# Loach is a dickhead fucking cop **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 14, 2006, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672 "2006-09-14T13:03:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/21 "2006-09-14T13:29:45Z")
that needed three posts, why? ---
**Author:** ![Eleusis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Eleusis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleusis)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/22 "2006-09-14T13:33:14Z")
[QUOTE=Loach] Words have meaning. Legal words have very specific meanings. Search and pat down do not have the same legal meaning. Probable cause and articulable suspicion do not mean the same thing. There is a small group of people who like to write about these things, we like to call them the Supreme Court. You might want to do some reading before you jump into a thread. You were showing your ignorance in a GQ thread. I tried to clarify a point using a generic example. You decided to shit all over a GQ thread. But appartently I’m the dickhead. Again I’ll say if you have a problem with anything I have ever doen in my life go ahead and rip me apart. Someone else gave you a ticket you don’t you deserved? Boo fucking hoo. [/QUOTE] Whatever, dick. You seem to enjoy pulling people over with cracked windshields, and “patting them down for your own safety”. That’s a dick move and I don’t care who disagrees. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/23 "2006-09-14T13:34:30Z")
[QUOTE=Eleusis] And what bearing does the gun really have on the illegal search? [/QUOTE] It was not an illegal search. See [Terry v Ohio](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_v._Ohio). > [@Eleusis](#): > > Therefore you know that the Supreme Court has ruled that a traffic stop is not grounds for a drug search. **Loach** did not describe a drug search. Loach described pulling someone over for a safety violation, a cracked windshield. Loach further described a driver who was nervous, aggressively/offensively postured and repeatecly reaching for his waist despite repeated instructions to keep his hands in plain sight. Loach described a perfectly legal Terry stop. You’re projecting something from your own experiences onto the post and you’re wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Mindfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mindfield/32/19759_2.png) [@Mindfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mindfield)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/24 "2006-09-14T13:36:11Z")
Ad hominems don’t exactly help you assert your argument, and you’re pointedly avoiding other side of the argument (the one that disagrees with your assessment) which is simply this: If there is a damn good, articulable reason to conduct the search _that arises subsequent to, and independent of, the reason the person was stopped in the first place_ then the search is perfectly legal and acceptable. Forget the cracked windshield. It is immaterial to the subsequent search except that it was the reason that the car was stopped and what the officer had initially intended to investigate. The search arose as a direct result of the driver’s highly suspicious behaviour, not because the cop just decided to use the broken windshield as an excuse to perform a search. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/25 "2006-09-14T13:37:16Z")
[QUOTE=Eleusis] Whatever, dick. You seem to enjoy pulling people over with cracked windshields, and “patting them down for your own safety”. That’s a dick move and I don’t care who disagrees. [/QUOTE] Again there is that reading for comprehension thing. I used the cracked windshield in my example because \*you \* did. I later mentioned that in 9 years I have _never_ pulled _anyone_ over for a cracked winshield, though I could because the state legislature has decided it is important enough to make a statute for it. I apologize for any one who has to read my posts today. Damn there are a lot of typos. In my defense I have been awake for a looong time. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/26 "2006-09-14T13:37:41Z")
1. It was an example. He never claimed to have done so. 2. Even if he did, so what? If he observes suspicious and furtive activity should he simply wait to get shot to provide the evidence, or is he allowed to take reasonable (quite reasonable) measures to protect himself AND the driver? 3. You have no idea what you’re talking about. None. ---
**Author:** ![Gfactor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9de053/32.png) [@Gfactor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gfactor)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/27 "2006-09-14T13:39:03Z")
You are way out there on this one **Eleusis**. **Loach** said that the windshield was grounds for stopping the vehicle–it is. He explained that cause to stop was not the same as an articulable suspicion necessary for a pat down. He gave an example of articulable suspicion. He never said anything like the strawman claims you allege here: > [@](#): > > Finding a gun later does not make the initial search legal. > > A cracked windshield does not make the driver a criminal. That was you. A cracked windshield is not a criminal offense, but it might be a civil infraction–like speeding. Cops can pull you over for both. Once they have pulled you over, they’ve got a right to protect themselves. If you are behaving suspiciously, he’s got a right to pat you down. Here is the behavior that justified a pat down in the famous \*Terry \* case. [QUOTE=Justice Warren] Officer McFadden testified that while he was patrolling in plain clothes in downtown Cleveland at approximately 2:30 in the afternoon of October 31, 1963, his attention was attracted by two men, Chilton and Terry, standing on the corner of Huron Road and Euclid Avenue. He had never seen the two men before, and he was unable to say precisely what first drew his eye to them. However, he testified that he had been a policeman for 39 years and a detective for 35 and that he had been assigned to patrol this vicinity of downtown Cleveland for shoplifters and pickpockets for 30 years. He explained that he had developed routine habits of observation over the years and that he would “stand and watch people or walk and watch people at many intervals of the day.” He added: “Now, in this case when I looked over they didn’t look right to me at the time.” His interest aroused, Officer McFadden took up a post of observation in the entrance to a store 300 to 400 feet [392 U.S. 1, 6] away from the two men. “I get more purpose to watch them when I seen their movements,” he testified. He saw one of the men leave the other one and walk southwest on Huron Road, past some stores. The man paused for a moment and looked in a store window, then walked on a short distance, turned around and walked back toward the corner, pausing once again to look in the same store window. He rejoined his companion at the corner, and the two conferred briefly. Then the second man went through the same series of motions, strolling down Huron Road, looking in the same window, walking on a short distance, turning back, peering in the store window again, and returning to confer with the first man at the corner. The two men repeated this ritual alternately between five and six times apiece - in all, roughly a dozen trips. At one point, while the two were standing together on the corner, a third man approached them and engaged them briefly in conversation. This man then left the two others and walked west on Euclid Avenue. Chilton and Terry resumed their measured pacing, peering, and conferring. After this had gone on for 10 to 12 minutes, the two men walked off together, heading west on Euclid Avenue, following the path taken earlier by the third man. By this time Officer McFadden had become thoroughly suspicious. He testified that after observing their elaborately casual and oft-repeated reconnaissance of the store window on Huron Road, he suspected the two men of “casing a job, a stick-up,” and that he considered it his duty as a police officer to investigate further. He added that he feared “they may have a gun.” Thus, Officer McFadden followed Chilton and Terry and saw them stop in front of Zucker’s store to talk to the same man who had conferred with them earlier on the street corner. Deciding that the situation was ripe for direct action. Officer McFadden approached the three men, identified [392 U.S. 1, 7] himself as a police officer and asked for their names. At this point his knowledge was confined to what he had observed. He was not acquainted with any of the three men by name or by sight, and he had received no information concerning them from any other source. When the men “mumbled something” in response to his inquiries, Officer McFadden grabbed petitioner Terry, spun him around so that they were facing the other two, with Terry between McFadden and the others, and patted down the outside of his clothing. In the left breast pocket of Terry’s overcoat Officer McFadden felt a pistol. He reached inside the overcoat pocket, but was unable to remove the gun. At this point, keeping Terry between himself and the others, the officer ordered all three men to enter Zucker’s store. As they went in, he removed Terry’s overcoat completely, removed a .38-caliber revolver from the pocket and ordered all three men to face the wall with their hands raised. Officer McFadden proceeded to pat down the outer clothing of Chilton and the third man, Katz. He discovered another revolver in the outer pocket of Chilton’s overcoat, but no weapons were found on Katz. The officer testified that he only patted the men down to see whether they had weapons, and that he did not put his hands beneath the outer garments of either Terry or Chilton until he felt their guns. [/QUOTE] The court noted: > [@](#): > > It does not follow that because an officer may lawfully arrest a person only when he is apprised of facts sufficient to warrant a belief that the person has committed or is committing a crime, the officer is equally unjustified, absent that kind of evidence, in making any intrusions short of an arrest. Moreover, a perfectly reasonable apprehension of danger may arise long before the officer is possessed of adequate information to justify taking a person into custody for the purpose of prosecuting him for a crime. > [@](#): > > The officer need not be absolutely certain that the individual is armed; the issue is whether a reasonably prudent man in the circumstances would be warranted in the belief that his safety or that of others was in danger. Cf. Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91 (1964); Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 174 -176 (1949); Stacey v. Emery, 97 U.S. 642, 645 (1878). 23 And in determining whether the officer acted reasonably in such circumstances, due weight must be given, not to his inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or “hunch,” but to the specific reasonable inferences which he is entitled to draw from the facts in light of his experience. Cf. Brinegar v. United States supra. > [@](#): > > We think on the facts and circumstances Officer McFadden detailed before the trial judge a reasonably prudent man would have been warranted in believing petitioner was armed and thus presented a threat to the officer’s safety while he was investigating his suspicious behavior. The actions of Terry and Chilton were consistent with McFadden’s hypothesis that these men were contemplating a daylight robbery - which, it is reasonable to assume, would be likely to involve the use of weapons - and nothing in their conduct from the time he first noticed them until the time he confronted them and identified himself as a police officer gave him sufficient reason to negate that hypothesis. Although the trio had departed the original scene, there was nothing to indicate abandonment of an intent to commit a robbery at some point. Thus, when Officer McFadden approached the three men gathered before the display window at Zucker’s store he had observed enough to make it quite reasonable to fear that they were armed; and nothing in their response to his hailing them, identifying himself as a police officer, and asking their names served to dispel that reasonable belief. We cannot say his decision at that point to seize Terry and pat his clothing for weapons was the product of a volatile or inventive imagination, or was undertaken simply as an act of harassment; the record evidences the tempered act of a policeman who in the course of an investigation had to make a quick decision as to how to protect himself and others from possible danger, and took limited steps to do so. [http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=392&invol=1](http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=392&invol=1) ---
**Author:** ![Eleusis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Eleusis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleusis)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/28 "2006-09-14T13:40:02Z")
[QUOTE=Otto] It was not an illegal search. See [Terry v Ohio](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_v._Ohio). **Loach** did not describe a drug search. Loach described pulling someone over for a safety violation, a cracked windshield. Loach further described a driver who was nervous, aggressively/offensively postured and repeatecly reaching for his waist despite repeated instructions to keep his hands in plain sight. Loach described a perfectly legal Terry stop. You’re projecting something from your own experiences onto the post and you’re wrong. [/QUOTE] Give me a FUCKING break. I got yer cracked windshield hanging low. It’s bullshit through and through. **I** have a cracked windshield. “Smashed so much you can’t see through it” is one thing. A _crack_ is quite another. The latter, generally being nothing but an excuse for lowlife bigheads like **loach** to fuck with the populace for no reason, jerk them from the car, act all bigheaded, and search their pockets, QUITE AFUCKINGNOTHER. ---
**Author:** ![Eleusis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Eleusis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleusis)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/29 "2006-09-14T13:42:25Z")
GFactor, you’re a lawyer right? So you should know better than most that bullshit like that combined with a cop’s “he was nervous” bullshit is nothing but that: BULLSHIT. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/30 "2006-09-14T13:43:33Z")
[QUOTE=Eleusis] I’ve always had respect for cops until you. [/QUOTE] Indeed? Then why did your OP say this: [QUOTE=Eleusis] I’ll admit I’m generally anti-cop, but Loach is generally why. [/QUOTE] One of these things is not like the other… ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/31 "2006-09-14T13:44:19Z")
Is this a suicide-by-mod or has someone been drinking? ---
**Author:** ![Crotalus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crotalus/32/41_2.png) [@Crotalus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crotalus)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/32 "2006-09-14T13:44:28Z")
**Eleusis** - You acted like an asshole in GQ, and you’re acting like a bigger one here. Can you comprehend that **Loach** was describing a hypothetical, perfectly legal traffic stop? Can you comprehend that he was using his actual knowledge of what is legal for a cop in his state to do to describe that? He was not describing something he had actually done. And by the way, when I’m pulled over by a police officer, I am not nervous. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/33 "2006-09-14T13:45:01Z")
[QUOTE=Otto] So you’re pitting a police officer who would make a legal traffic stop and then in response to a driver acting suspiciously executes a legal patdown to preserve his own safety. And on top of that you make completely unfounded assumptions, in a GQ thread where they absolutely do not belong, that he’s motivated by race. I have no particular love for cops either but there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the scenario **Loach** laid out. You’re a dickhead fucking poster. [/QUOTE] Ditto what **Otto** said, **Eleusis**. You are way out in left field on this one. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/34 "2006-09-14T13:47:31Z")
[QUOTE=kambuckta] I suggest you go for a lie-down **Eleusis** , because if the SDMB-cops come cruising 'round HERE, you’re going to be in for a smackdown yer’self for posting such a stupid fucking pit-thread. 😛 [/QUOTE] Actually, this may be the smartest thread Eleusis has ever posted. ---
**Author:** ![Eleusis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Eleusis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleusis)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/35 "2006-09-14T13:48:33Z")
[QUOTE=Crotalus] **Eleusis** - You acted like an asshole in GQ, and you’re acting like a bigger one here. Can you comprehend that **Loach** was describing a hypothetical, perfectly legal traffic stop? Can you comprehend that he was using his actual knowledge of what is legal for a cop in his state to do to describe that? He was not describing something he had actually done. And by the way, when I’m pulled over by a police officer, I am not nervous. [/QUOTE] I might be an asshole, but what is “legal for a cop in his state” does not make it fucking right. **Loach** , thinks it is, I fucking don’t. He enjoys it. I don’t. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/36 "2006-09-14T13:49:00Z")
[QUOTE=Eleusis] Give me a FUCKING break. I got yer cracked windshield hanging low. It’s bullshit through and through. **I** have a cracked windshield. “Smashed so much you can’t see through it” is one thing. A _crack_ is quite another. The latter, generally being nothing but an excuse for lowlife bigheads like **loach** to fuck with the populace for no reason, jerk them from the car, act all bigheaded, and search their pockets, QUITE AFUCKINGNOTHER. [/QUOTE] Reread all the posts. You are projecting like a mother fucker. Everything you have said is occuring in your own head, not in my posts. So why am I being pitted again? You don’t like the windshield statute? Write your state senator. Like I said I don’t think it’s that important and have never pulled someone over for it. Maybe I said it in some secret post only you can read. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/37 "2006-09-14T13:50:37Z")
[QUOTE=Loach] Reread all the posts. You are projecting like a mother fucker. Everything you have said is occuring in your own head, not in my posts. So why am I being pitted again? You don’t like the windshield statute? Write your state senator. Like I said I don’t think it’s that important and have never pulled someone over for it. Maybe I said it in some secret post only you can read. [/QUOTE] DAMN YOU FOR HYPOTHETICALLY PERSECUTING THE HYPOTHETICAL CITIZENRY OF THIS GREAT HYPOTHETICAL NATION!!! ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/38 "2006-09-14T13:51:54Z")
[QUOTE=Excalibre] DAMN YOU FOR HYPOTHETICALLY PERSECUTING THE HYPOTHETICAL CITIZENRY OF THIS GREAT HYPOTHETICAL NATION!!! [/QUOTE] Hypothetically guilty. ---
**Author:** ![Eleusis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Eleusis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleusis)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/39 "2006-09-14T13:52:12Z")
[QUOTE=Clothahump] Ditto what **Otto** said, **Eleusis**. You are way out in left field on this one. [/QUOTE] Whatever man. I can handle left field. But I still think **Loach** is a dick for pulling randoms over for a cracked windshield, jerking them from their car, and searching their pockets. Oh yeah, and thinking it’s right all the while, getting a judge’s “gavel” and putting them in jail for nothing more than a joint. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672/40 "2006-09-14T13:53:26Z")
It’s been fun but I got to go take care of a sick little girl and hopefully get some sleep. I’ll come back later to see if you get anyone to agree with you. Happy Pitting. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/loach-is-a-dickhead-fucking-cop/372672.md?page=3)