They need to double the pay for cops and remove their protections like qualified immunity and the right to fire if they feel threatened. This is the only way we get higher quality cops in the system, we incentivize better people to join with money. Maybe once we have a critical mass of great cops we will need less cops overall.<p>All of these extra costs associated with overtime etc because of these riots and looting are a direct result of employing shitty cops and completely avoidable. The costs should be taken directly from the pension funds of cops as far as I’m concerned, cities should not bear the costs of overtime because of riots caused by cops killing people.<p>If we had a critical mass of good cops, we likely would need less overtime overall because the relationship would be better between law enforcement and citizens, especially minorities.
I have been meta-worried about the optics of protests because as a student of history i see echoes of 1964 and 1968, and i am horrified at the idea of a “law and order” second term.<p>USA Today publishing something like this does a bit to assuage my fears! For the non-American HN audience, USA Today is the anodyne newspaper you get for free at a business hotel chain with your crappy refrigerated muffin or yogurt and instant coffee. It’s about as intentionally bland and inoffensive to everyone newspaper as still exists.<p>If the message there is this, we might pull it off and meaningfully address something instead of wanking about protestors like we usually do.
They have immunity and no requirement to protect<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_v._District_of_Columbia" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_v._District_of_Columbia</a>
It's sad to see how little progress has been made on concrete reforms that would meaningfully reduce these problems. Curtailing qualified immunity, and limiting the power of police unions to protect "bad apples" is something with bi-partisan ideological support.<p><a href="https://www.heritage.org/courts/commentary/less-government-more-gorsuch" rel="nofollow">https://www.heritage.org/courts/commentary/less-government-m...</a><p><a href="https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/supreme-court-gives-police-green-light-shoot-first-and" rel="nofollow">https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-poli...</a><p><a href="https://www.cato.org/blog/why-qualified-immunity" rel="nofollow">https://www.cato.org/blog/why-qualified-immunity</a><p>You'd think reforms to qualified immunity--which everyone from the ACLU to Heritage to Cato agrees on--would be on the fast track to legislation, at least in left-leaning states. There is no reason a state like California, where politicians habitually genuflect to social justice, couldn't pass legislation to create causes of action against police officers that aren't subject to the federal constitution's qualified immunity doctrine. None at all. Instead, for some reason the debate is now about whether rioting and property destruction is an acceptable response to police brutality--an extreme position that is not going to carry the day with anyone but a tiny minority.
I'd like to point out that even when police officers have their hearts in the right places, they don't do themselves any favors by going after those in blue who abuse their power. We have heard countless stories of police officers that crossed the blue line to do what was right, only for extreme retaliation to occur, to the point of getting fired, harassed, assaulted, stalked, and even murdered.<p>And the idea that people can just join the police force with good intentions is fatally flawed. The police is a hierarchical organization with a culture that is characterized by its top down command structure. In order to have any influence at all, you have to be at the top...and by the time you get to the top, you're assimilated into the culture. It is self perpetuating.<p>Absent of firing all the police and starting over from scratch (an option I'm oddly not opposed to), I think the only way we can accomplish this is with strong carrots and even stronger sticks. Taking away qualified immunity is just the first step.<p>We have laws that punish doctors and lawyers and even commercial truck drivers more harshly when they commit crimes that directly relate to their jobs, under the premise that they know better and should be held to a higher standard. No such laws exist for police, but they should.<p>I think most importantly though is that we need to protect those who break ranks for good reasons. Retaliation, in any way, shape, or form, by police officers for enforcing the law against another police officer, should be a Class A felony with sentencing in the double digits. And we shouldn't just stop there. Good cops that enforce the law against bad cops deserve our protection, much like how we go out of our way to protect witnesses and whistle-blowers.<p>And not only that, but there should <i>never</i> be investigations into criminal misconduct by a police officer by other police officers of the same jurisdiction. Once it crosses the line from department policy violation to criminal violation, that investigation should be handed over to a superceding jurisdiction, and any local jurisdiction on the matter should be voided.
In other words, police act like laws don't apply to them because they <i>don't</i> (not in some "that's what it feels like" sense, but as a matter of precedent and court finding). See starting at 3 here <a href="https://threader.app/thread/1266053291684827138" rel="nofollow">https://threader.app/thread/1266053291684827138</a> , and the linked <a href="https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-police-immunity-scotus" rel="nofollow">https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-poli...</a> .
I don't want to excuse the abuses but I think in a sense the cops are the victims of bad politics and management. Obviously shooting innocent people is not acceptable but on the other hand they are being thrown into a bad situation and don't get much help coping with that. I know a guy (very nice guy) who started as a cop two years ago. Since then he had to shoot somebody in the leg who attacked him with a knife, had to deal with a teenage girl hanging herself, lots of domestic violence and a lot of other really bad stuff that's very tough to deal with. They don't get any psychological counseling so a lot of the old-timers are either alcoholics or have some other kind of psychological damage.<p>In the end politics needs to have the courage to address the underfunding and also address the training and management situation. They don't want to do either because it may cost money so the bad situation just keeps going. Reminds me of the healthcare situation where even the most blatant problems go unaddressed because it's more important to do partisan fighting instead of addressing issues. I think it's well understood that the drug laws are damaging so it would be a good start to clean them up.
Citizens should be able to pull some of their tax money away from ineffective police departments to hold them accountable. There could be competing police forces, all run by the government, and the citizens should get to fund the ones they prefer, not unlike charter schools allow parents to fund the schools they prefer, and food stamps allow the poor to buy the food they want from the grocery store they prefer.
Isn't qualified immunity only for civil suits? Police can still be criminally charged.<p>Perhaps police aren't charged criminally when they should be, but that doesn't seem to be because of qualified immunity.<p>Suing over murder is not a great recourse, anyway. You still lost your loved one, and the individual you sue probably can't pay you much.
Does anyone know some examples of organizations that work to change laws like this? Or organizations that work with victims of police brutality to hold perpetrators accountable?<p>I would like to support changing some of the things about our society that contribute to overreach by police but it is hard to know where to begin
TBF, Plato's Republic explicitly states the guardians of the Polis were not subject to the same laws, and refers to the idea that there is no hierarchy as the "noble lie."
It's entirely naïve to believe that an apartheid for the primary benefit of the wealthy can or will ever be reformed from within. Citizens' United, "campaign finance reform", lack of action on climate change, and many, many other examples of the corrupting influences of the very rich will preclude significant change because the status quo is how the aristocracy prefers it. Voting/media-driven popularity contests masquerading as elections without exit polls, protests, petitions, and nibbling around the periphery on small issues like QI or as Rachel Maddow doesn't do a damn bit of good because the bigger problem is who's in control: it's not We The People.<p>If a citizen really wanted change, voting, running for office, looting, and peaceful protests with prayer sticks aren't the answer. There is no reforming a system that has no mechanism for reforming pervasive corruption within and above it! Therefore and unfortunately, the rich have left us with no other answer other than focused, strategic rebellion, and overthrow of their greedy, vampiric apartheid that too many people are blind to because it benefits them. <i>Queue predictable pearl-clutchers and naysayers</i>
Maybe qualified immunity needs to be reduced in scope, but what is the alternative? Without something like it, police might otherwise be held liable for something like having to taser a violent person, only they hit their head on the way down?
If your are angry about injustice it is wrong to be angry against police and courts enforcing wrong laws.<p>Demand action from politicians to change those laws (e.g. remove qualified immunity, etc). While protesting is important, engaging with your representatives and VOTING is very important too.