Personally I have had very little interaction with police, so I was surprised to have a conversation with a friend who discussed being repeatedly pulled over and harassed / beat up by local police when he was a young man. When he filed a complaint with the police, the same policeman made sure to stop him and impress upon him that that was a big mistake.
His story took place in rural upstate New York. I doubt that race was a factor since he is white. He is impressively large and powerfully built, so I suspect he was targeted because of those features. The alleged abuse took place before the era of cell phone cameras and body cams so any evidence would have been the word of a “young punk” versus a policeman.
Does anyone have similar stories? I suspect that abuse by police is much more common than people realize.
Yes, the vast majority of police are professional, and their job is inherently dangerous and difficult.
On the other hand, I suspect that there have been problems with abuse or corruption that do not make national headlines, and some of the problems are more severe in rural areas. When I moved to Pennsylvania in the 1980s I was surprised to read about local small-town police calling in the volunteer firemen to hose down the site of a suspected homicide before state police had a chance to investigate. Speculation in the local papers was that the killing was drug related.
The borough council eventually responded by closing the local police department and contracting with a neighboring township for police services. Is that an early example of “defund the police”?
Here is a link to a court decision related to the resulting lawsuit by the police against the borough council members:
My impression is that abuse was much more common before the widespread use of cell phones and cameras.
Not me personally but my son used to have issues. He had juvenile incidents (fighting, underage drinking) that followed him till he was 28 years old because of one officer. One or two times it was over the top behavior by the police. Totally unacceptable. We filed complaints and eventually the officer was let go. I hear he’s working nearby though.
Not abuse, but police too lazy to give a ■■■■. …Had my car broken in to. Decent amount stolen. value wise. Went to police station to file a report, they told me to come back later they are doing a shift change…I didn’t bother since obviously they weren’t going to do ■■■■about it.
very true. I used to have to drive through this little town at 4 am. I would get pulled over at least once a week with the excuse of your license plate light was not bright enough. They were checking to see if I had been drinking. Never got a ticket or even a written warning for it. The law was they had to be able to see plate from 50 ft. I tried to explain to them that they are more then 50 ft away when they are following me.
Finally got a lawyer and sued. When they claimed they were withen fifty feet the lawyer asked the judge to issue them a following to close ticket. There were no stop signs or lights on the section I drove so they could not claim it was when I was stopped. They stopped pulling me over but I bet they still pulled others over.
In Kansas City, if you’re a white guy who lives in a black neighborhood, and work the overnight shift, you will get pulled over multiple times for BS reasons on your way home from work as the sun is rising.
Out here in the middle of nowhere Missouri at night, a license plate from another county will get you scrutinized for possible drug transportation.
Sometimes it’s about race, most times it’s about drugs and alcohol.
Farm that we were at was raided by county swat/police, wife and I was butt ass naked.
They forced us to lay down on ground for some time until someone/superior officer came around and told em to allow us to get some cloths on. Had to listen to comments from those sheriffs…I hope they were directed at my wife at the time.
Other then being pulled over lot for driving while being long haired redneck.
All and all, growing up on farm and riding my motorcycle on the road they pretty much left me alone. Mostly going to school when I went so they basically left me alone. Beside the couldn’t catch ma anyway.
Most police officers I’ve dealt with were level headed & professional.
One, though, I was working the second shift & got off at 3 AM. Was pulled over for speeding.
Officer had a tirade when it was an ungodly hour of the day, & it was just myself and a driver who had crashed into a guard rail.
Maybe he needed to learn to be a crime scene or fingerprint tech if he couldn’t even deal professionally with two drivers at 3 in the morning.
Work with a young woman who sort of reminds me of Lena Horne, pretty mixed race Latina. She was upset about spending a few hours in jail over, in her words, disputing a speeding ticket.
She insisted her mom’s car is older & not in such great shape & couldn’t have reached the speed he claimed. I wonder is she was white if she would have gotten off with a verbal warning, or at least have avoided arrest.
I’m sure that’s not true. No such thing as “driving while white” only “driving while black”
Your white privilege protects you from that.
/sarc
I was pulled over in NY state for having Texas plates and he told me so. Searched my car, busted my chops for half an hour, accused me of having burglary tools and weapons because I had concrete tools in my car, all kinds of BS. I wanted to use that broken sledge hammer handle up side his head, it sure could have been a weapon alright, but it was just a tool among other tools. He was a complete jack ass, and I never gave him any reason to bust my ass, not even an inkling of a reason.
I had trouble with the police when I was a teenager. One of the cops in my town was a brother-in-law of a kid I had trouble with in school. He would pull me over every time he saw me. He told me once he would catch me one of these days when he was off duty and whip my ass.
Since those days I have had nothing but good relations with the police.
If they pull you over always make a point of letting them see your hands as they approach the car. Ask permission before reaching for something like your wallet. Say “yes, Sir” and “no, Sir” when asked a question. If you kiss their ass, 80% of the time you won’t get a ticket.
