I know quite a few leo's of our local pd, some are the best people you would ever want to meet, I have met some(mostly young ones) that would not give you the time of day because they feel that you are "below" them...I talked to a good friend of mine who has been on the police force for 12 years, and asked him what it was like. He told me of things that happen to them that made me understand why leo's sometimes go bad,or make them cross the line. Like how, even though they know going into the job that its very stressful, that its hard to realize just how stressful it can really be.He told me it was like joining any branch of the military,recruiters giving the gung-ho speech, telling about the training and the opportunities to visit foreign places, but they very seldom mention the fact that you may have to kill someone. Examples he told me about were things like, doing pat downs and finding a needle in a guys pocket that could have stuck him containing God knows what disease, going on a domestic dispute call, and a drunk fool comes at him with a knife or icepick, or how when asking potential witnesses about seeing someone getting assulted, everyone basicly turns their back an says "no, didnt see anything".
Maybe there are some police that dont deserve the badge, maybe there are some that become police just for the badge, gun, and power. But from what I see and here from other LEO'S these people dont usually last very long. If I put myself in their shoes I can understand why they do what they do, why they sometimes act the way they do. Its very hard for any person to be perfect all the time, especially seeing and doing the things these guys(and gals) are doing. He tells me about how hard it is to find dedicated people, how most are there to gain experience to get better, higher paying jobs (State Police, DEA,ATF). The police force of this town of 100,000+ only make 2500.00 a month BEFORE taxes,sure seems to me thats not alot of money for putting your life on the line.
I agree that there are some laws that need to be changed both for and against the benefit of us and the LEO'S. But we have to also remember that the laws were put there to protect US.Whether we think these laws are to our benefit or not, whether we think they infringe upon our rights, we have to understand that they were passed by human beings who like ourselves are not perfect. If we dont like these laws, then we can do something about them, just like the athiest woman who had prayer abolished in our schools,just like Sarah Brady, all we have to do is exercise our rights as citizens.
I think ill get off this soapbox now, Cuz
sorry if this makes no sense whatsoever, im not a writer...