How not to act as a policeman

By Guy R. Grant

The article from the Washington Post details just how bad police enforcement and governance can get in one town in Arkansas.

Watching the video of the police stop provides many lesson in how NOT to do a police stop. The officer either has a very poor duplication of what is happening in regards to Adam Finely movement or is just outright lying trying to create an incident so that Finely can be arrested.

Police officer Mercado communication is poor. He constantly interrupts Finely and does not allow Finely to complete his communication. This interruption and non-duplication of communication will often cause upset and if you think back to your own interaction you will likely spot times where an interruption in communication caused upset for yourself.

Let say that officer Mercado had a legitimate reason to stop Mr. Finely. As soon as Mr. Finely hands over his railroad ID the procedure should stop and Finely should be sent on his way.

Officer Mercado justifies some of his behavior by saying that at any stop a policeman might get a gun pulled on him. But if that is all he is thinking about then his attention is elsewhere instead of the on the person he stopped. The policeman reaction to an actual dangerous stop is going to be slowed with perhaps disastrous results for either himself or those around him.

Why did this incident happen at all? The article quotes a former policeman who provides great insight to the policemen life, " It was subconscious. I was trained and subtly incentivized to do so. You intentionally create conflict and manufacture noncompliance in order to build your stop into an arrest situation."

Unfortunately, police and city governments, use tickets as a source of income. This was clearly shown in Ferguson, MI where one of the complaints was the over use of tickets and court costs to fund the government. However, this source of funding is not confined to Missouri!

So how do you fix this problem? My suggestion would be to have essentially a 'Truth and Reconciliation' commission where a tribunal would here where police, prosecutors, judges and city governments could reveal all of the phony crimes they have pursued. No criminal charges would be filed if they reported it during the tribunal hearings but any phony crimes would have to be expunged from the system and restitution made to the individual.

Laws should also be passed so that cities and municipalities can not collect more then say 20 per cent of their income through fines over say a two or three year period.

Baldo, R. (2018). An Arkansas man complained about police abuse. Then town officials ruined his life. July 2018. Washington Post. Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2018/07/10/an-arkansas-man-complained-about-police-abuse-then-town-officials-ruined-his-life/?utm_term=.ff9a627e51ad

Blesset, B (2018).Using Fines to Fund Municipal Government Hurts Low-Income Minorities, Just as Sharecropping Did a Century Ago. May, 23 2018. Schlars Strategy Network. Available at: https://scholars.org/brief/using-fines-fund-municipal-government-hurts-low-income-minorities-just-sharecropping-did

Threewitt, C. (2018). Do police really write tickets to make money? How Stuff Works: Culture. Available at: https://people.howstuffworks.com/do-police-write-tickets-to-make-money.htm

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Legalized Remnants of Institutional Slavery

By Guy R. Grant

If you think that governments and justice officials are the same across the USA. Think again. In some parts of the South criminals are money making opportunities which encourage incarceration due to the ‘prisons for profit’ concept. Louisiana and Mississippi law enforcement provide two recent examples which shows this is concept is currently observed

The official mission of the Louisiana Department of Justices has the following 'Vision statement', "Louisiana citizens will live in safe communities and a healthy environment where economic opportunities are available to pursue a better quality of life while natural resources are preserved for future generations."

If you think that governments and justice officials are the same across the USA. Think again. In some parts of the South criminals are money making opportunities which encourage incarceration due to the ‘prisons for profit’ concept. Louisiana and Mississippi law enforcement provide two recent examples which shows this is concept is currently observed

The official mission of the Louisiana Department of Justices has the following 'Vision statement', "Louisiana citizens will live in safe communities and a healthy environment where economic opportunities are available to pursue a better quality of life while natural resources are preserved for future generations.". However, this statement does not seem to be applied to ‘all’ citizens. There are some sheriffs in Louisiana who do not seem to share this vision for all. For example, Sheriff Steve Prator of Caddo Parish thinks the problem with the upcoming criminal justice reform in Louisiana is that he will have to release the 'good prisoners' who are willing to do work in the Sheriff office doing activities that saves the Sheriff’s money in his budget. Their main concern is profit from imprisonment, which prompts them to ask themselves, ‘how can I make money off citizens by increasing the number of those imprisoned’? Is it any wonder that Louisiana has the highest rate incarnation in the United States? Sheriff Prato’s slavery concept and actions are reminiscent of legal slavery which existed in the post-Civil War South (Alexander, 2010).

Sheriff Prator objects to one of the positive signs of change which calls for law enforcement to move away from unjustly long prison sentences. Unfortunately, those that are sworn to enforce that law as part of the Justice System new directives are not changing or are only changing reluctantly. This is only one of many examples that may not reach the mass media exposure. On the same note, In Mississippi, creating criminals are a source of revenue stream for the local government.

Case in point, a mother was a passenger in a friend's car with her four month old baby in the car in a baby seat while they were looking for employment. They were stopped for a minor traffic violation. Both adults had an outstanding warrants for routine misdemeanors and were arrested as a result. The arresting officer contacted the Mississippi Department of Human Services and claimed the child was "abandoned" because of the mother being arrested. His definition of abandonment was a direct result of his actions not the mother’s. The fact that the baby's grandmother arrived in minutes to pick up the child was ignored.

Judge Shirley awarded custody to the baby's grandmother but in addition entered an order prohibiting further contact between the mother and child until all court fees were paid in full. So the mother was prohibited from seeing her child for 14 of first 18 months of the child life. Southern judges often claim to be pro-life in order to get elected yet their actions are anti-life and anti-family. Such a ruling does not appear to be something that would do anything for family unity or the family’s well-being, or the well-being of the child. Such rulings are designed, it seems to be another way to make money for local governments. Judge Shirley has resigned and the youth court in Pearl, Miss. has been closed. However, more cases were cited where this same type of problem exists in Mississippi and similarly in Louisiana.

Any government whose prime source of money targets criminals and court fees are not best for society since it seldom takes just actions in lieu of profitability. Rather than promoting responsibility in its citizens; it looks instead at some of its citizens as ways and means of making money. The government ends up creating criminals to make money.

References:

Alexander, M. (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. New York, NY:The New Press.

Balko, R., (2017). Mississippi judge resigns after barring mother from seeing newborn because of unpaid court fees. Available at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2017/10/26/mississippi-judge-resigns-after-barring-mother-from-seeing-newborn-because-of-unpaid-court-fees/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-a%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.8e562dc26c22

Landry, J. (2017). Attorney General Landry: About the Office. Available at:http://www.ag.state.la.us./OurOffice. Available at: http://www.ag.state.la.us./OurOffice

Rosenberg, E. (2017). Louisiana sheriff argues against releasing prisoners "you can work," drawing slavery comparisons. Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/10/12/louisiana-sheriff-argues-against-releasing-prisoners-you-can-work-drawing-slavery-comparisons/?hpid=hp_no-name_hp-in-the-news%3Apage%2Fin-the-news&utm_term=.7ad8a4a20184