Tag: police accountability

It is Now Illegal to Film Near Police Officers in Arizona

Frequent readers of the Free Thought Project know that filming the cops is not a crime. Despite this being a widely known provision — held up with multiple court precedents — cops continue to violate the First Amendment protected right of citizens to film the police. Earlier this year, the Arizona House Appropriations Committee approved a bill that would criminalize filming cops on the job, dealing a massive blow to First Amendment rights. The following month, the Senate passed it, and on Wednesday, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey signed it into law.

On Sept. 24 it will be illegal to record the police in Arizona within an 8-foot distance.

Republican Representative John Kavanaugh, who is a former police officer, was the lead sponsor of the legislation. According to the new law, it is illegal “for a person to knowingly make a video recording of law enforcement activity, including the handling of an emotionally disturbed person, if the person does not have the permission of the law enforcement officer” and is within 8 feet of the cop.

Kavanaugh originally stipulated a 15 foot radius, however it was later amended after multiple objections. But for many, this is still too far.

As Valera Voce, points out, the law also classifies unlawful video recording of law enforcement activity as a petty offense, unless a person fails to comply with a verbal warning of a violation or has been previously convicted of a violation in which case an offense is a class 3 misdemeanor. A class 3 misdemeanor comes with a minimum of 30 days in jail. Finally, the bill explicitly declares that it “does not establish a right, or authorize any person, to make a video recording of a law enforcement officer.”

“It’s crazy thinking about that for a second. The video that led to the criminal conviction of the police officer who killed George Floyd would itself be a criminal act. And that makes no sense whatsoever,” attorney Dan Barr told FOX 10.

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Rogue Cops: The Supreme Court Is Turning America Into a Constitution-Free Zone

“No one should get used to their rights. Predicting with certainty which ones, if any, will go, or when, is impossible.”—Mary R. Ziegler, legal historian

The Supreme Court has spoken: there will be no consequences for cops who brutalize the citizenry and no justice for the victims of police brutality.

Although the Court’s 2021-22 rulings on qualified immunity for police who engage in official misconduct were largely overshadowed by its politically polarizing rulings on abortion, gun ownership and religion, they were no less devastating.

The doctrine of qualified immunity was intended to insulate government officials from frivolous lawsuits, but the real purpose of qualified immunity is to ensure that government officials are not held accountable for official misconduct.

In Egbert v. Boule, the Court gave total immunity to Border Patrol agents who beat up a bed-and-breakfast owner, in the process carving out a massive exception to the Fourth Amendment for border police (and by extension, other federal police) who unconstitutionally use excessive force. As journalist Ian Millhiser concludes, “Egbert v. Boule is a severe blow to the proposition that law enforcement must obey the Constitution.”

In Cope v. Cogdill, the Court let stand a Fifth Circuit ruling that granted qualified immunity to jail officials who watched a suicidal inmate strangle himself without intervening or calling for help. Likewise, in Ramirez v. Guadarrama, the Court let stand a lower court ruling granting qualified immunity to police officers who fired their tasers at a suicidal man who had doused himself in gasoline, causing the man to burst into flames.

Both Cope and Ramirez move the goal posts for the kind of misconduct that merits qualified immunity, suggesting that even sheer incompetence is excusable when it involves a cop.

It’s a chilling reminder that in the American police state, ‘we the people’ are at the mercy of law enforcement officers who have almost absolute discretion to decide who is a threat, what constitutes resistance, and how harshly they can deal with the citizens they were appointed to ‘serve and protect.”

This is how unarmed Americans keep dying at the hands of militarized police.

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Five Stories You’re Missing While Obsessing Over The “Current Thing”

In recent years and months it has become apparent that more often the attention of the American public is easily diverted. With increasing frequency we are seeing attention spans decrease, swaying incoherently from one curated narrative to the next, often irrational and logically inconsistent, to align with the “current thing” that establishment officials and their obedient talking heads on the ‘tell-lie-vision’ proselytize.

The new “current thing” takes the place of the old “current thing” in a seemingly never-ending game of Simon Says: Empire Edition. In just a month’s time we’ve seen virtue signalers exchange Ukrainian flags for Pride Flags, and COVID hysteria for monkeypox hysteria, with a smattering of gun control hypocrisy in between; shifting back and forth from “No one needs an AR-15!” to “Weapons for Ukraine!”, and “all cops are racist!” to “Only cops should have guns”.

All aided and abetted by an establishment media all too willing to participate in the degradation of common sense so long as it bolsters their abysmal ratings. It is tiresome for the intellectually competent.

But under the fanfare of these ridiculous charades a number of actually important news stories are either being ignored or at the very least obfuscated in favor of these insufferable ineptitudes.

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Supreme Court Issues Ruling, Gutting Miranda Rights And Threatening The Fifth Amendment

On Thursday, the Supreme Court issued a ruling in Vega V Tekoh, a case involving the administration of Miranda rights, with the court ruling that a suspect’s words or statements can be used in court regardless of their Miranda rights. 

For background, these are the facts of the case in question:

Terence Tekoh worked as a patient transporter in a hospital in Los Angeles. After a patient accused him of sexual assault, hospital staff reported the allegation to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department. Deputy Carlos Vega went to the hospital to ask Tekoh questions and take Tekoh’s statement. Although the parties described vastly different accounts of the nature of the interaction between Tekoh and Vega, it is undisputed that Vega did not advise Tekoh of his Miranda rights before questioning him or taking his statement.

Tekoh was arrested and charged in California state court, but a jury returned a verdict of not guilty. Following the acquittal on the criminal charge, Tekoh sued Vega, alleging that Vega violated Tekoh’s Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination by taking his statement without first advising him of his Miranda rights.

Justice Samuel Alito issued his ruling, a count of 6-3, deciding that using such statements outside of Miranda rights is not a violation of a defendant’s rights and does not give them the right to sue the court for such use. 

Miranda prescribed a specific and protective set of warnings to ensure that criminally accused suspects were made aware of the Fifth Amendment’s decree that no person “shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.”  

Miranda is also one of the court’s most culturally famous decisions. Americans know Miranda. More accurately: Americans know their Miranda warnings. Even if they cannot recite the lyrics to the national anthem or the Pledge of Allegiance, they likely can recite Miranda’s warnings: 

  • You have the right to remain silent;
  • Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law;
  • You have the right to a lawyer;
  • If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you.

Generally, if the police obtain a suspect’s statement violating Miranda, the government cannot use that statement against the defendant in court. 

But can the defendant later sue the police for violating the defendant’s constitutional rights? 

The Supreme Court now says, No. 

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Ex high-ranking Seattle cop who displayed Nazi insignia to get $1.5M from city

A suburban Seattle city will pay more than $1.5 million to settle a dispute with a former assistant police chief who was disciplined for posting a Nazi rank insignia on his office door and joking about the Holocaust.

Former Kent Assistant Police Chief Derek Kammerzell, who had been with the department for nearly three decades, was initially given two weeks of unpaid leave after the 2020 incident. Outraged residents and members of the Jewish community prompted Mayor Dana Ralph to put Kammerzell on paid administrative leave and demand his resignation.

The city’s attempt to essentially discipline Kammerzell a second time led to a dispute between his lawyers and the city that appeared headed for litigation. But interim city Chief Administrative Officer Arthur “Pat” Fiztpatrick, who is also the city attorney, said Friday the city had resolved the matter through negotiation, The Seattle Times reported.

Ralph, in calling for Kammerzell’s resignation in January, acknowledged that the decision to revisit the discipline issue would likely “come at a high cost.” The city said Friday it would pay him $1,520,000 to resign.

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Here Are Eight Lies Texas Officials Told About Uvalde That Should Get Them Fired

More than one week after an 18-year-old gunman stormed Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, state officials are still struggling to set the record straight on what really happened that led to the deaths of 19 kids and two adults.

For a week now, the public, the press, and politicians have been on a wild goose chase to find out why it took more than an hour for good guys with guns to take down a school shooter in a small school in the small South Texas town last Tuesday.

Unfortunately, Texas safety officials have traded the truth for multiple false, misleading, and vague statements that have significantly undermined the public’s trust in law enforcement’s ability to protect children like the fourth-graders who lost their lives in the attack.

Not only have they severely undercut the trust of Americans, they’ve infuriated the mourning Uvalde community.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he felt “misled” and “livid” after hearing that a poor police response significantly contributed to the delay in action against the shooter. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick also lamented that “No one mentioned the fact that there was this 45-minute to an hour hold by the chief of the police of the school district while there were still shots being fired.”

Here are eight lies Texas officials told about the Uvalde shooting that should get them immediately fired.

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Agent misconduct revealed to be recurring theme at FBI; attempts at fixes fall short

FBI agents have a longstanding pattern of breaking rules on investigations and the bureau’s efforts to solve them did not eliminate the problems, according to more than six years of internal reviews obtained by The Washington Times. 

The previously undisclosed data covering 2013 to 2019 documents more than 1,600 instances of broken rules on cases that involved investigations that do not require a warrant, the use of informants and undercover agents, and on sensitive matters involving people engaged in politics, government, the news media and religious groups.

Mike German, a Brennan Center fellow who formerly worked undercover as an FBI agent, said the rule-breaking detailed in the audits are “the tip of the iceberg.” Mr. German, who left the bureau in 2004 and authored the 2019 book “Disrupt, Discredit, and Divide: How the New FBI Damages Democracy,” said the actual problem is likely far worse than the public knows. 

“The culture is one of impunity,” Mr. German said. “The FBI leadership controls what gets approved and what doesn’t, regardless of the rules.”

The Times first reported in March about internal FBI audits in 2018 and 2019 showing misconduct by agents. These newly revealed documents portray a persistent pattern of rule-breaking since at least 2013. 

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Disgraced Cop Gets Just 2 Years for Molesting Fiancé’s 10yo Daughter and Filming It

Another police officer has been arrested for child porn and has been given a sweetheart plea deal. While this happens so often that it is depressingly not surprising, this time, it was the cop’s own soon-to-be 10-year-old step daughter who was the victim.

Columbus police officer Raymond Rose, 31, was arrested in 2020 by an officer with the Franklin County Internet Crimes Against Children task force after being accused of filming a young child in a “state of nudity,” according to Franklin County Municipal Court records.

In January, Rose took a plea deal and pleaded guilty to a single charge of of gross sexual imposition for inappropriately touching the 10-year-old girl whom he also videotaped naked.

The charges of illegal use of a minor in nudity-oriented material and pandering sexual oriented material involving a minor — both felonies carrying steep sentences — were dropped. Thanks to the plea deal, this week, he was sentenced to just two years in prison.

In October 2020, family members of the reported victim contacted the police department’s Internal Affairs Bureau with the allegations.

Assistant Franklin County Prosecutor Sayje Brown told the judge that the child’s mother found the video on Rose’s phone.

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