Slashdot Mirror
Cop Seeks Wiretapping Charges For Woman Who Videotaped Beating
An anonymous reader writes "A police officer who was disciplined for his role in the beating of a Massachusetts man (many broken bones in his face and permanent partial blindness) is looking to bring criminal wiretapping charges against the woman who caught much of the incident on video. The officer received a 45-day suspension for the beating. He does not appear to deny anything that happened in the video, but he apparently thinks it shouldn't have been filmed."
The full video being available in the second link, but it looks it's being taken on a public street, where police officers should have no expectation of privacy.
On another note, the individual referred to in the summary (identified in the stub-of-an-article as Michael Sedergren), was not the guy who beat Jones senseless, but in my personal opinion, he's just as dirty, and should have been fired, too.
FTFA:
“They’re really just trying to intimidate and silence her, but whether she’s charged or not (the tape) can still be used in court,” said attorney Shawn P. Allyn, who represents Jones in a civil rights lawsuit against the police in U.S. District Court.
Case and point. Guy is a complete dirtbag.
vos nescitis quicquam, nec cogitatis quia expedit nobis ut unus moriatur homo pro populo et non tota gens pereat.
on how wiretapping is the same as recording video.
He does not appear to deny anything that happened in the video, but he apparently thinks it shouldn't have been filmed.
Too bad... fuck 'em.
Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
What has happened to law enforcement in this country that too many of them have started acting like there's no such thing as accountability?
Charging someone for videotaping police never stands up in court, so it's just another example that we're not dealing with the sharpest knife in the drawer.
Pick me for that jury, or just let one person like me on there and this case is over.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
The officer received a 45-day suspension for the beating
What do you think would happen to me if I beat a police officer enough to cause "many broken bones in his face and permanent partial blindness"?
I don't know the etiquette for reposting ideas, but we need a "National Record the Police in Public Day". If nothing else, this would force the issue to be dealt with. Anyone interested should contact this guy.
If you film somebody being beaten, then wait until after the trial and the cop(s) has/have testified. THEN release it ANONYMOUSLY to the press. Quit telling police who to go after. Here in America we have the corrupt neo-cons/tea*, the corrupt DAs and the corrupt police that support these kinds of actions. Most importantly, that gets not just the beating but the lying under oath that the perp AND the supporting police will do.
It is time to take back our nation from these bastards. Out them, but do not give them a target. BTW, assume that the corrupt DA and police union disallow those films. That is ok. The victim can still sue the cop CIVILLY and get the bastards pensions. Do a few of those and watch how quickly cops change their attitude.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Mostly because of the following appeal to emotion type argument:
"The police face dangerous people every day, and need to be able to respond to percieved threats accordingly. Enforcing more strict controls over police escallation of violence places our public servants (The people who protect us from violent offenders) at risk. You dont want to be responsible for letting criminals run loose because you prevented the police from reacting, do you?"
This argument bears a superficial resemblence to the "Support our TRUUPES!" argument:
"Our men and women in uniform fight to protect our freedoms from dangerous terrorists overseas. If you dont support our men and women in the armed forces, you are selling out our country, and are complicit in the terrorist's cause."
Both provide "Enforcement" agencies with Carte Blanc to do pretty much watever they feel like, because if you disagree with the tactics or reasons for their activities, "You are a criminal/terrorist sympathizer."
No self-respecting politician with any hope of being re-elected will act on either agency in any fashion besides a stern wrist slapping, because of the danger of violating the de-facto taboo that these appeals to emotion invoke, regardless of how desperately these entities actually need such corrective action. (This is why the GITMO prisoner torture was downplayed, and why "Wiretapping" charges keep getting lodged against citizens reporting and recording instances of police wrongdoing.)
Additionally, the egregious activities of these agencies work hand-in-hand with power hungry parent entities (City, State, and Federal governments), because slowly escellating violence against both foriegn and domestic entities desensitizes the public, and allows for greater abuses of power at higher levels without causing moral panic or alarm.
Without some form of mass moral outrage against these practices, and I mean *RIGHT NOW*, there will be no going back and this country will continue to fast-track toward a police-state.
I think it is time for another Amendment to the Constitution. The Bill of Rights discusses a great amount about the OUTPUT of citizens, but little regarding the INPUT...mostly because at the time of the founding it was impossible to -record- such things. The only means was to write about experiences, what someone heard, saw, smelled, tasted, or felt. However that equation has been altered greatly in the past 150 years, starting with photography. Yet the citizenry's right to secure backup of the human sensory system (or electronic record that corresponds to the human sensory system) has not been recognized accordingly.
Photographers are still fighting photo bans, and dealing with unconstitutional charges that result. And that is for the oldest form of "record keeping"! There are still outright bans on audio in many states, though video--due to its similarity to still photography--is in a somewhat legal limbo.
This is going to require an Amendment to fundamentally enumerate and incorporate the human right to record the environment. That should not extend to electrical interception (true wiretapping) or electronically-assisted interception (unidirectional microphones and telephoto lenses), but simply to the environment as presented to the human in place, at human levels of perception. Although "photos can lie", human beings should not be hamstrung to the subjective judgement of character (he said, she said) when significantly more accurate measurements are available. If the citizen has a 5th Amendment protection against self-incrimination, they should certainly have a right to provide individualized proof of innocence!
Scott
"Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid."
He'll win, easily.
It's illegal to record audio of people without their express permission in Massachusetts. Period. Doesn't matter where.
About the only exception is if it's blatantly obvious that you're being recorded, which has been taken to mean "news team" - in other words, an absolutely gigantic, impossible-to-miss camera, or a large microphone, like TV reporters carry with the station logo on it.
Otherwise, it's "wire tapping."
Ridiculous? You bet. Going to change? Hah!
Incidentally, as far as I know, you're allowed to take video of people in public places. Just not the audio.
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
The Law should not be applied equally to cop and civilian. Penalties should be HARSHER when the authorities break the law, and the benefit of the doubt should not apply, because law enforcement officers are charged with avoiding even the appearance of impropriety. This idea is usually expressed as "the color of authority", and it is an essential and traditional safeguard of Liberty.
Yes, the rules are absolutely different when you carry the awesome power to kill in a split second. They are, and they should be.
Cops shouldn't solicit charitable donations from businesses, because it looks like protection money. Military officers may not sleep with their subordinates, because it looks like "command rape." The FBI shouldn't be assembling dossiers on political activists, because it looks like oppression.
These used to be commonly accepted ideas before we gutted public education and Fox News began blaring propaganda 24/7.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
What they don't realize is that they reap what they sow. The police live under the assumptions that there are two kinds of people: Cops and criminals. The only gray area is for family of cops and other government employees. But if the cop doesn't know you, then you are a criminal, and they will treat you the same as someone they just saw beat someone to death. Because they treat everyone with a complete lack of respect, they earn the same treatment from everyone else, and that leads to their job being more dangerous. If they were nice to everyone at all times, then they'd earn some respect and their job would be easier and safer. But that's hard. It's mentally easier to separate everything to an "us vs them" battle. And so, that's what we get. That doesn't serve us as well as a "protect and serve" force, but no one cares enough to try to change it.
Learn to love Alaska
Cops have the ability to ruin your life legally and as part of their job. When they're corrupt, they can do much, much worse than you or I can, and they need to be treated as such. The more power someone has given to them by the state, the harsher we need to be on them if they're found to be in violation.
This idiot cop's name is Jeffrey Asher, and his Facebook page is here:
http://www.facebook.com/jeffyjewjagoff - NO KIDDING!
Such an appropriate "screen name"...
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Cops should die. Painfully, slowly and messily.
s/Cops/Bad Cops/
There _are_ good cops. They almost never make it into the news because that's just not the way news works, but they do exist.
On the close order of zero. Almost any cop will cover up, by acts of commission or omission, overtly bad acts by other cops. That makes them bad cops too.
Interrogation room
Cop: *pushes a blank piece of paper to the man sitting in the chair
Innocent Person: "What's this? You want me to write a confession?"
Cop: "No, those are your rights."
How much money do you have? If it's billions, then your security detail defended you against a lone rogue officer who violated department policy, and the City offers it's apologies and takes this matter very, very seriously.
If all you did was study hard, work hard and then follow the rules after you served your Country honorably, then criminal lowlifes like you will not be tolerated or coddled...
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
NO. Big mistake.
Let the courts convict the man, but follow the case CLOSELY.
It is not just that a cop commits a crime. It is all the ones around that person who will lie FOR THEM that is just as much, if not worse. I have little doubt that when given a chance, many cops will lie to protect their friend. WIth this approach, you take down all of these cops. The victim will be righted, and more importantly, will be to sue these cops, and the municipality that did this for lying.
Look, our problem today is that we are turning into a corrupt nation. We did not use to be. We really were one of the good guys. But for the last 30 years, we have become a corrupt nation. Our cops are no better than Nixon, reagan, Clinton, and W, who are all criminal (reagan multiple times over). Any cop that lies on the stand is just as bad as the one that is thumping somebody. So, if you allow 4 cops top lie to support their buddy, then all 5 will be gone. At the least, that can be used in future trials against them to show that they are corrupted cops. Pretty much destroys those ppl.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Cops should have full time recording of audio and video of them, and if it *goes missing* then consider it a felony with a minimum 20 year sentence, with no chance of parole, no appeals, no questions asked - the officer who tried to turn off the recorder, the chief who let something happen, the IT geek who did the erasure - all 3 of em - same penalty.
Then we'll see how many accidental erasures *cough bullshit cough* happen.
So you want to cause an innocent man to be convicted to further your own personal agenda against cops ...
How exactly is that different than what they do? Because you think you're on 'the good side' ... as you let someone else suffer ... not you, someone else.
Douche.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Submitting the evidence to the prosecutor anonymously before the trial takes place is the best solution. Withholding evidence is not only a felony, but really stupid if you want to see these types put away. The prosecutor will figure out how to use it most effectively to take him down, whether that means catching him in a lie or some other method.
I'm getting sick and tired of this argument.
how many McDonald employees hold down and bash someone? I'd imagine McDonald employees to rival the number of police officers in the country, yet why do we not see an equal distribution of violence and aggression if its just "a couple of bad apples", when do you stop blaming the individual apples and start declaring the Tree defective?
also, why is an officer getting sent to an "anger management class". If you have anger issues you shouldn't be carrying a gun, let alone being a police officer!!
You must not watch much fox news, or listen to the talking heads on talk radio. (Something I am sadly subjected to by ideologue relatives.)
While I could see the reason to divide 'blame the soldiers' with 'blame the govt that sent them' I also must stress that 'I was only following orders' does not absolve persons of guilt in cases of wrongdoing.
As for the 'Support our troops' line not being purposefully confused by the media and from DOD representatives to de-facto imply that you MUST support the stupid wars we have sent our people to die in, I simply have to question what form of domestic reporting you have been consuming. IIRC, we were demonizng people left and right under the bush admin ("America, love it or GTFO" type slurs against people critical of our occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq, and also later of GITMO) for suggesting that our actions were out of line. The public controversy over "The dixie chicks" spings instantly to mind--
Further, with the Vietnam confict there was an involuntary draft. These days they just pressure people to enlist through bogus government "shcolarship" programs. Choosing to become complicit with the destructive whims of our current government for cash is quite worthy of some level of contempt in my book.
No, no, no. Don't buy into those lies.
First of all, arresting someone for being "disorderly" in their own home is just another form of contempt of cop.
Secondly, Obama had enough facts to make the right call - that the police were acting stupidly. He only backtracked because the media crucified him.
Obama was guilty of commenting on police affairs while black. I doubt very much that there would have been the sort of uproar had it not been for the fact that both the President and the man being arrested are black.
"The police face dangerous people every day, and need to be able to respond to percieved threats accordingly. Enforcing more strict controls over police escallation of violence places our public servants (The people who protect us from violent offenders) at risk. You dont want to be responsible for letting criminals run loose because you prevented the police from reacting, do you?"
"If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear from surveillance." If the police aren't doing anything wrong, then they should have no objection to their actions being recorded. It's the same argument that law enforcement agencies keep trying to shove down our throats, and objecting when it gets turned around so that they're the ones with the cameras pointed at them just reveals the depth of their hypocrisy.
Damn you horribly biased, agenda pushing slashdot summary writers!
The officer received a 45-day suspension for the beating..
No no no no nooooo. The officer who did the beating was fired and is facing criminal charges. It is one of the officers who stood by and watched that got the 45 day suspension.
Just for the record, I think this wiretapping charge is bullshit and I think all the cops involved should be punished appropriately. But the summary makes it seem like a cop only got a 45 day suspension for assault with a deadly weapon, which is incorrect and borderline flame bait.
If what I just said sounded like a troll, it was probably just a failed attempt at humor.
Not entirely true:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3067
vos nescitis quicquam, nec cogitatis quia expedit nobis ut unus moriatur homo pro populo et non tota gens pereat.
How is one to know whether your video recorder or phone has put sub-protocol information on the recording that identifies you. Ok, even if its a camera, it can put the serial number of the camera there. And if you bought it with a CC, then they can relate the two. Or , if you post other video of your camping trip or whatever, they could relate two recordings.
If recording the audio is a crime, then one should strip the audio before giving the recording to anyone. This would block the seizure of the tape as evidence that the recording itself was a crime.
This is the perfect opportunity to bring back jury nullification into the main stream, but it will be hard with all the brainwashed sheep in the US currently. If this goes to trial, the jury should just acquit because any law that states filming in public without consent is illegal is the stupidest law ever. Also if people actually stood up to cops my throwing out these cases, then maybe the attorney generals would grow a pair and start getting the bad weeds out of the police force
There are good cops! It's really policemen like this who give the other 5% a bad name.
There are two rules for success:
1. Never tell everything you know.
Poor attempt at irony. You used a real universal truth to illustrate a bad stereotype.
What? Universal? Uh-uh. No, sorry... had he said StarWars-Loving-Nerds it would have been a poor attempt at irony.
The public should have the same right the police have (not necessarily accepted by the law enforcement community) to video and record for the same reasons the police use them in their day to day activities. Protection. And to answer the question of why it should be allowed is the same reasoning given by police when they want to search you, your car or house without a warrant. What do you have to hide? Nothing if you didn't do anything. Police are not regular people. They are PUBLIC SERVANTS. And unless there is a compelling reason not to (undercover investigation would be one) there is no good reason for them to NOT be recorded. What are they trying to hide? As a public servant they should be accountable for what they do, just like any other employee. And as an employer (that's right, I pay taxes and so I employ them) I have a right to know what they are doing on my dime. Secrets have no place in government with the exception of the armed forces for protection of the country.
It's because of poorly raised excuses of humanity like you that we need cops.
I do not think you know me well enough to make this statement
I further wonder if you have ever been pulled over when you were breaking no laws at all. I HAVE. I have been stopped for no other reason than that I was out driving past midnight (I was taking my brother back to college). I watched as the cop walked around my vehicle twice looking for anything he could stick me with. Of course there was nothing so he rudely told me not to speed and sent me on my way.
My licence plate numbers and other personal information went out for anyone with a police scanner on to hear. I had people at work the following day (I worked as an x-ray tech in the local ER) ask me if I got the ticket or not.
During that time I lived a block away form the hospital and would frequently get paged out at all hour of the night to x-ray someone. Because I live so close to my work I would walk to the ER. On multiple occasions while walking only a block to work I would have the local cops stop me and ask my business. Let me be abundantly clear about this. I respect cops when they do "keep the peace". However in my life I have never had a cop around when I felt threatened unless the cop was the reason that I felt threatened.
You may have only have had good experiances with cops. Good for you. But do not dare criticize my upbringing. YOU DO NOT KNOW ME!
"For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice" -- God
However in my life I have never had a cop around when I felt threatened unless the cop was the reason that I felt threatened.
This is the sad truth. I am more afraid of being shot by a cop than by anyone else.
I'd feel more comfortable around a pimp or pusher with a gun in his belt than with a cop. Because the crook at least values business and doesn't feel an urge to shoot potential customers. There's a good chance he has that that gun to protect himself from the police or organized criminals who sponsor the local donut brigade.
If you are sick and tired and seeing police officers beat people up and have them and the watch that WATCH it and do nothing get away, then please petition the federal government for a Federal Law: petition2congress.com/4898/kelly-thomas-law/ It is a start of the beginning of a whole lot of pain for officers who think they are in the sopranos while on the tax payers dime.
shot? what about tasered? tasers were supposed to be ONLY an alternative to deadly force (used in place of shooting an armed or otherwise deadly assailant), but cops use them regularly to "put people in their place". after they were introduced in that manner, authorities quickly put in place use of force guidelines that give them license to use them pretty much whenever they want to. a conversation with a cop should NEVER allow for the possibility of saying "but..." leading to a partial electrocution.
...because the numbers say they have. My political awareness began with Watergate. In 1972, concentrations of wealth in this country were radically different. Unions still had some sway. Textbooks in public schools were not a rare and precious commodity.
I didn't get strip-searched to board a plane. I carried a pocket knife to school, and my science teacher borrowed it to open a box of reagents. We had the capability of putting a man on the moon. Engineers made good money and their sole income could support a family in affluence. "Stay in school" was a reasonable plan for success, not a bitter joke.
Prisons were run by the government, not for-profit corporations. Using prisons as a way to make money was thought of as immoral, so much so it was a major plot point of "Gone with the Wind." Jimmy Stewart was a national hero, not a filthy socialist.
Two reporters caught a president in a felony, and it cost the president his career. Today, Woodward and Bernstein would be reporting from Gitmo. I went to church and sat on bare wooden pews while a conservative Christian pastor taught that God loves all men. Today, the sons of those pastors appear on Jumbotrons and talk about church marketing and working the demographics. From the sermons I've heard lately, they've never even seen the New Testament, and have only a few pages of Cliff Notes on the Old.
You make a good point, but I'm pretty sure things have actually changed.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Similar for me in the UK. I was pulled over recently because my passenger was black. I have never in my forty years witnessed racism like I did that day. The looks they gave him could have killed.
"What's your name?"
"What is your name?"
"You name please"
I know why the copper asked me three times - to see if I was lying. But was it nessecary?
When he'd finished his 20 questions and looked inside my car and out, he proclaimed that my car was dirty (it was) and that I should clean it. Yes, the police in the UK now protect us from dirty cars.
"Just a routine check sir" came the reply after I asked why. If I had a pound...
This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
The right to bear arms was put into the constitution specifically to protect the people from a corrupt government, militia, or police force. Now we need a new right, specifically the right to bear cameras (and full protections on what we record, including the right to share it.) Sure, there's some details to work out; no recording classified stuff, etc., but anywhere a police action occurs, the public should have the right to record it, and to use that recording as they see fit.
On the one hand you take life too seriously, and on the other, you do not take playful existence seriously enough. Seth
This is a textbook example of "I knew it all along" porn. Once you understand the premise of mistaking the accessory who received a mild suspension for the perpetrator who was fired and is now facing criminal charges, it makes more sense.
The human social order is a more complex beast than a toddler's mine/yours calculus can circumscribe. Of course in any stable society the power elite is protected by the power apparatus, it's practically a chicken and egg problem: which came first, the elite, or that which protects them?
We have a mixture of dirty cops who know where their bread is buttered, and we have selfless cops who deal with a lot of crap so us peons don't have to.
The pornographic conclusion is that there is this other system where there are no dirty cops ... and a different social elite. The only social systems minus the dirty cops known to archaeology (according to my diligent populist gleanings) are isolated tribes with fewer than 200 people. These societies also tend to have a strict (I would say oppressive) moral code, and conduct their internal class warfare with a good shunning (generally deadly), often directed toward a smart-ass who thinks there's a better way, and won't shut up after he's been politely tolerated for a few seasons, until some old man interprets a routine set-back as a dark omen, and gives the loud-mouth the crookered finger.
It's the same in the world of sports. Some guy is the dirtiest douchebag living when he plays for the other team; but then when your team adds "sandpaper" by acquiring the same notorious douchebag, the message instantly shifts to, "he might be an asshole, but he's our asshole". In this lingo, an asshole is a righteous douchebag fighting for a just cause. Around puberty, mine/yours graduates to us/them.
I never get on that wagon: the asshole is still the same old douchebag. To my mind revolutionary rhetoric never makes much sense. Most of the time, the new douchebags are worse than the current douchebags, with less of their rap sheet known around town to keep them cautious. If you can saw off, from time to time a housecleaning is a good measure. I don't have a problem trading douche for douche.
Politicians are like public transit: it really doesn't matter a lot which bus arrives. Some are cleaner than others, and don't rumble as much, or the driver doesn't do the herky-jerky with the power train every 30 seconds for the entire trip.
There are no political systems yet discovered minus the ugly buses. In democracy, the buses run on time and get washed clean every so often. It's a big advance by historical standards.
Nice fishline. Taxes are universal in modern society. We're nowhere close to being "sucked dry", though we complain as if it were true (until the corn fiasco, food prices were the lowest in human record). Our politicians govern themselves with an ear cupped daily to the opinion polls, and every bill to change the tax rate is mired in controversy and obstruction.
It's true the other ear is cupped toward insanely wealthy power brokers, but even having one hand cupped in the general direction of the public interest is said major accomplishment by historical standards.
With all this camera phones out there, politicians might soon have to crane an eye stalk, as well, to the public interest.
Unfortunately, with the staggering advances in image manipulation, every photograph will soon be mired in JFK controversy, and then the polarizers of discontent can go back to not hearing each other inside their fuzzy wombs that "make sense" once you know the pornographic secret about that which oppresses you.
I want add that taxation is a smokescreen issue, a public outcry which the power brokers incite to serve their own interests.
Better regulation could have averted the recent bail-out of the luxury yachts by the work-a-day SUVs. It had nothing to do with the tax code. The power brokers do their magic tricks by inciting a mass protest on the western front when they are up to tricks on the eastern front.
I mean really, railing about taxation in modern society (it goes up, it goes down) is about the stupidest forum of protest out there. Maybe when the boomers are another decade older, they will organize a last ditch protest against human mortality, as their democratic clout is reduced to digesting the hair and bones of the fat little piglet in the python of human population growth.
If we capped retirement at five years (after which the retired person steps into the retirement booth) all of our tax problems would magically vanish. Turns out we tax less than previous societies, after longevity adjustment.
Here's the other profound secret: money goes around in circles, if the right sort of douchebags are running things. When money stops going around in circles, you've got real problems. Tax is just one of those circles. Do bail-outs to the wealthy count as circular? I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.