police abuse

At least eight San Francisco police officers were surrounding a man when several opened fire, shooting and killing the knife-wielding man in a hail of bullets earlier today.
Had it not been caught on Instagram video, this could easily have been reported as another case of a suspect “lunging” at the officers.
That, after all, is one of most commonly used words in police reports in cases where cops kill citizens carrying knives.

As I dive deeper and deeper into the legal complexities of the right to photograph and record in public (I can quote Glik v Cuniffe so fast I will make your head spin), I have noticed a disturbing trend:
The reasons and excuses offered by police officers, firefighters, security officers, even teachers and principals, to keep you from taking a photograph are just plain pathetic.

A Maryland cop who placed a gun against the head of a man because he had stepped out of an illegally parked car was convicted today.
And only because the incident was captured on video.
Prince George’s County police officer Jenchesky Santiago was found guilty of first-degree assault, second-degree assault, misconduct in office and the use of a firearm in the commission of a crime of violence.
The man, William Cunningham, was a passenger in a car that had parked in front of his home when Santiago pulled up, accusing the driver of parking illegally.

A photojournalist who photographed Chicago police abusing a protesters during the 2012 NATO Summit, only to be beaten up himself by police, received a $100,000 settlement last month.
Joshua Lott, who was on assignment for Getty Images, said police destroyed one of two of his cameras as they stomped on him and beat him with batons.
He was jailed for misdemeanor reckless conduct, a charge that was dismissed when the cops failed to show up to court.

In an obvious effort to detach himself from the growing scandal in the Windy City, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel fired the police department’s top cop today, saying it was the first step in restoring confidence in the Chicago Police Department.

Two more Los Angeles sheriff’s deputies were sentenced to prison today after a federal judge refused to give them leniency because of their law enforcement status.
Deputy Sussie Ayala received a six-year sentence while deputy Fernando Luviano received a seven-year sentence.

A Florida Highway Patrol officer did not appreciate PINAC’s Jeff Gray from photographing and recording the scene of a single motorcycle accident Friday, ordering him away from what he called “my crime scene.”
But the cop did not say a thing to the woman who rode her bicycle right through the scene.
And Gray did not even cross the street as the woman did.
But he did not have a camera, so that made all the difference in the world.

It took Chicago Police over a year to release the video of Laquan McDonald. If a video is recorded and nobody sees it, then does the recording matter?
What if there wasn’t a whistleblower, a reporter and a lawyer who combined to sue on behalf of the public interest and gain release of the video depicting an officer shooting the teenager McDonald as he walked away from cops.

It took less than 24 hours for the wife of Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke to raise more than $10,000 on a Go Fund Me page she set up for her husband’s first degree murder trial.
It’s taken more than five months for the wife of Missouri Highway Patrol Sergeant Randy Henry to raise less than $3,000 on a Go Fund Me page she set up for her husband’s legal expenses.
The difference?

The long-awaited video has finally been released and it’s not pretty, showing 17-year-old Laquan McDonald was nowhere near Chicago police when one cop opened fire and shot him 16 times.
Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke then walked up to him and continued to shoot after the teenager had collapsed on the street.
Initially, police claimed that McDonald had “lunged” at Van Dyke with a knife, but the knife is barely visible in the video.
But what is visible is that McDonald never lunged.