The hardest part of recruiting new police cadets .......

[Stinky The Clown]

..... is weeding out the sociopaths.

No industry/business/career is without its assholes. In some cases, being an asshole is of little consequence. An asshole car salesman just winds up with no commissions. An asshole customer service rep just pisses people off and laughs about it.

But an asshole cop is a different thing. An asshole cop can actually hurt people.

Now, I'm not a cop hater. Not by a long shot. By and large, they really are the good guys and they really do concern themselves with our well being. But assholes do get through the vetting process. Sometimes, assholes even rise to positions of power and some to positions of **serious** power. Big city PDs and small town sheriff departments are equally vulnerable and affected by assholery.

Look at LA's Ramparts Division as but one example of institutionalized assholery. Or to Bernie Kerik.

In the last few days, we've seen video of a woman who was the victim of crime made a victim of the police as she was stripped naked by a coed team and kept chained, naked, for six hours in a cold concrete jail cell. We've read of a small child being taken for surgery, detained by the goon squad at the airport and who died while in custody; the kid was going for life saving heart surgery. A quad is dumped from a wheelchair and a 14 year old is bullied by a huge, burly cop in a bumblebee suit.

Each of those is one worse than the other.

But they are also a tiny - a minuscule - percentage of cops on the job.

I am pained when I see **any** group painted with an overly broad brush. The use of the term 'pig' was all the rage in the 60s. It was wrong then and it is wrong now.

The pendulum is swinging. The ubiquitousness of video recording devices is a help to We The People. Every bad cop is subject to being filmed and having that film slapped onto YouTube or some such web site for all the world to see. There are even long running reality shows that show dash cam video of cops losing it.

And most PDs have some mechanism for removing sociopaths from their ranks.

Now ...... if we can get the DHS and private 'security' firms to follow suit .......

By the way, while all of this is really old news, cops having been this way forever, it is currently like a festering sore. It started on 9/11 and has been perpetuated by Bushco. Nowadays, every two bit punk has a buzz cut and tats and knows his firearms and wishes to get a job where he can celebrate all that. PDs need to be more than usually vigilant to keep these punks out and private security firms need to prosecuted for hiring these sociopaths.

[cloudbase]

1. Part of the problem is

the general reluctance, absent really documented and overt misbehavior, of police to weed out the assholes from their ranks. Doing so is considered not being a team player. The entire profession needs a fundamental overhaul in its attitude toward citizens, or that whole "us vs. them" mindset will become a very real and painful reality.

[lonestarnot]

2. Is there any institution left in America that doesn't need a fundamental overhaul these days?

[lynnertic]

3. the mindset is and has been as entrenched as you warn us about

now imagine adding Iraqi vets to the force.

[Stinky The Clown]

4. I think the truth is that its a more middle ground issue ......

.... any one in a position of 'power' is subject to false charges. And cops have rights, too. Most citizen complaints are probably well founded, but there are also quite a few that are simply bullshit. Sorting through that takes effort. Good PDs expend the effort. Bad/lazy PDs blow it all off.

But in boarder terms, I agree with you. Mostly.

But consider this ...... if you're in a pressure job, you're subject to burnout. Nurses and cops are among those with the highest burnout rates. These are good people who get ground down by job stress. The result, as it affects us, is mistakes or worse.

edit to fix a typo that made the post unintelligible

[AX10]

6. True. Also, they work for us and we pay their salary.

They who hold the purse should hold the power.

[islandmkl]

5. jackboots and brown shirts...it's always there...

blackwater, etc. does not accidentally hire this types...they are ALWAYS good for something...history shows what can be done to the general poplulation with 'patriotic' zealots...'one pure race', 'America, love it or leave it', etc. all boil down to the same thing: Power must be maintained by the powerful, using whatever methods are effective. 'Patriotism' has historically proven to be one of the best to keep the least in control of the most.

[Stinky The Clown]

7. There is no defense of Blackwater

And that was absolutely not the purpose of the OP. Blackwater is a legal gang of thugs.

[islandmkl]

8. didn't mean to get off track, just responding to:

"PDs need to be more than usually vigilant to keep these punks out and private security firms need to prosecuted for hiring these sociopaths.'

[Stinky The Clown]

9. No problem!

:thumbsup:

[izquierdista]

10. I will argue with 'miniscule'

There is an asshole cop in San Diego that helped me make my decision to leave the United States for good. I really don't care what happens to the rest of you who stay behind in that shithole country. My only concern is that it may drag the rest of the world down with it as it turns into a fascist, bankrupt, failed state.



But otherwise, have a nice day! :-) :-)

[Stinky The Clown]

11. Where's your argument?

You mentioned one cop and your personal odyssey.

[izquierdista]

15. No statistics, just anecdotal

I don't know any American cops personally and have no relatives in law enforcement. Just my personal experience that cops are short-tempered, overbearing, unhelpful, and arrogant. I don't know if they select for these traits, or just instill them through training, it doesn't matter. In every other country where I have lived or visited and interacted with a member of the police, only one, a Mexican cop doing a traffic stop shake down, was as bad as an American cop. At least he went away after a $20 bribe.

[Tesha]

22. The trouble is, we've *ALL* met asshole cops.

The trouble is, we've *ALL* met asshole cops.

Yes, anecdotal evidence is suspect, but we've *ALL* met
"those" cops. The cop who writes you the ticket for a
broken tail-lamp instead of issuing a warning. The cop
who is verbally abusive to you or threatens (or delivers!)
actual violence. The cop who charges the videotaper with
breaking wire-tapping laws after it's the cop who was
caught on video clearly acting "in the wrong".

Sure, there are lots of really great police officers
out there, officers who work hard every day and sometimes
put their lives in jeopardy to keep us safe, and they
deserve our praise. But there are enough asshole cops
out there that we've *ALL* met one at some time or
another. Clearly, even though the evidence is anecdotal,
there's enough of it that we can recognize that this
is a problem about which something must be done.

Tesha

[Squatch]

12. Since I married into an Irish family from the Jersey shore...

every third person in that clan is a police officer. They're good people when we're on the deck drinking beers, but I sure as shit wouldn't want to be confronted by them in the dark places of Wildwood. I've seen them come back from their shifts with a tiny scrape here, a bruise there, and a twinkle in their eye when you ask them "how's the other guy look?"

[Stinky The Clown]

14. I don't know your family so I can only generalize .....

...... I think most cops could also be gang members. Not because they're bad guys, but because they value 'family' and 'brotherhood' and 'camaraderie' and so on. Look at how gangs recruit. They play to those very values, albeit in a perverted fashion.

As to the cuts, scrapes, and eye twinkles. I suspect that's a rare occurrence, not a daily event. Adrenaline rushes are funny things.

[jhain]

18. Much Gratitude for this Thread, H2S

Many, many retired and current police officers in my family ( an Irish family at the Jersey Shore, in fact. My dad was a cop in Wildwood in the 50s. But none of us related to Squatch as far as I know).

The hours suck, the pay sucks and generally speaking, the attitude from the public sucks.
Community Law Enforcement officers need all the help & support we can give. More threads like yours will go a long way towards changing attitudes.

This entire farce of a "War On Terror" is always better 'fought' as a law enforcement issue. As a nation we would do well to find more ways to support legitimate, honest cops as their numbers FAR outweigh the bad ones.

Thanks, again.

[Squatch]

21. Hey, Jhain...

If you want, PM me your Dad's name. My aunt just remarried, this time to a former police officer who's beat was Wildwood Crest. I bet you a bazillion dollars that he knows your dad.

[Historic NY]

13. Its the do it to them before they do it to you, training mantra........

some idiots just don't have common sense. Trust me I know I've worked with more than a few. My local dept has been pretty good in getting rid of lets say under-performing problem children. Unfortunately they sometimes go onto other Dept's who accept them w/o even a recommendation. The biggest problem is most have to be weeded out in field training after they have been hired. Those persons responsible for the field training have to be of the highest caliber, w/o that everyone loses. You know how some people can't take a joke, well there are people that can't really work and play with others. The civil service process is supposed to weed out the defects but face it its is not perfect. They have to get rid of the defect early or they are stuck with them until something like this happens. Police Dept's are not unique just look at the working society of young people today, the pizza delivery guy, the car washer, the cash register person, that is the pool out there available to be hired. The good thing is there are people with the right smarts getting through. There was a time when people didn't want to be cops and it was easy to pick recruits, today its not an easy or perfect system. Smaller agencies usually do a better job in recruiting and retention than bigger, sometimes they are just looking for warm bodies.

[Stinky The Clown]

16. I agree with your observations ..... broad though they may be.

Good summation of issues that are faced by PDs.

I live in a relatively wealthy county (nationally ranked as such). Our PD pays well and, again relatively, is smallish. There are some jerks, to be sure, but no real assholes. A close friend of ours is the number 3 guy on the force (number two non-elected). They're pretty tough on recruits and are not the least bit afraid to wash them out. And what you say is true. The washouts find their way onto other, bigger forces, including the state police.

[ThatsMyBarack]

17. Wump!

:kick:

[kentuck]

19. I started to say...

:-) "weeding out the sociopaths", but you already said it.

I have come to believe that most people that volunteer for police work have some type of power trip going on or some mental deficiency that they try to cover up.

[HughBeaumont]

20. Well, until this happens . . .

. . . there shouldn't be any condoning or defending the actions of the badge-abusing dickheads in need of counseling and/or firing, especially not on a progressive board. Victim-blaming, disguised as "playing devil's advocate", which I saw a lot of on the other thread regarding Officer Funnyshorts is vomitous no matter WHAT the subject matter.

There was absolutely NO reason that fat bastard clown in Baltimore needed to act the way he did. NONE. Most normal police without a need for anger management treatment pick their battles and tell the kids to merely "move along, they can't skate here"; problem over. This piece of pigshit was looking to intimidate and fight. And there's people on here saying "the kid deserved it"?? FUCK that. The kid was scared and when kids are frightened they tend to blurt things repeatedly without conscience. It's not like he called him a fatass pig or anything. Unbelievable.

The covering-up, failure to report unless they're forced to and hyperdefensiveness does nothing but continue to give assholes with badges license to abuse women, children and the handicapped. This in turn, reinforces the notion that police are merely a "legal gang".

[KillCapitalism]

23. I always thought academy applicants had to take psych. evals.

Do they still give polygraphs and psych evals. to try and weed out sociopaths and sadists?

I have an older cousin who used to be a county police officer & he described what the pre-employment testing was like. He said he was asked all kinds of questions in a polygraph exam such as if he'd ever abused an animal, or assaulted anyone. Who knows, maybe some departments don't pre-screen that thoroughly.

[Stinky The Clown]

24. I don't know for certain how any department prescreens .......

.... but I would bet a paycheck that **all** of them do their best on prescreening ....... I can't imagine any department in the entire country being like Andy's and Barney's Mayberry PD ...... or like the department that hired Rod Steiger's character in "In the Heat of the Night".

[DCKit]

25. You're assuming that some departments aren't actively recruiting sociopaths.

Given the current tone of the country and the ongoing disregard for the Constitution and Civil Rights, it's not much of a stretch.

Speaking from personal experience, there are more than a few who abuse the power they've been given and, while they are the minority, the damage they do is far out of proportion to their numbers. Also from personal experience, the less contact I have with the police in the future, the better I will sleep.

There's nothing like being jacked out of a private home in your bedclothes, physically assaulted and locked in a frigid cell for ten hours to change one's point of view about what constitutes due process in *'s Amurkia. Did I mention there were no charges?