If a LEO believes there is probable cause the chief of police committed a crime, the chief should be duly arrested, charged, etc. It doesn’t matter what kind of crime it is. And the chief should be held to the same standard – not more or less – than anyone else suspected of the same crime.
But you also mentioned that potentially muddies the issue:
Are you saying it is rare for a person to be *arrested *for this particular crime, even when there is ample probable cause? And it’s a felony? :dubious: I guess I have never heard of a felony treated this way.
Has he taken any action in order to have the law changed? Can you say (without, if you must keep this up, saying what the actual crime was) what tone his confession took? Was he remoseful, or did he flaunt his actions? What was the general public reaction?
For crying out loud just tell us what the actual felony was.
Are you aware of Kohlbergs stages of moral development? Right now you seem to be at a solid ‘4’ out of 6, ie ‘the law is the law’ stage, regardless of how stupid it would be to enforce that particular law.
Is it being enforced for other people? Or is he being singled out for enforcement? Is it a law that will likely fail on constitutional grounds but just ruin his life in the meantime? Those would be some fairly important details for a start.
If Top Cop did somebody in the butt, and it was consensual, the question is moot. The Supreme Court struck down all such laws several years ago. Nobody but nobody gets prosecuted for that any more. Right?
I’m racking my brains for any felony still in effect that is ignored by law enforcement. Some old blue law? Whiskey on a Sunday?
**WhyNot **had an excellent argument: If it’s a bad law and needs to be repealed or struck down, and the legislature won’t play ball, let somebody take one for the team. Get arrested and convicted, then appeal it up and get it struck down.
I would only want laws I agree with enforced. I’m not ashamed to admit it. I think my views of the law should be what the law is
If the Chief confessed to a felony I disagree with, then it shouldn’t be enforced. I would think he has MORE credibility if he doesn’t resign, because I automatically think that people who agree with me are smarter than people who disagree
This is simply incorrect. The average person cannot be charged with Misconduct in Public Office (THAT, by the way, is NOT the crime the OP is talking about). But my point of this specific post is that the Chief of police is in a unique position and is not the same as the average citizen.
Yep. And while the idea behind the law is archaic, the law itself isn’t buried in some old musty volume somewhere. In fact, it’s in the anecdoted copy of the state statute book that every squad car in Wisconsin is equipped with.
[Moderator Note]You supposedly started this thread as a vague hypothetical, but you keep bringing in specific details from one particular case. Either stick to the original op and keep it hypothetical, or drop the “hypothetical” part of the OP and give with all the details posters are asking for.[/Moderator Note]
You didn’t give details so it was a hypothetical. Until you give details, it can’t be anything but. We can’t give you our opinion of a real situation if we do not know the details of that situation.
From what little you have given, my answer is that, if the law is not ever enforced against anyone else, then it isn’t really a law, even if it is on the books. This clearly sounds like a politically motivated stunt by someone who doesn’t like your police chief. That is a good reason, in my opinion, to fight back. And hard.
But the fact that this is a police chief does not factor into the considerations and I am actually somewhat alarmed that, as a former cop, it somehow does in your mind. Cops are not above the law. If anything, they should adhere even more strictly. A cop that does not obey the law is not a cop, but a vigilante.
If I had provided the offense in the beginning Dopers would have judge the law and not the Chief. My goal here was to get the opinions of a police Chief that breaks the law he is sworn to uphold, not as a forum to rant against this Chief. If you go back and read you’ll see I posted that I believed the law to be archaic and should be repealed, that I don’t believe the Chief should have been charged, but I do think he should resign. It is revealing how some simply want laws they don’t like to not be enforced, yet shrug at the idea of having those laws repealed. Is this a distrust of their legislatures to do the right thing?
You’re all over the map here. You seem to be defending the Chief but at the same time you post “A cop that does not obey the law is not a cop”. What?
Police Chief Eddie Flynn, in Milwaukee, with the Other Woman.
(Chief Flynn admitted to adultery in 2009, a felony in Wisconsin. He also recently slammed a CCW licensing proposal, which you may recall is one of pkbites’s hobbyhorses.)
Alright, it is. Ya gotta let me a little fun though, eh?
Like I posted previously, my opinion is the law is archaic and should be repealed. There are civil remedies for it (divorce, ex-spouses suing for emotional distress, etc.). I also don’t believe that, even though it is a felony, he (or most offenders) should be charged. But my opinion is it does damage his credibility and he should have resigned.
How Kimmy_Gibbler tied in CCW to this is beyond me, though.
Current issues being debated are a mere coincidence.
“This is not a crime that is prosecuted,” said Chisholm. “And I know of no case that’s been prosecuted by this office since I’ve been an assistant [district attorney].”
A google shows he started as one in 1994.
Yeah nothing selective about trying to get that one enforced.
Police should be held to a higher standard, when an offense is connected to their position, and just like everyone else when it’s not.
Now, I believe that cops get away with far too much in this country, and think way more cops should be fired for abusing their position, but where a putative crime has nothing to do with the officer’s job, and especially is never, ever, enforced against anyone else, then enforcing it against the Chief is pure political prosecution (that’s a Bad Thing, by the way).
Sure, in an ideal world, the law would be repealed, but this world is not ideal, and I can’t think of a better case for prosecutorial discretion.
How do I know? It depends on what the law was. I’m not going to be outraged if I find out the Chief of Police was part of an anti-segregation protest in Mississippi in 1960.
Alright, it is. Ya gotta let me a little fun though, eh?