COPS behaving badly

[Foggy]

Dozens of officers ... dividing up

$226,000 ...

One of my rules is, if'n you are going to steal money, steal a LOT of money. A bloody lot of money. Like, steal enough to retire comfortably in a country that has no extradition treaty with the US.

Otherwise, you're a piker.

[humblescribe]

Indeed, Foggy.

(I seem to recall that when the story broke three years ago that the total amount of bogus OT paid was closer to $350,000, but $226,000 is all the state has solid evidence for--dunno.)

I think most CHP at patrol level have a base salary of about $80K. With other forms of compensation like OT or graveyard shift or motorcycle officer or special assignments they might top out at 90K. So an additional $4,000-$5,000 is like a 5% raise without doing any more work.

For those who are not aware, when CalTrans road workers started getting severely injured or killed by careless drivers speed through construction or maintenance zones, the state decided to beef up enforcement of the lower speed limits. This resulted in additional funds for the road projects paid to CalTrans for police presence and protection. Those funds would then be transferred to CHP to pay the overtime (usually in 2-or-4-hour shifts) for officers just to have a presence and act as a deterrent. (Traffic fines are doubled in these zones.)

So, Project X would need an officer for a certain date and time. It would be coordinated with CHP, and officers would be assigned. These officers were no-shows yet still put in for their overtime which was cheerfully approved by their supervisors.

Likely because of the massive bureaucracy between CalTrans executives and CHP headquarters, it took a couple of years to figure out that we taxpayers were getting ripped off.

But small minds think small.

[LM K]

They are also very common items stolen for re-sale on the street. Many of our more expensive laundry detergents and diapers are now behind little window things that make it hard to steal more than one or two at the time. Almost all the OTC drugs are less accessible too. No more just raking an armload off the shelf and running out.

I was wondering about that. Everything is name brand, including the baby wipes.

The press on nails did make me chuckle.

How does one shoplift large boxes of diapers?

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

They are also very common items stolen for re-sale on the street. Many of our more expensive laundry detergents and diapers are now behind little window things that make it hard to steal more than one or two at the time. Almost all the OTC drugs are less accessible too. No more just raking an armload off the shelf and running out.

I was wondering about that. Everything is name brand, including the baby wipes.

The press on nails did make me chuckle.

How does one shoplift large boxes of diapers?

Put them on the bottom rack of the cart, then "forget" to ring them up when you go thru checkout. If you get caught on the way out, proclaim how embarrassed you are that you forgot to pay.

[sugar magnolia]

They are also very common items stolen for re-sale on the street. Many of our more expensive laundry detergents and diapers are now behind little window things that make it hard to steal more than one or two at the time. Almost all the OTC drugs are less accessible too. No more just raking an armload off the shelf and running out.

I was wondering about that. Everything is name brand, including the baby wipes.

The press on nails did make me chuckle.

How does one shoplift large boxes of diapers?

Not so much shoplift in the sense of concealing it, but more like shoplift by grabbing as many as you can and running faster than the security guy.

[Ben-Prime]

Indeed, Foggy.

(I seem to recall that when the story broke three years ago that the total amount of bogus OT paid was closer to $350,000, but $226,000 is all the state has solid evidence for--dunno.)

I'll come down on this side with HS, yeah. Personal experience here -- from 2006 to 2008 I was the one-man-band IT team for a two-location rehab and mental health clinic catering to adolescents in the greater Fort Lauderdale area. It was honestly the best job I ever had. I lost it because my direct boss, the CFO (who didn't want to hire me anyway and was forced to by the EVP/COO who later became CEO, precisely because the CFO didn't want someone with full time ability to poke around the network and find things) was embezzling a crapton of money. We know it was over $3 million, but between statutes of limitations and for what we had incontrovertible evidence, he was only charged with about $1 million. He was found guilty. I cannot tell how how much I danced the day I heard the verdict. That man cost so many good people their jobs -- the EVP/COO-turned-CEO got kicked out by the board because it took too much time for us to prove he wasn't involved; the company started bleeding out when donors stepped back from the stink; and I had to take the toxic job I would then hold for the next 10 years before joining the Foreign Service.

So, yeah, I'm pretty sure it was probably more than the near-quarter-million, but the smaller figure is what they can prove in a court of law. I got nothing but my gut and personal experience on this one, of course.

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

Dozens of officers ... dividing up

$226,000 ...

One of my rules is, if'n you are going to steal money, steal a LOT of money. A bloody lot of money. Like, steal enough to retire comfortably in a country that has no extradition treaty with the US.

Otherwise, you're a piker.

My dad would agree wholeheartedly!

[RTH10260]

Florida Police Distributed a Link to Pay Traffic Fines That Was Actually a Link to a MAGA Store

William Vaillancourt
Wed, February 16, 2022, 6:24 PM·

Police officers in Miami Beach handed out fliers that led recipients to an online store selling merchandise supporting former President Donald Trump, the Miami Herald reported on Tuesday.

The fliers, which instructed drivers on how to resolve traffic tickets online, included a link to miamidadeclerk.com, which is the incorrect website address for the county court. The correct address, miami-dadeclerk.com, was also listed on the flier.

The fliers were in circulation until last week. It’s unclear how long they were being distributed or how many drivers received them. The original, correct flier was sent to police across the county for distribution in May 2020, a court spokesperson told the Herald. But Miami Beach police “produced its own version of the notices and the error was inserted at some point during the printing process,” the paper notes, citing Miami Beach police spokesperson Ernesto Rodriguez.

Users who type in the incorrect address are redirected to an online store on findsale.com, and from there an Amazon page. Items for sale include Trump 2024 flags with captions like “Let’s Go Brandon” and “Hillary Belongs in Prison, Joe Belongs in a Nursing Home.” The site is a Trump 2024 “World After Trump” DVD, tagged with “Trump, Prophecy, Globalism.”



Miami Beach police began distributing parking violation fliers in the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic to facilitate virtual ticket payments and court hearings.



https://sports.yahoo.com/florida-police ... 02086.html

[LM K]

Update:

[LM K]

Austin: 19 officers charged with aggravated assault over 2020 protests

Jose Garza ran for district attorney in Austin on promises to hold police accountable in the Texas capital. He got off to a fast start, charging at least seven officers during his first year on the job, including one charged with murder twice.

But no cases have reached deeper into the police department than the indictments on Thursday of 19 officers on felony charges over tactics used during protests against racial injustice in 2020.


By late Friday, all of the newly charged officers had been placed on administrative leave, said Saul Gray, a department spokesman.


But even allies were frustrated by the lack of details, which Garza has said he is unable to release. Garza announced in a news conference that grand jury indictments were expected but gave no specifics. More than 24 hours later, the officers’ names and the reasons they were charged had not been publicly released.

Texas law requires that an indictment remain secret until an officer has been arrested. Criminal justice experts also expressed skepticism about the large number of indictments in one case and whether it would result in convictions.

“It is a large number and I’m anxious for the public and for everyone to learn what it is that gave rise to that,” said Steve Adler, the mayor, who noted that he supports Garza and that there had been pressure on the city to change its police culture.


Several people with knowledge of the indictments said the charges included aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case publicly.Aggravated assault charges, when committed by a public servant, could carry a sentence of up to life in prison.

The Austin police chief, Joseph Chacon, expressed disappointment over the charges. The head of the police union, Ken Casaday, blasted Garza, saying he was trying “to fulfill a campaign promise” to indict officers. Garza brushed off that criticism and emphasized that his office also prosecuted 33 non-officers involved in the protests.


It is by far the most indictments of officers from a single US police department over tactics law enforcement used during the 2020 protests. Two Dallas officers face charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and official oppression and a New York police officer was charged with assault after shoving a woman to the ground. But despite widespread claims of heavy-handed or even illegal police tactics, few cities pursued charges.

A former US attorney, Joe Brown, who spent two decades as a Republican district attorney in North Texas, said convicting a police officer is always difficult and that Texas juries tend to give officers the benefit of the doubt.

“This is really unprecedented, to my knowledge,” Brown said. “To allege that there was criminal intent by that many police officers, who were operating in a chaotic and unpredictable environment and assumedly pursuant to policy and how they had been trained, is really remarkable.”

Chacon stressed that command staff prepared officers to face hundreds of people when thousands actually showed up to protests he said were at times “riotous and violent”. The 1,640-officer Austin department serves a population of 960,000 people.

[RTH10260]

[Phoenix520]

Bethany: But that’s not me.
Cops: Yeah? How many “Bethany Farbers” do you think there are around here?
Bethany: But…check my ID
Cops: No Need. We gotcha!

Two weeks in jail, when all it would have taken was an ID check.

[John Thomas8]

90+ mph and weaving traffic, nothing happens:



Me, I'd be rolled down to the hoosegow and buried.

At some point folks have to be held accountable.

[RTH10260]

Davontae Sanford ready to move on with $7.5M settlement after DPD framed him for murders

By Randy Wimbley and David Komer online producer
Published March 25, 2022 11:47PM

DETROIT (FOX 2) - You can't put a dollar figure on the injustice that Davontae Sanford experienced. But he says he can finally move on with his life - after he was nearly robbed of it.

"I look at myself as the true definition of Detroit tough," he said. "Detroit and me have been through so much, like we rose through the ashes. I've been through so much, I've rose through the ashes."

It would border arrogance if anyone else said it, but few have stories like Davontae Sanford.

The 29-year-old reached a $7.5 million settlement agreement with the city of Detroit for its role in his wrongful conviction and incarceration for crimes he did not commit.

"Every day I wake up and see a room instead of a cell - it just amazes me," he said. "(There) was times I thought that I was going to die in prison."

FOX 2 sat down with Sanford along with his lawyer Julie Hurwitz as he pondered his future

"I’m just ready for like the (new) beginnings and the journey, because I know things are going to be a lot easier," Sanford said.

And he reflected on how his life became anything but, after a quadruple murder on the city’s east side in 2007.


Hurwitz says officers picked an easy target in the young teenager and coerced him into confessing to the crimes.

"In the course of their targeting him, they literally fabricated evidence and committed perjury in order to ensure that this young man, that they could get a conviction," Hurwitz said.

Sanford, at 15 years old, was sentenced to 37-90 years in prison.

But a few weeks later, hitman Vincent Smothers was arrested and confessed to 12 murders-for-hire — including the killings Sanford had been convicted for.

Unlike the teen, whose confession did not match up with evidence at the crime scene, Smothers delivered precise details about the killings.




https://www.fox2detroit.com/news/davont ... or-murders

[Shizzle Popped]

Illinois Police Officer Resigns After White Supremacist Posts Surface Online

A veteran police officer in Illinois resigned Tuesday after researchers connected him to a deluge of violent and bigoted social media posts that glorified Adolf Hitler and hate crimes.

The resignation of Springfield Police Department Officer Aaron Paul Nichols, 46, came shortly after his department announced an investigation into the posts, first surfaced by Anonymous Comrades Collective (ACC), a group of anti-fascist researchers.

“If I found a genie and I had one wish? The Jews would be a distant memory in 72 hours,” one of the posts allegedly written by Nichols reads.

The Springfield Police Department said on Friday that it had launched an investigation into Nichols’ “racist comments,” and that his “police powers had been removed.” On Tuesday, the department told HuffPost in a statement that Nichols, who joined the department in 2004, resigned instead of meeting with investigators.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/illinois ... 157f7a8e81

This is the first article on HuffPost right now. Much, much more at the link including a number of his extremely offensive posts. I lived in central Illinois for many years and had several friends in Springfield. For some reason this doesn't surprise me at all.

[Lani]

Police are behaving better in Denver after some horrible incidents. Instead of sending police, when it's appropriate social workers are sent instead. They go into the same homes, neighborhoods, schools, and unstable situations as police. Every location should do the same thing.

[John Thomas8]

[raison de arizona]

BREAKING:

We found the Reddit account of University of Colorado Boulder Police Department Officer Drew Matthews and it's full of anti-homeless and anti-Black comments, including a call to attack homeless people with high pressure fire hoses.

[RTH10260]

Officers accused of inmate beating which left woman paralyzed not charged nearly 3 years later
State paid $4.65 million to settle

By: Adam Walser
Posted at 6:43 AM, Apr 14, 2022 and last updated 4:23 AM, Apr 15, 2022



A brutal beating leads to a broken neck

On August 21, 2019, Weimar was assigned to clean toilets, but she said she was in pain from a hip injury.

“I did about seven toilets and I realized I couldn’t do anymore," she said. "So, I got down to the eighth one and I said 'I can’t do it.'”

That’s when she said correction officer Ryan Dionne and Lt. Keith Turner handcuffed her and then attacked her in front of more than a dozen witnesses.

“The lieutenant came running up in the back with his steel-toed boots and put it right through my spine," Weimar recalled. "I mean, I went to my knees."

According to the lawsuit, while she was on the ground, "they brutally beat her with blows to her head, neck, and back."

The lawsuit alleges Weimar “was elbowed and kneed in the back of her neck by at least one of her attackers, causing her to suffer a broken neck.”

“In one of the videos, her chin is touching her chest in a way that’s physically impossible without a broken neck,” her attorney, Ryan Andrews said.

Andrews said he could not share the disturbing videos due to a settlement agreement.



https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/loca ... ears-later

full video story of aboe article

[Volkonski]

[Volkonski]

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

[Ben-Prime]

Clearly Disney made him do it.

[Chilidog]

LA Sheriff Fucks Around

LA times says "Find Out!"





https://www.latimes.com/california/stor ... t-reporter

[RTH10260]

behind paywall, sheriff office backs-off

https://www.latimes.com/california/stor ... on-coverup