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Faceplams: THAT ARTICLE? Yes. Absolutely.Originally Posted by tony.parente
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THAT ARTICLE? Yes. Absolutely.
Captain Rustleboots
One time I read an article from a McDonald's employee that talked a lot of shit about the McDonald's they worked at, and I read a few stories about how some McDonald's messed up some customers orders therefore all mcdonalds employees are incompetent.
Bite me
Come on, Tony. Did you READ the fucking Serpico article? He's used as an expert on boards and trials, he was a narcotics detective pretty high up on the food chain, a fucking AL PACINO MOVIE was made about him, MAYORS listened to him, the NYPD was / is PISSED AT HIM because he blew the whistle on their money-making corruption. Your McDonald's analogy is immature and just more cop ass-kissing and very Small Town. Maybe your mindset works in Hooterville but most of us don't live in Hooterville. To constantly deny that change is needed is the Union talking.
Last edited by allegro; 01-13-2015 at 09:26 AM.
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Here's a new one. He was arrested for car jacking btw.
Captain Rustleboots
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NJ cops gun down unarmed black man.
Video at the bottom of the page with sound.
I've watched it once. At first glance, it appears there's a lot going on.
Both cops appeared on the edge from the get go.
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Two black men tortured two white boys in 2012. They were just sentenced. When given the chance to apologize to the victim's families, one of them said this, and only this:
"I'd like to say sorry to the families of Aiyanna Jones, Michael Brown, Eric Garner and I want to apologize to them for not being able to get justice for their loved ones who was murdered in cold blood - and in respect for the peaceful protest, I want to say hands up don't shoot. Black lives matter."
http://www.myfoxphilly.com/story/27909137/men
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^^^^
that is so sad. that is murder. He is RUNNING AWAY, whatever he stops to pick up, he is shot in the back, running away.
let him go ffs, pick him up later, follow him in a car, whatever. don't fucking shoot him because you're a fearful fuck.
and all the upvoted comments (from the Vice News page) "yep yep, legal shooting, legal shooting." sick sick country.
Also this: http://feministing.com/2015/01/28/16...denver-police/
so sad to read constantly of this daily massacre of POC by so-called police.
Last edited by aggroculture; 01-28-2015 at 12:31 PM.
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17-year old girl shot and killed by Texas Cops.
Can't subdue a 17yo girl? It looks like they had her at one point. This is sad.
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that looks like an obvious case of Suicide by Cop.
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The whole sequence is sketchy. I mean she clearly did take a step towards the officer just before getting shot but it's not like she had a gun.
Killing her was the easy way out I guess.
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Double post.
Seattle man needed state official's help to avoid charges for "walking while black".
This is the most surreal video I've seen in a while. Encounter starts at 1:45. I mean, if you want to know what it felt like in the 50s I guess this video gives you a good idea.
Bite me
This is just the world we live in, now, unfortunately. It goes back to that Serpico article, where he says that cops used to do everything they could to avoid shooting anybody, but now it's the first thing they do; it's the lazy way out, and it's evidently sanctioned and accepted as "just the way it is" by the public (fear of police is ingrained in our respective psyches) so it will continue.
Last edited by allegro; 01-29-2015 at 12:42 PM.
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The Chicago Tribune's John Kass drew a lot of attention to the death of John Wrana, a 95-yr-old World War II veteran who was shot in the chest by 5 rounds fired at close range by a bean bag rifle and then later died from internal bleeding. The cop who fired the shots was the only one charged; his supervisor in command was not charged, nor were the other cops who stormed Wrana's room at the senior center wearing metal shields and riot gear. The Judge is going to make the decision in the criminal case.
Here are Kass's last articles pending the Judge's decision. Since the Trib is a pay site, I'll quote Kass's articles in case you are unable to see them:
WWII vet's death a textbook case of excessive force, but no hashtag for him
John Wrana, the 95-year-old World War II veteran killed by police, wasn't killed for selling illegal "loosie" cigarettes on the streets of New York.
And he wasn't killed by an officer on the street in a small town outside St. Louis, just after wrestling for the cop's gun and punching the cop in the face.
When John Wrana died, entertainers and NFL players and basketball stars didn't identify with him. They didn't raise their hands up or wear T-shirts with his name, there was no hashtag justice for him, or protests, or public anger.
But if there ever were a textbook case about the use of excessive force by police and the killing of an innocent American, it's this one.
And trial is scheduled to begin this week in south suburban Markham in the courtroom of Associate Judge Luciano Panici. A Park Forest police officer, Craig Taylor, stands accused of felony reckless conduct in connection with Wrana's death.
Wrana served his country in India and Burma in the U.S. Army Air Forces and built a business and liked to play cards and shoot dice, and even have a drink on occasion. He died just weeks shy of his 96th birthday.
And he was in his room alone at an assisted living center in suburban Chicago on a night in July 2013. That's when five suburban cops rushed him.
One officer had a Taser and police riot shield, others had handguns, and one was armed with a 12-gauge Mossberg pump shotgun. The police said later they were afraid for their lives, though Wrana used a walker to get around.
What bothers me is that Taylor is the only cop charged by Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez.
There were others there with him. Police supervisors, others with higher rank.
Yes, Taylor pulled the trigger. He pumped the shotgun and pulled the trigger again and again, firing beanbag rounds at close range into the old man's guts, according to state investigators. So Taylor should wear the jacket, yes. But he wasn't in command. And he wasn't alone.
Unlike other, more celebrated police killings I mentioned above, the Wrana case hasn't generated all that much national attention, even though it is perhaps the perfect illustration of excessive force by law enforcement.
And someday perhaps, someone will explain to me why this one hasn't generated more discussion.
The death of Eric Garner, a black man selling "loosie" single cigarettes in New York, and his last words, "I can't breathe," received national attention.
A grand jury declined to indict a white police officer who'd been accused of causing Garner's death with a forbidden chokehold, and there were angry protests and shouts of "What do we want? Dead cops!" And later, two police officers were assassinated in a parked vehicle.
Earlier there was the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. Brown was black. According to evidence presented to the grand jury, he began punching a police officer, wrestling for the gun, and was shot to death.
The grand jury declined to indict the white officer in the case. There were riots and looting in Ferguson.
What followed were the ugly politics of race.
Wrana is white. Taylor, the officer who pulled the trigger of the shotgun, is African-American.
I'm uncomfortable mentioning race in connection with this crime. I know people use it easily, but I've avoided it because there is no information that race had anything to do with it. For months I didn't know what race the cops were. To me it's immaterial.
But I'd be lying if I didn't wonder how this story would have been covered if the races were aligned for optimum racial political leverage.
What if Wrana had been a black WWII veteran, perhaps one of the famed Tuskegee Airmen, and Officer Taylor had been white?
It would be national news, with editorial boards weighing in on excessive force and political actors lining up, all the usual suspects preening and fronting themselves off for TV time. But would it change the facts? No.
And facts, not skin pigment, are what matter. So what happened, happened. And John Wrana didn't have to be killed by police, who said they couldn't handle a feeble old man. They could have used a pillow, a mattress, a blanket. But they killed him.
Like Brown and Garner, Wrana was resisting, too. Unlike them, he wasn't large or powerful. He resisted because he was afraid and delusional, perhaps paranoid, symptoms attributed to a reported urinary tract infection. Wrana had refused treatment.
The police were called to the nursing home. According to authorities, they initially thought Wrana brandished a 2-foot-long machete, which turned out to be a shoehorn.
They said he had a knife, though. And five cops with all that equipment couldn't disarm a 95-year-old man. They fired a Taser, but that didn't work. They rushed him. Wrana moved forward, according to investigators for the state police, and that's when Taylor began firing the shotgun.
According to state investigative reports of the shooting, Taylor fired and fired and fired at close range. The beanbag rounds travel at speeds of about 190 miles an hour. The rounds tore Wrana up. He bled to death internally.
And after all this time, after so much silence from authorities, after so much silence from political officials who avoided mentioning John Wrana, we'll have something in this case I've been waiting for: testimony under oath.
I told you I wouldn't let this go. I'll be there Tuesday.
jskass@tribpub.comWrana judge seems frustrated with case against cop, but trial goes on
I'm not one to read a judge's mind — not even that of a South Side judge who loves Frank Sinatra and the Italian soccer team Juventus — but you didn't have to be much of a mind reader to understand the look on Cook County Associate Judge Luciano Panici's face.
A scowl. Sometimes a look of frustration, sometimes one of exasperation.
They've all been on display this week during the Wrana trial.
You know the facts of the case. Park Forest police Officer Craig Taylor, charged with felony reckless conduct, fired five beanbag rounds from a 12-gauge shotgun at close range at a frightened and angry old man who was waving a knife. The rounds ripped the 95-year-old World War II veteran's insides apart.
Careful readers already know the details, which have been explained in this column by pathologists. In the Markham courthouse on Wednesday, Cook County Assistant Medical Examiner Adrienne Segovia outlined her findings from a July 2013 autopsy.
"John Wrana died as a result of hemoperitoneum due to blunt force trauma of the abdomen," Dr. Segovia testified. "It was blood loss."
Prosecutor Clarissa Palermo asked: "And the manner of death?"
"Homicide," said Dr. Segovia.
Judge Panici, who will decide the case in this bench trial, let the doctor testify without much interruption. But throughout Wednesday's testimony, as the prosecution put on the last of its case against Taylor, Panici frequently let his frustration show, his exasperation with the prosecution's case evident.
"You think I don't know how a shield is used?" the judge asked when prosecutors asked a Park Forest police officer to demonstrate how a police battle shield could have been used to rush the old man without shooting him.
Earlier, when former U.S. Secret Service agent Francis Murphy testified that police used excessive force, the judge also seemed angry. Murphy testified that the police, not Wrana, were at fault for instigating the confrontation that led to the old man's death.
As soon as Murphy said police had "created the situation," defense attorney Terry Ekl stood up to object and skillfully riled the judge. Ekl insisted that his client shouldn't be held responsible for the actions of other members of the Park Forest Police Department.
Prosecutor Palermo countered that, "You cannot look at the defendant's actions in a vacuum."
Panici seemed to side with Ekl, again. He slapped his forehead with his palm, and growled. "You haven't talked one iota of what the defendant has done!" he told Palermo.
A lawyer friend of Panici's warned me against trying to read a judge's mind by a few outbursts — or by the fact that he seems to consistently side with the defense during objections. And I don't mind repeating that admonition here. Because I can't read the judge's mind.
I can, though, see what he's doing and what he's saying, and while it seems clear to me he doesn't like the state's case, he could have throttled it when the prosecution rested at 3:37 p.m. The defense then asked him to toss the case by issuing a directed verdict, but the judge let the trial continue.
Readers have known for some time now that Wrana, two weeks shy of his 96th birthday, used a cane, had a walker in his room, and stood only 5 feet 5 inches tall. What we learned in court Wednesday was that the police who rushed him in his room at the Victory Centre assisted living facility in Park Forest were comparative giants.
One, Charlie Hoskins, stands 6-foot-4 and weights 320 pounds. Another, Cpl. Lloyd Elliot, is 6-foot-2 and 220 pounds. A third, Mitchell Greer, is 5-foot-11 and 230 pounds. And the smallest among the officers there that night, Taylor, the one armed with the shotgun, is also muscled up.
That's a lot of beef coming at an old man in a narrow space.
The commander of the crew, Michael Baugh, hasn't testified, but he was the one at the front of "stack" formation holding the heavy police battle shield.
All they needed was that shield, really, Murphy testified. "All he had to do was lift it up," Murphy said. "Lift it up and push."
A mattress could have worked just as well, he said. It wouldn't have been as dangerous as firing high speed projectiles into an old man's guts from a 12-gauge Mossberg pump shotgun.
Murphy suggested the best thing that police could have done was to walk away and let the old man cool off.
Another thing we learned was that all the Park Forest police at the scene were armed with Tasers.
Baugh's Taser failed — malfunctioning into the floor and enraging Wrana. And that was when Taylor began firing the Mossberg.
So the cops could have tried their Tasers. Or they could have rushed the old man with the shield.
But to hear Ekl tell it, the old man could have sprung on them from the side, he was such a terrifying ninja warrior.
One thing I expected to see during the trial, I saw. And there should be more of it before it ends. Among the strategies used to save the police officer — and the police department before the upcoming federal civil trial — is to blame Wrana's death on the old man himself.
Defense lawyer Tracy Stanker, Ekl's daughter, all but testified herself in laying out that scenario. And Judge Panici allowed it.
Stanker told the assistant medical examiner that, at Advocate Christ Medical Center after the beanbag shooting, Wrana told Dr. Steven Salzman he didn't want to undergo the surgery that could have prolonged his life.
"Were you aware that Mr. Wrana told Dr. Salzman that he wanted to die?" Stanker said.
That's not how it was according to Wrana's family: The old man was told by the docs at Christ that he would likely either die in surgery or be left in a vegetative state. The family is seething at the defense tactic.
John Wrana was 95, but he didn't want to die. He wanted to live.
John Wrana
jskass@tribpub.comCops leave trial into killing of John Wrana feeling good
It started just moments after Park Forest police Officer Craig Taylor left the witness stand, and it lasted only a few seconds, but I don't think I'll forget it.
It was a small thing, perhaps, and definitely not part of the official proceedings. It happened just after Taylor testified in his own defense on why he felt right about firing five 12-gauge beanbag rounds at close range at 95-year-old John Wrana, the World War II veteran who, delirious, lost out in a deadly confrontation with five strong, young cops.
The judge had already stepped ponderously down from the bench, most likely exhausted after another long day of scowling at prosecutors. The lawyers had packed their notes, ready for final arguments on Friday. The court deputies had already opened the doors to usher visitors out of the courtroom.
So it was as quiet as a wake, hushed as people filed out. And then came another sound:
Men laughing. Cops laughing.
It wasn't long, but it was long enough, a burst of laughter as punctuation, the sound of guys who were feeling good, as if they were knocking off a hard and tension-filled day's work and going to a ballgame to celebrate.
They'd been sitting on the far side of the courtroom behind the defense table, near Taylor and his family. They'd watched him testify. They'd watched him stand up to a cross-examination and walk away from it, untouched.
And somebody made a joke. I'm not saying it was disrespectful to anyone. I couldn't hear it. But I heard what came after, and that told me something about the room. The Wrana family could hear it. The readers of this column who came to sit behind them could hear it. The lawyers heard it. Other cops and lawyers heard it, too.
But if you were Wrana's family, it must have hurt. It must have punched you in the guts to hear it. And, it might at the same time have sounded beautiful to Taylor's family, a sound of spontaneous celebration, a sound suggesting that this might be over soon.
Of course, John Wrana couldn't hear it. The Park Forest police killed him in 2013, the beanbag rounds from Taylor's so-called "less-than-lethal" riot gun fired at him at close range, 6 to 8 feet, in his room at the Victory Centre assisted living facility, the rounds from the Mossberg hitting the delirious and disoriented man so hard that they ripped his lower intestine and he bled to death.
"What was going through my mind?" Taylor said from the witness stand. "I initially saw Mr. Wrana holding the knife, saying he was going to kill me and my fellow officers and I was afraid."
What's odd is that he said he never looked at Wrana's face. The old man was screaming, suffering from a suspected urinary tract infection and delusional, according to testimony. And Taylor never looked at the man's face?
If you don't look at the face then you don't see how old the man is, you don't take age and mental state into the equation when you pull the trigger. It's all so neat.
"I was focused on the knife that was in his hand," Taylor said under cross-examination. "My focus is not on his face."
Taylor shouldn't be up there facing charges alone, and I've said that's unfair. Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez didn't indict Taylor's commander for reckless homicide or involuntary manslaughter for coming up with a stupid plan that left an old man dead.
And you should see the police on the witness stand, big guys, muscled guys, men who can handle themselves and put hands on people, all of them saying they were afraid of a little old guy two weeks shy of his 96th birthday.
Drunks resist police, thieves do it, violent predators resist police as do fools. But this was a frightened old guy who has been made out to be some deadly raving killer. Portraying Wrana that way must make it acceptable to gun him down, and the judge is allowing the defense to paint that picture.
So the way this is going, I figure the cops will wash their hands of this, and Alvarez will say she did the best she could, and nobody will be held accountable for what happened to John Wrana.
On the witness stand, in his gray suit, you could see Taylor is a weightlifter. He has the look of one of those small, quick former high school running backs and he works out at the police gym. But he told Cook County Assistant State's Attorney Clarissa Palermo that he didn't know how much weight he could lift. A man who lifts weights doesn't know?
She was trying to demonstrate that he was a strong man, like the others in the "stack" formation of burly cops who confronted Wrana on that night in July 2013. She found photographs of him working out and hoped to present these in evidence, arguing that five big strong cops against a feeble old man to be excessive.
That's when Associate Judge Luciano Panici waved her off, shook his head dismissively, and with a quick gesture of the wrist, said the photos were irrelevant. He said something like, Why do I need to see them?
If only there had been a camera in the courtroom, showing the look on Panici's face, then you'd know why the cops felt like laughing.
John Wrana, 95 years old
Last edited by allegro; 01-29-2015 at 01:07 PM.
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San Francisco public defender is "arrested for resisting arrest" (while producing the most compliant and voluntary arrest I have ever seen)... for defending her client in the SF Hall of Justice
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/0...r-client-VIDEO
edit: slightly more informative article: http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/articl...rt-6046088.php Seems like an odd situation.
Last edited by DigitalChaos; 01-29-2015 at 01:32 PM.
Alt-Left Leaning Cunt
http://gothamist.com/2015/01/29/nypd_machine_guns.php
This will go well.
Trollhunter
Are you fucking serious? Machine guns?!! Seems like this past year proved police can use handguns and chokeholds to murder people just fine but sure, let's spend more money and give them weapons that can shoot bullets faster and at more people...for fuck's sake.
Captain Rustleboots
LOL WHAT?!??
The NYPD just turned into a Monty Python skit.
Active Member
This article's title is alarmist stupidity that runs rampant in the gun-fearing segment of society (aka most of NYC and sites like gothamist).
Machine gun = anything capable of full-auto fire. The NYPD already carries tons of these. They are the M4 rifles (aka the AR-15 that can fire with full-auto) you always see them carrying in pictures. Many years ago it was only their "Emergency Services" unit of several hundred people that carried them. I believe they started "training" everyone on them over 5 years ago though. Someone more familiar with NY probably knows more.
The news here is that they are forming a specific unit for anti-terrorism purposes.
I'm not saying it isn't an issue that we are arming cops with these guns... because it is. Hell, I posted about the NY cop who was using an M4 in an active shooter situation WITH HIS SIGHTS ON BACKWARDS. It's just that "arming police with machine guns" this isn't at all new.
Alt-Left Leaning Cunt
That wasn't even the thing I was reacting to... I was meaning the lumping the treatment of protesters in with terrorists.
Anyone have more information on this?
Throbbing Member
what the fuck? I'd like to see more of what happened but c'mon... White cops (some, not all) fear of black males is off the charts.
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Posting this over here too because it perfectly straddles police misconduct and gun rights:
A Texas paramilitary style group is organized in response to police brutality
http://benswann.com/a-texas-paramili...ice-brutality/
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While "guy brings gun to snowball fight" is a pretty good stereotype for the horrible cop mentality we all know, I don't think there is anywhere near enough info in the video to support the claims of the person recording. The fact that this went viral based only on these claims is a great example of how easy it is to lead people.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crim...icle-1.2099426
Cops say there was no snowball fight and they have a 911 call that backs up why they were there: a report of someone pointing a gun at another person. Cops got there, suspect ran, cop followed... what we see in the video is the remaining cop dealing with everyone who decided to comply instead of run.
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If suspect ran away, why not holster your weapon?
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When responding to a gun situation, you need to secure the scene and make sure nobody is armed. Cops who don't do this get killed. They have no idea how much the person calling 911 DIDN'T see. They have no idea how much transpired between the call and their arrival at the scene. I don't know what happened before the video started rolling either... If the cop felt there was a reasonable threat, he could be justified in drawing the weapon. Unfortunately, the video starts after he had already drawn the gun. So, it's not currently possible to judge whether that very threat had passed or not (and thus indicating whether he should holster or not). I believe there is a lot more attention on the escalation (drawing a gun) than there is how quickly the remove the escalation though.
I'm going entirely based on the available info though. It's possible the cop's side is full of shit, but if they have a 911 transcript to back it up... I'll believe it.
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Make sure nobody is armed? Isn't that wishful thinking when almost everybody can legally carry a firearm?
If I was a cop, I'd assume that everyone has gun. Anyways, that's another topic
Last edited by Deepvoid; 02-02-2015 at 06:45 PM. Reason: confusing typo
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I chuckled
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The cop in the Wrana case mentioned on prior page was acquitted.
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