09-24-2020, 07:52 AM
I held off on commenting on this last night because I had some things going on and I really wanted to mull it over. A lot of things I saw on social media from some of the ACAB folks talked about how ridiculous this was when the city admitted some sort of culpability by settling the lawsuit. Here is why I think what Cameron said was wrong, but also have no issue with the decision by the Grand Jury. Something can violate the law, can violate procedures, but can also not rise to the level of criminality.
This has prompted me to think even more about the whole situation in this country, in general. First off, this should in no way be taken as me saying that if a LEO does something they shouldn't that they should never be charged criminally. Investigations, grand jury hearings, and potential charges should all still be happening. What we need to be doing, though, is recognizing what these civil cases are costing us. When a city settles for millions of dollars, that is taxpayer money that is being spent because something was done that shouldn't have been. Even if it doesn't rise to the level of criminality, something wrong occurred and we need to recognize that. Focusing on these civil cases, though, keeps the focus on the system. The system screwed up, procedures weren't followed as they should be or, if they were, the procedures are flawed in some way. We need to take this and say to the city, state, whoever, "look, I don't want my money being spent on things like this. Let's figure out how to fix it."
This goes to the conversation I had in another thread about focusing on the system and not the individuals. I mean, if a cop is running around with white nationalist groups and what not, fine, flame the bastard, but most of these instances occur because a cop was following what they saw to be the correct decision and policy probably backed them up. That means we need to put our focus on the system and see how we can fix that.
Anyway, this is the end of my not-quite-awake rant of the day.
This has prompted me to think even more about the whole situation in this country, in general. First off, this should in no way be taken as me saying that if a LEO does something they shouldn't that they should never be charged criminally. Investigations, grand jury hearings, and potential charges should all still be happening. What we need to be doing, though, is recognizing what these civil cases are costing us. When a city settles for millions of dollars, that is taxpayer money that is being spent because something was done that shouldn't have been. Even if it doesn't rise to the level of criminality, something wrong occurred and we need to recognize that. Focusing on these civil cases, though, keeps the focus on the system. The system screwed up, procedures weren't followed as they should be or, if they were, the procedures are flawed in some way. We need to take this and say to the city, state, whoever, "look, I don't want my money being spent on things like this. Let's figure out how to fix it."
This goes to the conversation I had in another thread about focusing on the system and not the individuals. I mean, if a cop is running around with white nationalist groups and what not, fine, flame the bastard, but most of these instances occur because a cop was following what they saw to be the correct decision and policy probably backed them up. That means we need to put our focus on the system and see how we can fix that.
Anyway, this is the end of my not-quite-awake rant of the day.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
