I was replying to a post in GD when it got locked, and it got me to thinking.   The gist of the post, cutting away all the crap that is the GD, is that police are not judges.  I think we already know that.  I am curious how we in Law Enforcement feel about this issue.  While I know firsthand that some officers can get too wrapped up in the blue line, become badge heavy, etc.  But the majority of LEOs, working traffic or otherwise, we go out there each day because we enjoy a job, and we have that job to do.  While many issue citation or warnings for traffic offenses or whatever, we issue citation for a reason.  Citations are issued as a summons to court so the judge can decide if A) the person actually did what was cited for B)what the punishment is for said offense.

Warning are a departments way of giving an officer the discretion to give a verbal or written warning when they feel that the actual stop itself meets the criteria for educating the person on the law, or believe that the infraction or reason for can be dealt with with said warning.  

While I am not going to comment on what other officers or departments say or do, I think that most officers would agree that common sense prevails in most traffic stops.  In my experience, there are some infraction I ALWAYS give a citation for.  For instance, Seat Belt use.  It is the #1 injury and death preventing device in a vehicle.  When I was in the Navy years ago, a good friend of mine was ejected out of his open top jeep and killed in a collision that should have been a paint scrape at best.  This was before my stint as a police officer, and it is just one of my pet peeves.  There are a few other ones, like having vehicle insurance.  If  all law abiding citizens are required to have it (our state law), then the one that gets in a wreck and doesnt have it puts the burden back on us citizens that pay insurance.  

I was told early in my career that a traffic stop is an opportunity to educate the public.   If I write a ticket, I explain why the ticket is being issued, and I don't argue.  That is for a judge.  If I issue a warning, I spend a bit more time educating or explaining the violation, and hope that the person has learned from the experience.  I try to remember what it was like to be on the other side of the traffic stop, since we have all been there before.  While I stop thousands of cars each year, the average person may be stopped 3-4 times in thier lives by the police.  They will remember most of the details of that contact for the rest of their lives, and it is up to Law Enforcement to make sure that the majority of the contacts with the public are a positive one.  I was told that once, and I have passed that on to rookie placed in my charge, and that still holds very true.  Treat others as you would want them to treat your mother, father, sister, or brother.  

Police usually contact people when those people least want to see the police.   Traffic Stop, Collision, Death, Domstic Violence, Robbery, Theft, whatever.  While victims may be happy to see the police, they would rather have never been involved in the situation in the first place.  Same goes for the person that caused the situation.  The fact of life is we are here, we have a duty to respond, enforce traffic laws, restrain people, and in some instances, hurt and/or kill people.  Many of us in the LEO community love what we do, because, in my case, deep down, I like helping people and making a difference in the community.  It sounds corny, yes, but modern police forces have become more professional (I hope) and the days of the one officer, one baton, game over I would hope are over.  We have our bad apples, I know.  But the majority of LEOs are just like the majority of all citizens, whether they be bankers, hairdressers, soldiers, or whatever.  

So you can bash at LEOs for enforcing the law, but good or bad, someone voted to put that law into place.  If you don't like the law, change it.  We call it like we see it for the most part, and I certainly don't get a free toaster no matter how many citations I write.  I do get some personal satisfaction out of, say getting an impaired driver off the road, but that satisfaction is temperd by the thousands of lives lost to drunk drivers across the nation every year.  We cannot stop eevery infraction, nor should we, but without your local LEO out there, do you think it would be any safer on the streets?  It would be a giant bumper car ride.  


I think that many in GD fail to grasp that concept, I have to say it here....

Right on man! That is exactly right, although I may not currently be in Law Enforcement, I have many friends who are and hope soon to get back into it. Many people that I have discussions with cannot seem to grasp the concept of what you just wrote. It is easy for us Pro LEO and Pro Law abiding citizens to understand but those who are on the other side of the law or close to it just don't understand because it is just an "Inconvenience" to them!





 

Very well said.

I think it's sad that so many here are critical of our large contingent of LEO members––GD seems to forget that we're all gun owners and gun lovers. The LEOs here are the most likely to respect their fellow citizens and their rights.

Today was my first post in a LEO thread and I do not dislike LEO in general. I have family that wear blue and strongly considered the force after my active duty was up. My problem is with the JBT that gives the rest of the good guys a bad rep. In GD, generally speaking, when a thread is spotlighted it is from wrong doing or a mistake made by a LEO. I hear the stories of this nature first hand of certain officer so&so doing acts which would and should get investigated and it never fails that you stick up for the officer in question. Maybe if you want the respect and understanding of the people, you should call a spade a spade and admit that some officers are in fact, a JBT and not defend the actions of some that should not be on the force.

Disclaimer: My statement is not directed at any officer and is only food for thought from a non hating member of this forum. We all are human and to error is a fact of life. To admit to an error is foremost, being a man and secondly, being a good officer.

The non leo group is a much larger group, so it's easy to find people with an anti police agenda.

AZ Trooper,

You sound like a good guy and make some good points. I'm in TX, but I have friends in AZ and they seem to have some pretty good state laws with respect to 2nd amendment rights.

I do wonder though how somebody can be a LEO in a state like NJ, MD or CA where the state laws are just unconstitutional? You either got to be so dumb that you don't know the law you are enforcing is unconstitutional and morally wrong or you know it and enforce it anyway. Personally, I can't find it in myself to trust either of these types. I can't buy I'm just doing my job. If somebody is on your ass to do things that are wrong, then the whole org is wrong.

Also, LE can't afford "a few bad apples" like other professions. That's too many. I see the amount of responsibility you have as equal with airline pilots or astronauts and expect that level of performance and professionalism. The kind of level headed, "we're landing in the Hudson" type of response regardless of the stress. And while being in authority, never taking advantage of that authority beyond what is granted.

It's funny but in my almost nine years on the job, I have only run into three persons who hated LEOs. Granted, they were arrested for various crimes. Since being on AR15.com since 2002, I have seen and read more LEO bashing than anywhere else in my entire life. Those who are openly hateful of LEOs here either have an agenda, are coo coo for coco puffs, or just looking for a way to lash out and cause trouble due to their own run ins with the "popo". It's very sad this happens on a great website like AR15 but let's face it, this is the internet and nothing should be taken seriously especially the rantings of an unquiet mind.

When I became an LEO thirty eight years ago the first thing that I learned was that a thick skin is required when dealing with some non LEO's.

Many people have opinions about LEO's that come from friends, and family, that have not had sterling relationships with The Police.

I try to be tolerant of such individuals but I sometimes slip into "uber defense mode" and have a good chew on someones ass.

Like I've said before I'm not one for this "turn the other cheek" stuff.

I'm afraid that some people will never see The Police as their benefactors, which they are.

That's a pity.

Mike

Jelousy or hatred over a past arrest or contact with LEO.

+1 you beat me to it.  

As one of those dumb morally corrupt CA LEO's I would ask you to please comment on the current events of Heller v DC and now McDonald v Chicago(think I got that one correct) and the constitutionality of CA gun laws.

Frankly, in my area I don't have many if any contacts with otherwise law abiding folks doing something illegal with a firearm.  The times a gun has been involved in a contact the person carrying the gun had other criminal issues - ie felon in possession, brandishing, stolen vehicle, etc.

Brian

People don't like being told what to do and they like to argue about it, IMHO. When I was doing Navy Police, I was called Hitler, infuriated senior officers for enforcement, had a "debate" with a retiree who got ticket because his dog was locked in the car, had officer wives take out, briefly, their distress of obeying the regulations on my enlisted, and so forth. I don't know why non criminal people have this degree of not wanting to obey the law...............but they do. It goes with the job.
__________________________________________________
(After illegal time traveler comments he has broken no law in this time, let him stay. "I'm the law (from our time period) here, Dr. Bach. I will decide whether or not you are in violation."––Darien Lambert, (w,stte), Time Trax "The Gravity of It All")

A lot of the people over on GD are either college kids with no real world experience, adults living in moms basement, social misfits, weirdos, and a few decent people mixed in the crowd.

A few times a week somebody on GD will post a 1500 word story about being pulled over by the police.  And then after demonstrating that they acted like a total boob in their story they ask, 'so hive, how did i do?'.  Anybody that seeks approval on an internet forum full of GD types is likely a social misfit themselves.

Once or twice a week I will browse GD for maybe 10 or 15 minutes just for a laugh.  Theirs a few good threads in there but it's mostly nonsense.

Some people can't stand being told what to do or not do.

Bashing I won't do cause I am a lowly corrections officer.The scum of the town. Babysitters. Couldn't get a job nowhere else, all that BS.
What I do though is put up with the nuts you bring in from the streets.
That said, I think a ticket for a marker light or tag light is crap , and wrong.That stuff is for the punks who cuss you and lie to you.

Mmmmm, that reminds me of forensics class I was in. Prof asks "what do you do if your informant still wants to deal drugs?"
And I responded, sitting on the front row (of course), that you don't let him................and I was ignored.

The question is repeated to the class in a different format, more intense. I repeat what I said before in a different way..........and he doesn't accept my answer but asks his question again. About the third time of this, I'm wondering "Am I too nice for this job?"

But what it was, as he told me after class, "Look, I know you have LE experience. I was trying to get the message out to this kids that you don't get in bed with the crooks, no matter how good the prize looks. All they know is what they have seen on tv." (probably words to that effect....he might not have used the "strange bedfellows" comment with me)

I refuse to watch most cop shows because most of them make me cringe with how they do things (#1 reason)........although I got a giggle with one that I caught in passing the other month. They showed the title agency making a rivalry blunder with another agency and even though they were suppose to be the premier heroes in the series, that blunder was rather like their reputation in reality 20 years ago.......(as I drift from the point)

One thing to watch out for General from my point of view.....it's easy to get caught up in the paranoia about the world as it is. Maybe.....I have more than one boss that's similar in paranoia, so it just maybe the compounding of the factor. My mother would call horror movies "mind pollution"......I find that General is similar. But it may not be General alone but rather, just the way things are as I noted in Being on the inside as oppose to being on the outside; when you are in the world like that, to some degree, people who aren't ................................. really have no clue about what your world is about.
___________________________________________________________________
(Professor Walsh, after setting Buffy up, has announced to Riley Finn that Buffy was killed....and the plan starts to fall apart as Buffy shows up on the TV monitors. "Professor Walsh. That simple little recon you sent me on wasn't a raccoon. Turns out it was me trapped in the sewers with a faulty weapon and two of your pet demons. If you think that's enough to kill me, you really don't know what a Slayer is. Trust me when I say you're gonna find out."––Buffy, (w,stte), BtVs "The I in Team")

Like being told to slow down.....

This and add in the fact that this IS the internet.

Some people in GD love the opportunity to anonymously post whatever they want.

GD knows who the LEO's on the board are and some thrive at the opportunity to argue with them in an internet forum because they could never do it in real life.

I love GD.

I have no problem with you busting them for other real crimes.  Haul their asses downtown.

Do you really think every law on the books where you work is just and constitutional and don't feel bad about enforcing some of them?

Unloaded OC is legal in CA, what would you do if you came across somebody with no other infractions other than he had unintentionally left a round in a magazine?

As to the Supremes, they are finally going to re-assert what we have all known all along. Owning and carrying arms is a right of every law abiding* citizen of the United States (even the citizens of CA, MD, NJ and Chicago) It is an utter shame that the citizens have had to go to some much legal trouble to have that right "clarified" by the court. It should have never been infringed in the first place.

*well, not states laws that try to overrule the BOR.

It's just assholes on the fringes of both sides.

You're leaving out those who abhor people that abuse authority.

Whether they be cops that break the law, priests that molest children or politicians that take bribes and forsake the voters they are the lowest of the low.

If you honestly know you don't do that, then that is great. Can you look at all your coworkers and honestly state that you have never seen them abuse authority?

I really want you guys to clean up your houses. There are still *far too many* news stories every week about police convicted (not accused, but convicted) of crimes and corruption. Then all the rest of you say "Isolated Incident."

This makes the average citizen like me fearful about what might happened if I get pulled over legally carrying by a "bad apple" cop that is having a bad day. It makes us feel like we can't trust any of you. We have no way to figure out which of you are honest cops and which are "bad apples" until it is too late. We don't have a detector for that.

These two posts sum up what I wanted to say.  More and more it is getting harder to take anything posted in GD seriously, especially when it comes to anything related to LEO's. I really believe most of them just get off on starting arguments over the Internet.

In my limited experience in LE, the majority of people respect LEO's and understand the job we have to do. Those that I have noticed that do not like LE, are those that have been locked up before or those that think they can do whatever they want without any regard to others.

I have yet to have a traffic stop where the driver didnt say "thank you". I don't think I am anything special, but that it just goes to show that if we are courteous and our actions are on par with the situation, people can accept responsibility for their actions and still have respect for LE.

People expect professionalism with the badge and when the person behind the badge lives up to that, regardless of the situation, LE will always be a respected profession.

AZ Trooper is spot on.

First off, I would like to say 99% of LEOs wherever they work are are honest, fair, caring, and upstanding people. Unfortunately now and then we get a "bad egg" and it only takes that one "bad egg" to ruin the view of many in the public's eye. You rarely hear "good" news...always the bad news....dirty laundry sells! It is sad that the reputation that all the good Officers worked so hard to uphold can be diminished and stained by the actions of a very remote  few "bad cops"....and their are some out there....it makes our job that much harder....and it's hard enough!

When we fall..we fall hard.

The whole "shooting your dog" thing is old too. Dogs love me. I carry a box of milk bones in the patrol car and I gotta tell you, I have never had any negative feedback from the K9 community.

Meh, its just all the cops wanting to be FFs or medics.

In a nutshell, I believe that as leo's we deal with 10% of the population 90% of the time.
The other people who we don't deal with typically, call us on their worst day.  Home
invasion's, burglary, auto theft, assault, etc etc etc.

The 10% we deal with obviously are slightly jaded towards leo's because of their own
past actions and behaviors which have resulted in being a suspect or arrestee.  Those
same people then complain to other family members/friends and displace the blame to
those who arrested them.

I believe that most people are inherently good and live life accordingly.  But with any
job there are those 1-10% who give their respective job a bad reputation.  (Fast food
to Government Agent)  
You just have to know where you stand and let all the rest be water off the ducks back.

The whole LEO bashing thing used to get under my skin. After reading it for a while, I came to pretty solid conclusion. These guys are the same ones that call for help every time something happens. They are also the ones who constatntly say, "I would have done this, or I would have done that if that pig would have done that to me". The most hilarious part of all of it is, is that we know these people. Very few have little real world expeirance other than playing Modern Warfare on PS3. Few have actually been in hot zones, few have actually ever done a dynamic enty into a home that an armed subject is in. Even fewer have ever been in a shooting or for that matter ever pointed a firearm at another humanbeing. We deal with them on a daily basis. In all reality, we understand that most of these guys WOULD NOT BUST A GRAPE IN A FRUIT FIGHT. These guys would still call us, and we would still take a bullett willingly to protect them, or would use deadly force to protect them with out a second thought. They will not, cannot understand this, to simply put it, its because of who we are. Most cops have a natural calling to do this job, our wiring, so to speak, our DNA perdisposes us to seek out this line of work. Officers who dont or cant understand this are weeded out eventually, either by other police, substance abuse, women, criminal activity, or their mental capacity to deal with people like this. I was in a armorer school with a real salty vet afew years ago. This guy had been a cop for 50 years and had the commision card to prove it. He put police work into perspective for me better that I have ever heard it. It actually gave me peace. I will share this with you guys. " Police work is like having a front row seat to the wildest circus or Jerry Springer show on the planet. We have the unique opertunity to sit on the front row and witness it first hand. Every once in a while, we get to take a worthless pos and take away his freedom for a long time or permanently. Furthermore, rarely, we get to take an active shooter, cop killer, rapist, murderer, or any other enemy of the state, be it foreign or domestic, of the face of this planet forever. That my friend is working with GOD....and helping him do his work".

Brian

Best post yet!

I used to really try to logically post responses to anti-LEO threads without any success.  When an anti-LEO nutjob starts on a rant, no amount of logic will stop them.  Now I just try to get my shots in and show them to be what they are.  It may not be the best approach....oh well.

Brian,
Thanks for the thoughtful and rational responses.
Sounds like you have put some thought into the whole situation.

General Disfunction is the toilet of ARFCOM. Nothing but puke, shit, and used tampons. I never go there, it's nothing but a waste of time IMO.


Stay safe...

QFT  






 

I enjoy reading their stupid "legalize pot but I dont smoke it" threads.

Because of things like this;
http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=1&f=5&t=1027560
Debate the merits of the officer's actions and the subsequent felony charges all you want, but remember it only takes one "Oh Shit" to wipe out years of "attaboys" and it only takes one douchebag to make an entire state look like douchebags, merely by association.

I've been to a "residential burglary in progress call" where the homeowner (armed) is hiding in his closet waiting for us to show up.

He had one of those nice little signs on his fence that said "Caution We Don't Call 911" and had a picture of a pistol.

After we determined the call was nothing more than the wind blowing a door in his house, I wanted very badly to ask him what his arfcom screen name was. I maintained my professionalism for once and told him to have a good night and left.

Well put, both.   I like the SEP.  It seems that society thrives on that lately.  The "not me" is to blame for all the worlds problems.  

Edited to add, Thanks to all for the posts.  Seems we have a better than average chance at a decent discussion, pro or con.  I have to thank the board for small favors like this Brothers of the Shield area.  I have been on this board for a while, and while GD has seen better days, AR-15.com has never been a better place.

First, the part a few posts ago, bout the "willing to take a bullet to protect"...............................I will send rounds down range, but if it is between badguy, goodguy, and me.........bad guy looses..........if it is between good guy and me, I am going home safe to my family the next morning. Sorry, but I would rather live to fight another day. I ain't in the military anymore, and when I was, it was not die for your county, but make the other guy die for his.............thats all for that rant. lol

The news will only report the "bad apples". That is what people who got speeding tickets want to watch. They sit there, and think of how they got screwed cause the cops are "all bad". lol
When really, you never see a "breaking story" that reads or starts out "37,529 legal, constitutional, stops, arrests, and detainees today!!!! Nearly 40,000 people saved from them selves and others!!"
or maybe this "This just in! Driver was given a citation for speeding! After a lengthy investigation, he was found to be speeding."

I think it would be pretty cool to see that.   We have to fight a lot of stigma here in the south and in LEO land esp. Like the Memphis PD reported around 300 or so murders last year......may have been closer to 400, not sure............but the thing is, they only reported murder on the UCR as people that were killed by other people and found dead on the scene. IF they died later at the hospital, it was not reported. There were more than 600 murders in Memphis! When people find out about that sort of stuff, then hear the city claiming a lower rate of crime, it gives us all a bad reputation.
Just saying.

It's easy to talk smack on the computer when nobody knows who you are.  I'm sure these people will not post about when they had to call the police because they heard something in the back yard or heard dogs barking.  They will probably post up a long story about how they pulled out their AR went outside and saved the day.  I just go out there do my job and keep each other safe so we can go home to our families.

Meh....same people who keep demanding, "why did you pull me over!?", "I demand to speak to a supervisor!", "I'm going to call my lawyer//sue you!"

Anything you say will set them off and they will twist your words to fit their narrow minded view of the world. Pipedreamers, the whole lot of them.

Why care?

Nobody left out those who abhor people that abuse authority.  I abhor those that abuse authority but I'm not an LE basher, I'm an LEO.  LEO's that step outside the law are terrible for us.  You think it causes trust issues with the public and you are correct.  Those trust issues make it that much harder for the rest of us to effectively do our job.  Nobody here is supporting those people or their actions.  What the OP was talking about was the attitude in GD to assume that, no matter what is reported, the Police MUST have wrongfully abused some citizen.  Many posters in GD despise LEO's so much that any LEO is believed to be the enemy.  That is no better than the gun grabbers believing every citizen that owns a gun is a paranoid criminal and is, in fact, less correct.  Both are very low, but the percentage of gun owners that commit crimes is higher than the percentage of cops that commit crimes.  

I do know that I don't abuse authority and yes, I can honestly say I've never seen a co-worker of mine abuse authority.  To my knowledge it has only happened one time at my department since I was hired and that Officer was fired for his actions.  I'm not sure what else we can do to "clean house" as you suggest.  The actions that got my co-worker fired weren't bad enough to be considered criminal, but they were enough to get him fired.

As for news stories every week, where is the shock there?  If a cop is arrested and convicted anywhere in the nation for practically anything it will be all over the news because it is such a rare occurance (ie isolated incident).  I don't have the numbers but I suspect the number of legitimate complaints against Officers compared to the total number of contacts Officers have with the public would be as likely as getting struck by lightning.  

As for the unconstitutional laws in states like California, the Officers there are hired from the public there.  If the commonly held belief is that guns should be regulated it isn't surprising that the majority of Officers there believe the same way.  You believe that such restrictive gun laws are unconstitutional.  I happen to agree with you and I will never live or work in an area where that is the case but just because Officers there don't believe the way you and I do about gun regulation doesn't make them "bad apples" or JBT's.  In fact, I would think someone like yourself would prefer Officers in those areas to believe as you do.  It would significantly raise the odds of you getting a break for something that is, in fact, illegal in those areas.  There are mechanisms in place to change the laws, and that is where we all need to focus our attention, not on bashing those tasked with enforcing the laws.

That is so true.  Everyone Most think they are Billy-Bad-Ass until there is actually a chance harm will come to them.  Then they call us...

ETA:  I shouldn't say "everyone" so I changed it to most.

If you wanted to be loved, you should have been a fireman.  If I gave two sh!ts about what the 350 lb. guys who sit in their mom's basements, eating cheetos and surfing porn thought about how I do my job, their complaints might matter.

The member who mentioned the "fringes on both sides" has an excellent point there.

I submit the greatest percentage of those who slam LE regardless of the facts of the matter - will continue to do so. They have screwed up and cannot accept it as their own fault, had some daddy issues from their childhood, or just love to pile on.

That said....we have a few members, allegedly LE, who positively suck at being diplomats of the badge. Or at least, fail at conveying objectivity in this medium, certainly upon this forum. And it not only sticks out like a sore thumb, it validates the words of the drooling, all-cops-are-JBTs crowd.

Both contribute to the others' perception of themselves. But there are statistically many more people who get arrested than there are LE, so the pool of blind LE haters will always be the larger of the two.

Hell, I had to go to IA for telling a guy he had absolutely no proof I'd ever had sex with his Mom after he motherfucked me in front of his whole family. So I may have not been quite the ambassador myself back then.

But I get better every day.

Well said.   We as LEOs have to be better ambassadors to our profession, and look at things objectively, just like we do when we are out on the street.  We are always being watched, whether from the innocent civilian to CopWatch to nefarious characters that want to goad us into confrontation.  And it all will be on YouTube, and of course it will be the single snipet of video when we are at our worst, have had enough, or making the right or wrong choice.  It is a fishbowl, and I guess we must live with it if we are to continue in this profession.  I think it is worth it, every day.

A question to the leo community, you witness another officer do something inappropriate, an unnecesary punch or slam on the hood.
What do you do ??? Do you risk crossing that thin blue line, being a rat risking somebody won't have your back.
I contend this is where the hate comes from, most leo may be good officers in the sense that they may not do something inappropriate
but when they witness something wrong the do nothing or even lie to cover it up. There for  becoming accessories to the bad apple.
This MD incident is a perfect example how many of you would have filed a contradictory report if the video had never surfaced.
If your honest with us and yourself  you will admit that number is near zero.