Just saw the latest news this morning. Last night memembers of the ACLU, NAACP, state and local government officials, representatives os the State Law Enforcement Division, etc. met to hear public opinion. Hell is being raised. People want Principal McCracken dissmissed. Changes are also being suggested for the Goose Creek PD. This would be a fine time to be an abulance chasing attorney in the South Carolina Lowcountry.
Well, to be frank, I would lump metal detectors in with the war on drugs, zero tolerance and reefer madness, if only simply because they are all connected, and are all part of a bigger picture. They’re all part of what’s wrong with our society today, in my opinion. They’re just symptoms of a much larger, more deadly social disease, if you’ll pardon the pun.
It doesn’t mean however, that I don’t approve of metal detectors in school. For the record, as long as they’re necessary, I do approve of them, as I believe there’s absolutely no possible good reason for bringing a weapon to school, ever. (Well, unless your school teaches something like fencing or archery, I suppose, but you get my drift.)
Neither students nor teachers should have to be subjected to being held at gunpoint in a school.
Which is my entire point, and the root of my outrage at this high school incident, really.
The above post is in reply to spooje’s last post. (I really need to learn to always quote, or type faster, one of the two. =p )
Then we are not that far apart after all. I hope that we can soon reach a point where we don’t need metal detectors at our schools…
Yeah, only an “amublance chaser” would represent these poor kids. WTF?! Personally, I think heads should roll. Nobody is against secure schools, or drug raids supported by actual evidence as far as I can tell. I’ll just speak for myself. The police did what they call on TV a “tactical entry.” There was no need for that. Handcuffing “non-compliant” students was more like cuffing sheep in shock.
Tactical entrys are better suited for meth labs out in the desert being guarded by rattlesnakes and two bikers with shotguns, or something. There is an inherent risk that you cannot get around when numerous humans unholster guns and wave them around. This type of behavior should be avoided except when necessary. Getting “tough” on crime has always been a laudable and dangerous goal. “Tough” isn’t in the US Constitution, for one thing. Standards for searches and seizures, OTOH.
Let’s say a student that doesn’t speak English so well runs when he sees the cops acting so overserious. He might be thinking “Columbine” and take the first route out. Bam
“We thought he was the armed druggie student.”
Amen.
Under THOSE circumstances, I don’t think that would fly anywhere. IIRC, cops cannot shoot at someone who is running away unless they KNOW they are armed and dangerous.
But I could be wrong…
Uh huh… And we all know how that always works out in practice right?
Of course, cops never get away with abuse of force, right? :rolleyes:
The video I’ve seen of both the cops and the principal have said that they believed the problem to be marijuana.
But again, this underscores my point – where was the investigation that preceeded this extreme police action? Where was the undercover agent put into the school? Where was the use of confidential informants? Where was the pinpointing of particular “students of interest” who could be put under surveillance, or approached for a buy by a cooperative kid wearing a wire, which would’ve solidified that there was drug dealing happening, and exactly who was involved? Where was the preemptory search of the school with drug dogs while all of the students were confined to an assembly, or during a class period when kids would be in their classrooms instead of out and about in the hallways?
It seems like a big, important, crucial, fundamental part of the process just got thrown out because the Goose Creek PD got a bee in their bonnet or got ants in their pants or failed to grow a brain or was looking for some quick glory, and let their desire to “go do this now” supercede good, basic police work.
You keep coming back to the fact that the police had no way of knowing whether or not there were weapons on the scene, and you’re right – but there again, the police opened themselves to the risk of students’ weapons by choosing this unnecessarily forceful and dangerous tactical raid. Again, if they’d started an investigation – which may have taken time – and coupled that with metal detector insertion and if they’d entered the school in a time and fashion that limited the possibility of student interaction, the danger would’ve been minimized.
Running into the school with guns drawn when all of the kids would be in the hallways was just dumb, if the interest was keeping the chances of anyone getting shot at the barest minimum.
Doesn’t even have to be an ESL student – how about someone who is simply so horrified at the sight of a gun that they act instinctively, which is to say that they try to put as much distance between themselves and that gun as possible? How about a kid who grew up in a violent neighborhood where guns meant innocent bystanders shot and learned at an early age to just get away? How about a kid who grew up in a violent household where gun threats had been a part of the family fabric?
Thank all good forces in the universe that none of those scenarios came to pass.
Plenty of people are in favor of the legalization of marijuana, and some would prefer to see all drugs legalized. From that POV, raids themselves seem unnecessary.
When cops get a bug up their ass, or a hair across same, and pull off a harebrained stunt like this, it shows that the HWOD has gone too far.
And then?
Get it? Now we’re getting Chinese food.
What the hell is that?
The And Then?/Chinese Food connection is from “Dude, Where’s My Car?” … beyond that, I can’t tell WTF that post was about.
Agreed.
Well, I guess you didn’t see “Dude, where’s my car?”
Sorry. That was a spoof on the dangers of the evil weed. After you run afoul of a dog that won’t share, you go to get Chinese food with a server that repeats “and then” over and over. Those are about the only two humor options in that movie, IMO. The giant hot girl is interesting, though not original.
I really did not mean to trainwreck this thread with a stupid joke. I still think the tactical entry was massive overkill.
But this is the point I’m objecting to. Why do we then assume that the school is NOT safe?
I went to a pretty safe upper middle class white HS. Just a mile away in the next town over was the type of school that you describe: much lower SES, guns and gang violence, drugs, a dangerous place. So we all know that these places exist, and there are far too many of them.
But if this was such a school I find it hard to believe that the journalist covering the story would omit this info. I find it very difficult to believe that the cop being interviewed wouldn’t have mentioned something: e.g. “Due to the recent gang activity/shootings/gun violence/whatever at this school over the passed few years, we really felt we needed to take every precaution for our safety”.
Look, if that info does come out, as well as a great deal of other info that I think would be necessary to convince me that they did the correct thing (such as taking other preliminary measures with the raid in fact being the last resort), than I’ll be glad to concede that you were right all along to have given the police the “benefit of the doubt”. (And I’d like to know why the heck that info was omitted in the first place).
Until then, I’m fuckin’ pissed off that the cops and the school’s administration would condone such a thing, and I’m saddened that so many young poeple had to experience that.
I have only lived in the Charleston area for a little over a year now, but let me tell you … the people here are pissed over this.
Perspective: Goose Creek is the “bedroom community” for Charleston. It’s generally a very quiet, low crime, clean area, partly because a lot of the military that live here reside there. Gang activity? Shootings? No. Quiet. Low crime. I’d move there myself, but it would lengthen my commute.
I think part of the reason that the local people are so upset is that the police have been increasingly touchy … reactive … triggerhappy? There’ve been a few “justifiable homicides” in the last few years that really soured the PD’s reputation. Just last week, they chased a mentally retarded gentleman down, shot him in the leg, beat him, and then shot him again (killing him) … for allegedly shoplifting. Then, they confiscated cameras from bystanders who had seen the events and had the sense to try to document what they saw. The statements issued by the PD have been very inconsistent with what observers claim to have seen (apparently there were not just a couple of observers, either).
Anyways, I’m just saying that the police here are viewed by the locals as excessively violent and not at all trustworthy. I fully expect to see people marching in the streets (peacefully, I hope) about these issues in the near future. I may be there with them. The excessive violence has to stop.
Becky, you’ve put a whole new spin on this – can you point to some news sources for the story about the death of the mentally challenged man?
This sounds like it. They require registration. It’s telling me my brand freaking new ID and password is invalid. Maybe I’ll go look A-gain.
People talk about the “bad apples” in the force. But, given the military structure and cooperation between units, it’s unrealistic to think that many “bad apples” can function in a police division or small department if that particular barrel is generally clean.