The Problem with Police "unions": Problem cop elected President of police union in LA

[99th_Monkey]

It would appear police unions have become nothing more than an organized white-wash scheme to protect cops guilty of using excessive force. This issue is touched on in this LA Times piece about Officer Lally, and several other articles are referenced and linked that illustrate the problem with police unions.

Recenty we've seen how this plays out, when there is a high-profile open & shut case of police brutality in Ferguson, and in NYC with Eric Garner. It's "the union to the rescue", every fucking time. IMHO this is a serious abuse of the whole notion of labor unions, which historically have championed justice, fairness, equality, etc. rather than covering the asses of murderers and bullies.

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From 'problem officer' to president, new police union leader takes over
By JOEL RUBIN * Dec, 31, 2014 * LA Times

Craig Lally, the incoming president of the union that represents Los Angeles police officers, has a framed newspaper article from 1992 haging on his office wall.

Far from a puff piece, the article named Lally as one of the Christopher Commissions’s infamous 44 "problem officers." The commission, a blue-ribbon panel that proposed reforms following the police beating of Rodney G. King in 1991, had flagged the officers for having several allegations of misconduct against them. The list, according to the commission, was meant to illustrate "the problem of excessive force in the LAPD."

Lallly, a nearly 35-year veteran of the department, said he keeps the article nearby “as a reminder not to let what happened to me happen to any other officer.” He takes over as head of the Police Protective League on Thursday after winning a vote by the union’s roughly 9,800 rank-and-file officers.

In many ways, Lally, 58, said the path that led him to the union’s top post began with his inclusion on the list of 44.

He was at the time a newly promoted sergeant who was well-regarded within the department. When The Times published the names of the 44 officers, Lally publicly contested the commission’s decision to include him on a ledger of the department’s worst offenders. Unlike many on the list, none of the accusations Lally faced had been sustained by department investigations.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-lapd-union-20141231-story.html

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SPECIAL REPORT: Unions protect problem officers
Part 3: Florida's two police unions use their political clout to push for changes in disciplinary process
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20111206/ARTICLE/111209976

Police Unions Produce Rules That Protect Bad Actors, That’s How Public Unions Work
http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/14/police-unions-produce-rules-that-protect

The Bad Kind of Unionism
When police unions have widened their gaze beyond issues like compensation and working conditions, it’s been almost exclusively to conservative ends.
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/01/the-bad-kind-of-unionism/