Rise of the Warrior Cop: How America's Police Forces Became Militarized 835
FuzzNugget writes "An awakening piece in the Wall Street Journal paints a grim picture of how America's police departments went from community officers walking the beat to full-on, militarized SWAT operations breaking down the doors of non-violent offenders. From the article: 'In the 1970s, there were just a few hundred [raids] a year; by the early 1980s, there were some 3,000 a year. In 2005, there were approximately 50,000 raids.' It goes on to detail examples of aggressive, SWAT-style raids on non-violent offenders and how many have ended in unnecessary deaths. Last year, after a Utah man's home was raided for having 16 small marijuana plants, nearly 300 bullets in total were fired (most of them by the police) in the ensuing gunfight, the homeowner believing he was a victim of a home invasion by criminals. The U.S. military veteran later hanged himself in his jail cell while the prosecution sought the death sentence for the murder of one officer he believed to be an criminal assailant. In 2006, a man in Virginia was shot and killed after an undercover detective overheard the man discussing bets on college football games with buddies in a bar. The 38-year-old optometrist had no criminal record and no history of violence. The reports range from incredulous to outrageous; from the raid on the Gibson guitar factory for violation of conservational law, to the infiltration of a bar where underage youth were believed to be drinking, to the Tibetan monks who were apprehended by police in full SWAT gear for overstaying their visas on a peace mission. Then there's the one about the woman who was subject to a raid for failing to pay her student loan bills. It's a small wonder why few respect police anymore. SWAT-style raids aren't just for defense against similarly-armed criminals anymore; it's now a standard ops intimidation tactic. How much bloodshed will it take for America to realize such a disproportionate response is unwarranted and disastrous?"
IRS Too? (Score:5, Interesting)
As a Brit, the stuff I read about the cops in the USA freaks me out, maybe because of the relative lack-of-guns here.
I read articles saying even your tax collectors are doing armed raids on houses, is this right? It seems like something from a Terry Gilliam film, nightmare-ish.
Re:Pfft. If you have done nothing wrong... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:IRS Too? (Score:1, Interesting)
Bear in mind that the US press prints only the most extreme incidents. Most police officers in the US never fire their weapons in the line of duty for their entire careers.
Armed raids by tax collectors, I can believe. If someone refuses to pay taxes long enough, it's reasonable to arrest him. If that individual is also known to be stockpiling arms, as happens in the US from time to time, then I can see how an armed raid is justifiable. That doesn't mean it's routine procedure. I think the point of TFA is that we don't want armed raids to *become* routine procedure.
Another notable example (Score:5, Interesting)
Cheye Calvo, then mayor of Berwyn Heights, MD: His crime was bringing a package inside his home. It turned out that this was a package of pot that the police had been tracking and put on his porch, and as soon as the package was inside the SWAT team stormed his house, shooting his dogs, nearly shooting his mother-in-law (cue jokes), no knocking or announcing. It turned out that the only reason that the package had been addressed to his home was that some drug dealer had gotten his wife's name and address at random, and then have the local UPS delivery guy just take the packages to whoever was really supposed to get them. There was also an obvious entrapment issue, as Calvo would never have seen the package without the police putting it there.
Nowadays Calvo spends most of his time traveling the country giving talks about out of control SWAT teams. He also points out that there are lots of people who this happens to that nobody paid attention to because they were poor and/or not-white, rather than relatively well-to-do, white, and the local mayor.
Re:Wake up (Score:2, Interesting)
As occupational hazards are concerned, Law Enforcement isn't even particularly high on the list. What happened to you is unfortunate, but is not especially common. If police cruisers came with grenade launchers and they blew up every car they pulled over then it would be even more rare, but I think we've long passed "eye for an eye" and are now looking at a situation where cops kill more people than people kill cops.
The US has been at war for over 60 (Score:5, Interesting)
Police SWAT (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:IRS Too? (Score:5, Interesting)
On TV, you watch the U.S. 'Cops' and you see violence all over from the cops.... ... you watch the Canadian show 'To Serve & Protect' and the cops are all,
"You've been driving drunk, eh!... I'll give you a warning this time. Did you want us to drive you home or can we call you a Taxi."
A much different look at police tactics (or TV show tactics?)
Re: Wake up (Score:3, Interesting)
I used to be a pizza delivery guy in Niagara Falls, NY. I've delivered pizza to places with crack and guns on the table in the living room. Let me know when you've been standing in front of a cracked out gangbanger with hundreds in your pocket and nothing to defend yourself with but a 2 liter of diet coke. Yeah, that's what I thought.
Cops on steroids (Score:4, Interesting)
The cops are taking steroids. There's no stigma against it like in pro sports, but just as much pressure to perform. You all know there are many performance enhancing drugs, not just steroids but even something as simple as ritalin or adderal. Cops have easy access, too.
I'd like to see random drug testing of cops, and drug testing of cops following these ridiculous events where they fire hundreds of rounds for no particular reason other than that all the other trigger-happy cops are firing. You can't substitute calm, rational peace-keeping with hyped-up cops over-compensating for their tiny guns.
We need to raise awareness of cops who are pulling a Lance Armstrong.
Re:The US has been at war for over 60 (Score:4, Interesting)
Violence in the US isn't "prevalent", it's "publicised".
Most of the US is quite cozy, with violent crime being largely confined to areas where toxic people prey on each other.
Much crime is VERY geographically restricted. For example I live in a county with an impressive number of assaults and propertly crimes, but I don't live in the "bad part" of that county. I've never had a problem in thirty years.
It's also an area where anyone burgling a home would expect to be shot, so crooks only hunt familiar territory. We pay the police to make sure their operational radius is short, so to speak. "If you don't belong there, stay the fuck out because it's not yours."
NASA? (Score:4, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This is where Police States are formed. (Score:4, Interesting)
Mostly because a large number of cops act like complete assholes.
Officers should be forced to be courteous and professional at all times. They speed off duty? Instantly fired. The problem is that most cops act like they are above the law and treat EVERYONE as a threat.
Reduce the number of assholes in uniform, and you will reduce or reverse the decline of the public image of the police.
Re:Wake up (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:IRS Too? (Score:5, Interesting)
Watching COPS, and Australian/NZ similar shows the differences are stark. The default on COPS seems to be if some mildly drunk person gives some backchat, they get crash tackled, two cops twice their size pound them into the ground screaming "STOP RESISTING" despite the person appearing to be more dazed and confused if anything. In the time I watched it there were plenty of cases where tasers were deployed to obtain conformance to the officers requests, rather than as a defensive measure, in a few instances directly used as a threat against someone for nothing more than talking out of turn. Maybe its just the producers showing the more "exciting" footage, but so many times what they show I would consider the cop assaulting the "perp" for not bowing to his demands rather than being an actual threat.
On the NZ shows they are almost placid - look up "always blow on the pie" to see what I mean. I am sure they have their rough and tumble, but the sort of assault and direct threats you see on COPS is not present, and even when they go against someone drunk and agro they try and talk their way down and only deploy capsicum spray or tasers as a last defence. The Australian cop shows are too heavy edited to show some of a heaviness the cops use here - I have do doubt they have certain groups they don't mind putting the boot into, but most of the confrontations you see on COPS would be resolved differently on the Aussie cop shows in similar situations.
I think shows like COPS though are the sort of thing that attract the wrong people to policing. The sort that like the power trip and the odd chance to rough someone up under the cover of a badge, rather than actually engaging and protecting the community. That said, there are those in the community I don't mind having those sorts of cops available for.
It's the guns stupid (Score:0, Interesting)
In a country where nearly anybody can be armed and the media idolizes the tough guy of course Law Enforcement is going to do more heavily armed raids. As a limited peace officer (conservation) I have received threats just walking down the street on my day off by an armed (CCW) local dipshit (no more CCW for him). The easy way to avoid the cops breaking down your door is don't break the law. Nobody has ever broken down my door - but then again I don't grow dope, run a betting ring, skip paying my taxes, hack government data systems or kill endangered species for fun. The cops are armed because the population is - the cops will always have more guns otherwise they can't do their job.
"Shock and awe" force implies scaredy-cat police (Score:4, Interesting)
I think the "shock and awe" SWAT tactics just reveal an underlying fear in the police that they could deal with the situation any other way. I guess this is what you get if you have a society where everyone may have a gun and be willing to use it on unwanted visitors, so the default setting of society is excessive violence. Reminds me of that South Park animation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDCh4-pKrrE [youtube.com] -- America was built on scared people (running away from Europe on the Mayflower -- don't blame me, South Park folks said it), and has continued in that great scared tradition (excessive military, excessive foreign intervention, excessive fear of others in society, excessive use of guns, etc, etc). Probably better to rewind 400+ years and try again.
Police story (Score:3, Interesting)
I remember a while back (this was in the nineties) watching a small Hispanic boy running in a supermarket in downtown L.A.and suddenly stopping to look up in stunned silence at a very large man dressed in dark clothes,. One of L.A.'s finest.
You know what that cop said to the little kid (he couldn't have been more than four years old)?
"Do I scare you?"
Right there and then I thought to myself: something very wrong with this man, something very wrong with the police in this town.
Don't slip like Egypt (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Wake up (Score:4, Interesting)
Strawman, no one is claiming cops come to a house unarmed, but they dont need a swat team in 99% of the cases they use them.
"I find this whole subject silly in that we are making out police to be the evil" Some police are evil, no one is making them all to be evil, no one is even making out the vast majority of them to be evil. But some ARE evil.
"Where in the world do the police go around with no guns?" Define your statement a little better, no guns as in any cops dont carry? If that is the case then easy, last I checked UK has beat cops that cary sticks instead of guns. In any case you have us on a red herring. No one is claiming cops should not cary guns, but they should not have a team of 20, in full riot gear, with fully auto machine guns, knocking on the door to serve summons and warrents to non violent offenders.
Re:IRS Too? (Score:5, Interesting)
Well put. An armed raid is the best way to escalate violence and increase the chances of someone getting killed. Why the police agitate for that escapes me. Actually, it doesn't: the police want to create the conditions in which they can kill people with impunity. Murdering a suspect after he's in custody is a crime. Killing him in his home because you "thought he was reaching for a gun" is just a mistake. :-/
For the IRS specfically, I was thinking of groups like the self-styled "sovereign citizens" [adl.org], who have basically the same attitude about wanting to create opportunities to kill police officers. Serving an arrest warrant on a member of a group like that is a situation in which I consider an armed raid to be justifiable.
Re: Summary of TFS (Score:2, Interesting)
Radley Balko here. I was 17 during Ruby Ridge. 18 during Waco.
So you are incorrect. I started getting interested in police issues in the mid-2000s.
You might start by Googling the name "Cory Maye."
Re:And it's only going to get worse (Score:4, Interesting)
From my perspective, we could be at the point where a straw could break the camel's back, where one viral video of a "legal" home invasion and manslaughter could start the process.
I'm not saying I think that's about to happen. In fact, I really doubt it. Just you state it like a certainty. People are rarely good at predicting when revolutions are going to happen or are not going to happen.
Re: Summary of TFS (Score:2, Interesting)
Radley Balko here. I was 17 during Ruby Ridge. I was 18 during Waco.
So you're assertion that I only got interested in police issues after white people were raided is incorrect.
I got interested in this issue in the mid-2000s. You might Google the name "Cory Maye."
And you should really know what you're talking about before you imply racial motives to someone you don't know. Especially when there's very public information available to contradict you.
Re:Bullies like being bullies (Score:5, Interesting)
I got stopped for not pulling over when they flashed lights, which I couldn't see because my mirrors and back window were fogged (no working defrost, sadly) and I was driving under traffic lights and streetlights, which meant my whole back window was flashing anyway. I got two guns pointed at my face and I got to sit on the curb for an hour in the cold with no shoes on (hey, it's legal in Santa Cruz to drive without them) while they rummaged through it and found nothing whatsoever. This was nearly twenty years ago now. And they had pulled me over for nothing whatsoever. I hadn't sped, run lights, et cetera. They just didn't like the look of my '83 Citation on the road at 2AM. Neither did I, but it's no justification for a traffic stop.
I don't even have to imagine.
Re:"Shock and awe" force implies scaredy-cat polic (Score:5, Interesting)
Sorry, no. America was imperialistic long before the Pearl Harbor attack. Go read about the invasion of the Phillipines, the Spanish-American war, and the Banana Wars. Don't forget the Barbary Wars. America has been big into foreign intervention since the early 1800s.
Re: Summary of TFS (Score:5, Interesting)
"It's probably news because white people are being raided now, whereas previously it was only scary black people like Fred Hampton who got murdered by militarized police."
Radley Balko here. I was 17 during Ruby Ridge. I was 18 during Waco.
So you're assertion that I only got interested in police issues after white people were raided is incorrect.
I got interested in this issue in the mid-2000s. You might Google the name "Cory Maye."
And you should really know what you're talking about before you imply racial motives to someone you don't know. Especially when there's very public information available to contradict you.
I have awaken from my near-decade-long Slashdot slumber to rebut the attempted race-baiting of Radley Balko.
Radley Balko is the type of person who calls out injustice, individual and institutional, regardless of who it impacts. And has done so for a long time.
Radley Balko is also the kind of person who has spent hundreds of hours of his personal time meeting with, writing about, agitating for the release of, and providing assistance to, wrongfully-accused defendants... most of whom, in my thirty seconds of scanning the 'net, are black.
"Google Corey May." Classic. Well done, sir.
Radley Balko is a goddamn American Hero.
Re:And it's only going to get worse (Score:3, Interesting)
Before things improve, they will get worse.
I strongly disagree.
Militarization weakens democracy, a weakened democracy disregards personal freedoms, threatened personal freedoms make people feel unsafe, people feeling unsafe support militarization, and the cycle goes that way, snowballing, until the military realize they're stronger than the government and BOOM! A coup happens. (It's what happened with most Latin American countries, by the way.)
So, if you still want to see things improved, you shouldn't wait it to get worse, else it'll be too late.
Re:"Shock and awe" force implies scaredy-cat polic (Score:2, Interesting)
The Blue Wall (Score:5, Interesting)
When my 11 year old son was handcuffed in middle school for being autistic while following the IEP, the school was held accountable and we were made whole with respect to their actions. Our lawyer, however, told us not to pursue the officer. She was concerned that our son would be charged with assault and resisting arrest if we went to the prosecutor. She also told us about the "Blue Wall" that protects officers involved in even the most egregious misconduct.
Our son was covered in bruises, especially around the neck. The security camera footage from two angles clearly demonstrated the brutality of the officer applying positional asphyxiation and twisting his arm around far enough to see his opposite wrist visible from the other side of his back.
I arrived after 45 minutes and the cuffs were immediately removed. We left the school 15 minutes later after my son calmed down enough to travel.
The same officer had also arrested another student at school for running away from home the following day. The department refused all FOIA requests, and stonewalled at every turn. So we gave up and withdrew our son from their school for his safety. This same child is now an honor student at another district and has completed advanced placement classes several grades ahead of schedule.
Re:A place and time for anarchy? (Score:5, Interesting)
The media don't have a concern to call out police overreach because frankly, they rely on police for 90% of their reporting. If you don't have a source to start the story, you're out. If you don't have a source to confirm the story, you're out. And if you question what the police tell you, you don't have a source anymore.
http://www.popehat.com/2013/04/09/misconduct-is-only-news-when-journalists-say-it-is/ [popehat.com]
http://www.popehat.com/2012/03/21/chelsea-kay-of-krcr-tv-supports-shooting-being-a-lapdog/ [popehat.com]
http://www.popehat.com/2013/07/12/a-brief-story-illustrating-my-view-of-law-enforcement-and-the-media-that-covers-it/ [popehat.com]
Re:And it's only going to get worse (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think the lawmakers actually told the police to kill anyone found betting in a bar. The basis of law is that one group makes the laws, one group brings suspected law-breakers to court, and another independent group figures out if these suspects are guilty and if so what the punishment should be.
What the US has is one group making the laws, one group killing and beating anyone they don't like the look of, and a court system with insanely long punishments for all classes of crime and a pro-police bias.
Re:If you don't like this... (Score:4, Interesting)
If we do not like this, we could always repeal the second amendment and get the semi-automatic guns out of the general population. There would be less reason to carry out raids with such a show of force. Until then, we have the society which we have sown.
How did America's policy forces become militarized? The second amendment.
the people they're supposed to be raiding would still have guns.. and you didn't have this amount of raids back when full auto weapons were legal in USA... despite having prohibition gangsters going around at the same time.
but it's actually real simple. if you invest in a swat team you're going to use that swat team.. it's just good use of money... but if you use them as a swat team that doesn't announce it's presence when starting the raid(no door knocks and waiting and serving the warrant) for cases that would have been previously handed like normal warrant searches of course the amount of times things go fucked is going to grow. so cities which have swat teams are assigning them searches that shouldn't be handled by swat teams - and the swat teams handle of course every case as seriously as any other case because "that's just smart", even if the proper procedure for that case would be acting completely differently.
what's worse is of course the same clowns then moonlighting giving home defense courses on how you should shoot home invaders! WHAT COULD GO WRONG?
Re:A place and time for anarchy? (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know how well this represents the larger population as most of the people I was talking to were both immigrants and females. I live in a pretty diverse area and I've found that immigrants in general seem to have a huge problem understanding the concept of freedom.