
The Chutzpah of a Police Union in Santa Ana, California - jseliger
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/08/the-chutzpah-of-a-police-union-in-orange-county-california/400502/?single_page=true
======
CWuestefeld
_Instead, they opted for a raid during business hours with guns drawn._

I disagree with the War on Drugs, but I understand the political process that
keeps us saddled with it despite its obvious stupidity and counter-
productivity.

But I can't understand the police's change in strategy, so that paramilitary
force becomes the default approach, rather than something that's wielded when
the situation seems to demand it.

~~~
scott00
I think it's a coping strategy formed in response to an absurd mission. Going
by national stats on drug use, I would guess that most cops have, at least at
some point in their life, been friends with drug users and tolerated drug use,
if not participated themselves. But they now find themselves in a situation
where they are ordered to oppose it. The psyche hates hypocrisy, so it
constructs an alternate narrative: the war on drugs isn't about drugs, it's
about violent drug dealers and drug users. That's a cause worth fighting for,
and one that would make sense to fight using military tactics.

In other words, kicking doors down makes cops feel like righteous warriors,
writing tickets in pot shops makes them feel like asshole tattletales. They
pick the strategy that makes it easiest to live with themselves. It has
nothing to do with the optimal strategy to counteract the violation of law.

~~~
gohrt
Police aren't that philosophical about it. They divide the world into "us" and
"them" like the rest of us (crudely, inaccurately, unfairly), and trip on the
high-powered tools they have to attack "them".

Police abuse plenty of people even without "drugs" in the picture.

Bug guns are fun toys.

~~~
DanBC
And they do this when the "them" is an unarmed 8 year old child.
[http://motherjones.com/politics/2015/08/kentucky-school-
cop-...](http://motherjones.com/politics/2015/08/kentucky-school-cop-
handcuffed-8-year-old-boy-mental-disorder)

------
eevilspock
Chutspah? That's a very, very generous characterization of these cops in my
opinion. Tyranny, law-breaking, cover-up, abuse of power and assholes are
among the words I'd use.

~~~
StavrosK
It's used sarcastically. It takes balls to be _this_ brazen in your tyranny.

------
caseysoftware
Why doesn't a company have the right to record their public areas 24/7
_without_ authorization? It seems like that's a reasonable right for security
and safety of everyone involved.

Also, if those recordings are deemed "illegal"and dismissed because the cops
didn't know, does that mean any jerk who robs a store with hidden security
cameras can claim the same?

------
fweespeech
> All by itself, this potentially dangerous, totally unnecessary show of force
> was troubling. The pot business was accused of a mere misdemeanor. There was
> no need to surprise patrons—some of whom were ill—with guns in their faces.
> But needlessly endangering the public was just the beginning of the dubious
> conduct. A surveillance camera recorded officers disconnecting the shop’s
> surveillance cameras. Under the impression that they’d got them all and were
> only accountable to fellow police officers, the cops discredited themselves
> in footage destined for YouTube:

> On-duty police officers appear to be eating edible pot products—OC Weekly
> transcribes words they spoke while egging one another on. (“Those candy bars
> are pretty good,” one said. “I kinda feel light-headed though.”) Other
> dialogue offers a number of insights into the subculture of this narcotics
> unit. Take the woman with an amputated leg that police encountered on
> entering the dispensary. “Did you punch that one-legged old benita?” one
> police officer asks another. The other cop laughingly replied, “I was about
> to kick her in her fucking nub.” These are people Santa Ana taxpayers
> empower to use lethal force at their discretion.

> The lawsuit argues that the video doesn’t paint a fair version of events.
> The suit also claims the video shouldn’t be used as evidence because, among
> other things, the police didn’t know they were on camera. “All police
> personnel present had a reasonable expectation that their conversations were
> no longer being recorded and the undercover officers, feeling that they were
> safe to do so, removed their masks,” says the suit.

> The dispensary also did not obtain consent of any officer to record them,
> the suit says. “Without the illegal recordings, there would have been no
> internal investigation of any officer,” the suit says.

Its pretty clear behavior like this and:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9948255](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9948255)

Is simply, horrifically common among law enforcement. :/

------
rm_-rf_slash
If you insist on being above the law to uphold it, what are you standing on?

~~~
Semiapies
Your guns and your union.

------
toomuchtodo
Archive.org URL of video:
[https://archive.org/details/SantaAnaPotShopRaidSparksInvesti...](https://archive.org/details/SantaAnaPotShopRaidSparksInvestigationJTKTfUHfeKM)

Torrent:
[https://archive.org/download/SantaAnaPotShopRaidSparksInvest...](https://archive.org/download/SantaAnaPotShopRaidSparksInvestigationJTKTfUHfeKM/SantaAnaPotShopRaidSparksInvestigationJTKTfUHfeKM_archive.torrent)

------
bigmofo
Most shops and location that have audio/video recording equipment have sign
indicating that such activity is taking place. So, I don't think that the
officers could claim that they were not informed. Also, the mere visual
presensense of such equipment implied notice of such activity.

~~~
Macsenour
They took the equipment down so they knew it was there and recording them. Not
getting all of them COULD mean that since they thought they got them all, that
they were no longer being recorded and now safe. Safe meaning reasonably
assured of privacy.

Don't think I'm agreeing with the behavior at all, just voicing a thought.

------
yohann305
While I was watching, I was wondering if these guys were tugs disguised as
police officers. I felt frightened by them. Aren't they supposed to be our
role models, show the good from the bad. An unethical behavior: "do as i say
not as i do" They need to go back to Police school...

------
jackpirate
I've added this to a git repo where I maintain a list of "Shit that happens in
America": [https://github.com/mikeizbicki/american-
shit](https://github.com/mikeizbicki/american-shit)

~~~
eevilspock
If you really want this to take off as a crowd-sourced compilation of the High
Crimes and Misdemeanors of America, you need to switch to a wiki format. One
long list with a single organization hierarchy won't scale in terms of
structure, usability or amenability to collaboration. And before you embark on
that, double check whether there isn't already such a wiki out there, and
contribute to that.

One of the projects on my todo list is a site that allows a group of people,
especially people who aren't great writers on their own, or don't have the
time to be, to "make a case", to collaboratively and systematically build that
case and hone its articulation.

If successful it would be a kind of Wikipedia/GitHub of arguments. So instead
of everyone trying to re-explain or re-argue a point each time there is a
need, they could link to the canonical explanation. So instead of off-the-cuff
and incomplete, or un-expert and flawed arguments, a point of view's "best
foot" is always put forward.

------
willow9886
Sickening. Standard operating procedure for a militarized police force that is
rarely held accountable.

------
njharman
Chutzpah is the very much the wrong word for this behavior. It's arrogance.
Maybe use audacity if you're afraid of being accused of bias for calling a
kettle, black.

~~~
ars
That's kind of what Chutzpah means. What does the word mean to you?

~~~
talideon
I've always understood it to mean 'audacity', but without any necessarily
negative or positive implications.

~~~
js2
Traditionally it has a negative connotation as in "gall" or "brazen" \-
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chutzpah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chutzpah)

------
amyjess
Scott Walker was right: public servants should be forbidden from unionizing.

~~~
logfromblammo
I feel I should note that Walker exempted police unions from his union-
busting.

And I disagree. The size and scope of the entity representing the employer and
the size and scope of the entity representing the employee should be similar
in scale. It's the only reasonable way to curtail abuses arising from
imbalances in political power.

For government workers, there is effectively only one employer. It is entirely
reasonable for those employees to band together into one union. Or three. Or
ten. That tenth one might not be all that effective, but collective bargaining
as a labor cartel should be equally accessible to everyone, regardless of who
their employer may be.

If one union behaves badly, it should be perfectly acceptable for the employer
to blacklist their members from future employment or contract renewals. In the
case where the union is defending the indefensible--the open and notorious
police misconduct seen in the video--the right thing to do would be to just
stop employing their members.

In trying to save the jobs of a handful of bad cops, this union is damaging
the collective reputation of all police in the entire country, along with the
criminal justice system. The behavior in the video is reminiscent of Hollywood
motion picture depictions of organized crime crews shaking down business
owners for protection money.

Not all unions are bad, but this one sure is.

~~~
amyjess
> I feel I should note that Walker exempted police unions from his union-
> busting.

OK, eww, yeah, Walker was wrong then.

Fundamentally, forming a union is an act against your employer's interests.
When your employer is a private entity, that's not a big deal. It's a dispute
between two private parties, let them hash it out amongst themselves.

But when your employer is the government, forming a union is an act against
the public's interests. Public servants should never, _ever_ be allowed to act
against the public's interests under any circumstances. And this goes double
when your job is a fundamental part of public safety. It's why Reagan fired
the air traffic controllers: because such a group going on strike is a direct
attack on public safety. Imagine if there was a police department that
actually did their jobs instead of choking black people to death on the
streets; now imagine that "good" police department suddenly went on strike
because of a pay dispute. Imagine how many people calling 911 for domestic
violence, home invasions, etc. would be completely and thoroughly screwed.

Police unions simply are incompatible with public safety.

~~~
logfromblammo
If you frame this in terms of freedom of association versus public safety, my
preference is to choose the former.

~If the cops go on strike, we can always contract city security out to OCP and
their clever robots.~

------
ZanyProgrammer
I bet the response from a lot of mainstream American leftists will be:
whatever the union does is fine, because by definition unions are supposed to
support their members.

~~~
danielweber
Unions _are_ supposed to support their members, and legally defend them. If it
wasn't the union making this crazy request, it would be the cops' lawyers.

And that's not a bad thing. Proper legal defense is an extremely important and
fundamental right, even for the people we dislike. Adequate legal defense is
often how people end up needing to protect themselves from crooked cops.

If this crazy request is _honored_ , then something is broke.

~~~
logfromblammo
Unions are supposed to act in accord with their own charters or constitutions.
Unions are supposed to support the interests of their _entire_ membership. The
union could have, upon watching the video, expelled the cops seen in it for
gross and egregious violations of the union's standards of professional
conduct. The former members would still be able to use the collectively
negotiated clauses in their contracts that protect them from unjust
disciplinary actions.

If the union does _not_ have standards of professional conduct that would
allow them to expel a cop for blatant, open, and notorious destruction of
private property, unlawful conversion, spoliation of evidence, deprivation of
rights under color of law, and grossly unprofessional and unethical conduct,
why the heck would any county or municipality hire any of their members?

Most unions can kick you out when shown good cause, including for actions that
are neither illegal nor unethical, such as joining a competing union.

This is probably something the union should have backed away from, as it makes
their entire membership look like they support corruption in policing.

~~~
danielweber
_and supporting the interests of the members as a whole_

That is even more frightening. The union already has tremendous opportunity to
negotiate for the rights of some members by giving up on the rights of other
members. If it could pick and choose which cases were "really worth it" it
would end up defending organizational insiders while declining to defend Joe
Sixpack.

One positive thing unions provide is that they provide a valuable way for
workers to know about and exercise their legal rights. If different kind of
organization were providing that benefit, it woulLd still be defending workers
accused of bad things.

"Even those accused of REALLY bad things?"

 _Especially_ those accused of really bad thing

~~~
logfromblammo
You are making this out to be an accusation, when it is, in fact, a public
release of damning evidence.

There is no dispute that the cops in the video did what they were recorded in
doing. The argument is literally that the prosecutors should not consider the
publicly available evidence when determining whether the cops should be
charged with a crime.

The union is not bound by the state's rules of evidence. It can make an
independent assessment of the facts available to it and decide whether the
union would be better served by keeping those guys in it and defending them to
the last, or by cutting them loose and preserving its reputation for the
remaining members.

It is all down to the operating principles ensconced in its own articles of
organization.

What goes beyond the pale? If Joe Sixpack sat down and ate a live baby, feet
first, and it was caught on video, which then went viral on YouTube, would the
union still go to bat for him?

