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Do Cops accounts of witnessless shootings deserve the benefit of the doubt?

Do Cops accounts of witnessless shootings deserve the benefit of the doubt?

  • Yes

    Votes: 2 11.8%

  • No

    Votes: 9 52.9%

  • Depends - explain

    Votes: 6 35.3%

  • I don't know...

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    17
Zinthaniel

Zinthaniel

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These cases blow me away - not because they reveal something about cops that I didn't already suspect but that it's a rare glimpse at the extreme lengths cops will go to cover their tracks.





Second Video without Commentary -



Here is Sean Groubert's, the officer in second video, statement about what happened and why he shot. Compare his statement to the events depicted in the video.

I pulled him over for a seat belt violation, Before I could event get out of my car he jumped out, stared at me, and as I jumped out of my car and identified myself, as I approached him, he jumped head-first back into his car."

"I started retracting back towards the rear of his vehicle telling him 'Look, get out of the car, let me see your hands. He jumped out of the car. I saw something black in his hands. I ran to the other side car yelling at him, and he kept coming towards me. Apparently it was his wallet."
Click to expand...

http://www.wltx.com/story/news/loca...his-account-of-shooting-levar-jones/16295527/


So here on the forums we have discussed at length the shootings of quite few black men. Without fail someone jumps to the defense of the cops involved using the Cop's account of the situation as their defense. These rare incedences where a conspiracy executed by cops to tamper with evidence and fabricate a story caught on camera, at least from my vantage point, make such blind faith in the words of law enforcement a tad foolhardy.

In this first video the hidden dash cam tape reveals officers beating the man who has his hands raised and screaming "Don't touch my gun" <--- the default defense, is it not? "He reached for my gun that's why I killed him." Except here we have irrefutable evidence that despite the officers clear insistance that the man reached for his gun he in fact did not.

The same happens in the second video.

So when a cop kills someone and the circumstances seem dubious - is it wise to put some much faith in the officers account of what happened?
 
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depends on the circumstances, if there is no evidence to suggest other wise we are going to have to believe the officer.

Or that is how it is in the Netherlands, because the police officer has to file a sworn statement, that carries a bit more weight that a suspect saying the opposite. The officer is swearing on his oath as a police officer. Now if there is evidence to seriously suggest that the officer lied, then this has to weigh massively against the officer if he did this to cover up something.

Firing such an officer and prosecuting should be a no-brainer for the prosecution.
 
I'm done with the idea that officers get the benefit off the doubt where everyone else is suspect as a matter of policy and habit.
 
The exact same weight that any citizen's unsupported word is given.
 
I'm with posts 3 & 4.

I grew-up in a city & a neighborhood that had more than it's share of dirty cops, and because of this I don't give any more weight to an officer's testimony than any other citizen's.

Which is a real shame to all those hard-working good cops that put their lives on-the-line every-time they go off to work. But to them, I say:

"Bust down the 'Blue Wall of Silence', and exorcise yourselves from your fellow dirty associates, because until you do, I can't give you the 'benefit of doubt' you so deserve"!
 
Chomsky said:
I'm with posts 3 & 4.

I grew-up in a city & a neighborhood that had more than it's share of dirty cops, and because of this I don't give any more weight to an officer's testimony than any other citizen's.

Which is a real shame to all those hard-working good cops that put their lives on-the-line every-time they go off to work. But to them, I say:

"Bust down the 'Blue Wall of Silence', and exorcise yourselves from your fellow dirty associates, because until you do, I can't give you the 'benefit of doubt' you so deserve"!
Click to expand...




Yeah. I'm former LE and I don't give a cop's word any more weight than the word of any other stranger. Known too many.


Badge is no guarantee of character.
 
Sometimes one may alter the facts to CYA.

But often one's account is subjective based on past experiences and preconceived opinions.

It is like watching a pro boxing match and listen to the three judges give their scores at the end of the match. Sometimes the scores are close and sometimes you have to wonder if they were watching different matches.
 
Goshin said:
Yeah. I'm former LE and I don't give a cop's word any more weight than the word of any other stranger. Known too many.


Badge is no guarantee of character.
Click to expand...
As a former LEO, you may take an interest in my former local neighborhood commander & his crew, whose local area headquarters was just a few blocks down from our two-flat where my family lived.

The crazy thing is: as dirty as these guys were (and they were far, far, far beyond the pale), my working-class neighborhood of city workers, cops, and firemen were standing behind these guys! We were a deteriorating blue-collar neighborhood filled with xenophobic European immigrants willing to do anything to separate ourselves from what can best be described as 'an African-American ghetto filled with housing projects' to the east, and 'a violent drug-ridden Mexican barrio' to the North. Even until today, the Mexican neighborhood is the top destination in the nation for narcotics brought-in from Mexico, and the African-American neighborhood is still the top gang-shooting zip-code in the U.S.

We were amongst some tough company.

Consequently, the attitude for most in our neighborhood was: "If Commander Burge says he got the guys that came into our neighborhood and did *that*, then it's good enough for me - and all the better they were found in an alley with slugs in their backs than wasting our tax money to go to court! [*that* - being whatever criminal 'trespass' incident was currently hot on the minds of those in the neighborhood]

Obviously, in a neighborhood like this, drugs, gambling, prostitution, and after-hours drinking were tolerated, as long as "the guys in the '9th'" were in on it.

And in on it, they were.

Wikipedia - 'Commander Jon Burge'
 
Chomsky said:
As a former LEO, you may take an interest in my former local neighborhood commander & his crew, whose local area headquarters was just a few blocks down from our two-flat where my family lived.

The crazy thing is: as dirty as these guys were (and they were far, far, far beyond the pale), my working-class neighborhood of city workers, cops, and firemen were standing behind these guys! We were a deteriorating blue-collar neighborhood filled with xenophobic European immigrants willing to do anything to separate ourselves from what can best be described as 'an African-American ghetto filled with housing projects' to the east, and 'a violent drug-ridden Mexican barrio' to the North. Even until today, the Mexican neighborhood is the top destination in the nation for narcotics brought-in from Mexico, and the African-American neighborhood is still the top gang-shooting zip-code in the U.S.

We were amongst some tough company.

Consequently, the attitude for most in our neighborhood was: "If Commander Burge says he got the guys that came into our neighborhood and did *that*, then it's good enough for me - and all the better they were found in an alley with slugs in their backs than wasting our tax money to go to court! [*that* - being whatever criminal 'trespass' incident was currently hot on the minds of those in the neighborhood]

Obviously, in a neighborhood like this, drugs, gambling, prostitution, and after-hours drinking were tolerated, as long as "the guys in the '9th'" were in on it.

And in on it, they were.

Wikipedia - 'Commander Jon Burge'
Click to expand...



Yeah, people are funny creatures. We're still a lot more tribal, mentally and emotionally, than we like to admit. When we feel threatened by "outsiders" we tend to go all shoulder-to-shoulder with any we see as "our own" especially if they are "protecting us from THEM." It's amazing what people will accept under such circumstances.
 
The vast majority of cops are dirty. That's why police unions across the nation refuse to install body cams. You can even see on that first video how cops are well practiced to repeatedly say "stop resisting...stop reaching for my gun" so that they can pre-emptively justify shooting unarmed people if they're in the mood to get some paid vacation time.
 
It's one of the reasons we need better recording of police intervention.
 
Zinthaniel said:
These cases blow me away - not because they reveal something about cops that I didn't already suspect but that it's a rare glimpse at the extreme lengths cops will go to cover their tracks.





Second Video without Commentary -



Here is Sean Groubert's, the officer in second video, statement about what happened and why he shot. Compare his statement to the events depicted in the video.



Trooper on Shooting: 'He Kept Coming Towards Me'


So here on the forums we have discussed at length the shootings of quite few black men. Without fail someone jumps to the defense of the cops involved using the Cop's account of the situation as their defense. These rare incedences where a conspiracy executed by cops to tamper with evidence and fabricate a story caught on camera, at least from my vantage point, make such blind faith in the words of law enforcement a tad foolhardy.

In this first video the hidden dash cam tape reveals officers beating the man who has his hands raised and screaming "Don't touch my gun" <--- the default defense, is it not? "He reached for my gun that's why I killed him." Except here we have irrefutable evidence that despite the officers clear insistance that the man reached for his gun he in fact did not.

The same happens in the second video.

So when a cop kills someone and the circumstances seem dubious - is it wise to put some much faith in the officers account of what happened?
Click to expand...



why would you think cops are any different than any other human being who royally ****ed up?

why is it so hard to convict some people....because they try like hell to cover their tracks, and throw the authorities off their trail

cops know the drill....they are going to know what to do better than the average joe to cover up their mistakes

the fact you think that is unusual or weird says something about you.....not them
 
Do I give police the benefit of the doubt?

To a small degree still, yes, but not anywhere near what I used to. I now start with a great dose of skepticism. They have to do more than merely say they feared for their life, or whatever, for example.
 
reinoe said:
The vast majority of cops are dirty. That's why police unions across the nation refuse to install body cams. You can even see on that first video how cops are well practiced to repeatedly say "stop resisting...stop reaching for my gun" so that they can pre-emptively justify shooting unarmed people if they're in the mood to get some paid vacation time.
Click to expand...

The vast majority of cops are good people and are not dirty.
 
Do Cops accounts of witnessless shootings deserve the benefit of the doubt?
Click to expand...

Only if they are a defendant in a criminal trial for the shooting. :)
 
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