This is the kind of story where you tell yourself there must be a lot more to it: a Florida man is arrested for trespassing over 50 times, at work, over the objections of his boss. How the arrests can be defined as trespassing isn’t explained in any thing I’ve been able to find so far.
I have to wonder just how big that police department is, or what their turnover is like… if this was all the work of a dozen or so cops, what the hell were they thinking the 20th or 30th time they jacked him up? “This guy has got to be trespassing this time! Yeah, I know he’s wearing a SpeedyCo apron and he’s stacking cans on the shelf, and the place is open for business, but this time, man…”
:dubious::smack:
Several times when I worked at the grocery store, people were fired for shoplifting, and as a result were also banned from the store for 6 months just like any other shoplifter, and were told that if they set foot in the store, they would indeed be arrested for trespassing. But HE STILL WORKS THERE and he still gets busted? Weird. I, too wonder what’s really going on. Is his ex-wife the chief of police or something?
Florida…whatchugonnado?
Working While Black?
My husband is a postal worker in an area where it’s rather well-to-do - a bunch of his coworkers kept getting pulled over for DWB (driving while black) violations on the way into work, until their postmaster threatened the local police station that they would have to come get their mail personally if they kept making her employees late to work.
Still, you’d think that in that area, there can’t be enough cops to forget that a black dude works at that convenience store… :smack:
I’d guess they’re harassing him because he’s not cooperating with them in some other way.
Some details here Miami Gardens Police Department: How "zero tolerance" policing in Florida helped bad cops create a civil rights nightmare. - Basically, the store owner allowed the police to make his store a “Zero Tolerance Zone” which in effect meant that the police could come in anytime and roust anyone who looked suspicious to them.
Basically, the owner has found a way to use the system to get extra private protection. Sounds legally iffy to me, but I’m not a lawyer.
So of all possible pretenses for arresting him they choose “trespassing”? Seems like that would be a hard one to defend, given the apparent circumstances. Can’t he get a pro bono attorney or public defender, or are they only available if he goes to court?
A longer article on the matter.
One thing to point out–from the Miami Herald article that Slate article links to, the store owner did sign up for the police-sponsored “zero-tolerance” thing, figuring it would mean more police around to protect him and his store–but after the store owner discovered “zero tolerance” means the cops would start harassing his customers and arresting his employees for trespassing, the store owner has spent the last three years fighting this shit. The owner of the store has put up video cameras, not to catch criminals, but to document police misconduct (like the cops arresting one of his employees 62 times for “trespassing”). And the owner of the store is filing a civil rights lawsuit over this bullshit.
Ugh. If legit customers are suffering the same problem, then it sounds like a serious issue with having black people in the neighborhood and wanting to drive out “undesirables” by this method.
There’s got to be more to this story. Maybe the store is a front for a drug operation or something? They may be selling more than milk & bread in there.
Cops got better things to do than repeatedly hassling people in that store. From what I’ve seen on shows like Cops, the same cops patrol an area of town week after week. They must know this guy’s name and face after arresting him multiple times. They must know he works there. There’s got to be some reason they keep picking him up.
There’s something not being reported here.
Protection costs more than they’re willing to pay.
The more is called racism. The reason why shit like this continues to happen is because people are always assuming there’s “more to the story”.
If there was more to the story, the police would have told us
But at the same time the reason can’t be ‘we want to have him charged with and convicted of trespassing’ unless ‘59th time’s the charm!’ is the department’s motto.
Is there some legal way of making the state either stop arresting someone or go to trial? It seems obvious in a common-sense way that at after a certain number of arrests that don’t lead to a conviction that the police are simply harassing someone.
Just wow. :eek:
Why would you assume that there is some sort of drug trafficking going on? The linked news stories give no indication of anything like this.
It’s just a guess. The police behavior is so outrageous. There’s got to be some reason they’re targeting that store and people in it. Stores are sometimes fronts for illegal activities. I don’t know if that’s the case here or not. It’s pure speculation on my part. But it could explain why the cops are constantly in there.
Just as an example. You’ve probably seen news stories about Dominoes Pizza delivering more than pizza. It’s been a few years ago, but I recall quite a few news article in the 90’s. Here’s just one I quickly found.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2519&dat=19910122&id=brBdAAAAIBAJ&sjid=vV0NAAAAIBAJ&pg=2809,2487255
You think that is the more obvious reason than the cops are assholes who are abusing their power and harassing people? Why did the store owner install video cameras in his store if he is involved in illegal activity? Why did he sign up for the police “zero tolerance” program if he is trafficking drugs from his store?