Here we have another stupid police officer in South Whitley Indiana. High school girl is driving home in the rain. Stupid police officer pulls her over for left headlight out and driving 37 in a 30. In the video, she seems compliant and is looking for her license. Within 90 seconds of the stop, he enters the car and body slams her into the pavement. He says she refused to comply. The video shows she was complying. I guess after 90 seconds on scene, he thought he was authorized to body slam her. The city posted remarks on their facebook page, but so many complaints were against the city, they had to take the facebook page down. The town prosecutor refused to charge her for resisting arrest. Her parents seem more than reasonable. They want better training. Another interestin g thing is the officer was suspended from his previous police officer job in another city and had to attend 10 days of de-escalation training. It sure didnt help him here.
All police officers should be bonded. When they screw up like this, the bond would payout. Then they couldnt jump to another department like this guy did because they wouldnt be able to afford the bond.
Start prosecuting these rogue officers for blatantly violating peoples civil rights.
Something interesting the cop said. “She refused until I tell her why.”
I’ve seen a lot of these and the cop answer is usually something like the above or along the lines of “I’ll tell you in a minute” or “I’ll tell you after I know who I’m talking to.”
It is so prevalent that somebody is teaching them to do it as a tactic.
I’ve looked at the law in a couple of places and the cops aren’t required to tell the victim.
I think that needs to change. It needs to be a law that their initial introduction, the very first things out of their mouth need to be their name, badge number, organization and pretext for the stop.
Not a question, “Do you know why I stopped you?” Is garbage.
Also, no “Bro”, “Man” or any of that. And no cursing, although I would give a pass on that in a fight.
Cops are rude, familiar and disrespectful. Not courteous. They are thugs. Frat boys.
This is just proof positive that some people are going to end up in a job that they do not have the temperament to perform properly. The proper procedure for a traffic stop interaction is not something new. See something that provides probable cause to initiate a stop (defective headlight and driving faster than the speed limit with inclement weather as a factor). Initiate the stop. Radio in the stop, vehicle description and license plate, along with a description of the driver and number of occupants. Approach the vehicle in a cautious manner and state to the driver, " Good (morning, afternoon, evening), I am (Officer’s title, name and agency), the reason I stopped you is (state the reason for initiating the stop), I need you to provide me with you drivers license, registration and proof of insurance.
Please is usually included in the request. In my day, we were taught that firm, but not abusive, never breaking bearing and maintaining simple courtesy until aggressive behavior on the part of the subject dictated measured escalation. I just don’t see a reason for use of force in this situation. In addition, now days these officers have a computer, with screen and printer in the patrol car. But even before they routinely had these in the car, not having your actual license in possession isn’t grounds for use of force. You ask the person if they have another form of picture ID. Then get their full name, DOB and address. With name, DOB and address you can run an NCIC check for a valid license. You can also run the vehicle license through the NCIC for registered owner’s name and address. And today, with the computer in the patrol car, the officer can bring up the DMV database image of the license, with picture.
The vast majority of officers cringe when they see incidents like this, because it is just this type of inflated ego driven, power trip riding fool that makes policework harder than necessary.
It was military, but the Army MP school was rated as in the top 5 of all police training courses in the US when I went through it. My son went through the course at Ft Leonardwood 5 years ago (graduated 40 years to the month after I did). Civilian agencies send their officers to that course to learn proper LEO procedures and to receive their required certification prior to being allowed to begin working with a training officer. Remember being in the military doesn’t remove one’s basic constitutional rights. And LEO interactions are human interactions.
We were warned about letting the authority exercised by an on duty LEO go to our heads. And my team leader, who was my probationary trainer at my first duty assignment, warned me of what he called the 4 stages. And we had some ego driven idiots that never should have been allowed to exercise that authority. I can tell you they were despised by the rest of us because they did make it harder for the rest of us.
That is a dangerous training shortcoming if so. An officer needs to be constantly aware that LEO service is a position of responsibility and service, not just authority.
