 7 months ago

Wait so they opened fire for him trying to excape???

Jesus fuck.

[–] IvanOverdrive@lemm.ee 15 points 7 months ago

Was the chocolate bar shaped like a gun? No?

Also, isn't homicide a crime?

[–] GluWu@lemm.ee 5 points 7 months ago

They're coming right for us! Kill em Ned!

They proudly never thought satire about justifying hunting would be a valid policing strategy.

[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Because simply jumping out of the way and performing a pesky chase is too hard.

[–] Kolanaki@yiffit.net 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Never run from cops. You'll just die tired.

[–] ShadowRam@fedia.io 3 points 7 months ago

Was it an obvious cop?

Some unmarked truck shows up, blocks you, and dude jumps out with gun in hand?

Fleeing with your vehicle seems pretty on par for most people's reaction.

[–] uis@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago
[–] ettyblatant@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

Do cops like him get security guards after murdering someone?