Well, we said it, and yet it’s not done, so it is obviously harder to do than say.
The hiring, screening, and training for the police in my city is fairly decent, so there are fewer incidents of “controversial encounters”, though that number is still far from zero. However, that has nothing to do with the police in Memphis. Would you get behind a national standard to be imposed on every police department? One that is regulated and monitored for compliance? I would conditionally, but I’d also be very worried about what exactly that looks like, and how it could be corrupted or abused.
You sue both. The department has deeper pockets to remedy the harm that has been done, but the individual who violated your rights should be made to pay as well.
Mostly, but that’s a whole different topic, that media is entertainment, most especially telivised media, and it needs to be exciting and engaging, even if it gives an entirely skewed view of the world.
You could have a nearly perfect world in every way, but you’d still be able to find enough negative material to fill a nightly news broadcast, meaning that your audience will never perceive a change in the amount of negative material they are being presented with.
The problems there are in many ways more complex and intransigent than the issues of police abusing their positions, and certainly outside the scope of this thread. Could be an interesting spin-off if anyone is interested.
Eh, I don’t know that we need more cops. Get rid of ticketing as a revenue source and traffic stops as a pretense for catching someone with drugs, and you cut the number of needed uniforms substantially. Have actual appropriate services respond to people in mental health crises, rather than people with at most a couple seminars knowledge in how to deal with it, with violence being their only and easy alternative.
Would the city of Memphis have been better or worse off if these 5 individuals were never on the force, and their positions never filled?
Having an unmarked car for “scouting” is reasonable. But they should not make stops or arrests. If someone needs to be approached, it should be done by someone in as official and obvious markings as possible.
Armed men in plain clothes coming out of an unmarked car and demanding you to get out of your car is a car-jacking.
I would argue that having paramilitary organizations like this actually increases crime, as it causes the people it oppresses to lose any respect for law enforcement, so they ignore laws they don’t care about, as well as enforce laws the police don’t.
Over policing doesn’t lower crime, it just criminalizes more things. If a teen in a middle class neighborhood is caught smoking weed, the cops are probably going to call their parents. If a teen in one of these over policed neighborhoods gets caught, they will probably be arrested. This can have a severe impact on someone’s life, closing a lot of potential doors for having a successful future.
Even as, and maybe especially as an adult, having an encounter with the police can destroy your life. If I had a traffic stop that escalated into me spending the night in jail, that would be fairly damaging. If I spent more than a few days, It’d be catastrophic. If I was incarcerated for a couple months, I’d have to start my life back over with nothing but debts and a criminal record.
As I said, it needs to be codified into legislation by congress. It’s all based on case law and precedent, which leaves the question of whether something is covered by qualified immunity in a permanent “it depends” category.
It would be complex legislation, but in the end, it could actually simplify things.
Unless one of those people used their position to violate your constitutional rights.
People winning against the city can be waived away as the city settling with them to make them go away. If the person or persons directly involved in the violation are part of the suit, then they will be forced to acknowledge liability. From a punishment as deterrence perspective, if discourages cops, or any officials for that matter, from abusing their position, as they may be personally financially punished for doing so. From a victim or family of victim perspective, this may provide some level of closure.