No, I meant what I said. You and Shodan are saying that, if someone is not smart enough to outsmart the cop, then they deserve to go to jail. If someone doesn’t know their rights as well as the cop, they don’t deserve those rights.
I mean, it’s an opinion, and I can’t say that your opinion on the matter is wrong, you are welcome to it. I am just saying that it is an opinion that I don’t share.
The OP had the words “police racism” in it. I did take that to mean that the OP was interested in discussing how the SCOTUS decision affected interactions between police and civilians.
The concern is that there are police who will take advantage of opportunities that they are given to be bad police. Whether that is because they are lazy, they aren’t all that smart, they get frightened easily, or because they are sociopaths with guns makes little difference. The fact that they have another tool in their arsenal that can be abused is a problem. What can be abused, will be abused. And it will not just be abused by bad cops, but by well meaning cops as well.
Fair, it was a rhetorical hyperbolic question.
But, at the same time, how often do we hear, when someone gets shot by the police that they “deserved it”. Even if they weren’t doing anything threatening to the public, the fact that they were suspected of a crime by the police was enough to get many people on the side of it being a justified shooting.
When you end up dead before you ever make it to a courtroom or talk to a lawyer, you don’t get much of a chance.
That’s a pretty wide gap. The problem is is when Officer friendly “knows” that the guy robbed the store. When he can trip him up into saying something that the officer takes as incriminating, and if that fails, get him to “resist arrest”. And when the person that the officer is assuming was involved doesn’t really match the description, but for one key characteristic.
Take this scenario. A report that a large black male is weilding a machette. They see a black girl, and assume that it was her, claiming that she “matched the description”.
Unless someone is being an active threat, they should treat everyone, even those they suspect of having committing crimes, with respect and dignity. They should not be trying to see what they can get someone in trouble for.
How are the stupid people being persecuted?
That doesn’t answer the question. How does a Terry stop prevent someone from giving their side of the story?
Again, you are not answering the question. What does an officer say or do, or not say or do, when he assumes that the suspect is innocent vs. when he doesn’t?
Regards,
Shodan
If you are being being subject to hostility and ill treatment due to your inherent qualities, that is pretty much the definition of persecution.
Ever try to tell your side of a story when you are dead?
I don’t care that I am not answering your loaded and useless question that does not relate to my statement in the slightest. It is only a question that you find baffling because you are insisting on following the excluded middle fallacy.
But, to explain, yes, an officer should be treating people with dignity and with respect, even if he has some reason to suspect them of a crime. When he has no reason to suspect them of a crime, he should not be looking for something to charge them with. For instance, if you pull someone over, you should suspect that they have committed a traffic infraction, one that you witnessed. You should not use that time to try to find other things to charge them with.
How does a Terry stop prevent you from telling your side of the story? Terry stops are not generally fatal.
So when a cop pulls someone over for a traffic infraction, they shouldn’t investigate anything else? Don’t administer a field sobriety test for drunk or impaired driving, don’t run the plates to see if the car was stolen, don’t run the driver’s name thru the system to see if he has any outstanding warrants - nothing like that?
A Terry stop is based on a reasonable, articulable suspicion that someone is or was involved in a crime. So, pretty much by definition, the cop has reason to suspect the person. So he doesn’t have to look for anything - he has a basis for suspicion already.
But what you are saying is that when the cops stopped Timothy McVeigh for driving without a license plate, the cop should not have investigated any further. The cop should not have asked for a bill of sale on the truck, and should not have arrested McVeigh for illegal weapons. Is that correct?
Not sure I agree 100% with your police work there, Lou.
Regards,
Shodan
This is a really awful analogy.
Driving without a license plate is not the same as speeding, or failure to indicate, or the other offenses which are usually used as pretexts. A car without a license plate cannot be permitted to go on its way after a stop, because it is still unlicensed. A driver who has been cited for speeding is not automatically speeding when he drives off.
It’s more of an example than an analogy, but it seems on point to me.
According to this, the cop should not have spent the time investigating McVeigh for anything but driving without a rear license plate. He should not have suspected that the truck was stolen, that McVeigh had illegal weapons, or that he had just got done murdering 168 people in cold blood.
That seems to me to be a bit problematic.
Regards,
Shodan
RNATB - The offenses you listed are not usually used as a pretexts. They are usually what they appear to be on their face - enforcement of traffic laws. May those violations be us as a pretext? Sure, and there’s nothing wrong with that. If the officer observes something that makes him suspicious he wouldn’t be doing his job if he didn’t pursue it.
I mean that they are the *most common *pretexts, not that they are most *commonly *pretexts, as it were.
I think the problem with the Terry ruling is…
Reasonable Suspicion is such a weak a criteria that we’ve seen two completely different lists (one repeated with case cites) of cause-for-suspicion that have been allowed in court. Those lists demonstrate, to the point of being pathetically-humorous, that law enforcement officers are essentially held to no actual standard for invoking “reasonable suspicion” in order to start confronting someone.
The problem with that astoundingly weak criteria isn’t that it has been used by the police to catch some major criminals. The problem is that it has been used as a means to harass and persecute people – and not just every civilian, but predominantly (disproportionately) members of minority populations; it has been used as a tool for racist oppression. While it is commendable that Timothy McVeigh was caught as part of a routine lack-of-license-plate traffic stop and that Al Capone was indicted, prosecuted, and jailed for tax evasion, I’m one of those who doesn’t believe The End Justifies the Means. Otherwise, based on historical precedent, we should see every affluent white person investigated for tax evasion because subsequent convictions could put away some majorly murderous organized crime figures.*
We are (at least I am) not saying every law enforcement officer is a racist jerk who is hell-bent on putting all (or even select categories of) minorities in either a jail cell or a grave. I am (We are?) saying the tool Reasonable Suspicion which SCOTUS has allowed to supersede Probable Cause not only gives a de facto carte blanche for good and bad law enforcement officers to be abusive, but it gives them the (abusable) ability to invent an excuse after-the-incident. I am (We are?) saying that the extreme weakness of Reasonable Suspicion invites abuse, tempts even the most righteous law enforcers, and is most frequently and disproportionately abused when dealing with non-white persons (in the problematic cases, they are ‘suspects’ only after they have been identified as non-white).
Furthermore, as noted in some other articles and editorials, it has laid the groundwork for a self-fulfilling and self-inflaming circle of abuse. Because these incidents are dividing the nation along racial lines, minorities are instinctively nervous when they encounter law-enforcement officers and law enforcement officers are able to cite that apparent nervousness as Reasonable Suspicion which, when considered in its modern context, reasonably gives any Law Enforcement Officer the ability to shoot any minority they encounter and justify it by believably testifying “I was afraid for my life…”
It’s amazing how far we haven’t progressed since the 1960’s.
As a side note (or at least as a comment not directly related to the above), the arguments above endorsing the “Terry pat-down” are crap as well. If I had my wits about me and articulated, “I do not give consent to a search.” I have immediately given the confronting officer Reasonable Suspicion to believe I’m Acting Too Nervous (last on Tired and Cranky’s list in post #21) so he can infer that I’m trying to hide something. Now I’ve pissed him off. Now he’s going to get nastier.
Furthermore, the argument about being smarter than the cop is another crap argument. If I’ve really got my wits about me and I’m verbally out-maneuvering an officer who has decided (for whatever reason) to confront me, then I’m Acting Too Calm (penultimate on Tired and Cranky’s list in post #21) and that, too, gives him Reasonable Suspicion to believe I’m the reincarnation of Al Capone’s nasty side. *
The problem isn’t that Reasonable Suspicion is and has been an effective tool in catching real criminals. The problem is that Reasonable Suspicion is written so vaguely that it is and has been an abusable tool for persecuting minorities. At the very least (and I know this is getting really abstract) that kind of persecution leads to disenfranchisement of both individuals and groups which, ultimately, weakens the nation as a whole. While the power elite (who happen to be mostly white) might say, “That’s okay, the fragmenting of the nation helps us hold onto the reins of reign” there are some of us idealistic idiots who still think the phrases of our youthful indoctrination like Liberty and Justice for ALL should still mean something. The abuse of Reasonable Suspicion rescinds liberty from a large enough section of humanity (regardless of citizenship or constituency) that it is an injustice.
Is there a solution for this problem? Maybe there is, maybe there isn’t. It’s nice to see it being discussed rather than dismissed.
–G!
Justice for Money
How much more can we say?
We all know it’s the American Way!
…–James (J.Y.) Young (Styx)
…Half-Penny Two-Penny
…Paradise Theater
Well said Grestarian!
Thank you for saying what I could not. and you can include me in your “we are saying”. . . except for: “The problem isn’t that Reasonable Suspicion is and has been an effective tool in catching real criminals.” While it may catch the occasional McVeigh it is in general a waste of time for cops. Most jurisdictions don’t keep statistics on these kinds of stops, NYC does and:
so, I dont think you can call an 88% failure rate an “effective tool in catching real criminals.”
mc
That are not universally survived, either.
In any case, how do you respond to the charge of “I thought I saw a gun.” There is no gun, the cop didn’t see a gun, the cop patted you down, and didn’t find a gun. The cop arrested you over “resisting arrest” when you flinched away from his touch, and they didn’t find a gun, even after being fully searched and detained.
When the original reason for them interacting with you is “I thought I saw a gun” how do you challenge that? The cop may have actually thought that, or he may be lying his ass off, no way to prove either way. If the cop actually had to turn up a gun if he thought he saw one, that would be a different level of “reasonable suspicion”.
No, why should they? Do they have an articulable reason to believe that you are involved in anything else?
Sure, if they seem drunk or impaired. But assuming that they are drunk or impaired and administering the sobriety test in the “hopes” that you can fail them on your subjective grading scale, not so much.
Those are usually run as a matter of course in traffic stops. Neither of those involved searching the driver nor the vehicle, but only looking at data that is available to the public and the police.
They have reasonable suspicion that I was doing 59 in a 55. They have no reason to suspect anything else.
If missing a license plate the same thing as speeding? You are driving a vehicle that is not legally allowed to be driving on public motorways. A missing license plate is certainly reasonable suspicion that something is up. Even if it’s not the driver, maybe it’s some teens going around stealing license plates. But, there is a crime that is committed that needs investigation before the vehicle can proceed.
That would be correct for a world in which the middle has been excluded, and we can only choose between the poor options you have presented. In the real world, people are capable of understanding that things like speeding, or unsignaled lane changes, or broken tail lights have a different level of investigative reason than driving a vehicle that is not legally licensed to be on public roads.
In any case, worst case scenario, McVeigh gets away from this particular cop. He is still hunted down and caught hours later, most likely.
It is not like this cop prevented the bombing.
Yes, I am aware of the way that you believe that police should operate, and the way they should treat the public, but I don’t really agree with that sort of police work either.
But, it is an effective tool for dragnetting.
I will take it from your determination not to answer the question, that you don’t have an answer.
So now you are shifting your position - investigations that do not involve a search of the driver or the vehicle are now apparently OK. Does this conflict with your earlier assertion that police should treat suspects as innocent, and not investigate anything besides the traffic infraction they observed?
So now some suspicions justify investigation and, apparently, no presumption of innocence. Which crimes are those?
Go back to my earlier example. The police spot someone who matches the description of someone who committed a robbery. Do they do a Terry stop on that person, or not?
Regards,
Shodan
Except that I did answer, and you cut that part out.
No, not shifting positions. Explaining that things are not black and white.
As a specific stop to determine whether or not that person is actually connected to that crime. Sure. As an excuse to stop anyone who even remotely matches the description, not so much.
For instance, if there is a report of a large black man wielding a machete, and a cop sees a black teenage girl in the vicinity, do they terry stop that person, or not?
No, you didn’t. Every time I asked how a Terry stop prevents someone from telling their side of the story, you keep responding that they can’t tell their side if they are dead, which is a non sequitur.
But you have already said that the police should presume everyone to be innocent. Why then would they stop anyone? They should (in your opinion) presume that anyone who matches the description is not connected to the crime.
Unless the presumption of innocence does not apply outside a court of law, and therefore the police should execute a Terry stop whenever they have a reasonable, articulable suspicion that someone is or was involved in a crime. And should further investigate when they make such a stop to see if the suspect may be involved in other crimes.
So it appears that your idea of applying the presumption of innocence outside of trial is a meaningless distinction. Make a Terry stop upon reasonable suspicion, arrest upon probable cause, bring the person to trial if the grand jury indicts - and then presume the accused innocent until proven guilty - in a court of law.
Regards,
Shodan
Yes, I did. That you cut that part out of your quoting me doesn’t change the fact that it is still right there on the page, for anyone in the world to see.
I’ll repost it here, for your convenience of not having to scroll up to look at the parts of the post that you cut out.
Not a non-sequitur, as when I originally brought up that point, I was talking specifically about people who are killed in the course of a Terry stop. So, rather than a non-sequitur, it was directly relevant, and your continued questions were the distraction.
Act as though they are innocent in the manner of treating them with dignity and respect. That’s different than what ever it is that you are claiming here. There are miles between what I said and what you are trying to strawman here.
And that list of reasons upthread, the ones about “He seemed too calm” “He seemed nervous” and all the other contradictory “reasons” that cops come up with to establish their reasonable suspicion is all good with you? Is there anything that you can do in the presence of a police officer that does not rise to the level of “reasonable suspicion”?
Why is that? Do they stop everyone on the street to determine if they are involved in crimes? If not, then why should they continue an investigation of someone they have stopped under “reasonable suspicion” of committing one crime, and use that stop to investigate others? They have no “reasonable articulable” suspicion that they were involved in any other crimes. If I have a tail light out on my car, what crimes would you suspect me of?
Do you agree that there is a difference between a reported crime with a description, and seeing someone who closely matches that description, vs there being no reported crimes, but you see a person that you have a “reasonable suspicion” that they are engaged in some sort of crime due to them either being too calm, too nervous, making eye contact, avoiding eye contact, or any of the other articulated excuses, err, I mean reasons that the cops come up with to justify the stops?
No, it appears that your ability to re-word another one’s position is severely lacking.
And the main question here is, what is a “reasonable suspicion”? You’ve been upset that you somehow missed the answer I gave to your question, and yet, have answered none of mine. I have one for you that you have refused to answer. It’s easy, yes, or no.
If a crime has been reported, and the description of the criminal is a large black man in his 30’s weilding a machette, and a cop sees a 19 year old black girl on a bike, do they have reasonable suspicion to stop her?