There have been enough incidents of law enforcement officers engaging in various kinds of unfortunate to
criminal behavior in the last few years that I view any encounter with one as being in the same class with encountering a rattlesnake or grizzly bear.
I think LEOs who commit gross violations of citizen rights should not enjoy official immunity.
To often LEOs who do badly wind up with paid vacation ('admin leave') as their 'punishment'.
That's my concern too, and it's tainting my very rare encounters with LE.
With so many bad cops not fired outright, after millions are paid out in AVOIDING criminal records by taxpayers, cities are setting up good Officers for negative interactions with the public.
Denver PD (and thankfully I rarely spend any time in the hell hole of the actual City and County of Denver proper, and go out of my way not to spend a single dime there other than sporting events usually on someone else's free tickets) has paid out over $3M to people for a single Officer in THREE separate violence cases, and he's still on the street.
Until LE cleans their own house, this will only get worse. My vote is one of "no confidence" these days. And I am paying for that level of service?
Eddie's given the tactical situation when standing alongside a car. It's a damn dangerous job.
Problem is, that stop didn't go wrong at the window not coming down, it went wrong at the second they set up the checkpoint.
And it's not the Citizen's job to make the Officer safe. It's smart if they do. But it's not their responsibility.
But be honest Eddie, if the kid wanted to kill the guy he could just as easily do it with the window open. You conveniently left that part out.
Hoping you can whack him with your clipboard is a nice tactical thought, but if he was out to kill the guy, he'd be dead.
And it's not "obstructing" anything to refuse to be detained without a charge. Period. End of discussion. That's a misuse of the law. Get the law changed so people must comply if you like, but faking up an obstruction charge because the job itself is unsafe, isn't appropriate.
If it were *really* about Officer safety, they'd never send out single-Officer cars and one Officer would draw and aim their duty weapon at every driver.
Nobody would put up with it and there'd be big discussions about the necessity and uses of traffic stops.
