Lawsuit: Virginia police officers threatened man during stop

[CJD]

(04-19-2021, 11:44 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I was referring to your statement that they were "out for blood".  Let me clue you in on something, no LEO goes to work yearning for their chance to kill someone that day.  This was always true, but it's especially true now given the guilty until proven innocent mind set many in this country have on LEO involved shootings.  

"Out for blood" is a common phrase usually used for people who are not in control of their emotions, specifically when that lack of control manifests in violent or manic outbursts, as with the 2nd officer. I won't use that particular phrase to describe actions such as those of the 2nd officer to prevent this misunderstanding in the future.

Quote:How is he clearly not a threat when he continues to refuse to leave his vehicle?  You have zero idea what he may have on the passenger seat next to him, wedged between his seat and the center console, etc.  There's a wide range of interaction between high risk, at gun point, and treating the person as wholly "not a threat".  As stated by me earlier, that should have, and could have happened, but the Lt. did everything as wrong as you can do them, which didn't help at all.


Deliberate non-compliance is always a cause for concern.  Why are they being non-compliant?  Google traffic stop murders and see very similar behavior from criminals who ended up killing the officer involved.  Not to mention the thousands more such incidents that don't result in officer death, but varying degrees of injury.  You keep going on about the officers but continue to completely absolve the Lt. for his major role in this confrontation.  I admitted wrong doing by the second officer very early on, I've yet to see one person on the other side acknowledge just how much the Lt. helped create this situation.

Because his hands were out and was speaking calmly. If he reached back in to the vehicle and reached for something without announcing it, that is a hostile action. Saying "I don't feel safe leaving my car [due to the behaviors you are exhibiting]" is not hostile and shouldn't be treated as such.

You've mentioned how dangerous traffic stops are for cops multiple times now. If they are this dangerous, then I would think there'd be a movement to cut down on them except in extreme cases (like drunk driving, aggressive speeding and weaving in traffic etc) just for the police officers' safety. No one is dying from this guy having tinted windows and having a temporary tag, as is my understanding with this scenario (or, in other cases, having an air freshener in their car).

Not to mention how dangerous and stress inducing they are to the people being pulled over. It sounds like they're just wholly a negative sum game, so why even do them when no one is in danger from the driver's actions?

Quote:These kind of comments right here are why people in the law enforcement community are always exasperated when discussing this type of topic.  You're ascribing a non-violent motive to the Lt.'s non-compliance as if the officers should automatically know this.  Non-compliance, of any sort, automatically sets off warning bells.  You don't get to say it's "non-violent" non-compliance so lets everyone calm down.

I don't see us as being at war, so no olive branch is necessary.  I just see a lot of people in this thread regurgitating the media position on law enforcement and calling out certain actions from a position of ignorance stated as expertise.  Like I said, it's going to get worse before it gets better and everyone who's not a criminal is going to pay the price. 

Maybe law enforcement communities should be less concerned with defending people like the 2nd officer then maybe it would be less exasperating having to explain why their uncalled for violence actually isn't uncalled for. I "get to" say it's non-violent non-compliance because it objectively is. Violence is a word that has a meaning and "maybe, possibly, per chance, he may do something violent if we don't mace him right now" is not in that list of definitions.

Throughout this conversation you have mentioned my "bias" multiple times. From bringing up "anti-cop propaganda," to me, apparently, being a slave to the media narrative that cops are bad (I'd dispute whether or not that media narrative is as holistic as you seem to think, but that's a different topic). I would suggest that you take a critical view of what you're saying and consider that maybe you are projecting your bias on to me. It's obvious that you have a pro-police bias (for obvious reasons) and will defend them in many circumstances where they don't deserve defense, whereas I have no reason to be biased against police other than their actions being wrong.

And I'm not even saying all the police are bad in this scenario. Just the one specific police officer. Like I said with my olive branch, the first cop was mostly fine, other than not attempting to control the aggressive cop, which I think is, if not reasonable, at least understandable since they share a community (of police) and all that. So if I'm biased against police, why would I ever give that one a pass? Your narrative doesn't really add up in a variety of ways, not in the actual behaviors of the police and the man nor in your claims of my bias in evaluating the situation.