you should fear the legal system.

There's a huge difference between "corruption" and "incompetence".

Mostly these incidents here fall under the category of "incompetence" or "malfeasance" or "misconduct".

As a cop, I can't stand it when the cops don't do their job. I pride myself on being professional and having good attention to detail and cops who are sloppy and cut corners or who are unprofessional in dealing with people drive me crazy.

Several times in my police career I've responded to assist other agencies and actually had witnesses come up to me and offer to give me a statement (once at a drive by shooting, once at a shooting outside a night club, and once at a major injury MV accident) and I couldn't find anybody from the primary agency interested in talking to the witnesses (!!)

So I took a statement, wrote a report like I should, faxed copies of my report over so it could go into the case files, and then made a few phone calls to supervisors over there that I knew. The last time that happened (the MV accident, which I think was in the fall of '01) I even sent an email direct to the Chief of the other agency to bring his attention to the problem.

My Chief was REALLY mad at me over that. I never got a response from the other chief, but I do know that he raised hell in a staff meeting and a few people got tuned up.

If the cops don't do their job, then sometimes you have to fight the battle. If you have a LEGITIMATE complaint, then deal with it. I've had to do that a few times with officers from agencies I worked for, with guys I worked with, because there were problems. Didn't make me real popular there for a while, but you always have to do the right thing. And I must say, these weren't guys who were corrupt or racist or brutal. But a few of them were sloppy, and one of them just could NOT talk to people properly if the situation was at all stressful and he needed an attitude adjustment. It wasn't that he was a jerk -- he just got overloaded way too easily under stress.

(He later went to a nearby agency and ultimately became a detective and I understand he's pretty good at it. Who'da thought?)

At various times we had a few young, enthusiastic (and ignorant) cops "scanner chasing" and jumping calls in a bigger and more active neighboring jurisdiction. To the point that they were getting in the way, being mildly tactically unsafe, and creating justified hard feelings with the other police department. But the officers from the other agency involved were reluctant to complain, because they didn't want to start a war, and my supervisor at the time wouldn't take action without a formal complaint to work with. So we actually had to solicit a complaint from the other agency about our guys to get any corrective action applied. So we did. Learning occurred. I always address the issue when field training new cops, but sometimes cops desire to be in on the action gets in the way of their common sense . . .

My point is, if you have a valid complaint of substance, it's best for everybody if you push it a little. Quite possibily some of the other cops will appreciate it, too . . . but that also depends on the situation where YOU are and whether or not the agency will actually pay attention. Some agencies disregard all complaints, and others over react . . .
 
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and a couple of other good ideas

Tyme said: "I would love to see more moderation in the adversarial system. Make the judge and jury an inquisitor of sorts, empowered to ask directed questions to the parties involved in a lawsuit or criminal case, although in a criminal case the defense doesn't have to answer and can still assert the 5th amendment. A judge, and even the jury itself, should be able to ask questions if they feel there are relevant issues or viewpoints that are not being presented properly to the jury."

ABSOLUTELY!! One of my instructors in college was a retired FBI agent. In class one day he discussed the French system of the examining magistrate, how they are involved in criminal investigations, and can actually ask questions during the trial. Ever since that idea has been in the back of my mind as an interesting concept.

BGutzman suggestion some kind of random quality control check to see if cops were actually doing their job correctly. I've thought about that concept for the last few years as well.

The other day I talked to a union rep for another agency in my county. He stated that they had several officers who generated a large number of citizen complaints and management's response was to require the officers to wear one of those little video cameras and a wire, and record all their contacts with the public for review by their supervisor. They identified one officer who (once again) didn't function well under pressure, and another guy who just had a short fuse and got frustrated easily. So some kind of remedial action is taking place.

In the military every year they do annual testing to make sure that you can properly perform certain job related duties. The Army calls it "common task testing" and the Air Force calls it "quality control testing". I always thought that might be a good idea for civilian police. Make somebody demonstrate proficiency in accident investigation, handling some disturbance scenarios (with a report), and in field sobriety testing. In my state we do that with the police recruits -- they get evaluated in scenario testing during the last week of the police academy. I think that would be a useful thing to do with serving LEOs, AS LONG AS the process was conducted and evaluated fairly.
 
Training & supervision...

As I posted in other topics, the main issues are training & supervision.
Sheriffs, Police Chiefs, SACs(Special Agents in Charge), etc always say; we need to be informed of any problems/complaints.
That's true but they need to be responsive to these valid complaints or problems too. Not just ignore these "citizens in crisis".
I heard a media story today of a young college student in the San Diego area who was detained in a DEA field office bldg for 5 days w/o food, water, etc. 5 days! The young man was in an ICU for 2 days & has severe kidney damage due to the ordeal. He's now going to sue the DEA. The federal agents never charged or arrested him either.

Fraud, waste & abuse is not tolerated in any private sector industry and it shouldn't be tolerated in LE agencies.

ClydeFrog
 
Charged with a Felony

When I was younger I was charged with a felony. I had returned to my base, in another state and my grandmother called me, informing I was going to be charged with a felony.

I contacted a Sgt that was a family friend and he informed me that I was indeed going to be charged. When I talked to him, he read me my rights (I was a young, military cop at the time) and I figured I had done nothing wrong, so I talked with him. Told him the truth, were things had happened, how they had happened and who had witnessed it.

Witnesses backed everything up that I admitted to (Of course he had already talked to a few of them, I found out afterwards). I was released on bail and returned to my duty station.

About a month later, I found out they were going to pursue the situation and I appeared in court. The smartest thing I did was listen to the judge who advised me, very strongly, to get a lawyer.

I pray I am never involved in any type of shooting, but I do know if I am, one of the first things I am going to do is request a lawyer.

After I obtained a lawyer, he was not happy. Something he told me and I have always remembered: When questioned by the police, deny everything, admit nothing and ALWAYS have a lawyer present.

Years later I remember this advise and still use it, even though I have many friends in the LEO community. We have a family/business lawyer we use and he has continued to give us sound advise.
 
You wish that fraud, waste and abuse were not tolerated in private companies!

I think one factor that is operative here is in the nature of people to protect their group. You see it everywhere. Someone has to do something pretty bad to be ostracized and most of the time, that's about the limit to what can happen. If something really criminal is discovered, however, they probably won't last until the sun goes down. But for less serious behavior, it is covered up, swept under the rug, ignored, excused, explained away or whatever. People are not so much protecting the presumably (without a trial) guilty party so much as they are protecting themselves and the group they are a member of. There's a lot more to it than that but that's the gist of it.
 
There's a lot more to it than that but that's the gist of it.

You said a mouthful of truth their my friend!

The 'code of silence' when wrongdoings are going on, can be, and often is, much more harmful then helpful when it comes to LE.
 
Uncle Buck said:
When questioned by the police, deny everything, admit nothing and ALWAYS have a lawyer present.

I can't tell if you mixed them up on purpose, but, "admit nothing, deny everything, make counter-accusations" is to the best of my knowledge a slogan on some swag that was cooked up by a few contra-era spooks. See these articles for details:
http://www.nytimes.com/1987/06/12/us/washington-talk-briefing-tribute-to-cia.html
http://www.weeklystandard.com/print/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/014/278vjcro.asp
The slogan was also co-opted, and this is where I saw it first in the early 2000's, on some shirts printed up by a central american vacation/expedition outfit, which may or may not have had ex-contra people helping out, or maybe they just saw the slogan and liked it.

In the legal system, "admit nothing" is a good first principle, insofar as it means shut your mouth, but "deny everything" can get you into trouble. When a matter is serious enough to get a lawyer, assert your 5th amendment privilege and let your lawyer speak for you.
Don't Talk to the Police (in defense of the 5th Amendment) by James Duane, Regent Univ Law School
 
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Too much to respond to but I have to respond to this:
When questioned by the police, deny everything, admit nothing and ALWAYS have a lawyer present.
NO, NO, NO! It sounds cute, but it's bad legal advice. Just assert your right to remain silent, request an attorney, and leave it at that. When you start "denying everything" then the lies you've told will come back to haunt you if it is a serious law enforcement manner. Your silence can sometimes be used against you if you haven't invoked your Fifth Amendment right to remain silent. It's called an adoptive admission. http://definitions.uslegal.com/a/adoptive-admission/
 
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