Ferguson

[dc.]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/15/the-day-ferguson-cops-were-caught-in-a-bloody-lie.html

The Ferguson police are not legit.

Yeah that's the incident I referenced earlier. In their defense, they have improved since 2010 apparently. But still scary to think that in the 2000s a force like that doesn't even understand the value of personnel files! (Or didn't want to)

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Yeah that's the incident I referenced earlier. In their defense, they have improved since 2010 apparently. But still scary to think that in the 2000s a force like that doesn't even understand the value of personnel files! (Or didn't want to)

Didn't I think is the operative word. Also how much do you think the culture has changed in 4 yrs after what they have done to the press in this case?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=UUy6kyFxaMqGtpE3pQTflK8A&feature=player_embedded&v=Bs9LNAI0nBc

[deeshopper]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmOoevyiA4I

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcYeFAMoQAk

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ABRlWybBqM

[ForceEight]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmOoevyiA4I

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcYeFAMoQAk

That second part is excellent.

[dc.]

Wow, Ferguson just can't get it together.

 

Chief now days the original stop was unrelated to the robbery but about the two guys being in the street. He does add that after the original stop the office realized Brown had cigars and therefore could have been a suspect.

 

To me this adds a bit more to the thought the office could have started to altercation, especially in a moment if, "oh crap, it's your!"

 

As a side note, one thing I still can't get past is the number of people, including Brown's friend who start statements with, "we were just minding our own business." True and not.

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Under this logic, the police can justify militarization in any circumstance under "how do we know they aren't bad?" SWAT teams for car stops? They COULD be armed!

 

The US system largely works under the other assumption - hence the need for reasonable suspicion and probable cause, not just generic fear. I like it that way. The police should have to have a very clear and specific justification for any violent act. Even serving a warrant. Because collateral damage is not an acceptable norm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnvJZRZ0dFE

 

It takes 1 page to get one of these vehicles.

[dc.]

And don't forget... THEY'RE FREE!!

 

Love this logic... The Federal Gov't pays probably 10s of millions for each of these things. Uses them... or doesn't. Some genius has a plan to mediate that cost by selling them off to other municipalities and governments. But then some other genius decides it would be nice if those groups didn't have to pay, so organizes a grant program to pay on their behalf.

 

So really, instead of just giving these things away... we are "selling" them and accepting vouchers/coupons that we made as payment. And you're telling me there's no room to cut a few bucks from the DOD budget? Cut this program's grant operation alone and not only will we have fewer of these on our streets, we'll actually get money for everyone we DO sell.

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You could cut the DOD budget by a third and the only people to suffer would be the contractors.

 

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/paradigm-shift-ferguson-shooting-americans-polled-trust-police/

Paradigm Shift? After Ferguson Shooting, Nearly Half of Americans Polled, Do Not Trust Police
Forty-five percent of US citizens don’t trust in justice amid police killings of civilians, according to a poll by HuffPost and YouGov in the immediate aftermath of the shooting of Michael Brown, a black teen, by a white officer in Ferguson, Missouri.

At the same time, 37 percent of Americans do trust the justice system, while 19 percent are undecided.

The poll also found that 43 percent think police violence with the use of lethal force happens too often in the US, while 32 percent disagreed with the statement.

The reaction to Brown’s fatal shooting on August 9, and the protests of thousands of people that followed, was different, depending on the political beliefs and ethnicity of the respondents.

Democrats were three times more likely to speak out against deadly police violence than Republicans, the poll found.

Sixty-nine of black Americans thought the officers used lethal force too frequently, while only 37 percent of white Americans thought so. Over 65 percent of black US citizens don’t trust the justice system to deal with the guilty, while 40 percent of the white population don’t believe in the system either.

When asked if the police treat the black population more severely than the white population, 53 percent agreed, while 31 percent said police officers treat everyone the same.

Minorities in the US usually express mistrust toward law enforcement officials: for instance, a Gallup poll carried out last year revealed that the white population is 12 percentage points more likely to be confident of the police actions than the non-white population.

The poll was conducted August 11-14 among 1,000 US adults, 116 of them black, using a sample chosen from YouGov’s online panel. Factors taken into account were: age, race, gender, education, employment, income, marital status, number of children, voter registration, time and location of Internet access, interest in politics, religion and church attendance, HuffPost said.

The poll follows an escalation of violence after the killing of Brown, 18, by a white police officer. During the protests, police used rubber bullets and tear gas, and detained several journalists.

The latest accounts of justifiable homicide reported to the FBI stated that almost twice a week in the US a white policeman killed a black person – that’s over a seven-year period that ended in 2012. An average of 400 police killings a year were reported, with 96 percent of them involving a black person as the victim, USA Today reported.

 

 

This is devastating. A few more high profile police abuse stories and it could be more than 50% don't trust the cops. Do they realize their funding will be going with the support?

[Spen]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmOoevyiA4I

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcYeFAMoQAk

 

Good stuff.

[vmax]

Great find Dee.

That helped take this event to another, important level for me. It's not just what we see, it's what we don't see in ourselves. That crap manifests.

That woman held a mirror up to everybody to look at themselves....hard.

 

yea...it feels like we're back in the 60's from the photos and reports. Nothings really changed.

I don't think anythings really changed since man emerged from the cave when it comes to hate, violence and racism.

 

This stuff is hard to talk about.

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http://thefreethoughtproject.com/neighbor-live-tweeted-brown-shooting-damning-evidence-officer/

Neighbor Live-Tweeted Brown Shooting; May Be Damning Evidence Against Officer

 

 

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/teenagers-build-smartphone-app-citizens-rate-police/#2pxFHOExmsStxOY9.99

Three Teens Create an Incredible Police Accountability App With Tons of Awesome Features
A new app will become available for IPhone and Android devices later this month that will allow people to rate their local police department, as well as their individual police encounters. Possibly the most impressive thing about this app, is that it was created by a few young teenagers who wanted to find solutions to the problem of police corruption.

14-year-old Caleb Christian and his two sisters, 16-year-old Ima, and 15 year old Asha, plan to release their revolutionary new app “Five-O” on August 18th. The app will allow people to review and rate their experiences with police much like the app “Yelp!” allows people to rate and review private businesses.

Five-O will allow users to share the details of their police encounters and traffic stops with the world, and will make it possible for victims of police brutality to instantly gather local support for their case.

“We’ve been hearing about the negative instances in the news, for instance most recently the Michael Brown case, and we always talk about these issues with our parents, they always try to reinforce that we should focus on solutions. It’s important to talk about the issues, but they try to make us focus on finding solutions. That made us think why don’t we create an app to help us solve this problem,” Ima Christian told Business Insider.

“The idea is to collect data that users can then bring to community activists, the media, and other forms of law enforcement. That way, it’s not just “he said, she said,” Caleb added.

“We’d like to know which regions in the US provide horrible law enforcement services as well as highlight the agencies that are highly rated by their citizens. In addition to putting more power into the hands of citizens when interacting with law enforcement, we believe that highly rated police departments should be used as models for those that fail at providing quality law enforcement services”, Ima said in another interview.

The young Christian siblings are actually very well versed in coding and app design, and have started a company called Pinetart Inc. Their company has already released two other apps aside from Five-O, called Coily and Froshly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wH-Veei0jQM

 

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUdHIatS36A&list=UU3XTzVzaHQEd30rQbuvCtTQ

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http://news.yahoo.com/ferguson-live-updates-115432700.html

Ferguson: Live updates on day 9

After another night of violent clashes between police and protesters in Ferguson, Mo., Gov. Jay Nixon issued executive order early Monday calling in the National Guard to maintain order as tensions over the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager, byDarren Wilson, a white police officer, continue to rise. Check back here for live updates.

Update, 11:15 a.m. ET: Michael M. Baden, the former chief medical examiner for the City of New York who performed the autopsy at the request of the family, told reporters that Brown was shot at least six times. Baden said that the bullet that likely killed Brown went "through the brain."

Representatives for Brown's family said the results of of the preliminary autopsy support witness accounts that Brown was trying to surrender when he was shot.

"Why would he be shot in the very top of his head? A 6'4" man," one of the family's lawyers said. "Makes no sense.

Near the end of the press conference, an audience member asked why, given those results, Wilson had not been arrested.

"Who gets arrested is not a forensic science decision," Baden said.

Update 11:00 a.m. ET: Attorney Benjamin Crump, the lawyer representing Brown's family, said his clients requested the independent autopsy to get answers to three questions:

"How many times was my child shot?"

"Was my child in pain?"

And, "What more do we have to give them to arrest the killer of my child?"

Update, 9:45 am. ET: Images of National Guard troops preparing for deployment on the streets of Ferguson are beginning to trickle in.

Update, 6:30 a.m. ET: The New York Times reports that reports that a private autopsy performed at the request of the family found that Brown was shot at least six times. The autopsy was performed by Dr. Michael M. Baden, former chief medical examiner for the City of New York, concluded Brown was shot twice in the head and four shots times in his right arm. One of the shots entered the top of his skull, the Times said.

Below, an image from the private autopsy released by Brown's family.

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Did anyone think while listening to WNST for yrs that they had a racist on the air. I didn't. Apparently I was wrong.

https://www.facebook.com/ken.wilson.90813/posts/10204566714113385?comment_id=10204569621546069&offset=0&total_comments=52&notif_t=share_reply

 

 

Ray Bachman They riot & loot because they are animals. No other reason. Got to love CNN opening their news cast by saying and unarmed black man was shot by a white cop instead of an unarmed man was shot by a cop. Now they should be saying a man who man handled a woman & old man as he robbed a store went on to fight a police officer and than was shot to death.

He wass on the air with Rob Long and played nice with guys like Robbie from Robbies 1st Base. I guess unless they dress in hoods you can't be to sure.

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http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/08/19/1322939/-Georgia-County-Won-t-Pay-for-Toddler-Med-Bills-After-SWAT-Drug-Raid#

Georgia County Won't Pay for Toddler Med Bills Caused by Stun Grenade from SWAT Raid

Remember cute little toddler, Bounkham Phonesavah, who was burned and put in a coma after a SWAT Drug Raid by police in Habersham County, Georgia? Here's a reminder if you don't recall the story:

A family says a SWAT team raided their home in the middle of the night and seriously injured a 19-month-old boy with a stun grenade.

Alecia Phonesavanh told Channel 2’s Ryan Young her child is at the Grady Memorial Hospital burn unit and is in a medically induced coma. [...]

"Everyone's sleeping. There's a loud bang and a bright light," Phonesavanh said. "The cops threw that grenade in the door without looking first, and it landed right in the playpen and exploded on his pillow right in his face."

The family whose child was hurt so horrifically by this no knock police assault had no connection to the individual police were seeking. They were from Wisconsin, and just happened to be in the Atlanta area visiting their sister-in-law. Certainly, there was no need by the local police to carry out a military style assault on the home at three o'clock in the morning merely to arrest a low level drug dealer.

Officers were executing a search warrant after a confidential informant claimed he bough $50 in drugs from a 20-year-old who lived at the residence, where the boy’s family had been staying since their own house burned down.

At the time, the police chief, Rick Darby, made a bunch of excuses for what happened, though he did say his SWAT team members were "very broken up about the incident." Well, apparently that sympathy for the family and their wrongfully wounded baby boy has its limits, at least as far as the Halbersham County officials are concerned. Though the family has no means to pay for the medical expenses of their child's stay at two separate hospitals, the county is holding firm and defending their decision not to "make things right" for this innocent child who suffered so grievously from the actions of their militarized police force which could have easily arrested the alleged drug dealer without the necessity of what amounts to a military attack on US citizens.

Bounkham Phonesavah, affectionately known as "Baby Boo Boo," spent weeks in a burn unit after a SWAT team's flash grenade exploded near his face. The toddler was just 19-months-old and asleep in the early morning hours of May 28. SWAT officers threw the device into his home while executing a search warrant for a drug suspect.

Habersham County officials are defending their decision not to pay, but the child's family isn't giving up.

Habersham County’s attorney provided the following statement, saying: "The question before the board was whether it is legally permitted to pay these expenses. After consideration of this question following advice of counsel, the board of commissioners has concluded that it would be in violation of the law for it to do so."

Well, God forbid the county violate the law to pay for the life threatening injuries their SWAT team. Of course, at all times they must conduct themselves with all due concern for their self-proclaimed legal obligations not to pay for the harm caused to an innocent child by their police department's decision to treat the arrest of a drug offender like a special forces operation in a war zone.

Oh, and by the way, the person for whom they obtained an arrest warrant justifying this absurd and tragic assault was not found at the home where Baby Boo Boo almost died as a result of the SWAT team's use of a stun grenade without anyb prior warning having been given.

The SWAT team did not find the person it was looking for in the home. An investigation is underway into the handling of the case. Meanwhile, Boo Boo and his family have moved back to Wisconsin. Supporters are planning a fundraiser for him in August.

But hey, at least the police chief has promised they will do better the next time his SWAT guys blast their way into a private residence seeking to arrest - well whomever.

“You're trying to minimize anything that could go wrong and in this case the greatest thing went wrong,” [Chief] Darby said. “Is it going to make us be more careful in the next one? Yes ma'am, it is. It's gonna make us double question.”

 

What a comfort that must be to the Phonesavah family as they struggle to pay for the life long harm their child has incurred, and the trauma they suffered.

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http://www.policestateusa.com/2014/louise-milan/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXqbLzHd_oo

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http://gawker.com/ferguson-police-threaten-to-shoot-reporter-and-mace-chr-1623125660

Cops in Ferguson Threaten to Shoot Reporter, Mace Chris Hayes

 

 

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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/15/editorial-when-cops-play-soldier/

EDITORIAL: When cops play soldier

Your friendly neighborhood policeman is becoming your not-so-friendly neighborhood Army Ranger. The riots in Ferguson, Mo., a small suburb of St. Louis, have demonstrated to a surprised public that the typical cop has weapons that only a few armies in the world can boast.

A review of photographs and videos shows that police in Ferguson confronted rioters decked out in Kevlar vests, night-vision goggles and helmets, and armed with AR-15 and M4 semi-automatic rifles, grenade launchers and fighting knives. The cops looked ready to take Omaha Beach. Most of the heavy weaponry, in fact, came from the Pentagon.

Included in the haul recently delivered to Ferguson and St. Louis County police includes, according to Defense Department documents reviewed by ABC News, “six .45-caliber pistols, 12 rifles, two sight reflexes, one explosive-ordnance disposal robot, one helicopter, seven utility trucks, three trailers, one motorized cart, one pair of elbow pads, one pair of kneepads, one industrial-strength face shield, and two night-vision viewers and computers.”

Thousands of retired military vehicles, weapons and warfare hardware have been transferred from the Defense Department to law enforcement agencies across the country since 1997, mostly in the name of fighting terrorism. Law-enforcement agencies, mostly police departments, have stocked their warehouses with more than $5.1 billion worth of property, according to the Defense Logistics Agency.

These weapons were bought and paid for to protect Americans from terrorism, but are sometimes turned on peaceful Americans. In his book, “Rise of the Warrior Cop,” Radley Balko, an authority on criminal justice, says that police SWAT teams make more than a hundred raids somewhere in America every day, using military-grade weapons and battlefield tactics. Many of the raids are aimed at people who, it turns out, are innocent. The cops occasionally raid the wrong house.

When protests, such as those in Ferguson, break out, these military weapons and tactics are employed so aggressively that it often invites resistance that becomes violent. The weapons are sometimes turned on people in the streets. A cop in a Kevlar vest and armed with automatic rifles and grenade launchers, accompanied by a robot, can be tempted to deal harshly with smart-aleck attitudes.

A policeman’s lot is rarely a happy one, and he is entitled to sufficient arms to protect himself as well as to deal with rough and reckless thugs and looters. The thugs he must deal with are never choirboys. But neither a supermarket under siege by looters or a noisy mob in the streets is Omaha Beach, and police departments don’t need the arms of an army.

The degree to which local law enforcement agencies have become militarized, many now bearing a closer resemblance to Army Rangers than to a cop patrolling a small town a decade or two ago, have themselves become a threat to public confidence in authority.

Enabling police officers and sheriff’s deputies to greet rallies and protests with tanks, machine guns, grenade launchers, helicopters and armored cars is not only menacing and unnecessary, but chills free speech. The police so armed can quickly silence protests and dissent by scaring demonstrators away — or by mowing them down. Policing unruly and even violent streets with the army, or a police force made into a reasonable facsimile of an army, has never been the American way. Congress should take a closer look atPentagon yard sales.

 

[cravnravn]

Why are these people looting?

[dc.]

Why are these people looting?

No one is justifying the looting. And I have no explanation for why people do it except opportunity of course. Of if the thousands protesting, how many do you think are looting? Not many.

 

Anyone see the video of the cop pointing his rifle at journalists saying I'll fn kill you. Crazy stuff. He's been suspended at least. As has frequently been reported you don't ask if you don't intend to shoot. He was leading a rowdy but peaceful protest march...

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http://conservativepost.com/former-navy-seals-were-deployed-to-ferguson-what-they-have-to-say-about-it-will-shock-you/

 

Asymmetric Solutions @AsymmetricUSA

Follow

Safe tour - job complete -on direct observation seems media has made protestors out to be more bloodthirsty than they are

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0cCBCseTEY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqTED8UjKr8

[Spen]

Did anyone think while listening to WNST for yrs that they had a racist on the air. I didn't. Apparently I was wrong.

https://www.facebook.com/ken.wilson.90813/posts/10204566714113385?comment_id=10204569621546069&offset=0&total_comments=52&notif_t=share_reply

 

He wass on the air with Rob Long and played nice with guys like Robbie from Robbies 1st Base. I guess unless they dress in hoods you can't be to sure.

I know its not him but do local sports show have a frequent caller who refers to himself as 'the fan'? He sounds like he's been smoking a thousand years.