I ran into this once. It was at a time when our neighborhood was in transition and wild and wooly. There was the party from hell in the house across from us which moved out into the street. Punches were being thrown.
I called the police as I was afraid someone was going to get hurt. Then I turned on the scanner.
I listened as the police scoured the east section of our street. We live on West Street.
By the time they got here the party had dispersed. They knocked on our door and told us they had been everywhere and there was no sign of a party. :smack:
Well I wish I worked where you work, because there *are *known areas and agencies that *do *have a open policy, and it works! I am glad to hear that is the case where you are.
I work in DC. There is more than a little Federal Paranoia leaking into the local authorities. Hell we’ve just learned that the DC Fire Dept is going to go full encrypted. Because, you know, accidents, fires and other emergencies are important to keep secret.
And as far as showing up on scenes goes, the biggest arguement I have is not knowing when to show up but rather when not to show up. I listen to scanner traffic for any indication there is that I don’t need to go to a scene. Lack of information drives me to have to go to places.
The short version of a run-in I had with MPD a few years ago was because the info my station had was that I was on the scene of a 4 yr old shot by a robber. It turned out later it was an adult male suicide. That was after I was threatened with arrest for being there with a camera (outside the police line).
Had I been able to determine it was a suicide early I never would have gone there.
No. I used a mathematical tool called “division”. It is “Distance” divided by “time” equals “velocity”. Look it up (it is in most mathematics texts).
You may find it useful!
And how did you measure the distance and the time? I’ll give you a hint, you couldn’t have. At best your wife guessed. And let me guess, your wife pulled out into traffic and was hit by someone she guessed was going 40mph.
I am in a similar situation, although, I am a lawyer who dabbles in criminal work rather than a public defender. It’s about the same for me. Most of the errors are due to negligence and stupidity rather than malevolance.
I’ve had to deal with them a few times because I’m a bad parent. They’ve always been more than fair and understanding when my daughter has messed up. They could’ve arrested and booked her on at least 3 occasions but instead let me deal with her. She’s a good kid/citizen now and doesn’t view the cops as an adversary–in fact she considers them as guardians from society’s delinquents. My son’s legal trouble’s had more to do with an over-zealous DA. The cops came to serve an arrest warrant (for a felony charge) but chose not to haul him away as long as we agreed to show up in court at the specified time.
Of course, we’re white. I have no idea if that has actually mattered, but I’m given to understand I am supposed to believe it has.
Our traffic and crime police are completely separate entities (the latter can’t even give you a parking ticket) but I think of the former when I say “Fuck 'em” - corrupt, power-mad slobs I wouldn’t trust to tell me the time of day. Probably not all so, but all the ones I’ve encountered are.
Criminal cops, I’m OK with - I’d say there’s a lot more good ones than bad ones…nowadays. But I was (understandably - South Africa, 70s-80s) brought up with a complete distrust of them too, which I’m mostly overcome despite the past.
In the small town I consider my “home” town (Northwestern Kansas, 5,000 residents, and the county seat) I knew one local police officer from childhood, and liked him, but never saw him on the job. The one I saw regularly was an arrogant jerk who harassed the local teens regularly, especially the girls. My best friend eventually ended up filing harassment charges against him. (They stuck, and he ended up being moved somewhere with a whole lot of space and not very many people at all.) His treatment of me colored my attitude toward law enforcement in general for a very long time after.
I moved to a slightly bigger town (Southeastern Kansas, 18,000 permanent residents, but I think we operate at 30k while the University is in session) and live in the county, so I get to deal with city police and county sheriff’s deputies at different times and places. As I’ve grown older and less terrified, my dealings with LEO’s have gotten better, though I can’t say any of the ones here have been actively bad, unless you count the deputy who wrote down the address of the accident at an intersection that doesn’t exist. :rolleyes:
Lately, I’m getting to know far too many of the locals on a first-name-basis, mostly by way of the troubles with my mother. I’m sincerely glad that the deputy who came out on the welfare check mom sent him on waited in his truck long enough for hubby to go out and calm the dog he could see. He told hubby he didn’t want to tase the dog. Hubby said that was a good thing, since the other three would likely have been very unhappy with him for doing it.:smack: He hadn’t seen them, since one had been coming around from behind his truck, one from in front, and one literally came underneath. Once hubby introduced them all around, all was well, but it could have been ugly. (That was less than a month after someone tried to steal our air compressor about 2 am. We heard the dogs erupt out from under the house, heard a scream, an engine rev, tires on gravel, and only THEN did they bark. After that, they apparently decided to surround the prey. )
To illustrate, they just caught a serial killer of children upcountry, and here is a typical tale of local police apathy in two of the children’s deaths.
[QUOTE= the link]
‘‘The location the witch doctor told us was the same location where Nui confessed to police that he killed my son and dumped his body.’’
[/QUOTE]
So, I was a little shocked/surprised/nonplussed by this, then I remembered seeing homeopathic remedies in the pharmacy at a Walgreens. Never mind.
I’m not a huge fan of the NYPD. They haven’t done much to me personally to me aside from a cop walking into the bakery I work at and informing his partner that I must be bulimic because I’m not overweight, but stop and frisk is a pretty much universally unpopular tactic.
I witnessed what must have been a stop and frisk. Two uniformed officers and two undercover officers had a group of teenage boys lined up against a basket ball court fence and one of the undercover cops took items out of a boy’s pocket and threw whatever the boy had into the street. Meanwhile there was a trash can on the corner. Or the cop could have simply confiscated whatever it was which I’m assuming is proper procedure.
I had another bizarre encounter in which two cops driving pulled me over while I was walking and said I shouldn’t have my ipod out in a black neighborhood (Harlem- and I’m a white female). I said “Are you serious? I used to walk around Bed Stuy (Bedford Stuyvesant- a somewhat “rough” neighborhood in Brooklyn) listening to music and nothing ever happened. I don’t have it so loud that I can’t hear anything.” And they said “Oh ok, never mind.”
My township they’re great. I know most of them & they were always helpful when we were out on a call (EMS). However, the neighboring township (2miles away)…they make the Keystone Kops look professional! I dont know how they keep their accrediation.
My son’s legal trouble’s had more to do with an over-zealous DA. The cops came to serve an arrest warrant (for a felony charge) but chose not to haul him away as long as we agreed to show up in court at the specified time.
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