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NYPD Put Couple On 'Wanted' Poster For Videotaping Police
from the overreact-much? dept
We've had plenty of stories lately about police overreacting to people filming them -- and multiple courts have ruled that filming the police is perfectly legal. Even the Justice Department has spoken out and warned police departments that they need to let the public photograph and video tape them if they want.
And yet, we keep hearing of new incidents of police going after people for filming them. Slashdot now points us to a story that takes that to a different level. It involves the NY Police Department creating a "wanted" poster for a couple who have been regularly filming them and posting the videos to a YouTube channel. While the poster did not technically say "wanted" it sure looked like a Wanted poster, and the couple worried that anyone who saw it would think they were sought for arrest. The poster did describe them as "professional agitators."
After calling police about the posters, they were told that they had been taken down, but the police still have not explained why they created them in the first place.
And yet, we keep hearing of new incidents of police going after people for filming them. Slashdot now points us to a story that takes that to a different level. It involves the NY Police Department creating a "wanted" poster for a couple who have been regularly filming them and posting the videos to a YouTube channel. While the poster did not technically say "wanted" it sure looked like a Wanted poster, and the couple worried that anyone who saw it would think they were sought for arrest. The poster did describe them as "professional agitators."
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I lost track of which side you were describing. Irony indeed!
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Hypocracy
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This is one of the most obvious I have ever seen. Projecting self to others is the name of the game and you have just hit the motherload! :)
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White Knighting - twice in one day - I'm tired
Pirate Mike for president - 2012 ?
Sounds like a good choice.
What's it feel like to be on the wrong side of history, where pirates are proud and anti-pirates are shameful scum that hate culture ?
I probably "spun it wrong"
Spin it right and the Anti-pirates are proud, kind people.
cough...cough...not sneaky...cough...greedy bastards at all...cough...bullshit
iNB4 :
You might have better luck white knighiing if you had some armour. Or even just didn't do it naked
Proof I am not naked, taken from my webcam.
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Ahhh, the desperation.
Nice to meet you and the NYPD.
Too bad you don't have the backbone Mike has or 1/90th the courage of the average beat cop.
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Re: response to Anonymous Coward
Only bully pigs are afraid of cameras recording their illegal behavior.
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You know what else is a professional agitator?
You would think that NYPD would have enough other work to do without trying to create more...
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Re: You know what else is a professional agitator?
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Re: Re: You know what else is a professional agitator?
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Professionally agitated?
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Re: Professionally agitated?
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Re: Re: Professionally agitated?
Law suites sometimes affect the politician leadership, but not always. It puts money in the pockets of the lawyers, who were or will be politicians themselves. They almost never actually affect the day-to-day operations of police officers. Any cop is quick to point out that the law that gets practiced in a courtroom usually has little relation to the law on the street. You can actually take that as gospel.
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Re: Re: Professionally agitated?
They don't get in trouble..
They don't get fired..
Without some actual consequences that directly effects them this will never stop.
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Re: Re: Re: Professionally agitated?
We need a bill that enacts new laws. We will call it the Civil Observation of Police Abuse or COPA for short.
The laws in this bill would be the following:
1) Citizens can stop and search police officers while on duty, to make sure they aren't carrying anything they could use to plant evidence (e.g. drugs, a spare gun, etc.)
2) Citizens can place GPS trackers on police vehicles without a warrant.
3) Officers are to be fingerprinted and submit a DNA sample, which will be entered into a database maintained by the civilian community.
4) Officers are to go through a backscatter body scanner before entering another neighborhood.
5) In the event that officers will search a suspect's property, officers will have to submit to a strip search and a cavity search before entering such property.
6) Any officer who is accused of terrorism by any person may be detained indefinitely in someone's basement. Civilians are allowed to waterboard officers detained in this manner in order to obtain information.
7) 3 strikes plan: each time a civilian complains of an officer's behavior, the officer will receive a formal notice, also known as a "strike". After 3 strikes, the officer will be barred from carrying a weapon.
8) Officers or politicians who do not approve of this bill will be labeled child molesting terrorists.
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Still, it's a start. Needs to be generic, though. How about, "When people take your picture, smile and wave."?
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My father taught me that the policeman is a friend.
My children will be taught that he is to be avoided.
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How in the name of all that's holy is filming the EXACT actions of the police and posting them portraying the police actions "in a negative way?"
We need a new designation. Police State Apologist. We'll call their messages PSA's.
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It depends on what those actions are...
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Cop fighting to stay on force after conviction for felony assault.
“Convicted 'kicking' cop fights for job” by Tim White, WPRI, 5 Jul 2012:
Cop fighting to stay on force after conviction for felony assault——now that's blatant.
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Hail the Sixth Amendment!
And there's that handy Sixth Amendment again, which granted her defense the right to subpoena the security tape footage once they knew a camera was pointed at the area where the incident occurred.
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Wow
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can you spell "moderate"
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hall of fame
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Their recordings were annoying the Police who decided to strike back at them. However this poster was unprofessional of the Police and it is good to see it was soon removed. The biggest issue here seems to be violating their privacy, including publishing their home address, then putting them at risk of assault due to the criminal looking theme.
We can learn from this that if you video the Police you may well get some objections. One can also wonder if recorded events can be seen in the correct context. So I can only feel that maybe the Police need to more welcome this community interest though some documentary like cooperation.
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Put it this way, the Police don't even put up posters of Child Molesters and their address up on posters!!! If anything that would be 1000 times more helpful to the people of the neighborhood!!!!
I can't believe the police still have a problem with this when it gets thrown out of court in every case. But this is a new low of the police!!!
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Amazing how the irony escapes them
Ironic that policemen are getting paid to do this sort of thing.
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Re: Amazing how the irony escapes them
I wonder if that poster might even be actionable. Calling someone a "professional agitator" who isn't seems likely to qualify as defamation.
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Re: Re: Amazing how the irony escapes them
Best to just take it as a compliment.
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Darwin awardee brains in their noggin....
No wonder there are more BAD cops than decent ones in the word....
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This is starting to look like a movie I once saw.
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THIEF and VIOLATOR OF CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS
3480 County Road 2550
Pomona, Missouri
469-2217
Employer: Missouri State Highway Patrol, Troop G (a group of fellow thieves and Constitutional rights violators).
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When someone pirates something, it's a "personal choice". When someone takes a video, they are always working alone - with absolutely no agenda. Yet, when a single officer in a single precinct makes up a poster, it's "the police" as a group who are broadbrushed.
"the police still have not explained why they created them in the first place."
Why no identify who you spoke to? Why the broad grouping rather than the individualization? Oh wait, you want anyone in authority to be a cardboard cutout, a faceless operative of a large secretive group.
Weiner.
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Absolutely, when the police don't voluntarily take disciplinary action against this sort of behavior, on their own without public pressure, then they should get collectively blamed.
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Four Dozen Police Salute A Murderer
Of course, [former] Officer Karl Thompson wasn't really convicted of murdering Otto Zehm. No, he just “violated his civil rights”.
Immediately following Officer Karl Thompson's conviction in connection with the brutal, videotaped beating death of Otto Zehm, Officer Karl Thompson served a weekend in jail. Then he was released. He has not yet been sentenced, and Officer Karl Thompson remains free on a signature bond.
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“Off-duty officers escort Sgt. Clifford out of jail” by Tim Blotz and Mike Durkin, KMSP, June 19, 2012
This little escort incident reminded folks of the collective police salute for convicted officer Karl Thompson.
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“L.A. County sheriff's official tells of jail brutality” by Robert Faturechi and Jack Leonard, Los Angeles Times, July 7, 2012:
Would it be “disciplinary action” if someone was hit in the face?
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You want everyone to be a dumb consumer at the behest of whatever laws the industry feels like dishing out, and the reckless enforcement of said laws. You broadbrush Techdirt. Why can't people broadbrush people? Or do you have some super-special-secret patent and copyright on broadbrushing?
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Is that a prank?
People should film the police officer fixating those illegal posters then, so the police officers involved should be held accountable to their acts don't you think?
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Why?
Um... because they can?
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Very Simple..
The cops see no reason why they should not harras people who annoy them. Civil rights are not the concern of the cops anyway.
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Putting up a poster of people along with their names and addresses simply for videotaping the police while on duty is a thinly-veiled threat to others to dissuade them from performing the same actions. Apparently it's A-OK when law enforcement and businesses do surveillance, including accessing over 1.3 million mobile phones without user consent, but not when a citizen does it to a cop.
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bail los angeles
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