Kissing your husband while black? Not if the LAPD can help it.

[Fotheringay-Phipps]

Here’s an article from LA Weekly with some sources. Apparently the ACLU and the Police union are on different sides, unsurprisingly. Also this:

UCLA law professor Paul Bergman, who teaches a “Street Law Clinic,” appears to agree:

Once a police officer identifies the suspect as matching a description of people involved in committing a crime, even a low-grade misdemeanor, it gives the police officer the right to do a minimally invasive investigation. And an investigation, typically, even the most minimal investigation, consists of asking for identification. The refusal to provide identification generally gives the police officer the right to investigate further.

As a suspect or even a subject of an investigation, “You do have to comply with a reasonable request for identification,” the prof says.

He said refusing to identify oneself to a cop investigating you for even a misdemeanor would, as the police union noted, constitute alleged obstructing or delaying a police officer. “That in itself is a misdemeanor committed in the officer’s presence,” Bergman said.

He said the right to remain silent does not apply to identifying oneself, either.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@you_with_the_face

I don’t understand why the racial angle is being dismissed so readily.

Because these days people dismiss claims of racism unless the guy has a swastika tattoed to his forehead. The level of proof that people require to raise the spectre of racism these days is unreasonably high because people perceive that agitators like Al Sharpton have cried wolf so many times that it has undermined the credibility of anyone that cries racism.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Bricker

I think there may be more widespread disagreement about what, exactly, “justice” means in a given situation. Legality tends to be more firmly and objectively defined.

But let’s imagine a person who prizes justice over legality.

In this thread, why wouldn’t such a person continue to valorize justice? Why would he (or she) suddenly switch to support of the law?

Because they, like you, understand that it is a better argument except when the law is against them.

I will say taht the one case where this is perfectly reasoanble is when we are taking issue with the law itself (see voter ID laws) and not with the legality versus morality of actions.

[DrDeth]

@Smapti

Let’s see your badge.

*“Badges, to god-damned hell with badges! We have no badges. In fact, we don’t need badges. I don’t have to show you any stinking badges, you god-damned cabrón and chinga tu madre!”
*

[XT]

@Acsenray

If it’s unrealistic then the whole concept of a police force is unrealistic. You don’t think that a large part of the training of cops doesn’t already consist of things like “you are allowed/not allowed to do this?”

No, that’s why we HAVE lawyers and courts of law. Sheesh, because you can’t realistically train police to know all the ins and outs of the law and be perfect little law enforcement robots isn’t a reason to toss baby out with bath water.

There are certainly close calls that can’t be resolved in court, but life is not all close calls. In a situation like that of Lillie in St. Paul, it seems to me quite easy for a cop to be trained to just let it go. You think encounters like that don’t already happen every day in which cops don’t escalate like they did with Lillie? When, for example, the person is an affluent-looking white guy?

I think they DO happen all the time, but most people don’t make a big deal about it. I wouldn’t. To me, the cops, while in the wrong, acted reasonably rationally…they were called in by their dispatch to check out a complaint, they did so and then ran into someone with a chip on their shoulder and reacted like, well, humans when in a confrontational situation. Again, the reason we have courts and lawyers is because the cops are just there to enforce the law, not make it, and if they don’t know something then it’s up to those courts and lawyers to figure that out and set them straight. I bet that, if there is a law suit and the cops lose in either of the cases being discussed in this thread that the cops involved and the departments involved will at least take notice for the future.

[Smapti]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Because these days people dismiss claims of racism unless the guy has a swastika tattoed to his forehead. The level of proof that people require to raise the spectre of racism these days is unreasonably high because people perceive that agitators like Al Sharpton have cried wolf so many times that it has undermined the credibility of anyone that cries racism.

Hyperbole aside, there is absolutely no reason to see racism in either of these incidents unless you automatically assume that any interaction between a white police officer and a black person is inherently racist.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Smapti

Is “submitting to racists” a bad thing if a result of it is that “their evil will not surface”?

Yes because their racism will surface anytime someone doesn’t obey their unlawful orders. Their racism needs to be exposed not avoided.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Smapti

The sum total of encounters I’ve had with the police in my lifetime (notwithstanding occasions when I called them myself) have been traffic stops, as follows, in chronological order;

• For operating an unsafe vehicle when my old Ford (which would die on me two days later) was spewing so much black smoke out the tailpipe that the officer couldn’t see my taillights. $91 fine.

• For driving without my headlights on the night after I bought the car that replaced the old Ford. I showed the officer the sales paperwork and explained to him that in my old car the headlights had always been on when the dash lights were on, and I hadn’t realized I only had the parking lights on because I was driving in a well-lit area. Let off with a warning.

• Driving 40 in a 25 zone. My fault, wasn’t paying attention to the speed limit signs, was very apologetic to the officer. He knocked it down to 30 in a 25 zone and gave me a ticket for $101.

• Traveling in the left lane on the freeway. Pretty sure the officer just wanted to see if I was drunk (I wasn’t.) Let off with a warning.

• Dead headlight. Let off with a warning and an instruction to replace the bulb the next day, which I did.

• Same thing, two years later. Same result.

• Using a cell phone while driving - I was trying to get directions off the GPS and the cop thought I had been texting. I explained and apologized and was let off with a warning.

I’ve never refused to give them my information or been anything but courteous, and I’d say it’s worked a lot better for me than shouting about vaguely-understood rights has for the people we’re discussing in this thread.

I think you are required to provide ID in each of those cases. So you have never been hassled by the cops wihtout doing somethign wrong. It is possible that every black man I have spoken to about this has lied to me but they universally have had encounters with police where police attention was unwarranted and they were hassled when they did nothing wrong.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Smapti

What is more civically responsible than obeying the law and respecting authority?

There is no issue of obeying the law here. The woman was not doing anything wrong.

Respecting authority is not civic responsibility. If tyranny comes then respecting authority means respecting tyranny and that is not a civic virtue.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Smapti

I believe we’ve established that the “prostitution” thing was ultimately a red herring; the cops never accused her of such, it was the boyfriend who claimed that they must have thought she was a prostitute.

Sorry I’m running behind.

[Snowboarder_Bo]

@Cheesesteak

Of course it’s plausible, it actually happens.

I just don’t know if giving a false name all on its own, if you’re just fucking with the cops, is a crime or if it has to be in conjuction with some other purpose like trying to avoid getting picked up on a warrant, like this guy was.

Who is “this guy”? Mr. Lollie? Cite that he was trying to avoid getting picked up on a warrant?

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Cubsfan

Because she was fucking a guy in a car in a parking lot? What’s hard to understand about that? There are pretty damning pictures and statements from people in the office that called the cops to begin with.

None of those pctures show them having sex.

[Smapti]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Yes because their racism will surface anytime someone doesn’t obey their unlawful orders. Their racism needs to be exposed not avoided.

But if no one ever gave them an opportunity to behave in a racist manner…

[Cheesesteak]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Sorry I’m running behind.

It’s only an 1,100 post thread, get a move on!

[Smapti]

@Damuri_Ajashi

Sorry I’m running behind.

I had noticed from your train of replying to my posts from 12 pages ago.

[Snowboarder_Bo]

@Smapti

We’ve established no such thing - quite the contrary, in fact.

No, we’ve established those facts. You’re just an idiot.

[Smapti]

@Damuri_Ajashi

There is no issue of obeying the law here. The woman was not doing anything wrong.

Having sex in public in broad daylight is what most people would define as “something wrong”.

Respecting authority is not civic responsibility. If tyranny comes then respecting authority means respecting tyranny and that is not a civic virtue.

How do you figure?

[XT]

@Damuri_Ajashi

None of those pctures show them having sex.

The people watching them obviously thought they were having sex. That’s why they asked them to stop and then called the cops.

[Damuri_Ajashi]

@Fotheringay-Phipps

These cops are not lawyers, and even if they were they don’t have the luxury of searching the net for case history on legal nuances every time they are making a decision as to what to do. If they are to be effective at law enforcement they need to be able to make snap decisions about what is to be done in this situation and then enforce that decision. And if the citizen resists, then they need to override that. There’s no other practical way to police things. You can’t have the cops on the phone with their lawyers in every encounter asking “He said/did such-and-such – what am I allowed to do now?”

Police academy around here is about 6 months. You can learn criminal procedure (particularly issues with respect to terry stops, which you will encounter on an almost daily basis).

The only thing more important than this is probably when you can conduct a warrantles search and seizure.

[Cheesesteak]

@Snowboarder_Bo

Who is “this guy”? Mr. Lollie? Cite that he was trying to avoid getting picked up on a warrant?

The guy in my link, he gave a phony name to avoid getting picked up, but the police matched him to a description. To a certain extent, how much I’m not sure, you are expected to provide accurate information, if you give the police your name.