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The RateMyCop Saga
So even as police departments across the country are setting up sex offender registries, drug offender registries, and posting the mugs and names of suspected johns online, they also took a great deal umbrage early this month when Gino Sesto set up a site called RateMyCop.com. The premise is simple: Sesto wrote to police departments across the country, and obtained a list of the names and badge numbers of their officers. He then posted the names online in a format broken down by state and city, and encouraged users to rate their experiences with individual officers. All of the information he posted was already open to the public. He didn't post the identities of any undercover officers.
Police groups went nuts, making the dubious argument that posting the publicly-available names and badge numbers of police officers on the Internet somehow jeopardized the safety of individual officers. Sesto said he had even planned on adding a feature that would allow individual officers to write responses to complaints made against them. But police groups persisted.
Jerry Dyer, president of the California Police Chiefs Association, told Wired the site could give citizens the opportunity to "unfairly malign" individual officers, and said he'd be asking the legislature to pass a law making sites like RateMyCop.com illegal.
Last week, it all got weirder. Hosting service GoDaddy mysteriously terminated Sesto's account, and pulled RateMyCop.com offline. GoDaddy has offered several explanations to Wired's ThreatLevel blog, but thus far, none of them have made much sense. Sesto gave up on GoDaddy, and next tried to get the site hosted at RackSpace. They turned him down. After initial accepting his down payment for hosting services, a RackSpace lawyer sent a letter to Sesto stating that, "We believe that the website to be found at www.ratemycop.com as described to our sales representative could create a risk to the health and safety of law enforcement officers."
The good news is, the site's back up, now, though it isn't clear who's hosting it.
Me, I think police departments should be required to post all citizen complaints against individual officers online in a searchable database. Individual officers, their union reps, or their departments could post responses or explanations to frivolous claims. Police officers are public servants. Not only that, they're public servants with the power to arrest, detain, and use lethal force. If certain officers are the subject of repeated complaints and aren't being properly investigated internally, the public ought to be informed of that. This culture of secrecy—and of intimidating anyone who dares question it—isn't healthy.
Ska|3.14.08 @ 8:39AM|#
could give citizens the opportunity to "unfairly malign"
individual officers
Because the police would never do that to someone who isn't a
cop.
How many cops suffer from the same affliction Client 9 does? The
one that makes them think they can do whatever the fuck they want,
but us non-police folks should respect their au-thor-i-tai?
tarran|3.14.08 @ 8:41AM|#
I notice that the police unions aren't too upset about a
simmilar website called www.copswritingcops.com which also
publicly posts the names of police officers for public shaming.
Although in the case of that website the people
complaining are other police officers who feel that they
aren't being treated fairly.
So, if a police officer publicly complains about another police
officer, it is OK. If, on the other hand, a non-police officer does
it's a threat.
Remember the score guys: if you're not cop, you're little
people!
Radley Balko|3.14.08 @ 8:47AM|#
"BTW, www.copswritingcops.com is also hosted by GoDaddy."
How can you tell?
Fluffy|3.14.08 @ 8:49AM|#
I occasionally will rant in these comments about how the
application of technology to existing rules sets can create
disruption.
A typical example I've chatted about with many of you is speed
limit cameras. I've argued that the only reason existing speed
limits have been acceptable to the driving public is because they
were difficult to enforce and were therefore overwhelmingly ignored
except at those rare times when a cop was around. Using technology
to allow for actual enforcement of existing speed limits creates a
situation that many people will probably find intolerable, even
though the underlying rules themselves are the same as they have
always been.
I think this is another example of this. There are many different
types of information which have always been rightly part of the
public domain. But "public domain" used to mean "available if you
want to research through a pile of musty paper in a basement
somewhere". Now that "public domain" means "really easy to look up
at an instant's notice" the subjects of public domain information
are pissed. And it's very important that we don't allow their
pissing and moaning or WATB tales about "safety" to change the
concept of public domain information.
The bottom line on all cases of this kind should be: the
information is public. Period. Don't like it? Tough. Is the
information easier to find than it used to be? Tough. And that goes
for concealed permit holders whose court filings are posted online
as much as it goes for cops.
tarran|3.14.08 @ 8:52AM|#
Radley I used whois and nslookup to find that out.
I'll send you an email with the text output shortly.
Episiarch|3.14.08 @ 8:57AM|#
As much as I despise the current state of the police, I think in
the long run it may be self-correcting.
The cops are barely restrained as it is at this point. They
consider themselves a higher class of citizen, and act accordingly.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of "law & order" assholes out
there who support the police in every situation, and this allows
the situation to continue.
However, more and more people, including those who automatically
support the police, are having run-ins with the pigs. And they are
learning. Nothing changes a "law & order" supporter type faster
than being harassed and intimidated by a cop and then seeing
nothing done about their complaints.
Everyone I talk to hates the police. Hates them. Sometimes
I encounter people who are ambivalent. But I can't recall the last
time I spoke to someone who unabashedly supports them. Everyone has
a negative story, a bad experience.
This can only increase, and should result in a backlash.
tarran|3.14.08 @ 9:24AM|#
OK, I went back and ran some tools to look at copswritingcops
and I was wrong in my most recent post.
While their IP address is part of a block assigned to GoDaddy, the
IP address appears to have been sublet to a company called Wild
West Domains Inc, who are the people who actually are hosting the
site.
So GoDaddy is not being hypocritical. But the police unions
are.
Personally, I think both websited should be allowed to operated. If
you don't want the public to know who you are, don't be a cop. You
know, if you can't do the time, don't do the crime.
|3.14.08 @ 9:25AM|#
"Everyone I talk to hates the police. Hates them."
Oh yeah, couldn't be that you hang out with a bunch of assholes,
now could it?
Episiarch|3.14.08 @ 9:29AM|#
Oh yeah, couldn't be that you hang out with a bunch of
assholes, now could it?
I don't hang out with you, so that's one less asshole for me to
hang out with.
To answer your question, however, it refers to co-workers, friends,
and people I meet socially. Everyone means everyone.
Maybe you should go suck some cop dick instead of impugning my
associates.
|3.14.08 @ 9:40AM|#
Everyone I talk to hates the police. Hates them. Sometimes I
encounter people who are ambivalent. But I can't recall the last
time I spoke to someone who unabashedly supports them. Everyone has
a negative story, a bad experience.
I don't know how Nixon won. No one I know voted for him.
LarryA|3.14.08 @ 9:42AM|#
"Everyone I talk to hates the police. Hates them." Oh yeah,
couldn't be that you hang out with a bunch of assholes, now could
it?
I "hang out" (work) with several cops, probation officers, etc. who
run our batterers/anger management classes. They have their own set
of negative LEO stories and bad experiences. In fact, I hear more
complaints about their fellow officers than about their
court-mandated students.
if you can't do the time, don't do the crime.
"If you don't have anything to hide..."
|3.14.08 @ 9:42AM|#
@Radley
Actually, it's not hosted by GoDaddy, it's registered to Wild West
Domains. Check the whois database:
ppc-g4:~ xxxxxx$ whois copswritingcops.com
Whois Server Version 2.0
Domain names in the .com and .net domains can now be
registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to
http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.
Domain Name: COPSWRITINGCOPS.COM
Registrar: WILD WEST DOMAINS, INC.
Whois Server: whois.wildwestdomains.com
Referral URL: http://www.wildwestdomains.com
Name Server: NS1.COPSWRITINGCOPS.COM
Name Server: NS2.COPSWRITINGCOPS.COM
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientRenewProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 14-oct-2007
Creation Date: 13-apr-2006
Expiration Date: 13-apr-2010
ratemycop.com is registered to name.com
ppc-g4:~ xxxxxx$ whois ratemycop.com
Whois Server Version 2.0
Domain names in the .com and .net domains can now be
registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to
http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.
Domain Name: RATEMYCOP.COM
Registrar: NAME.COM LLC
Whois Server: whois.name.com
Referral URL: http://www.name.com
Name Server: NS1.MYCPANELHOST.INFO
Name Server: NS2.MYCPANELHOST.INFO
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientRenewProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 11-mar-2008
Creation Date: 05-aug-2007
Expiration Date: 05-aug-2008
>>> Last update of whois database: Fri, 14 Mar 2008
13:38:57 UTC
Fluffy|3.14.08 @ 9:45AM|#
To be fair, everyone loves the cops when they need one.
But I think it's pretty telling that the cop unions don't believe
in the fundamental principles of the society they're
defending.
It is an article of faith in our society that free expression and
transparency benefits the good and harms the malefactor. If the
principles underlying our society are valid, having cops rated
online will result in good cops getting good ratings and bad cops
getting bad ratings. The only reason to prevent this process is if
you don't really believe in the principles of a free society.
I can't decide if the opponents of this site are primarily being
assholes because they're cops, or because they're in a union.
They may be being assholes because they're cops, and as cops they
don't really believe in freedom.
Or they may be being assholes because they're union members, and as
union members they don't believe that their membership should be
subject to individual ratings or individual criticism that isn't
handled via the union.
I can't decide.
And no joe, this is not my admission that I don't like unions. I
merely observe that they quite naturally have different priorities
than the rest of us in certain situations.
LarryA|3.14.08 @ 9:45AM|#
I don't know how Nixon won. No one I know voted for
him.
I did. Another lesser of two evils election. At the time I liked
him better than I now do McCain.
Pete|3.14.08 @ 9:56AM|#
I bet if we had competing private defense agencies, in the interest of being transparent and professional, they'd offer to post complaints against their employees as a way to cater to customers.
The Democratic Republican|3.14.08 @ 10:03AM|#
i just clicked on the ratemycop.com link, and it said the webpage wasn't there.
dhex|3.14.08 @ 10:06AM|#
it seems to be up now.
i don't think something like this will have much of an impact
either way, but it may be the seed for something far better in
terms of transparency.
though i think the days of the genuine community beat cop are
largely gone. too many people.
|3.14.08 @ 10:11AM|#
This culture of secrecy-and of intimidating anyone who dares
question it-isn't healthy.
You said it, brother.
Police officers all too frequently forget that they are there to
serve us, not the other way around.
In my area there was recently a couple of incidents involving
police who conducted unnecessary and improper searches (both body
cavity on a public street and strip searches) of innocent people,
and it has created quite the backlash. But for real... how do
people with this kind of mentality get so much protection?
Shouldn't the police departments be eager to get rid of corrupt
cops so as to have a chance at a better relationship with their
communities?
|3.14.08 @ 10:18AM|#
Don't forget: the police who killed Ahmadou
Diallou were hired under Clinton's Safe Streets
scheme. Trash in uniform is still trash, and
even veteran police will tell you most of the
new people are in the wrong job. N.B.: a lot of
the head cases wandering back from Iraq are
going to end up on the beat.
|3.14.08 @ 10:31AM|#
Wild West Domains is Go Daddy. They are a GoDaddy reseller,
which means that it is hosted by GoDaddy.
I have some domains ( 60 ish) and a few hosting accounts with
GoDaddy. Probaly not enough to make a difference if I boycotted
them though.
Considering Bob Parsons and GoDaddy's struggle to get their double
entendre T&A commercials past the censors, I thought maybe they
would have better judgment.
I guess not.
Jacob|3.14.08 @ 10:48AM|#
Someone needs to tell the guy about nearlyfreespeech.net, the
web host that believes in the first amendment.
https://www.nearlyfreespeech.net/about/background.php
Dave W.|3.14.08 @ 10:53AM|#
When the site first came back up it was reaaalllllyyyyy slow.
Yesterday it seemed to be operating at a reasonable speed, but not
as fast as most sites.
I have tried to engage with police at 2 sites. At one I was told by
the admin that I was banned despite the fact that I had carefully
avoided violating any of the rules because I was causing too many
police to get upset and speak intemperately. I appreciated the
explanation, although I think that is a bad way to run a
board.
At the other police site, I only lasted about 2 hours, I was
accused of being someone I wasn't. A couple of my posts were
deleted, and then when I said that they were deleted, I was accused
of lying about that (even though the posts were still there visible
on the thread with the comment "deleted by mod" where my text had
been).
My point is that if police want reasonable people (like myself) off
of police friendly sites they have to understand that we still need
a place to go.
|3.14.08 @ 11:03AM|#
Lemme translate:
could give citizens the opportunity to "unfairly
malign" exercise their rights of free speech
regarding individual officers
Rhywun|3.14.08 @ 11:07AM|#
Trash in uniform is still trash
It doesn't help here in NYC that the union sold out new cops for
their own benefit. Starting salary is like $24,000.
I'd say the root of cop corruption is split about 50/50 between cop
culture and unions.
|3.14.08 @ 11:10AM|#
People don't give automatic respect to LEOs like they used to.
There are multiple reasons for that, so here's my partial
list.
Too many laws ensnaring too many people who haven't done any harm.
It isn't the cop's fault, but it is human nature to blame the
messenger.
Unionized police forces do what unions do. One of which is to fight
any disciplinary action, no matter the seriousness of the
offense.
The heirarchy in the law enforcement community also has a vested
interest in ignoring wrongdoing. Nobody likes airing their dirty
linen in public. It make the chief, and the city government who
hired him look bad. It's more comfortable to ignore the
problems.
The people most likely to want to be LEOs are the least suited for
the task.
The War on Drugs Sanity.
The blue wall of silence. Every violent cop who assaults suspects
is known to by his co-workers. Without the videotape, which of the
cops at the Rodney King beatdown would have come forward,
implicating his fellow officers? Every cop who plants evidence is
protected by his partner. The marijuana in Kathryn Johnstons home
was not an isolated incident, and every inner city resident knows
it. Every cop who commits perjury is protected by the entire
criminal justice system.
They behave like assholes when they feel like it. I know of no
other profession that takes out thier personal problems on the
public in a way remotely similar to cops.
I've never been arrested for anything, I've gotten less than my
share of traffic citations, and I no longer respect cops. There are
good ones out there, but I consider it foolish to assume that the
one I'm dealing with is one of them. Figger the odds is my
attitude.
|3.14.08 @ 11:14AM|#
Why anyone would want to host their site at a company with a
name as flaky as "Go Daddy" is another question. It sounds more
like a forum for incestual pedophiles than a hosting company.
The site is back up and running, and more power to it. Sorry cops,
this is a battle that you will lose. I realize it bruises your
inflated egos to have the jackboots aimed at your own posteriors
for once, but this is America, and last time I checked, you arent
the SS (though many of you seem to think you are). Many cops have
good ratings there. Try doing your jobs honestly and stop abusing
the public and you wont have anything to worry about.
T|3.14.08 @ 11:35AM|#
To be fair, everyone loves the cops when they need
one.
Never dealt with the Houston Police Department, I take it? It's
great to call the cops, wait 2 hours for them to show, and then
have them tell you "Well, nothing's gonna happen anyway, so there's
no point in us filling out any paperwork, so bye!" Way to do your
job, there, piggy.
|3.14.08 @ 11:47AM|#
Cops deserve all the hating they get, but I have to admit I had
great experience in my last interaction.
My plates were stolen from my car parked downtown. I called in,
thinking it would take hours to deal with. Instead, I got a call
back from a cop on my cell phone. He took the info in about two
minutes, gave me the report number, his name, badge number and
cruiser phone number and said to have any LEO call him if I got
stopped before I got replacement plates.
Quick, professional and, unfortunately in my experience, rare.
Jennifer|3.14.08 @ 11:50AM|#
I've never been arrested for anything, I've gotten less than
my share of traffic citations, and I no longer respect cops. There
are good ones out there, but I consider it foolish to assume that
the one I'm dealing with is one of them.
Ditto for me: not a single arrest, never a second in jail, and
very, very few tickets. But with one exception, I've yet to meet or
hear of a cop actually deserving of any respect beyond the bare
baseline given to any human.
Nephilium|3.14.08 @ 11:54AM|#
I've actually met good cops... and the good cops are worth their
weight in gold... I've also had experience dealing with the high
and mighty types.
By default, I'm willing to give a cop the benefit of the doubt
until he does something dickish... which with the bad cops, usually
takes about five minutes.
I think one of my favorite times seeing something was when one of
the good cops was telling bars that vice was coming down to crack
down on everyone... except the bars that paid them off.
Nephilium
thoreau|3.14.08 @ 11:55AM|#
A student at my university started a site for rating professors. I'm getting trashed there, so you know what I did? I wrote to the admin and asked if I could post my own self-evaluation there. Better to respond to criticism rather than demand that the criticism stop.
Rimfax|3.14.08 @ 11:58AM|#
I've been reading a lot of anecdotes lately about GoDaddy abusing their customers and sending threatening sounding marketing promotions to current and former customers. Sorry, I couldn't find any links among the plethora of Google results with various other complaints about GoDaddy.
Rimfax|3.14.08 @ 12:01PM|#
A friend who was a cop on Long Island eventually quit, largely because he was tired of watching cops clean up the evidence when other cops wrecked while driving drunk.
Jennifer|3.14.08 @ 12:11PM|#
Jennifer, HPD is as bad as they say?
That city's not my beat, so I don't know firsthand. The town I
mostly cover is a prosperous suburb where real crime is quite rare,
so the cops go out of their way to look for things to
bust. It's similar to the way a kid raised in an overly clean home
is more likely to develop an allergy, because his immune system
doesn't want to sit around twiddling its thumbs.
I do recall one piece I wrote soon after I got here: a (clean cut,
Jewish) young man in his 20s was pulled over and hassled for over
30 minutes. The excuse for pulling him over was that the ornament
hanging from his rear-view mirror was too large (it was a mezuzah,
half the size of a pencil), but then the cop started asking
questions about drugs and can I search your car and are you SURE
you don't have drugs and if you're innocent then why can't I search
your car?
|3.14.08 @ 12:13PM|#
Under the first (Mar. 11) post at the Wired blog linked to by Radley there is another (Mar. 12) in which GoDaddy is reported to claim that they pulled the site not for its content but because a spike in usage caused an unacceptably high number of simultaneous connections. This claim seems plausible to me -- whether it's true is of course another question.
Jennifer|3.14.08 @ 12:22PM|#
GoDaddy is reported to claim that they pulled the site not
for its content but because a spike in usage caused an unacceptably
high number of simultaneous connections.
Well, there's a hell of a marketing campaign: "GoDaddy: the go-to
host for unpopular sites that don't get a lot of visitors!"
Sal Paradise|3.14.08 @ 12:27PM|#
The petty bickering on www.copswritingcops.com makes me feel all warm and squooshy inside. Thanks.
Episiarch|3.14.08 @ 12:36PM|#
The town I mostly cover is a prosperous suburb where real
crime is quite rare, so the cops go out of their way to look for
things to bust.
So glad I grew up in a small town in NE CT that had--and still
has--zero cops.
DG|3.14.08 @ 12:54PM|#
It doesnt matter who holds the domain. The question is, who is hosting it? The answer is ServerCentral. I know their management and they are standup guys.
|3.14.08 @ 1:08PM|#
DG,
Which domain are you talking about? I show ratemycop.com as being
located at 205.234.222.18 which does not resolve out to
ServerCentral but rather a hosting service out of Washington
state.
|3.14.08 @ 1:17PM|#
To be fair, everyone loves the cops when they need
one.
Not me. When my mom got her passport (American) and cash stolen the
day before she was traveling, she got treated like shit when she
asked to file a police report to take to Passport Services. They
accused her of lying about getting her passport stolen and asked
for proof of citizenship (because when I travel, I always have a
copy of my birth certificate).
Before she attempted this, I told her not to bother because NYPD is
worthless.
Dave W.|3.14.08 @ 1:27PM|#
I wrote to the admin and asked if I could post my own
self-evaluation there. Better to respond to criticism rather than
demand that the criticism stop.
Lissen carefully to what they say, T. It is when the students
become the teachers that the learning can really
begin!
robc|3.14.08 @ 1:30PM|#
I fall into the never arrested/fewer tickets category (except for a 2 year period in the late 90s where I couldnt get my car without getting a ticket for something, it seemed). I have only had 1 positive interaction with a cop and that was for the "worst" ticket I received - 50 mph in a 25 mph school zone. The ticket was semi-bogus and he was almost apologetic for giving me the ticket (he did check the box allowing me to go to traffic school, which saved me a ton of money because 25 over in a school zone aint cheap). Every other cop who has pulled me over has been a dick.
|3.14.08 @ 1:31PM|#
...and said he'd be asking the legislature to pass a law
making sites like RateMyCop.com illegal.
So, in essence, Jerry Dyer would like to get us to a place where
police could potentially arrest people for criticizing the police?
Hmmm. Nope, I really don't see a problem.
|3.14.08 @ 1:31PM|#
By my recollection I've dealt with cops five times (in four states). Three of those interactions the cop was fair and professional. Twice the cop was an ass. So the majority of the time I've had no issue with the police, but if my interactions count as a random sample, there's way too many bad apples out there.
robc|3.14.08 @ 1:32PM|#
It even resists "view source".
I had no problem viewing source. Could that be a Firefox v IE
issue? Im using firefox.
Dave W.|3.14.08 @ 1:49PM|#
My breakdown of encounters:
Above Average Good: 2 (one involved going after an armed neighbor,
the other was a massive, sustained response to a persistent peeping
tom)
Average: about 12 or so (most being me getting traffic tickets or
warnings)
Below Average: 2 (one was an arrest of my designated driver (who
ended up blowing 0.00 at the station), the other was a rude, late,
violent and intrusive response when I reported an attempted late
night break-in at my apartment)
Episiarch|3.14.08 @ 1:54PM|#
Ironically, the 6 (yes, 6) times I've been arrested and booked
(never for violence) I was treated pretty well. It's been the
non-arrests, such as traffic stops and the like, where the cops
ranged from arrogant to hostile.
However, the one thing that is ever-present: total indifference.
They don't give a shit, even if what they are doing to you can fuck
you terribly.
DG|3.14.08 @ 2:01PM|#
To be more clear: RateMyCop.com at 205.234.222.18 is hosted by HostForWeb, which is a downstream client of ServerCentral. Both are located in Chicago, and HostForWeb is colocated at SC. I utilized traceroute and dig to determine this. Its not tough for a network engineer of any skills at all.
|3.14.08 @ 2:02PM|#
When my wife passed, the cops of course responded to the 911
call. One asked me, while my wife's body was still laying on the
living room floor, "Do you have a permit for that porch
work?"
I shit you not.
Episiarch|3.14.08 @ 2:18PM|#
Jsub, that doesn't surprise me. The job desensitizes people to such a degree that they don't even seem human any more.
johnl|3.14.08 @ 2:21PM|#
The funny thing is that I might never have heard of ratemycop if it had not been for the shutdown.
|3.14.08 @ 2:22PM|#
No pity whatsoever for these guys, even if some of the better
among them are unfairly maligned (which the whole lot of them
deserve to be until they get their house in order). We finally have
the tools technologically to at least begin to hold them
accountable. Tough shit for them.
I am another one of those folks who've had minimal contact with
police (one arrest, and several tickets years ago), and I've
consistently found cops to be rude, arrogant, aggressive, and
generally hostile to all non-cops. I actually love to see them
squirming and on the receiving end of something. It's a nice
turnabout. And this from a white, well-educated, law-abiding
citizen who has had no contact with any of them for years.
Please keep posting this stuff. The collective police mentality
towards civilians is an issue that stinks to high heavens and needs
a good airing.
|3.14.08 @ 2:24PM|#
LarryA | March 14, 2008, 9:45am | #
I don't know how Nixon won. No one I know voted for him.
I did. Another lesser of two evils election. At the time I liked him better than I now do McCain.
I think you mean "evil of two lessers".
|3.14.08 @ 2:43PM|#
I'm using IE, and that is resisting "view source". But more importantly, I'm not able to actually click on any links on the site. Is that also an IE vs FF issue?
Episiarch|3.14.08 @ 2:50PM|#
If he is bouncing around from host to host then he's constantly
changing his IP address, and it can take time (hours or more) for
"ratemycop.com" to be associated with the new IP address in all
domain name controllers. Some people may be going to the old host
(and not finding the site).
It is possible to javscript it so the page does not allow "view
source", at least in IE. Don't know about Firefox.
Nash|3.14.08 @ 3:01PM|#
"Everyone I talk to hates the police. Hates them. Sometimes I
encounter people who are ambivalent. But I can't recall the last
time I spoke to someone who unabashedly supports them. Everyone has
a negative story, a bad experience."
It's always been this way but the sphere of influence has increased
significantly and is reaching higher income levels. In the past
only the poor or people of color had these types of run in. Now the
average middle class Joe is getting hit up this type of harassment
(car searches, DWI's, loitering etc).
It's pretty sad that it had to come to this for us to wake up and
it will correct but I think it's going to get a lot worse before it
gets better.
|3.14.08 @ 3:13PM|#
Jerry Dyer, president of the California Police Chiefs
Association, told Wired the site could give citizens the
opportunity to "unfairly malign" individual officers, and said he'd
be asking the legislature to pass a law making sites like
RateMyCop.com illegal.
I know it's a quaint concern, but wouldn't such a law run afoul of
the right to "petition for a redress of grievances" in the 1st
Amendment?
|3.14.08 @ 3:23PM|#
one of the good cops was telling bars that vice was coming
down to crack down on everyone... except the bars that paid them
off.
Wait, you're telling me one of the good ones was running
interference for the extortion ring? Nice. Real nice.
johnl|3.14.08 @ 3:24PM|#
The site works fine on Safari, view source included. Sounds like an IE problem. Or a windows problem. Try the universal Windows antidote (restarting).
|3.14.08 @ 4:12PM|#
""" If you don't want the public to know who you are, don't be a
cop."""
Or, if you don't want the public to know who you are, don't be a
public servant!
I say a public official, doing a job on behalf of the people, in a
public place, has NO expectation of privacy.
|3.14.08 @ 5:20PM|#
Citizens' Police Review Board
If you feel that you have been treated inappropriately by an
officer, you may file a police misconduct complaint with either: 1)
the Citizens' Police Review Board (CPRB), a civilian police
oversight agency or 2) Internal Affairs Division (OPD/IAD).
The CPRB has civilian investigators and uses a public process to
review complaints.
After a complaint has been filed with the CPRB:
Complaints are investigated by a civilian complaint investigator
who prepares an investigative report for the Citizens' Police
Review Board. The Board is a nine member advisory body.
The Board conducts public hearings on some cases and make written
recommendations to the City Manager for discipline of officers or
rangers.
The City Manager decides whether to implement the recommendations
of the Board, to implement them with modifications, or not to
implement them........
prison guard's union
California Correctional Peace Officers Association
The California Prison system is the third largest penal system in
the country, costing $5.7 billion dollars a year and housing over
161,000 inmates. Since 1980 the number of California prisons has
tripled and the number of inmates has jumped significantly. In the
past few years controversies involving prison expansion,
sky-rocketing costs, and claims of mismanagement and inmate abuse
have put the California prison system under heightened public
scrutiny.
The California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA) is
the California prison guards' union. In recent years the CCPOA has
become a major player in California politics. Its political
influence has grown to the point that it is widely considered to be
one of the most powerful political forces in Sacramento. Its
lobbying efforts and campaign contributions have greatly
facilitated the passage of legislation favorable to union
members.
San Diego Union Tribune
DATE: August 15, 2000
Have you ever wondered why California's prison population grew from
23,264 in 1980 to 160,846 in July 2000? It is not because rapists
and murderers are finally getting their due; for the most part,
that was already happening. What has driven the growth of the
prison system in California over the past two decades is the
25-fold increase in the number of drug offenders sentenced to
prison under harsh new state sentencing laws for virtually every
offense imaginable. Because of these laws, California now has the
highest rate of drug offender incarcerations in the nation - 134
per 100,000. A rate that exceeds states such as Texas and
Louisiana, where compassion and sympathy for law breakers is not
highly prized (49 per 100,000 and 106 per 100,000 respectively).
Although such a system seems counter to public safety interests,
there are powerful political forces at work in California that
promote and sustain the present system. Chief among these forces is
the prison guard's union. Because they benefit from prisons teeming
with inmates, the guards lavish campaign contributions on political
candidates. The influence that the prisons guard's campaign
contributions buys, allows them to pressure elected officials to
enact sentencing laws that keep inmates in prison longer, thus
expanding the overall pool of prisoners and creating a "need" for
more prisons. The guards union blatantly uses its political
influence to promote the funding of more prisons.
http://igs.berkeley.edu/library/htCaliforniaPrisonUnion.htm
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=prison+guard+union&btnG=Google+Search
cactus|3.15.08 @ 1:12AM|#
Some of the most hateful, vitriolic and scathing comments I have
heard as of late directed at the police hasn't been from 20
something kids, urban types or assorted dope smoking longhairs. The
most pointed criticism has been from old ladies. Little gray haired
grandmas and great grandmas in the 60s, 70s and 80s. They have
expressed a seething hatred for various officers of the law as of
late. They have all had personal experiences with different
officers and they have what is best described as seething hatred
for them. These aren't poor minority residents from public housing
in the inner city. These are little old ladies from very small
towns and farmers wives from very rural areas. I was frankly
shocked at the profanity the subject evoked from little church
going old ladies. I was stunned.
It's one thing to have people Liberty loving people from LE
families and backgrounds like myself who witness and experience
abuse hating you, but when the geriatric set starts wishing you
dead - literally hoping you get killed - you've really got to start
looking at how you're doing business.
|3.15.08 @ 1:30PM|#
Just to clear up a misconception about www.copswritingcops.com ,
it's NOT a website for police to complain about other police
behaving improperly.
Instead, it is a website to for cops to complain about other cops
who refuse to turn a blind eye towards illegal conduct-- typically,
writing another cop a ticket for speeding, for example.
Evidentally, the norms of police behavior encouraged by this
website are that police should be exempt from punishment for minor
violations of normal laws that apply to civilians.
Ironically, the behavior the website attacks is that which most
civilians would believe is professional (applying the law equally
to all).
|3.15.08 @ 4:25PM|#
Wonder how many of the anti-police whiners in this thread have taken any positive steps to correct the problem?
Benjamin Wright|3.15.08 @ 11:55PM|#
A modern police officer should assume that everything he does on duty is recorded and reviewed in public. Authority figures are finding it harder and harder to hide anything. Ask Eliot Spitzer!
|3.17.08 @ 12:38PM|#
What action do you suggest, Cop Watcher, shooting the
motherfuckers?
Because every action the so-called "anti-police whiners" have taken
from campaigning for candidates more in tune with civil liberties
to writing letters to the editor to complaining directly to police
departments have fallen short.
And whose to say that "anti-police whining" is not a positive step?
Getting the word out and exposing these assholes is necessary for
change to occur.
Unless, like I asked earlier, we should just shoot the
motherfuckers.
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