How did we even get on board with this? I thought this – police and tax collectors getting part of the take on taxes and fines, was the ultimate example of government corruption and theft from the people? From the Sheriff of Nottingham, to Matthew the Tax Collector, to police today, we see government appointees finding any way they can to take money from The People, in the name of The People, all protected by The Law.

IMHO, it doesn’t matter how common they are today. The fact that bad conduct is widely seen to have no consequence virtually guarantees that if it isn’t yet a problem, it WILL become one, unless a bona fide effort is made to crack down on bad conduct.

This is sort-of the nature of news reporting, though, isn’t it? Millions of people go to work, go to school, and go home to their families in relative peace, and get no mention on the news. Occasionally, some nut gets a gun and shoots up his office, school, or home, and he makes front-page news for a week.

I would love to see good data on how common these abuses are, and my understanding is that it’s often hard to get those numbers. (Note the need for SWAT raid transparency bills.) Certainly, it’s hard to work out how often the police get away with beating someone up for mouthing off, since they’re only going to be charged with anything if there’s some external evidence. The fact that two states are actively prosecuting people for videotaping policemen suggests rather strongly to me that, at least in those states, serious police misconduct must be quite common. Otherwise, why bother trying to frighten citizens out of recording it?

Except that, before we had them, laws still got enforced (for better and worse), and life was no more ‘nasty, brutish, and short’ than can be accounted for by purely technological or cultural differences (people simply respect the lives, privacy, and physical comfort of their neighbors more than they did hundreds of years ago).

And I wish the good cops would stop pretending that there are no bad cops, and that everyone who gets beaten, robbed, killed, and wrongly imprisoned simply must have had it coming because cops would never do such a thing without cause.

I have a lot of friends in law enforcement circles; the only time any of this stuff even shows up on their radar is when it gets national headlines. They don’t even seem to be aware of the problem.

…I really wish that Radley and his like would write about the good cops too on occasion,…

You mean the “good cops” that stand there picking their nose when their fellow cops assault people and lie through their teeth on reports? Those “good cops”?

A serious problem isn’t with the actual cops themselves, it’s the “Police Culture”. A culture where “good cops” who rat on the blue line are targeted for harassment by their peers and superiors.

As such, a “good cop” that wants to keep his job is one who quietly does their job.

I don’t think anyone but the most frothing anarchist wants to actually disband all police, they serve an extremely useful function. Just that transparency and accountability are in order. That includes questioning the whole “Executing search warrants on non violent persons with extreme force” as in SWAT raids.” and the “Police Culture” itself.

But all of that is way out of the hands of individual cops. As such, there are three kinds of cops… bad cops taking advantage of the situation, quiet cops who turn a blind eye for their own protection, and truly “good cops” who speak out and are crushed by the Police Culture. As such, there are no good cops left.

Serious question…..

How the Hell can you think there are still good cops out there?”

Cops serve a very important function: they enforce the laws. Without them we really would have chaos, life that is “nasty, brutish, and short.” I really wish that Radley and his like would write about the good cops too on occasion, so that people like you, Steve Verdon, don’t think that none exist. It is unfortunate that the misbehavior of a few will cast such a long shadow on a whole organization, which is so crucial to any civilized living.

So, if the “players”, those who’s money was stolen, did nothing illegal (it’s not illegal for you to gamble, only for the processing centers to process the payments), then how is it they cannot sue for their money? Will the gov’t claim they seazed it from the processing center and not from the people themselves? Is that how they get around it?

Got rope?

The incompetent officer I deal with most frequently will be getting a huge pension that I will be paying for at 90 by working in a donut shop.

It’s a racket.

Because if one dares say otherwise, you’re a “cop-hater”, pot smoker dopehead or bitter loser anarchist who hates authority.

Looks like AACPD got $470,000 and the “Maryland State Police also participated in “Operation Texas Hold’em” and will likely receive a check as well though Winter did not know how much or when.”

With guns, quicker beats bigger every time. (-:

Serious question…..

How the Hell can you think there are still good cops out there?

I am a bit rusty on my internet jurisdiction, but it is possible that non-Maryland residents could file civil actions against AA county in federal court where they live. If so, I bet this scam would cease once AA county was forced to defend hundreds of lawsuits across the country.