Russian Whistleblower Cop Arrested 199
Remember the Russian cop's YouTube narrative on police corruption? Reader Max_W writes with the news that Alexei Dymovsky, the cop whose videos started a movement, was arrested (Google translation; Russian original) on January 22, 2010. He is in prison in the south of Russia. Max_W adds: "It seems only a president is allowed to have a video blog in Russia."
Corrupt cops act corruptly, film at 11 (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, was anyone really surprised? Mess with bad cops, and you'll come to a bad end. This is unfortunately true everywhere, including the United States.
Re:Not final (Score:2, Insightful)
And if that pesky little law is inconvenient, you label them an "enemy combatant" and it no longer applies! Great huh?
He Has Tarnished The Glory Off? (Score:4, Insightful)
Did he lessen the status of corrupt bosses or the supposed glory of the state. Frankly regardless of which nation does this sort of thing the truth is that human history is dark and wicked and anyone foolish enough to actually believe that any nation's history is glorious needs a mental health professional and a lot of appointments.
Re:Not final (Score:1, Insightful)
Unless of course you're called a Terrorist. Then it's off to Gitmo with your ass, regardless of any facts or lack thereof!
Re:Corrupt cops act corruptly, film at 11 (Score:5, Insightful)
No matter how common abuses of power are, they should never ever become so mundane as to not be newsworthy.
Re: He Has Tarnished The Glory Off? (Score:4, Insightful)
Russia is just following its normal course, nothing to see there and nothing new to expect.
"anyone foolish enough to actually believe that any nation's history is glorious needs a mental health professional and a lot of appointments."
Glory isn't neat and pretty and seemless, but it certainly exists.
Consider the Soviet soldier, who despite being horribly treated by his own government contributed more than any other group to destroying the Wehrmacht. Stalingrad and the many other brutal battles like it indeed had "glorious" outcomes, for glory is when man triumphs over such terrible adversity even it comes from other men.
BTW one thing the Commies got right is war memorials that reflect the sacrifice of their people. Contemplate Mamayev Kurgan sometime...
Re:Do not just type. Do something to help him! (Score:5, Insightful)
While I do generally agree with your statement, this is something that really caught my eye
is remarkable proof that good people who think and act like Westerners still live in Russia.
possible eventual escape from Russia to the West. For the sake of humanity, we must not allow the Kremlin to kill him. The Kremlin has already killed too many innocent people.
Can I borrow your time machine back to cold war? Being someone who has actually lived in Russia and some time in the neighboring countries too, I don't see this "Western vs Russia" thing or rant about 'Kremlin'. People in Russia are extremely good people and friendly towards another human being. Even more than in western countries or my own country, where people usually are careless about each other. There is corruptness (sometimes bad too), but you do not change everything in a few days after fallen communism. It is getting there and this is another example about it.
But should you think "Westerners" as better persons for some reason? No. In fact, they're losing on that regard.
Re: He Has Tarnished The Glory Off? (Score:4, Insightful)
Any memorials to the 3,000,000 Ukrainians Stalin starved to death for fun? The KGB put posters up at the time saying "It is considered barbaric to eat your children" because people were eating their own children's bodies to try to stay alive. Stalin did not like cannibalism, even if he caused it. What a guy!!
Russia Corrupt? No way! (Score:2, Insightful)
Russia, Iran, China, all great examples of what happens when the people get their own way. Some clever bastard comes along and dupes them.
Russia: you overthrew your terrible govt, you had some semblance of democracy, now you have Putin.
Iran: You had democracy, you had the shah, you overthrew the shah, then you voted for a dictatorship again. Good job.
China: you had a civil war, multiple citizens based movements, you ended up with a shitty one. At least you let it happen right?
Out of all 3 China probably had the least chance at democracy out of the bunch.
What did we learn? That proles are stupid and you can't give someone a democracy until the limitations on the govt are understood and clear.
Re: He Has Tarnished The Glory Off? (Score:1, Insightful)
Please stop posting in this article!!! I can tell it's you this whole time because you keep ending your poorly-worded sentences with multiple exclamation marks!!! You do not have to use three exclamation marks!!! The exclamation mark is like the HTML {em}{/em} of natural language!!! Using it more than once is redundant!!! In fact, even using one in lieu of a period only dilutes your point!!! Save the exclamation marks for the really important points!!! Otherwise you sound like children, who don't know what their central point is so they blurt it out!!! Except children are adorable so they can get away with it and anonymous cowards on nerdy internet forums are not adorable!!!
And we all know the world's a shitty place!!! Getting upset about it does very little but wastes time!!! The best we can all do is to live a moral life and intervene in problems only when we have the capability!!! And we don't have the capability because most of us don't live in Russia, and those that do can't form a large enough voting bloc/rebellious mob to get this thing fixed!!! And even if they could, the other guy's probably as much of a prick as Putin!!! That's just life!!!
More details (Score:2, Insightful)
Ironically, he is accused of "fraud abusing the official position" i.e. corruption. The investigation has started after "an appeal of concerned citizen" in December 2009, a month later his video post. Now, he was sentenced under accusation of threatening witnesses and is held in PTDC.
Unfortunately, Dymovsky is pretty dumb. His speech is intermittent, unintelligent, with many errors (he is a cop after all). He admitted, that during a phone conversation (which was wire tapped) he said, that if he had been falsely sentenced he was going to avenge the investigator and the judge. But after admitting this, he said that he was just "testing if he had been eavesdropped and if Government was going to react". Well, it did, Einstein.
Re:"The Law" doesn't always follow the Law (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:It's more complicated a story than it appears (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure you're right, but it's also true that most whistle-blowers have petty and selfish motives, and that they are often driven by personal grudges (which they tend to have a lot of, since they are generally quarrelsome and problematic people). Deep Throat apparently exposed Watergate because he was bitter about losing a promotion.
It takes an unreasonable person to go up against the system and against the culture of one's organization. These people may not be personally admirable in the way we might like for a Hollywood good-guy/bad-guy story, but that doesn't make whatever revelations they provide less important. Nor does it make it OK to persecute them for it.
Now maybe Dymovsky was arrested for some other shit he was involved in, but given Russia's history with internal critics, that would not be my first guess.
Re:I accept your apology (Score:3, Insightful)
You accept his apology ... for correctly pointing out that you're full of shit?
NOTHING on that page backs up the claims you've made. It doesn't speak about the right to detain suspects in Florida. It doesn't say anything about the "commonwealth". It says nothing about Miranda rights. And, lastly, it doesn't say a fucking thing about martial law.
If anything it shows that you're just making it up as you go along, since the measures mentioned in the article are much laxer than anything you spoke of, and none of it agrees with what you were claiming earlier. Either provide some evidence to back up your assertions, or be a man and admit that you're full of shit.
As an interesting side-note, although I know little about Hurricane Frances, I do know that Martial Law was NOT declared in Florida, or anywhere else. The only people who claim that it happened are the far-right lunatics over at prison-planet. This is what happens when you get all your information from Alex Jones.
Re:It's more complicated a story than it appears (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know if there was an extended YouTube version I didn't see, but the one I did wasn't anything of the sort.
Basically his rants aren't about the bad Russian cops but about the bad Russian government that doesnt pay its cops and Mr. Dymovsky in particular enough money.
From what I remember, he was pointing out that the latter led to the former. I also don't remember him singling himself out for a pay rise above and beyond anybody else.
Major Dymovsky had a habit of not coming into work for weeks at a time
Something to do with suffering from stress, and the breakdown leading to the confession on video as he couldn't take it any more?
there were numerous complaints about him basically alleging he himself was extorting various businesses for money before he put anything on Youtube
That was his whole point, wasn't it? He couldn't afford not to, and in fact would be ostracized by his colleagues if he didn't.
Yulia Latynina who is easily the best credentialed opposition journalist in Russia has dismissed Dymovsky as a fraud on her radio show and in editorials.
Fair enough.
His complaint isnt with the system but with his own place in it -- he is no opponent of the Kremlin, but a guy who was trying to secure his own position.
By saying he can't take it any more, and will quite happily quit. Obviously has designs on Putins job (not).
His own ex-wife has called him mentally unbalanced. He had a messy divorce involving death threats and other assorted stories fit only for the tabloids
So he is a Russian Tiger Woods. Big deal. This has nothing to do with anything. I don't know how authentic the video appeal is, but I find the Anonymous Coward posting very unconvincing.
Phillip.
Re:dude, link please, I can't find it (Score:3, Insightful)
No. That is what I have been saying. At the time I got arrested it was more than four days after the hurricane. All the lights worked, including streetlights. They were letting many cars pass, but I believe they pulled me over because I had an out of state plate (no extermely uncommon if that part of FL.) They were letting people go if they were coming back from the football game, but a women who went out for diapers got arrested. It was mayhem, but not because of the storm, which subsided days earlier. (Bear in mind that the link is to an official government website. Obviously they don't have any incriminating details)
Again, when they cuffed me I told them I would not answer any questions, and that I wanted to invoke my right to an attorney at which point one of the six cops present told me I didn't have Miranda rights because I was in Florida. The public defenders office intially refused to represent me, telling me that I did not have a right to lawyer as no charges had been filed. I finally told them I was being held illegaly and they reluctantly gave in, but I continued to be held for 33 days, at which point they let me go, still with no charges even filed!
Re:Not final (Score:3, Insightful)
I bet if those Sprinfield MA police officers were videotaped accusing their superiors of corruption they would not get off so easily. Nor is he being persecuted for abuse of his power against common people.
Oddly enough, anytime you piss off your superior, you are likely to suffer for it -- police officer or not, America or Russia.