
Paramilitary police: Cops or soldiers? - dmmalam
http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21599349-americas-police-have-become-too-militarised-cops-or-soldiers
======
bostik
And here's the meat, since the article does come from Economist:

> _Because of a legal quirk, SWAT raids can be profitable. Rules on civil
> asset-forfeiture allow the police to seize anything which they can plausibly
> claim was the proceeds of a crime. Crucially, the property-owner need not be
> convicted of that crime. If the police find drugs in his house, they can
> take his cash and possibly the house, too. He must sue to get them back._

> _Many police departments now depend on forfeiture for a fat chunk of their
> budgets. In 1986, its first year of operation, the federal Asset Forfeiture
> Fund held $93.7m. By 2012, that and the related Seized Asset Deposit Fund
> held nearly $6 billion._

Proliferation of SWAT team setups may have been due to a perception issue, but
they sure as hell are kept going because there is a real financial incentive.
For that reason the answer to the article's title should probably be something
like: "Neither. Try mercenaries."

~~~
mercurial
> _Because of a legal quirk, SWAT raids can be profitable. Rules on civil
> asset-forfeiture allow the police to seize anything which they can plausibly
> claim was the proceeds of a crime._

Isn't this true in general, and not only when SWAT is deployed to arrest the
suspect?

> _Crucially, the property-owner need not be convicted of that crime._

I would have thought this to be contrary to the US constitution, since it
clearly breaks the presumption of innocence, but it turns out that it doesn't
feature in the US constitution explicitly, according to
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence)

~~~
Crito
You are afforded rights such as a presumption of innocence. Your property
however, not being a person, has no rights. That's why they sue your property,
not you.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asset_forfeiture#United_States](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asset_forfeiture#United_States)

~~~
mercurial
That's legal sophistry.

~~~
coldtea
Most of the US legal practices regarding the constitution are legal sophistry
of the worst kind.

Take the "right to bear arms" for example, which is clearly stated that it
applies to citizen militias (something important at the time it was written).
Through tons of applied sophistry it was decided that it also means the right
for every redneck to buy military grade automatic weapons for "self-
protection"...

~~~
hga
" _Take the "right to bear arms" for example, which is clearly stated that it
applies to citizen militias...._"

Only to those with fundamental failures in English comprehension, which does
not include the Supremes, who in _Heller_ agreed 9-0 that it's an individual
right.

And the Federal courts have been implacably hostile to "assault
weapons"/civilian semi-auto assault rifles and the like (full auto has been
covered elsewhere in this subtread; I'll just add there are about 200K legal
ones out there, and two known crimes committed with them, one by a police
officer). Not a single favorable opinion prior to _Heller_ , and none that I
can remember after it.

Try again.

~~~
shpxnvz
That's two crimes committed with NFA weapons in the 80 years since the NFA has
existed. One committed by an active duty police officer and the other by a
former police officer.

And to the previous poster I'll add that production of AR15-pattern rifles and
carbines alone for the commercial market averages about 380K units per year
since 2008. Adding in non-AR pattern "military style" rifles brings that
number to about 480K per year, or about 20% of all rifles produced and sold
commercially in the U.S. The AR15 is undoubtedly the most popular rifle in the
U.S. and that includes a hell of a lot of folks who can't reasonably be
classified as "rednecks."

~~~
hga
I think, to the typical anti-gun bigot, by definition nearly all of us gun
owners are "rednecks", in spirit if not quite so the stereotype.

Quoting production and sales numbers isn't likely to help with them, except to
possibly scare them away from trying to pass gun grabbing laws that will
result in massive resistance and/or civil war. We're holding our breath right
now with Connecticut, which was surprisingly quite pro-gun in practice pre-
Sandy Hook and which, due to passive resistance, has now created an estimated
300K felons, with the usual suspects calling for all of them to be prosecuted.

And a cherry on the top with Connecticut State Police Spokesman Lt. Paul Vance
telling a newly made subject of the state, after she said " _You 're the
servant, we're the master_", that " _I 'm the master, ma'am. I'm the
master_"([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUxjuz2o9Gk;](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUxjuz2o9Gk;)
jump to the end).

I don't think these people understand the forces they putting into play.

~~~
reader5000
Not necessarily rednecks, just low intelligence people that live in a fantasy
world.

~~~
evilduck
Your ridiculous hyperbole undermines your attempt to position yourself as the
intelligent side of your false-dichotomy.

------
mercurial
_These programmes provide useful defensive equipment, such as body armour and
helmets. But it is hard to see why Fargo, North Dakota—a city that averages
fewer than two murders a year—needs an armoured personnel-carrier with a
rotating turret. Keene, a small town in New Hampshire which had three
homicides between 1999 and 2012, spent nearly $286,000 on an armoured
personnel-carrier known as a BearCat. The local police chief said it would be
used to patrol Keene’s “Pumpkin Festival and other dangerous situations”. A
Reason-Rupe poll found that 58% of Americans think the use of drones, military
weapons and armoured vehicles by the police has gone “too far”._

Oddly enough, I was under the impression that a large part of the American
population protested loudly whenever their tax dollars are spent for "useless"
reasons. Do the complaints only apply when it's the Federal government doing
it?

~~~
maxerickson
That was the federal government doing it:

[http://www.unionleader.com/article/20120326/NEWS07/703269971](http://www.unionleader.com/article/20120326/NEWS07/703269971)

[http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/12/20/local-
cops-...](http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/12/20/local-cops-ready-
for-war-with-homeland-security-funded-military-weapons.html)

(Each article discusses a grant from the Department of Homeland Security being
used to purchase a vehicle)

Which is probably part of the problem, an average citizen can't do much more
than whine to their Congressperson about this sort of spending.

~~~
mercurial
It's more complicated than that. First off, local councils take the decision
to buy these toys with Federal money, so there is irresponsibility on both
sides, but they also do it on their own:

 _Nashua police purchased a BearCat with drug forfeiture money in 2003._ (from
your second link)

------
koenigdavidmj
[http://www.volokh.com/2013/07/04/a-real-live-third-
amendment...](http://www.volokh.com/2013/07/04/a-real-live-third-amendment-
case/)

Summary of the case: cops wanted to use a neighbor's house to surveil their
suspects. The neighbor who owned the house reacted about as would be expected.

~~~
FD3SA
In the spirit of police brutality:

[http://landing.newsinc.com/shared/video.html?freewheel=69016...](http://landing.newsinc.com/shared/video.html?freewheel=69016&sitesection=dash&VID=24990535)

------
kaffeinecoma

      > One had a criminal history that included three assault charges
    

I really dislike when "charges" are used this way to defame character. Were
the charges dismissed? Was the person found innocent during a trial?

~~~
koenigdavidmj
Not found innocent. All the jury said is that the state did not prove its
claims to their liking.

~~~
bitwize
That's why the opposite of "guilty" at trial is "not guilty". Someone who is
not guilty is not necessarily innocent, even of the charged crime, but there's
not enough evidence there to find guilt.

~~~
grkvlt
Interestingly, in Scotland (but not the rest of the UK) there's still the
third choice of 'Not proven' which indicates that there is not enough evidence
(or a problem with the evidence) to prove guilt, whereas acquittal is seen to
be a finding of innocence.

------
renang
> On hearing intruders break in, the homeowner’s son, a disabled ex-
> serviceman, reached for his (legal) gun. Luckily, he heard the police
> announce themselves and holstered it;

There is a new tactic for intruders to use: announce themselves as police
officers.

Really. That's not a way to raid a house due to "allegedly" buying things with
a stolen credit card.

~~~
alexeisadeski3
That wouldn't be a new tactic.

------
Sharlin
Incidentally, I've always been a bit baffled by the _Gendarmerie_ units in
many Central and Southern European countries. They're typically a military
police force tasked with policing civilians, and the concept really rubs me
the wrong way from a Northern European perspective.

------
adamnemecek
> One had a criminal history that included three assault charges, albeit more
> than a decade old, and on his arrest was found to have a knife ...

Is that illegal?

~~~
gambiting
That's how law works nowadays. Make most things illegal, but don't prosecute
so no one worries about having so many laws. But then when you want to place
someone behind bars you can cherry pick any law you like.

"Show me a man, and I will show you what he is guilty off" \- old communist
saying.

~~~
ghostDancer
Hi i think you refer to this : "If you give me six lines written by the hand
of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him."
and is attributed (disputed) to Cardinal Richelieu , not a communist
precisely. By the way i completely agree with what you are saying , that's the
tactic and is been used in a lot of places around the world.

------
vezzy-fnord
Relevant map of botched paramilitary police raids:
[http://www.cato.org/raidmap](http://www.cato.org/raidmap)

------
qwerta
Paramilitary police is called "gendarmery" and they are used against organized
crime or at outbreak of civil war. US did good job at Philippines with those
units.

Current SWAT teams are just bunch of happy triggers and robbers.

------
cabalamat
They are cops pretending to be soldiers; if they had to fight a real army, I
bet they would all shit themselves, and die shortly thereafter.

~~~
hga
The stark raving mad behavior of LA area police in reaction to Chris Dorner
removes pretty much all plausible doubt from your supposition.

------
D9u
Drug warriors = soldiers.

