FINALLY they Notice: "Officer Darren Wilson Began Career At Disgraced Police Department: Report"

[IdaBriggs]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/24/darren-wilson-jennings-police-department_n_5704133.html

Officer Darren Wilson Began Career At Disgraced Police Department: Report

The Huffington Post | By Andres Jauregui

Posted: 08/24/2014 10:05 am EDT Updated: 08/25/2014 12:59 pm EDT

The Ferguson police officer who shot unarmed teen Michael Brown had worked at a department that was disbanded by authorities over racial tensions, the Washington Post reports.

Darren Wilson and the other officers at the Jennings, Missouri, police department lost their jobs three years ago. Wilson was a rookie cop at the time.

The newspaper described the old Jennings Police Department as "a mainly white department mired in controversy and notorious for its fraught relationship with residents, especially the African American majority... not an ideal place to learn how to police."

The city council deemed tensions between officers and black residents so bad that it was necessary to fire everyone and build a new, more credible department from scratch.

Some officers from the disgraced department reapplied for their jobs. Wilson got a job in Ferguson ... (more at link)

and The Washing Post article....

Darren Wilson’s first job was on a troubled police force disbanded by authorities

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/darren-wilsons-first-job-was-on-a-troubled-police-force-disbanded-by-authorities/2014/08/23/1ac796f0-2a45-11e4-8593-da634b334390_story.html?utm_content=bufferc45ab&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

FERGUSON, Mo. — The small city of Jennings, Mo., had a police department so troubled, and with so much tension between white officers and black residents, that the city council finally decided to disband it. Everyone in the Jennings police department was fired. New officers were brought in to create a credible department from scratch.

That was three years ago. One of the officers who worked in that department, and lost his job along with everyone else, was a young man named Darren Wilson.

Some of the Jennings officers reapplied for their jobs, but Wilson got a job in the police department in the nearby city of Ferguson.

(more at link)

Of course, you can find half a dozen links on DU about this from nearly two weeks ago....!!! http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5446553 or http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025411848 or the first one I noticed on August 15, 2014 http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025393403

[sabrina 1]

1. Good, finally. Thanks for the post, Ida. I read this in your other post but nothing on the

media.

Ferguson needs to do the same thing. Disband that PD and start all over. But that won't happen until they get a new City Council which means there needs to be a huge Voter Registeration effort there. And if necessary, the DOJ needs to get involved to stop any kind of intimidation against voters who want to do so. People pointed out to me that many people there might have outstanding warrants (considering how many are handed out each year, that is a definite possibility) and might fear going to register because of that. That should not be allowed to happen, imo.

[IdaBriggs]

2. Well, since the black people of the town have been supporting the town government

via the fines, arrests and warrants (generating $2.6 MILLION in revenue), and "felons" aren't allowed to vote, it doesn't take much imagination to see what the outcome of most elections is going to be, does it?

Driving While Black in Ferguson
http://www.newsweek.com/ferguson-profiling-police-courts-shooting-264744
(Monday, Aug 18, 2014 “Despite Ferguson’s relative poverty, fines and court fees comprise the second largest source of revenue for the city, a total of 2,635,400,” according to the ArchCity Defenders report. And in 2013, the Ferguson Municipal Court issued 24,532 arrest warrants and 12,018 cases, “or about 3 warrants and 1.5 cases per household.”)

Where the heck is a RICO investigation when you need one? What the city government has been doing to the residents of Ferguson has *got* to be a crime!!!

[sabrina 1]

6. Hmm, I thought Missouri did allow felons, who have served their sentences, to vote?

Just checked, yes, felons can vote after they have completed sentence, including probation.

There definitely needs to be a thorough investigation of this issue, whether people are being prevented from voting using the criminal justice system to do so.

Not just in Ferguson, but anywhere else that has a similar system.

[rhett o rick]

8. It really doesn't fix the problem to disband the police dept and start again if you rehire

the same officers or even send them elsewhere.

[sabrina 1]

9. Of course, but the other town did not do that, they hired a new team and just a few of

the original officers. Among the 53 or so there may be a couple who are not bad cops but that would be considered during the process of replacing those who are.

[rhett o rick]

10. Well that makes sense. But I bet all the "fired" officers found employment in law enforcement. nm

[sabrina 1]

11. That's probably true, considering the low standards of our law enforcement agencies. That needs to

fixed also. Fired cops, which Wilson was, should find other employment where they do not have weapons and/or pose a threat to the public.

[eppur_se_muova]

3. Oh, good, they *can* disband the police department -- just what Ferguson needs.

Why hasn't this been possibility been raised before now ?

[IdaBriggs]

4. Jennings was disbanded due to corruption after they proved missing money.

The town council disbanded it. See links.

The Ferguson town council apparently thinks everything is hunky-dory; granted, they only have one minority member on the council, and it is only the pesky black folk who are being harrassed by the mostly-white police force, so no biggie, right?



Watch John Oliver’s Take on Ferguson and the Police
http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2014/08/18/john_oliver_on_ferguson_missouri_and_police_militarization_video.html
(Sunday, Aug 17, 2014 Includes video of Ferguson/St Louis police calling citizens “f*ck*ng animals” – very disturbing.)

[eppur_se_muova]

5. No missing money, just dead black people ? Not reason enough. nt

[rhett o rick]

7. So let me get this straight. The have a bad police dept. so the fire the bad police, those police

spin around three times and say two mother may I's, and bingo-bango you have a new police dept.

Or maybe it goes like this: "Hey our police dept will trade two really, really bad police for one of your not so bad police."

[IdaBriggs]

12. Jennings fired the bad police; Fergusan hired this one.

And who knows how many of the others?

It isn't like accusations of corruption were actually going to be used as "bad references" that might have caused someone to take second look at the potential job candidates, right?

Well one must consider how difficult it is to find qualified people to do police work, especially in a town like Fergusan. First, they have to be white. Next, they need to be comfortable abusing authority while on duty, and even arresting innocent people. Oh, and swearing at citizens while they are being recorded for national television.

Serve and protect - well, some of them probably do....to bad the rest of the bad apples are stinking up the barrel.

[rhett o rick]

13. Yep!