Archive for the ‘Cops’ Category

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We could fly a helicopter, nothing left to talk about.

Friday, December 5th, 2014

Hey, speaking of Chief Acevedo and the Austin Police Department, were you saying to yourself, “Self, I wonder if the APD got any of that sweet military surplus gear, like snow pants and snow shoes?”

The answer? $2,170,190.24 worth. Including a helicopter.

apd

Also, 13 “RIFLE,7.62 MILLIMETER”. Not that I’m complaining; I own one, so why shouldn’t the APD?

Also, this is just the Austin Police Department. The Austin Community College Police Department, which is a separate entity, got some stuff too. Nothing flashy, though. The Bastrop PD got $93,180.88 worth, including 10 “RIFLE,5.56 MILLIMETER”. The Buda PD numbers look a little odd: they are reported as getting 13 “RIFLE,5.56 MILLIMETER” with a total value of $1,560 (that’s $120 per rifle; you can’t even buy a Mosin-Nagant for $120 these days) and 3 “PISTOL,CALIBER .45,AUTOMATIC” valued at $176.13 (that’s $58.71 per; I’ll buy .45 automatic pistols at $58.71 all damn day. As long as they have a serviceable frame, I don’t care if they fire out of the box; they can be gunsmithed into working guns. It’d be a good learning experience.)

One more: the Lakeway PD got 30 of those “PISTOL,CALIBER .45,AUTOMATIC” (same price per as above) and two “RIFLE,7.62 MILLIMETER” ($138 per) for a total of $2,037.30.

And why does the Leander PD need a “MINE RESISTANT VEHICLE”?

If you’re wondering about your own municipal police department or other law enforcement agency, here’s the database I drew all this from (scroll to the bottom to search).

Hattip: Popehat on the Twitter.

(Subject line hattip.)

Posted in Austin, Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

Art (Acevedo), damn it! watch. (#Q of a series)

Friday, December 5th, 2014

Lawrence sent me a link this morning with the subject “Just go to town on this”. I see that several other folks have already.

Here’s the Statesman version:

Acevedo asked the public to be alert and to keep their eyes peeled for people who are known to be well armed and espouse extremist beliefs.
“And that’s why it’s important for us as Americans to know our neighbors, know our families — tell somebody,” he said. “If you know somebody that is acting with a lot of hatred towards any particular group — especially if it’s somebody you know is a gun enthusiast or is armed with these type of firearms and they’re showing any kind of propensity for hatred — it doesn’t mean we’re going to take them to jail, but we might want to vet these people.”

Mmmmmmmhmmmm. I could point out that anyone who purchases their firearm from a licensed dealer (roughly 80% to 90% of transactions) has already been “vetted”. I could point out that Larry Steven McQuilliams also set several fires, and that a plastic container of gasoline can be more devastating than any assault weapon. I could ask what Chief Art means by a “propensity for hatred”, or how many officers he’s going to assign to vetting people. (Here’s a hint, Chief: you’re probably going to want to start by vetting every single employee of Dell. That may be a slight exaggeration, but when I worked there, pretty much everyone in Enterprise Technical Support owned serious firepower of one sort or another.) Or I could just quote Greg Campbell:

Our civil rights are not to blame for violence and we should not feel compelled to inform on our neighbors like a modern day Stasi.

If I really felt mean, I’d point out that you’re probably in more danger from the Austin PD than any “extremist”, especially if you’re black.

But let me single out one thing I haven’t seen anybody else jump on:

And on Monday at the same press conference, he urged for people to consider supporting laws that would make illegal “straw purchasers” that help put guns into the hands of criminals.

Wow. Just…wow. Dear Chief Acevedo:

“Straw purchases” are already illegal, you fucking moron.

Perhaps if you bought your own ammunition, you would have seen one of these posters at your local gun shop. Or WalMart. Or Academy. Or maybe you could listen to NPR.

But apparently our chief does none of these things.

The city council runoff elections are a few days away. I’m going to make a point of asking the candidates in my district if they support keeping Chief Acevedo in his position. And I plan to vote appropriately.

Posted in Austin, Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law, Politics | Comments Closed

Well. Well well well. Well.

Monday, December 1st, 2014

As the threat of federal charges looms over eight former Fort Worth police officers accused in a traffic ticket scandal, a Tarrant County prosecutor revealed that state charges were dropped this year because evidence shows the city was using an illegal quota system.

….

The quota accusation was first raised in 2010 by an attorney for some of the fired officers when they appealed their terminations.
Lt. Paul Henderson, then [Police Chief Jeff] Halstead’s chief of staff, dismissed that accusation, saying, “The Fort Worth Police Department does not have ticket quotas.”
Henderson was later fired after his arrest on suspicion of DWI.

…

“There was never even an effort, however, to explain the supposed difference between ‘you write four tickets an hour or you don’t work STEP’ and a ‘quota,’ ” the attorneys wrote in their motion. “The illegal activity was, therefore, not only illegal and ongoing, there was a concerted, albeit sophomoric, effort on the part of the police department to disguise the illegal activity and to cover it up.”

…

In El Paso, 18 police officers were indicted in recent years after an investigation into similar reports that officers falsified documents to gain overtime pay through a state Transportation Department grant program.


Houston also had their own overtime scandal, but I’m unclear if it also involved state grant money.

Hattip: Grits for Breakfast.

Here’s another one from over the weekend that also made my jaw drop:

In a shocking action, Judge Morrison C. England Jr. ordered the recusal of every federal judge in the Eastern District of California. (Emphasis added – DB)

What happened? Briefly, Sierra Pacific Industries and some other companies have been fighting the Justice Department for several years. Justice accused the defendants of causing a forest fire, and managed to get 22,500 acres of land transferred to the government, along with $55 million in payments over five years. Sierra Pacific and the other defendants argued that they didn’t start the fire, and that Justice…

“…presented false evidence to the Defendants and the Court; advanced arguments to the Court premised on that false evidence; or, for which material evidence had been withheld, and obtaining court rulings based thereon; prepared key Moonlight Fire investigators for depositions, and allowed them to repeatedly give false testimony about the most important aspects of their investigation; and failed to disclose the facts and circumstances associated with the Moonlight Fire lead investigator’s direct financial interest in the outcome of the investigation arising from an illegal bank account that has since been exposed and terminated.”

Hattip: Overlawyered.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Ripped from the police blotter.

Friday, November 28th, 2014

This is still a breaking news story, so details are sketchy. I note it here because…well, it is strange, and there may be some lessons to draw from it. Also, I’m not sure how much coverage it will get outside of Austin.

Early this morning (around 2 AM), somebody started driving around downtown Austin shooting at buildings. According to the Statesman, he shot at the Mexican consulate, the Federal courthouse, and APD headquarters.

He did not injure or kill anyone, as far as is currently known. The shooter was confronted at or near APD headquarters by the police and killed. There are rumors that he may have had an explosive device in his vehicle, and possibly one on his person, but these rumors are not confirmed.

Don’t know what to say about this, beyond: trouble can happen anywhere, and where and when you least expect it. I’ll add updates if I see anything substantial.

Edited to add: more from the HouChron, which claims “more than 100 rounds” were fired, and that the gunman tried to torch the Mexican Consulate.

I threw together a quick and dirty Google map, just to illustrate (for the benefit of my out of town readers) the locations in question.

Posted in Austin, Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

A couple of random notes: November 14, 2014.

Friday, November 14th, 2014

When asked whether disparities in treatment were based on race, gender, rank or nepotism, officers overwhelmingly said they believed decisions about discipline revolved around an officer’s rank and whether he or she was well liked by their superiors in the department. Command-level officers routinely received slaps on the wrist or no punishment, while lower-ranking officers were suspended for similar misconduct, officers wrote.

From the LAT archives, some spectacular photos of firefighters responding to a DC-6 crash.

Former Seattle Sonic Robert Swift has been charged with a gun crime one month after police claim to have seized drugs, guns and a grenade launcher from the Kirkland home where he was living.

What I find interesting about this story is that, with the exception of the standard “junk on the bunk” photo, all the weapons photos are of guns “similar to one police say was seized from Bjorkstam’s Kirkland home”. No photos of the actual guns? Also, heroin dealing must not be that lucrative if all you can afford is a Taurus.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clothing, Cops, Guns, Heroism, Law, Photography, Planes | Comments Closed

Historical video, emphatically NOT suitable for use in schools.

Friday, September 26th, 2014

By way of Ace of Spades: The LA Police Department Skilled Shooting Exhibition Of 1936. (As Maetenloch notes, this is probably from 1938. And although the heading says LAPD, this is actually the LA Sheriff’s Department.)

There’s some good stuff in this:

  • I do love me some nice Thompson work.
  • It is an interesting piece of history, if you want to see how police shot back then. I believe the LAPD was pretty progressive in their pistol training at that time; certainly they were in 1955, when Sterling Walker wrote “How Cops Get Killed” for Guns Magazine. It seems logical to assume that that the LACSD worked the same way. The one-handed shooting stance looks funny in retrospect, but you have to remember the Weaver Stance hadn’t been invented yet. And I suspect that “Combat” range and the practice drills were pretty far out in front of the curve for 1938.
  • I like the course of fire shown at the range. I might try that next time I go out to the range with one of my revolvers.

    • LAPD

  • I wonder if this is where the shooting competition in Magnum Force was staged. IMDB is no help here.

There are also some things I really dislike about this video:

  • The tinkly piano music really gets on my nerves.
  • I wish it were better lit, or in better focus, or both. I can’t tell what guns the shooters are using (except for the one guy with the Thompson, of course). Various sources say LAPD was issuing the S&W K-38 Target Masterpiece and the K-38 Combat Masterpiece until 1988. (The difference between the two is that the Target Masterpiece had a 6″ barrel; the Combat Masterpiece had a 4″.) The Walker article mentioned above says they also used the Colt Officer’s Model Special. The problem I have is that the K-38 in either version didn’t start showing up until post-WWII. I think the guns in the video may be Colts, and there could be a couple of M&P Model of 1905 4th Change revolvers in there; it is just hard to tell. (Again, I’m assuming LACSD and LAPD used the same or similar equipment. Frankly, there weren’t a lot of choices at the time, though I guess they could have issued Registered Magnums…)
  • JESUS JOSEPH AND MARY ON A FREAKING POGO STICK, WERE THESE PEOPLE IDIOTS?! In case you’re wondering why I’m screaming, it should become apparent to you at about 35 seconds into the video. What the frack? What the fracking frack? Was life cheaper back then? Were these guys getting some hefty hazard pay? For my readers at home: DON’T DO THIS, OKAY? Seriously, this has “manslaughter” written all over it.
  • Also, there’s much more effective ear protection out there these days than cigarettes or wads of cotton.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law, Stupid | Comments Closed

Banana republicans watch: September 23, 2014.

Tuesday, September 23rd, 2014

The six members of the LA County Sheriff’s Department who were convicted of obstructing a FBI investigation were sentenced today.

Former Lt. Gregory Thompson was sentenced to 37 months; Lt. Stephen Leavins to 41 months; Sgt. Scott Craig to 33 months; Sgt. Maricela Long to 24 months; Deputy Gerard Smith to 21 months; and Deputy Mickey Manzo to 24 months.

(Previously.)

And a seventh LACSO deputy was convicted last week.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Jesus, Joseph, and Mary. Poor guy.

Wednesday, August 27th, 2014

I’ve mentioned previously that I watched COPS on a regular basis, at least until it left Fox for the wilderness of basic cable. I’ll still watch it if I catch it on somewhere.

I remember seeing some fairly shocking and disturbing things during that time; fatal highway accidents, one carload of police officers (with a camera crew on board) being broadsided during a high-speed chase by another cop car. But I never thought anything like this would happen.

A crew member with the “Cops” television show was fatally struck by police gunfire as Omaha officers confronted a robber — who also was fatally wounded — at a midtown restaurant, law enforcement sources said Wednesday.

…

The robbery suspect apparently had an air gun, a type of BB gun that looks like an actual firearm. He apparently was a prison parolee from Kansas, law enforcement sources said.

The World-Herald claims that the police were the only ones shooting, and that “at least 30 shots” were fired during the incident.

I’m not sure what else I can say about this, other than it is sad and awful, and I’ll pass along any significant updates.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law, TV | Comments Closed

Busted, again.

Tuesday, August 26th, 2014

General hattip on all of this to Romenesko.

A while back, I wrote about Busted, Wendy Ruderman and Barbara Lasker’s book about their coverage of corrupt cops in Philadelphia. At that time, I asked what they had accomplished, given that the bad cops were still on the street.

Last week, the Philadelphia Inquirer (the other daily newspaper, and the one that got soundly beat by Ruderman and Lasker on the story) ran a piece “Why an accused Phila. officer is still on the force” purporting to answer the question of why Thomas Tolstoy hadn’t been fired yet, even though he’d been accused of sexually assaulting three women. There are various reasons, but the Inquirer‘s key one:

The documents also show that actions the victim ascribed to two Philadelphia Daily News reporters who wrote about her assault further undermined the criminal case by damaging her credibility and complicating a federal investigation.
The woman told investigators that the reporters – whose account of the assault and other police abuses would go on to win a Pulitzer Prize in 2010 – provided her with gifts, paid her bills, offered her money to hire a lawyer, and told her that she could collect a financial windfall if she talked to them and not to law enforcement officials, according to the documents.
She also told investigators that the reporters were aware that an associate of hers had pressured her to lie about the circumstances of the attack. And she said one of the reporters encouraged her to give an exaggerated account of the raid, saying it would help in a potential lawsuit.
The woman’s accusations of impropriety by the reporters – included in detailed interview summaries signed by FBI agents – imperiled an already precarious case, according to three high-ranking officials familiar with the investigation.

Uh-huh. Ruderman and Lasker deny this, of course. Ruderman has posted a response on Facebook. And it’s worth pointing out that these accusations only involve one of the three women, and have nothing to do with the separate allegation that Tolstoy was one of the cops caught on tape stealing from bodegas.

Philadephia magazine has published their own piece about the problems of the Inquirer story. Points:

Posted in Books, Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

The Washington Post makes me testy again.

Wednesday, August 13th, 2014

Actual WP headline:

Waldman: Libertarians silent on Mo. shooting

(I won’t provide a link because 1) the Posties tell me I’ve used up all my articles for the month even though I’m a subscriber, and II) I don’t link clickbait.)

Yeah! Those pesky Libertarians haven’t been talking at all about Ferguson!

Except for Walter Olsen at Overlawyered.

And the folks over at Reason.

And Popehat on the Twitter.

And Morlock Publishing, but technically I think he’s an anarcocapitalist rather than a Libertarian.

To be fair, Balko hasn’t had much to say specifically about Ferguson, though he has been continuing to write about police militarization and misconduct.

Perhaps the WP issues highly effective hearing protection to their staff. Maybe something like these.

Posted in Clippings, Cops | Comments Closed

When seconds count…

Tuesday, August 5th, 2014

…the police are only minutes away the phone company will send your 911 call to an answering machine.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law | Comments Closed

Strippers. Always with the strippers.

Thursday, July 31st, 2014

This one gives me qualms, as it is a BuzzFeed article (by way of the Popehat on the Twitters). But I haven’t found any other coverage of it, and I don’t think it needs to be buried. I did a Google search and found a lot of links to press releases about the original arrest, but very few about the following events (and those I found were mostly on less reputable websites, basically repeating the BuzzFeed article).

Lauro Tobias was an agent with Customs and Border Patrol. Last year, he was arrested and charged with participating in a drug deal:

…6 kilograms of cocaine were exchanged with unnamed persons for $100,000. Tobias was paid $4,000 for working as security during the deal, based on court documents.

Tobias claimed he thought he was participating in a legal transaction, and had no idea it was actually a drug deal.

Except it wasn’t actually a drug deal. The entire thing appears to have been set up by the government specifically to go after Tobias. Why him?

Tobias’ attorney, Steven West, argued in an interview with BuzzFeed that federal agents tried to turn Tobias bad in order to use him as mole in the border station. “They couldn’t get close to the so-called ‘suspect corrupt people,’” he said. “I think they took a 90-degree turn.”

Okay, that’s just what his defense attorney claimed. Take it with a grain of salt.

But it seems pretty clear, based on the evidence already introduced, that the government spent many thousands of dollars setting up this case.

For instance, according to a court motion filed by Tobias’ attorney, department officials would not release certain information about the investigation during discovery, including “an accounting of how much money was spent on this operation by the government … on hotel rooms, air fare, frequenting adult entertainment establishments, rental car costs, restaurant bills, and any other ‘perks’ that were used to implement the operation, such as the Pacquiao fight at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.”

Again, defense allegations, grain of salt, etc.

But Tobias’ attorney moved for dismissal of the case. And the government agreed and filed its own motion for dismissal. That never happens. (Well, maybe “never” is an exaggeration. But it is very rare.)

An FBI source referred requests for comment on the case to the Justice Department.

I recommend that you don’t hold your breath waiting for comment from Justice. Blue is a very unattractive color for faces.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Well, isn’t THIS interesting?

Wednesday, July 30th, 2014

Some of my readers may recall my review of Busted and my complaints about state, local, and Federal officials not taking corruption in the Philadelphia Police Department seriously.

Well.

Well well well. Well.

A group of Philadelphia narcotics officers repeatedly robbed and assaulted the drug suspects they were supposed to be investigating, engaging in a campaign of brutality that lasted nearly six years, federal authorities said Wednesday.

More:

One year later, during an illegal search of a suspect’s home, the officers held a suspect by his ankles off the edge of an 18th-floor balcony while demanding information, according to the complaint.

Somebody’s been watching too many movies.

I have trouble linking to the two Philadelphia newspapers, but I think this one will work for the Inquirer coverage. The names of the indicted cops (Thomas Liciardello, Brian Reynolds, Michael Spicer, Perry Betts, Linwood Norman, and John Speiser) ring a faint bell with me, but they don’t overlap with the cops in Busted. (Possibly they were peripheral characters in that book, but I don’t have it in front of me to check.)

The LAT claims “five of the six officers could face life in prison”, but we should keep Ken’s advice in mind. In any event, it should be interesting to watch this play out; does the chief go next? Does the Philadelphia PD come under federal supervision? And do Ms. Ruderman and Ms. Lasker have anything to say? (There’s nothing on the Daily News site. Philadelphia newspapers are weird.)

Stay tuned to this blog for more “As the Badge Turns”.

Edited to add: Oh, I wanted to highlight this part, too:

In the midst of the scrutiny, Liciardello, Reynolds and a third member of the unit, Jeffrey Walker, filed suit against Philadelphia trial lawyer Michael Pileggi, saying multiple civil rights suits he had filed on behalf of clients alleging abuse had unfairly tarnished their names.

Man, that’s brazen. That’s like Lance Armstrong brazen.

Pileggi’s insurance company settled the case for a relatively small sum. But in an interview Wednesday, the lawyer said all of the allegations in his client’s lawsuits “came to fruition [in the federal case] – beating up, false arrests, stealing.”

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law, Media | Comments Closed

Go to jail. Go directly to jail. Do not pass “Go”. Do not collect $1,000.

Friday, July 18th, 2014

Prosecutors said the detective, a 19-year veteran who works at Police Headquarters, forged another detective’s name, as well as the names of a supervising sergeant and a police inspector, on several forms after a November 2012 arrest in which a gun was seized. The arrest report did not include any associated tip, so the detective added one in order to collect $1,000, prosecutors said.

The detective in question, John Malloy, has been charged with six counts of “felony forgery” (is there “misdemeanor forgery”?), five counts of “offering a false instrument”, “attempted petit larceny”, and “official misconduct”.

Interesting note #1:

…the police have seized more than 3,350 illegal guns and arrested well over 5,500 people on gun charges. The program is viewed as a boon to officers, who get weapons off the streets, and easy money for the anonymous tipsters who collect a $1,000 reward. The foundation has paid out more than $2.1 million in rewards, which are financed by donations.

I wonder who donates to “Operation Gun Stop”. Do you suppose that’s a matter of public record?

Interesting note #2:

But the rate of tips coming into the program has declined over the last five years, according to department reports on the program. In 2008, the Gun Stop program received 731 tips, resulting in 319 guns seized. By 2013, the number of tips had fallen to 496, with 235 guns taken.

Hmmmmm. So in 2013, the NYPD got 261 more tips than guns. I wonder about those 261 other tips…

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Guns, Law, NYPD | Comments Closed

Happy Fourth of July, everyone!

Friday, July 4th, 2014

History has shown, Scruff observed, that you can never have too many fireworks.

Indeed. We spent a fair amount of money on fireworks for tonight, but the people of Dyckman Street make us look like pikers.

Scruff, whose real name is Ralphy Sanchez, 27, heads a group known as Down Post, representing a block on Post Avenue between Academy and Dyckman Streets. He is confident his group will put on the best show; he estimated that he had about $1,500 of fireworks at the ready, much of it, he said, bought with the proceeds from sales of marijuana.

Of course, this is illegal in New York City. But the people of Dyckman Street don’t give a rat’s ass.

Each block has a 10- or 20-person explosives team, but anyone is free to join. First, the firecracker chains go down — two long ones can stretch the length of a block and light the pavement in a polychromatic blaze for 15 minutes or more. Soon, they pull out the smaller rockets, handing the Roman candles to the children.

Do you smell that, former Mayor Bloomberg? It smells like…freedom.

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Explosives, Law, NYPD | Comments Closed

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