Too Many Cops Are Told They’re Soldiers Fighting a War. How Did We Get Here?

http://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform-free-speech-technology-and-liberty/too-many-cops-are-told-theyre-soldiers

by tankenmate • 13 years ago

429 247 13 years ago

I don't know how we got here, but you must admit that SWAT teams in mine-resistant personnel carriers sure look spiffy. If your police force isn't ready for battle, the terrorists win

xroche• 13 years ago

You’re More Likely to be Killed by a Toddler than a Terrorist. (http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/06/youre-more-likely-to-...)

digitalengineer2• 13 years ago

From the article: "–You are 8 times more likely to be killed by a police officer than by a terrorist"... Wow, so we need a war against... The police? If we follow todays logic?

kens• 13 years ago

I was wondering how toddlers kill people, so I went to the original source, which describes 5 fatal shootings. All but one were by preschoolers, not toddlers, which ruins the alliteration. And the article cherry-picks data from 2013; terrorism deaths are considerably higher if you include other years (even excluding 2001). I'd classify this as a catchy link title, not an accurate statement.

digitalengineer2• 13 years ago

What terrorists? Did you read the article? "Today, the use of this sort of force is in too many jurisdictions the first option for serving search warrants instead of the last. SWAT teams today are used to break up poker games and massage parlors, for immigration enforcement, even to perform regulatory inspections."

SkyMarshal• 13 years ago

Sarcasm.

cypherpunks01• 13 years ago

FYI Two days ago there was a very extensive discussion on a Salon article which was an excerpt of this book:

“Why did you shoot me? I was reading a book” (salon.com) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6001843

tehwalrus• 13 years ago

Thanks, I didn't connect the dots here (I had read the Salon article.)

Shivetya• 13 years ago

Simple, do you see the limits to preventive actions they can take in most cities? Have you read how "rights" activist are going to strip NYC cops from doing just that which has resulted in an incredible drop in murders and similar crimes?

We got there because we stopped police from policing and instead forced them to respond to situations left to build until they explode.

We got there by telling them, no you can't look at that guy because of where he lives, where he doesn't live, his skin color, the type of clothing he wears, or such.

mercurial• 13 years ago

I'm not sure of what you're trying to say here. Is it OK for the police to harass people because they're black, or sport a beard, or wear the wrong T-shirt? That's what you call "preventive policing"?

dsr_• 13 years ago

You can't deny the effectiveness of putting everyone in jail.

pstuart• 13 years ago

We got here because of the War on Drugs. Look at what they use the SWAT teams primarily for.

ianstallings• 13 years ago

"Rights" in quotes like it's a questionable idea, having rights. 'Nuff said.

king_jester3• 13 years ago

Have you read how "rights" activist are going to strip NYC cops from doing just that which has resulted in an incredible drop in murders and similar crimes?

You are no doubt referring to stop and frisk. I'm so tired of having to say this to folks, but the violent crime rate in NYC has been dropping since before stop and frisk was a policy. In fact, there is no conclusive evidence or study that gives a direct causation for the fall in violent crime rates in NYC, even though Bloomberg and Ray Kelly will continue to claim otherwise.

We got there by telling them, no you can't look at that guy because of where he lives, where he doesn't live, his skin color, the type of clothing he wears, or such.

If you think the race and poverty oriented profiling that the police employ make you safer, you are totally mistaken. They encourage harm to communities of predominantly black and hispanic people, they encourage imprisonment of those people, they encourage the destruction of those communities, and they encourage the increased power of the police force over all aspects of a city.

buuda• 13 years ago

There is very good evidence that the reduction in crime is related to the levels of lead in blood. The correlation between crime and lead levels is found on the international, national, state, city and even block by block level.

Stop and frisk can be legally done, but the way the NYPD implements it is clearly discriminatory. There is no better way to create a criminal than to treat someone like one from adolescence.

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-li...

mikeash• 13 years ago

Yeah, who needs that stupid Fourth Amendment anyway?

darkarmani• 13 years ago

Simple, do you see the limits to preventive actions they can take in most cities?

No, what limits?

Have you read how "rights" activist are going to strip NYC cops from doing just that which has resulted in an incredible drop in murders and similar crimes?

NYC cops were never allowed to give abortions, so I'm not sure how any changes are going to affect the crime rate.

kevincennis• 13 years ago

"But whether it's with the ubiquity of these SWAT raids, stop-and-frisk, or the default geared-up, Robocop response to political protest, the relationship between police and the public on the whole is growing increasingly antagonistic -- and oddly, this comes during a period when both crime and on-duty police deaths are at historic lows."

Author seems to completely miss the possibility that this is causal.

Edit: Just see gizmo686's comment below. Pretty much sums up my line of thinking.

drzaiusapelord• 13 years ago

Or maybe the author doesn't want to pull something completely out his ass? Isn't this what we criticize journalists for? Especially in social sciences reporting?

There has been a lot of spilled ink regarding why big city crime has been going down with lots of decent theories (abortion access, gentrification, easier access to higher education, smarter policing, larger prison population, etc) and I've never really heard that heavy handed SWAT tactics account for this.

gizmo6868• 13 years ago

But the author is making a claim that this is a contradiction. There is an obvious explanation that disagrees with the author that was ommited. That is exactly what we complain about in journalism.

king_jester3• 13 years ago

If you want to say its causal, you are going to have to show some kind of evidence that it is. The author is correct not to make that leap since they don't have any such evidence or info to provide on that point.

chipotle_coyote• 13 years ago

I suspect that what you're intending to assert is the possibility that lower crime and higher police survival rates are due to the access the police have to better, "military-style" weapons, and you're accusing the author of missing that possibility.

But that's not what the thesis of the sentence you quoted above is. The thesis is "it is odd that the relationship between police and the public on the whole is growing increasingly antagonistic." For that relationship to be casual, that would mean that lower crime and higher police survival rates are due to the practice of responding to illegal poker games among retirees at the Elks Lodge with the same degree of force as they'd use to take down an international drug cartel.

vondur• 13 years ago

A large number of police officers are former military personnel. It's not surprising that this militarized philosophy is common among police today.

ihsw• 13 years ago

This is an awful generalization, there are many veterans that see this as excessive and abhorrent. They left the Middle East to trade the military environment for quiet(er) civilian life.

arh682• 13 years ago

Yet they presumably chose to join the military, right? Is it really excessive and abhorrent to suggest that those who decide to join the military would tend towards militarized philosophies? They're not saints.

mabhatter6• 13 years ago

Real MILITARY soldiers are subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice... Which is somewhat stricter and includes a lot of rules that are unconstitutional for crvilians. They also don't get to form unions, they get a chin of command and that's it. They break ORDERS and they get Courtmartialed.

Our militarized police like to call the rest of us "civilians" but they run straight to their Union when any superior calls them out, and they hide behind the same lawyers as the rest of us and ask for favors from the prosecutor and court.

We need to keep the teacher unions and break the police unions up, then subject them to higher standards of conduct, and LOWER standards of defense and evidence... We have allowed them to become a wild pack of dogs and they need caged up, put back on the leash, or put down.

cousin_it• 13 years ago

During the 2011 protests in Russia, some people suggested that the government benefits from bad relations between the public and the police, because the government is afraid that the police will side with the public during mass protests. Though I guess that problem is much less severe in the US.

dclowd9901• 13 years ago

Given how the situation is playing out in Egypt, I'd say this assessment is spot-on.

dobbsbob• 13 years ago

Google the story about 7 cops in VA that went after a 17yr old girl because she was carrying non alcoholic fruit soda the cops thought were wine coolers. They handled this by breaking through her car windows guns drawn like they were seals going after bin laden lol.

chc• 13 years ago

Actually, it was a 20-year-old college student with a 12-pack of water, and they failed to break her windows because she drove away when the crowd of large men ran up and started beating on her car, and then they charged her with assault.

hfsktr• 13 years ago

Link for those who want the details: http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/state-regional/abc-asks-st...

Moral_• 13 years ago

The charges were dropped.

Myrmornis• 13 years ago

Driving away from American police officers is not a good idea.

http://reason.com/blog/2013/05/03/culpeper-cop-who-shot-and-...

Zoepfli• 13 years ago

That's no laughing matter.

run4yourlives3• 13 years ago

Since I can't flag the story, I'd like someone to explain to me how in the hell they consider this "Hacker News".

Seriously, this article, and all 22 comments of this discussion belong on reddit.

diydsp• 13 years ago

From [1], "McKenzie Wark talks about the new class of hackers, a direct social manifestation of the intellectual property laws. According to Wark hackers are the people capable of forcing the sign/information system to creatively transform."

Since hackers transform the sign/information system, they inherently infringe upon AND establish authority. This puts us incidentally in the same position as other authority, such as police.

[1] http://ramocki.net/ramocki-diy.pdf

run4yourlives3• 13 years ago

What in god's name does that have to do with the article that was posted?

mindstab• 13 years ago

If you think limited freedom cultures are good for our work go on ahead ignoring this stuff. Or realize that we generally need a good free society to work in and flourish in and these are all precursor warnings to more political crack downs that could drastically curb the hacker scene in the US. There are already increased cases of security researchers getting the SWAT treatment followed by jail. Who thinks thats good. These articles are digging deeper into the why this is happening trying to look for ways to prevent it before it tanks the US tech scene.

I'd say that's relevant but if you disagree put your fingers in your ears, close your eyes and wait another decade and we'll see

run4yourlives3• 13 years ago

If you think limited freedom cultures are good for our work go on ahead ignoring this stuff.

I exist outside of HN.

HN though is where I want to see technology articles and discussion, not politics.

From the guidelines:

Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon.

Spooky232• 13 years ago

The SWAT issue is a different issue IMO, more related to politicians wanting to "do something" at the Federal and State levels. "Doing something" translates to "allocate funding". That money can pay for more cops/overtime, or stuff. Or it may be earmarked by a congressman whose donor makes light tanks to only buy tanks.

The us vs. them stuff is related to the state of affairs in high-crime communities. Cops can't relate to the people they interact with (and vice versa) because they essentially live in different societies -- they might as well be different planets.

If a policeman has access to body armor and machine guns to serve a warrant on some guy in a house, he will take them along. The cop has no idea who may be behind a door when they knock -- they may be intoxicated/high, have a vicious pit bull, or just be a scared kid with a gun and nothing to lose. The policeman wants to go home to see his kids at the end of his shift.

jimzvz2• 13 years ago

Uh, shouldn't this information be available based on some kind of investigation that the warrant is based on? This argument leads to the "shoot first, ask questions later" ethos. It is exactly what leads to innocent people and animals being murdered by police. The police should not shift the risks of their job on to the public.

Spooky232• 13 years ago

Easy for a guy sitting in a chair in front of a computer to say.

I'm not justifying the behavior, I'm trying to illuminate why it's happening. You're attributing responsibility for a situation to people who don't make decisions. Society has made choices (let's move to the burbs to get away from those poor folk) and your representatives have enacted laws that have created all sorts of absurd situations. And we drop policemen into the middle of the chaos to exert some control over it.

takluyver• 13 years ago

If a policeman has access to body armor and machine guns to serve a warrant on some guy in a house, he will take them along.

Interestingly, in the UK, where regular policemen don't carry guns, most policemen apparently don't want to have firearms.

Obviously this is a rather different culture, and there's a difference between a collective matter (should we all be armed?) and an individual matter (should I be armed today for this particular call?). But I mention this to point out that human nature isn't as simple as everyone wielding the biggest stick available to them.

UnoriginalGuy• 13 years ago

I think part of the reason for UK police not wanting guns is primarily what the UK police see as their mission: It is community policing, where UK police try to work within and with the permission of the community because they feel they're most effective that way (also called "policing by consent"). http://www.civitas.org.uk/pubs/policeNine.php

Police carrying guns makes them "scary" to the general public, and as such damages their primary mission (see above). It is also hugely damaging to the police's reputation when someone gets shot (even righteously) and would be catastrophic if someone was illegitimately killed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Jean_Charles_de_Meneze...).

The US police is VERY militarized in Urban areas. They also seem to have an "us Vs. them" attitude about the general public, and are less interested in earning respect but rather taking it by force or coercion ("thin blue line," "respect my authority," "quit resisting," etc).

arethuza3• 13 years ago

'A 2006 survey of 47,328 Police Federation members found 82% did not want officers to be routinely armed on duty, despite almost half saying their lives had been "in serious jeopardy" during the previous three years.'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19641398

"Arming the force would, say opponents, undermine the principle of policing by consent - the notion that the force owes its primary duty to the public, rather than to the state, as in other countries."

eloisius• 13 years ago

The cop has no idea who may be behind a door when they knock -- they may be intoxicated/high, have a vicious pit bull, or just be a scared kid with a gun and nothing to lose. The policeman wants to go home to see his kids at the end of his shift.

One way to reduce the risk of encountering these dangers is to not be serving warrants on non-violent drug offenders in the first place. Not that this a police decision, but it should be obvious to policy makers.

The more drug dealers they stamp out, the more rewarding an endeavor selling drugs becomes. Increasingly aggressive police tactics will be met with increasingly drastic measure to secure drug operations, until you've literally got cartels riding around in military hardware.

I wish that was a hypothetical doomsday scenario, but just look to the south of the border.

rhizome• 13 years ago

It's more likely that SWAT teams are being used to hide the fact that violent crime is at the lowest levels in decades. Police use terrorism to justify keeping officers on the force when they should be getting laid off. It's makework.

roc4• 13 years ago

"The cop has no idea who may be behind a door when they knock"

The cop also has no idea what's waiting for them in a vehicle they've just pulled over on the highway. Some of them have been murdered in exactly that situation.

But should they all suit up before writing traffic tickets?

mabhatter6• 13 years ago

And the number of people illegally beaten or killed by cops at routine traffic stops is an order of magnitude higher than cops injured or killed.

PavlovsCat• 13 years ago

The policeman wants to go home to see his kids at the end of his shift.

All kids are different. Personally, I think I would have preferred my father not come home, than come home a murderer. Maybe I was a fluke, but just to be sure the police officers should ask their kids about this, before operating on potentially false assumptions.

noonespecial• 13 years ago

If you dress up a guy in like a soldier and tell him he's going to war, he's going to go fight one, even if his enemy turns out to be a 12 year old with a baseball bat.

Context leads action. Our police are deeply out of context. Bulls in china shops break china. If you don't want broken dishes, don't send in a bull.

betterunix2• 13 years ago

"The policeman wants to go home to see his kids at the end of his shift."

...and I do not want to have a gang of soldiers invade my home at 5:00am and shoot my dog. When soldiers are doing police work, police work puts the public in danger.

gohrt2• 13 years ago

You know the difference between body armor and a machine gun, right? They don't have to go along together.

rayiner12• 13 years ago

How did we get here? When gangs and organized crime turned the cities into war zones in the 1970's and 1980's.

princess3000• 13 years ago

Actually the militarization of the police force comes from a coordinated effort to repurpose military hardware for domestic police use. [1]

Kind of funny that the gear used to fight one terrible war overseas is sent back to our own country and used to fight another terrible war domestically, huh?

[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/program-1033-military-equipme...

rayiner12• 13 years ago

That's a relatively recent phenomenon that comes at the tail end of something that has been happening for many decades now.

parfe• 13 years ago

The existence of drug organizations is a capitalist response to government intervention in the market. Prohibition is the source of the black drugs market as well as the reason the police militarized themselves.

lukifer4• 13 years ago

It is impossible to outlaw drugs. Attempting to do so merely increases the price by increasing the risk, resulting in unending escalatio.

http://longnow.org/seminars/02010/may/03/deviant-globalizati...

roc4• 13 years ago

Then why did the practice only catch on and spread like wild-fire after crime had already begun its plunge?

And why, after crime has continued to drop dramatically, has SWAT-ification continued to increase (if not accelerated) rather than plateau or even drop in response?

rayiner12• 13 years ago

Once you've built up an organization like that, it's hard to demobilize it. Public unions basically make it impossible to shrink police forces.

joe24pack• 13 years ago

When EPA and Department of Agriculture have their own SWAT teams, you know that SWAT teams are more for status display between high level bureaucrats than for any real need to fight off the nefarious activities of Dr Evil.

betterunix2• 13 years ago

Which could not have had anything to do with the actions of the state:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs

DanielBMarkham• 13 years ago

Somewhat tangential: There has long been a tie-in between the military and the police. Former military members make an easier transition to the police, and a lot of policemen have a strong weekend-warrior, macho mentality and like big guns and things that go boom. Plus the rank system is similar, there's use of deadly force, and so on.

The U.S. has also seen major mission creep in the military. Instead of going in and bringing a devastating kinetic assault to an enemy in order to get them to surrender, now we're in the mission of Counter-Insurgency (COIN), nation-building, handing out candy to kids, and air-lifting supplies in to earthquake victims.

Because of all of that, I think we need a new branch of the armed forces specifically set aside for nation-building, humanitarian relief, and so forth. It's a completely different mission from the other branches, and deserves its own budget, training, and voice. Then, civilian police forces should only pull military members from that branch.

We need to separate the warrior mentality from the protect and serve, community-friendly mentality. Some organizational re-alignment may help.

winthrowe• 13 years ago

Here's a TED talk discussing such a military realignment:

http://www.ted.com/talks/thomas_barnett_draws_a_new_map_for_...

kps• 13 years ago

The US military did do extensive nation-building in Europe and Japan after WWII. (I have it from my father, a 4-year-old German at war's end, that candy was most definitely involved.) I would argue that the difference is that, then, the military was expected and allowed to win the war first.

dkarl• 13 years ago

I wouldn't say the military has seen mission creep. Their job was always to stay until the fighting was over and the mission was accomplished. The difference is that we've found ourselves in conflicts where the fighting doesn't stop, and the mission might be "accomplished" now and then but it never stays that way. Judging by our recent conflicts, it's wishful thinking to try to separate the duties of fighting and interacting with civilians, and I think the new branch of the armed forces you're talking about is basically what the current U.S. Army is trying to be. Any nation-building and humanitarian relief force we create will have to deal with ambushes, mortar attacks, RPGs, and assaults on their bases, so it's not like they won't be fighters (and inevitably killers.)

Honestly, I think the army, along with a handful of progressive city police departments, will solve the problem of community policing long before most local U.S. law enforcement agencies. The army has greater ability to control and change its culture. It won't happen overnight, but we can hope that eventually U.S. cops will learn to respect their neighbors across town by the example of how U.S. soldiers treat people from the other side of the world. The army will also learn how to assess soldiers' fitness for interaction with civilians, which will have interesting implications for law enforcement.

AnthonyMouse• 13 years ago

Because of all of that, I think we need a new branch of the armed forces specifically set aside for nation-building, humanitarian relief, and so forth.

Maybe we could call it something like The Peace Corps?

makerops• 13 years ago

The job of the US' domestic police force is to serve and protect; the job of the military is to defend the nation against foreign enemies. When police forces become militaristic, the citizens become the foreign enemy.

justinator• 13 years ago

The job of the US domestic police force is to serve and protect the status quo (NOT individuals). Be against that, and you're against the police. Police aren't paid to care what the status quo is, but the status quo pay the police. And who is the status quo (ask yourself)

The methods they use to protect and serve that ideal just need to be one step less that what the masses will absolutely tolerate. If they cross that line, you get a riot.

Police violate individual citizen rights all the time and usually it's just ignored. It's a sorry state of affairs. That's why I'm afraid of police and police actions.

fixxer• 13 years ago

I'm in constant awe of the state of fear in this country.

splrb• 13 years ago

Anything that keeps us scared and submissive works well for the plutocracy. Citizens should never think that they live in a neighborhood, oh no, they live in a terrorist infested war zone.

Caskman• 13 years ago

"There's a reason you separate military and the police. One fights the enemies of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people" -Commander William Adama, Battlestar Galactica

arh682• 13 years ago

Do you think it matter if veterans were disallowed from joining law enforcement? Without getting into constitutionality arguments, would it really make the country safer for all its citizens (and not just those lucky enough to never be confronted by cops)?

bicknergseng4• 13 years ago

In the interest of playing devil's advocate, couldn't the fact that we have 94 guns per 100 Americans have something to do with it? To be honest, the cops that work in Oakland, Compton, Detroit, Chicago, and many other cities effectively are fighting wars with heavily armed gangs, etc.

I don't know that I buy the notion that police are the way they are today because of the Civil Rights Movement and Vietnam protests. Seems to me like the rise of inner city violence is a far bigger mover.

Not trying to justify militarized police, just trying to understand the reasons why in order to logically approach alternatives.

cobrausn2• 13 years ago

America has always had that many guns, but the police weren't always militarized. In addition, the amount of crime and number of police killed in the line of duty has steadily decreased over the years.

The devil's advocate in me wonders if the number of police killed is reduced because of the heavy use of SWAT whenever they think there might be any threat to an officer in a raid.

bicknergseng4• 13 years ago

America hasn't always had as many guns as it has now, nor the population density. Emphasis on population density and urbanification.

roc4• 13 years ago

"Seems to me like the rise of inner city violence is a far bigger mover."

What rise? Crime, inner city included, has been plunging, nationwide, for decades now. Major city crime rates are approaching fifty year lows.

bicknergseng4• 13 years ago

It's been dropping since the 90s, but so far as I can tell there has been a large increase in violent crime rates since the 60s. If we're at a 50 year low in rates, what does that mean for the total number of violent crimes?

Which raises other questions. Has our militarized police force contributed to declining crime in the past 20 years? If so, to what extent?

bilbo0s3• 13 years ago

Murders are WAY down from their peaks in the 90's. And that's across the board. So what violence are they encountering now, that they didn't encounter in... say ... '93 when they had no APC?

knowaveragejoe• 13 years ago

In continuing the devil's advocate angle here, there is a lot of scary stuff going on in Mexico right now. Some of that spilling over the border(or more realistically, the people and equipment are already here just unnoticed) is a possibility.

bicknergseng4• 13 years ago

Again, devil's advocate. The Hollywood Shootout was in 97. Murders might be down, but I don't think it's murder rates alone that drive policy in the area.

enko3• 13 years ago

You can't make this shit up.

Police in North Dakota borrowed a $154 million MQ-9 Predator B drone from the Department of Homeland Security to arrest a family of anti-government separatists who refused to return six cows that wandered onto their farm.

blhack2• 13 years ago

That's really misleading.

There is a base in Grand Forks, ND that houses several CBP (Customs and Border Patrol) Predator Drones, and they work with local law enforcement when asked to.

So, more than likely, the drone is going to be flying home here anyway, and made a pass over some property.

The facility where these things are flown from isn't some top secret bunker or anything, it's an office building on the air force base, and they give tours to local schools[1]. A local cop probably just stood behind one of the pilots while they flew over the property and spotted the cows.

Also: to somebody who didn't grow up in this area, that probably sounds really silly...but keep in mind that cows are worth a couple of thousand dollars each. So you're talking, low end, about $12,000 worth of property that they won't return. That's like having a stolen car.

I think something like this (flying a UAV, since CBP doesn't actually fly drones) should require a search warrant, but this is a totally reasonable use of resources IMHO.

Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, I guess.

[1]: They'd probably give a tour to anybody that asked, actually. Grand Forks is home to one of the biggest and best Aviation and Aerospace engineering schools in the world[2], and it would surprise me if there wasn't a relationship between the air force base there, and the school. If any HNers are ever up there, I'd suggest asking for a tour.

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_D._Odegard_School_of_Aeros...

enko3• 13 years ago

Well, it's quoting from the ACLU feature. The headline does take a certain stance, but 10 years ago it would sound like some joke headline from Robocop.

I'm not a US citizen but if I was I'd love to take that tour.

rickdale• 13 years ago

I don't think the comment is misleading at all. I think its pretty accurate and makes a succinct point about the current state of affairs.

freditup• 13 years ago

Thanks for the counterpoint. I'm completely of the mindset that police should take the mindset of community-servants first (perhaps the fighting mentality is appropriate in certain situations at specific times.) But so many of these kinds of articles (not this one specifically) take anecdotal incidents, tell them from one specific viewpoint that makes the cops look like trash, and expect you to be all outraged with them. I'm personally not going to get outraged until things are prevented in a fair light and I can decide if things are over-militarized.

thenomad• 13 years ago

Thanks - really interesting and reassuring comment! Much appreciated.

ljf• 13 years ago

2k for a cow? Try 60 dollars...http://www.cattlenetwork.com/cattle-resources/cow-calf/price...

_ap• 13 years ago

I think something like this (flying a UAV, since CBP doesn't actually fly drones) should require a search warrant, but this is a totally reasonable use of resources IMHO.

The Supreme Court decided in 1986 that aerial surveillance of a person's backyard did not require a warrant. Then again, the search was conducted by a human only using his "naked eye". See California v. Ciraolo.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_v._Ciraolo

tzs• 13 years ago

North Dakota [...] a family of anti-government separatists

Were these the kind of anti-government separatists who are harmless quirky people who confine their anti-government activity to blogs and leaflets, or the kind of anti-government separatists who amass a ton of weapons and declare themselves independent and vow to shoot any government agents who "invade" their sovereign territory?

moron4hire• 13 years ago

or are they anti-government separatists because one time they reshared a link on Facebook to an article mentioning Ron Paul?

tptacek• 13 years ago

The MQ-9 doesn't cost $154MM; more like 1/10th of that, list.

enko3• 13 years ago

You're right. The error is from here: http://www.aclu.org/criminal-law-reform/predator-drones-seek...

I thought it sounded awfully high. Egregious errors like that don't auger well for the reliability of the rest of the article.

matt__rose• 13 years ago

David Simon and Ed Burns wrote the following passage for the TV show, "The Wire" spoken by Bunny Colvin:

<<<< I mean, you call something a war and pretty soon everybody gonna be running around acting like warriors. They gonna be running around on a damn crusade, storming corners, slapping on cuffs, racking up body counts. And when you at war, you need a fucking enemy. And pretty soon, damn near everybody on every corner is your fucking enemy. And soon the neighborhood that you're supposed to be policing, that's just occupied territory. >>>>

This was written in 2004. With the passage of time, it seems more and more prescient.

yardie5• 13 years ago

It's not prescient because that is how it's been in predominantly black neighbourhoods. Black people have been saying this for the last 2-3 decades through protests, riots, and community organisers. It's only now that everyone has a cameraphone and a Youtube account do you get to see what's been going on.

Even well respected actor, Levar Burton, knows how to act in front of police. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=M-ck....

For black people we go into every encounter with the police thinking this might be my last moment on earth.

mabhatter6• 13 years ago

Being as its Levar...

His famous role was in Roots as the slave that kept getting lashed for not taking a proper English name from his owner over and over if he would just say his English name...

So its more than a little ironic that THIS actor makes a video about how to be properly submissive to his mas'ers!

It just sad that he would have to make a video like that because most of his TV time has been spent reading books to children. He's about as threatening as Mr. Rogers and still gets the jackboot.

known• 13 years ago

Cop/Soldiers are banned from thinking out of the box

nostromo3• 13 years ago

Crime is at an all-time low yet spending on police is near an all-time high. (Those factors could have a causal relationship, but I doubt it's the primary cause based on reading "The Better Angels of Our Nature".) http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/spending_chart_1950_2010...

Having big budgets but less crime means these swollen budgets end up being wasted on a lot of "fun" things like military gear. (Did you know that Wisconsin has two anti-terrorism centers? One in Madison and one in Milwaukee.)

I think this has something to do with politicians being unable to touch the budgets of first responders.

Tangentially, due to stringent building codes, the number and severity of fires has been dropping dramatically over time. Yet spending on fire protection only goes one way: up. http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/spending_chart_1950_2010...

Today in the US, if you call 911 about an emergency medical condition, they will often send a fire engine along with an ambulance and a cop. It makes me wonder if firemen and firewomen are so underutilized they've ended up with mostly make-work.

rayiner12• 13 years ago

Crime is at an all-time low yet spending on police is near an all-time high.

Two words: public unions.

mpyne• 13 years ago

I'm not opposed to unions in general, but there are definitely some specific ones our labor relations dept. could point out that would correlate very well with your point.

wwhitman• 13 years ago

Is it inconceivable that crime is lower due to more police on the streets and more criminals in jail?

calibraxis• 13 years ago

This is why tech workers need unions. When Facebook does something nasty, they can blame the unions; the billionaires and millionaires were merely cowering behind their desks.

We shouldn't contort ourselves to avoid the simplest answer: the state is getting what it paid for. The US incarcerates its population more than any known state on earth. That isn't unions' fault — other countries with more powerful unions don't jail themselves like this.

If any enemy nation did this, we wouldn't have any illusions. But we refuse to apply the same logic to ourselves, nor conclude as Chomsky did, "Remember, any state has a primary enemy: its own population."

Otherwise, it might be obvious why police are fighting a war, and who their enemy is.

mike_herrera• 13 years ago

Two words: public unions.

Citation needed.

coldtea• 13 years ago

We have unions over here in Europe too. Even more respected actually. But they don't correlate with "police spending".

Perhaps the word you're looking for is "lobbyists" and "demagogues".

mathattack• 13 years ago

"Crime is at an all-time low yet spending on police is near an all-time high."

Isn't this cause and effect? Crime is lower because we are hiring more policemen. That is certainly one conclusion from Freakonomics.

This is just a digression, because I do think the "Cops as Warriors" model is very scary, as "collateral damage" becomes acceptable in a war.

tolmasky2• 13 years ago

But if spending AND crime were at an all time high wed be saying that its cause and affect in the other direction and probably be making the argument that we need even more spending! So no matter what high budgets are always justified.

nostromo3• 13 years ago

I attempted to address that in my comment. Check out, Steven Pinker's "The Better Angels of Our Nature" which shows that violent crime is down globally, not just in the US.

Also, Levitt did say increased policing decreased crime, but only caused around 5% of the decline ( http://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levitt/Papers/LevittUndersta... p. 184)

bstrand2• 13 years ago

There is substantial evidence that lead poisoning, particularly that from leaded gasoline, is the causative element behind the violent crime spike and subsequent decline: http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-li...

lostlogin3• 13 years ago

About now I usually are the below story quoted. It's such a fascinating read that I'll stick it in as someone may not have seen it. Leaded petrol and crime.

http://m.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-link...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9790009/Was-lea...

nrivadeneira3• 13 years ago

I used to be a volunteer junior firefighter as a teen (many of Long Island's fire departments are volunteer based). Fire engines were sent out on emergency calls because many times the situation calls for tools and equipment that ambulances don't carry. I doubt it was budget-related, considering nobody was on payroll.

mililani2• 13 years ago

I believe crime is at an all time low because everyone is in prison.

http://dcj.state.co.us/ors/images/Stats%20Images/crime%20rat...

Tuna-Fish3• 13 years ago

Even greater reductions in crime rates are visible all across the Western Europe, and they have worked to reduce incarceration.

yardie5• 13 years ago

I'm going to go with Freakonomics on this one and believe crime is low because fewer criminals are being born.

gohrt2• 13 years ago

I'll take your extra firemen, thanks.

Please don't conflate police looking for make-crime, with generous responses to emregency situations risking irreversible damage to life and property.

dalke• 13 years ago

Taking off on a tangent, the comment about firefighters and police reminded of Dennis Smith's 'Report from Engine Co. 82'. It described his life as a firefighter in New York City/South Bronx during the 1960s and early 1970s. What I recall most vividly from it was that locals would use the callbox to ring the fire department, in case of problem, because they didn't trust the police.

Arjuna• 13 years ago

"Today in the US, if you call 911 about an emergency medical condition, they will often send a fire engine along with an ambulance [...]"

This is SOP (Standard Operating Procedure).

1. Imagine a scenario where an ambulance arrives as a first responder, and the EMTs [1] find that they cannot gain access to the emergency scene, because the home or other structure is locked or otherwise blocked. In this case, a firetruck would need to be dispatched, because it deploys with the correct equipment (e.g., Halligan bar [2], Denver tool [3], etc.) and personnel trained to handle such a situation. Also, ambulances are typically deployed with only two personnel, and that may not be enough in situations where items need to be moved or cleared to gain clear access to the emergency scene.

2. Most firefighters are cross-trained as EMTs. If they are local to the emergency scene, then they may be the first responders, while an ambulance is en-route.

3. Incoming 911 calls can often be confusing, with callers under extreme stress, experiencing situations that they have never faced in their lives. Imagine a situation where a caller is so distraught, overwhelmed, or focused on a life-saving effort, that they cannot articulate that they need firefighting support, in addition to an ambulance.

The bottom line: in an emergency situation, it is better to have more help on-hand than too little.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_medical_technician

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halligan_bar

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denver_tool

davidw• 13 years ago

Good points.

Interesting anecdotal data: here in Italy you have to call the fire department to get a fire truck out, whereas they're part of the standard package described above in the US. Fires aren't that common here because of construction materials, so while you see plenty of ambulances and police cars whizzing around, fire trucks are a far rarer sight than in the US.

stefantalpalaru2• 13 years ago

How about a HazMat team? Imagine a scenario where the EMTs cannot gain access to the emergency scene because there are toxic substances in their way. You can't rely on the incoming 911 calls to decide on a case by case basis so you might as well send a HazMat team alongside the ambulance and firetruck for each and every call.

And what about an anti-terrorist unit? Imagine a scenario where...

nostromo3• 13 years ago

Check out this chart: http://marginalrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Wha...

There may even be a happy middle-ground with regards to firefighters. In eastern King County, they don't send out a firetruck and three firefighters for non-lethal medical emergencies anymore -- they just send a single firefighter in an SUV.

dnm• 13 years ago

I needed an ambulance in a state park and they sent a fire truck too. When I asked the EMT from the ambulance why the firetruck, she responded "they're our toolbox."

dizzystar• 13 years ago

I thought the reason the red fire ambulance needed to be around was because regular EMTs aren't allowed to administer oxygen do to its high flammability, which important in many emergencies. This according to one EMT that I know.

In general, the EMTs you see carrying out an elderly woman are people with a few months of training. When people are getting stabbed, shot, or on the brink of life, you sort of need people with better training.

https://www.cpc.mednet.ucla.edu/node/27

Cthulhu_4• 13 years ago

And yet I can imagine this is something that could be optimized; why not cross-train the three emergency respondent department members into jack-of-all-trades that can deal with 80% of cases? Or put members of the three departments into a single vehicle equipped to deal with most cases? They could travel swifly to the site and deal with most cases, and call in back-up (like a fully equipped ambulance, fire-truck, or paramilitary SWAT-team in an armored hum-vee) if the situation needs it. I'm not an expert, but that would reduce overhead and cross-department communication needs.

Of course, the risk is that if the one vehicle has an accident in itself, there's no others that can fall in right then.

Fomite• 13 years ago

"Today in the US, if you call 911 about an emergency medical condition, they will often send a fire engine along with an ambulance and a cop. It makes me wonder if firemen and firewomen are so underutilized they've ended up with mostly make-work."

One of the reasons for this is also that fire stations are often far closer to the scene of a call (fire suppression being something that benefits from being distributed vs. centralized hospitals) so the fire truck will often arrive there first, and can render aid until the ambulance arrives.

bluedino2• 13 years ago

You also get a bill for $400 for the firetruck and $10 for each fireman

a3n• 13 years ago

In response to a similar observation that I once made, a friend suggested that police at a non-law enforcement emergency act as ad hoc project managers. "You need what, Mr. EMT? I'll have it for you directly, and I'll have those cars blocking access towed too. ... You lot! Back away!"

_pmf_• 13 years ago

Crime is at an all-time low yet spending on police is near an all-time high.

Devil's advocate: that shows they are effective and crime would be even lower with increased budgets.

nrivadeneira3• 13 years ago

One of my best friends is NYPD working in the projects in Brownsville NY, one of the most dangerous cities in NYC. From the stories he tells me, he is fighting a war.

Of course, that's not applicable to most other areas, but it's worth noting that when your day-to-day job is dealing with the criminals and scum of the earth, it changes your perspective on life.

gizmo6868• 13 years ago

There is at least two sides to every war. Dissarmerment has to start somewhere.

coopdog• 13 years ago

But are they criminals just because drugs are illegal, and they got sent to prison where crime is all they learned? Has the adversarial relationship been heightened by both sides?

When you send the police to war, the people become the enemy. The goal should be deterring the behavior not taking these people down and stomping them hard in retribution.

qohen• 13 years ago

Forgive my pedantry, but: dangerous as it is, Brownsville is not a city, but rather a neighborhood of Brooklyn, NY:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownsville,_Brooklyn

nrivadeneira3• 13 years ago

You are correct, but not forgiven. Sometimes I wonder why no mistake may go uncorrected on the internet...

D9u3• 13 years ago

Here in Hawai'i, we're lucky to have small communities, from which many of our police officers are enlisted, thus maintaining more of sense that we are all part of the same class, as well as the fact that many officers are related to people in the communities, so there is less disconnection and stratification than one would see in larger metropolitan areas.

I've been on both sides of the law here, and have always been treated with the utmost respect and humanity, even when I didn't deserve such. (a couple of drunken incidents, which will shame me for the rest of my days)

Sure our local police force has an armored, Lenco Bearcat, which they rarely use, but such measures are necessary in today's world - where criminals possess military-grade weapons.

This is not to say that I disagree with the article, as it's plain to see that the points made in the article are valid for a large portion of the USA.

I guess all I can say is... Lucky we live Hawai'i!

mililani2• 13 years ago

I find that hard to believe. I grew up in Hawaii, and I have come across lots of dick head cops engaging in some heinous activities. I have several friends from Oahu who would also agree with my statement.

D9u3• 13 years ago

O'ahu is NOT the Big Island...

But the Big Island is Hawai'i, and I've lived on this island for my entire life, with the exception of military service.

caycep• 13 years ago

It would be interesting to get a lot of data (HN specialty!) looking at the breakdown of all the different approaches. It seems like there are 2 extremes, and a wide variety from place to place.

Certain parts of NYC has seen amazingly drops in violent crime due to more "community-oriented" policing that requires officers to integrate themselves into the fabric of the neighborhoods in their precincts (I think it's NYC...). On the other end, you have that Salon article about SWAT teams gone willy nilly.

Some basic correlations, and visualizations showing comparative effectiveness of the different techniques could go a long way....

alan_cx2• 13 years ago

Not a flippant comment...... I blame Hollywood.

I honestly do.

They glamorize and hero worship mega violent law breaking cops, while at the same time portraying criminals as super beings with government like resources, who always lose due to the violent law breaking cops.

The people in the end believe this to be a vaguely true, even though in their lives they rarely see it, most cops are in fact fairly decent professionals, and criminals are average to dumb folk with bugger all resources, while the cops think they look crap compared to the Hollywood versions, and want more powers and toys.

No? Well, I'm yet to see a credible argument as to why adverts influence us, but movies don't. One of those special people who claim ads dont work on you? Simply, I don't believe you. Every one reckons that, yet ads work.

yk• 13 years ago

You are missing a news industry, who secretly want a Micheal Bay like special effects budget .

alan_cx2• 13 years ago

Very good point.

Yes, they do dress up news like an action movie. That most obvious and grating feature of this is the emotional music they now play over news and documentaries. Also, they way enemies are completely demonized and dehumanized, and the good guys worshiped. And when a lead character goes off script, they really freak out.

cadasfafad• 13 years ago

I think it's not just that Hollywood movies are influencing the Police, although that is part of it. Art both reflects and influences culture. It's hard to separate out causes and effects, although it's clear there is a problem here.

American culture as a whole places a ridiculous emphasis on empowerment through violence. It's everywhere; films, tv, books, music, punditry, news reporting, people's attitudes and idle conversation. A huge proportion of narratives resolve themselves through heroic violence. Often a heroic character will find inner strength through physical violence (and often inner strength means becoming murderously callous).

If you take a step back and look at it critically, it is rather absurd. In the real world true empowerment comes from intelligence and leadership skills. In the real world, having to kill lots of people would be very traumatic (at least for a well adjusted person).

I don't think it's as simple as violent movies causing violence. I think the real dangers come from the unspoken assumptions, the things that movies take for granted, which then become part of everyday thinking.

base698• 13 years ago

Relevant via The Wire: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BA5za4VsskM

socialist_coder• 13 years ago

Yet another reason to not have guns in your house.

If you get raided by overzealous police that don't even identify themselves properly, and you have a gun that you try to use for self defense... EOF

gizmo6868• 13 years ago

In other words, you shouldn't have a gun because some scary men might break into your house and point their guns at you.

lmm• 13 years ago

You shouldn't have a gun except for things you care about more than your and others' lives. Having one makes it far more likely for a violent encounter to escalate into a lethal one.

mrjaeger• 13 years ago

As with everything else it seems to be a case of misplaced incentives, both good and bad.

Imagine in 2 out of every 100 raids (numbers completely made up of course) that these style raids are called for - the people inside are incredibly dangerous and bargin in unannounced is the safest thing to do. Based on what I've read these police forces seem to treat every situation like this. Whether a hardened criminal or some dude playing poker with his friends they assume the worst and barge in guns a blazing.

And what happens? 2 times out of 100 they nail the bad guys and are probably congratulated on the local news and within the department. And the other 98 times? Nothing. They hand out some minor violations and leave, none the worse for it. Or again that's what it seems the case is based on these articles. So why wouldn't they just barge in and do whatever the hell they want. They are either heroes or the people they are terrorizing have no way to fight back. There needs to be some way to either punish them for this or positively incentivize more civil raids/raiding at all.

As the financial crisis showed us, bankers would bet the country if it meant they get a bigger bonus. It seems we are a point where the police will essentially do the same.

aidos• 13 years ago

It's interesting to contrast the approach taken in different countries. I spent the majority of my life in New Zealand but the last 9 years in the UK so I've witnessed it first hand.

Within the first couple of months of arriving here (London) I had attended several large gatherings, for example festivals in and out of London, and there was a marked difference in the police handling. I was genuinely surprised when I realised that the police controlling the events were interested in the safety and enjoyment of the public. They weren't looking to stir up trouble, they weren't searching for the "bad eggs" to antagonise - they were just trying to do their best to control the situation by working with those involved.

In my time in NZ I saw the police carry out all sorts of actions that were completely unnecessary.

I saw someone arrested for overloading a car with people leaving a party - prior to that I watched the police insist that the driver allow the car to be overloaded in the first place.

I was once tripped from behind by the police (on the pavement) for walking alongside a protest on my way home from University.

Might not seem like big issues but I've seen countless similar examples where the police were actually responsible for instigating the problem.

There's very much an Us vs Them attitude in NZ that, thankfully, isn't the norm in the UK (for the moment).

lostlogin3• 13 years ago

What city were you in? I haven't experienced anything like this - but I've always been in Auckland. That sounds bad.

kunil• 13 years ago

Oh boy you have to visit Turkey sometime.

It is not just war, it is a religious war! They attack people while chanting "Allah Allah Allah...".

Too Many Cops Are Told They’re Soldiers Fighting a War. How Did We Get Here?

Related Stories