Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s Arrest

skavenhorde said:

Yes, it does give him a reason to. You don't think that out of the thousands of laws out there that there isn't one that could be applied to verbally abusing an officer of the law. Disorderly Conduct is a great law that gets any jerk put in jail. It won't stick in court of course, but it does give the officer every right to arrest that man right then and there.

Click to expand...

You can't be arrested for doing what Sir Markus said, hurting a cops feelings, more than that was going on if he was arrested for disorderly especially since he was on his own property when it happened.

Of course you can be arrested for that.

Examples of Disorderly Conduct

Disorderly conduct offenses vary widely by state. Here are some of the most common acts that are considered disorderly conduct offenses:

Public drunkenness
Inciting a riot
disturbance of the peace
loitering in certain areas
fighting / physical altercations
obstructing traffic
use of extremely obscene or abusive language
loud or unreasonable noise

Given the wide range of behaviors that could constitute disorderly conduct, a person may be arrested for this crime without proper cause. Virtually any socially offensive or disruptive conduct may be prosecuted as disorderly conduct.

http://www.criminal-law-lawyer-source.com/terms/disorderly-conduct.html

The law can be abused, but it's still pretty much just a law to get any person that's being a jerk out of the cops face.

skavenhorde said:

Given the wide range of behaviors that could constitute disorderly conduct, a person may be arrested for this crime without proper cause. Virtually any socially offensive or disruptive conduct may be prosecuted as disorderly conduct.

Click to expand...

Do you think police officers should have the right to arrest whomever they please, even if they know it doesn't stick in court?

If so, do you believe they would abuse this authority rarely enough that the benefits would outweigh the costs? If so, could you explain your thinking a bit?

skavenhorde said:

use of extremely obscene or abusive language
loud or unreasonable noise

Click to expand...

Those two are as close as it gets to what was said:

Sir Markus said:

Calling a cop a racist and insulting his 'momma' will pretty much land you in jail any time, regardless of skin color.

Click to expand...

But even then this is neither extremely obscene or loud by itself.

Like I said, I am assuming more was going on, but who knows maybe he wasn't even being disorderly. If he can somehow prove that he wasn't then this cop might catch more shit than he already has.

Prime Junta said:

Do you think police officers should have the right to arrest whomever they please, even if they know it doesn't stick in court?

If so, do you believe they would abuse this authority rarely enough that the benefits would outweigh the costs? If so, could you explain your thinking a bit?

Click to expand...

I edited my response above before you posted, but yes of course it can be abused. Do I think the good outweighs the bad, yes. For one an officer has to deal with the unknown every single day. He has to be 100% correct every single day or people may die. It's one of the few jobs that when you go to work you may not come home or you may end up killing someone. Officers are just humans they aren't super heroes or super villians. They are just normal people trying to do a job.

If one of the people they are suspicious of starts to become verbally abusive or emotionally unstable then it's not far of a stretch to think that this man might pull a gun or knife or escalate it to the next level. People are very chaotic creatures and very hard to predict, imo of course. So if the safe route to avoid any of that from happening is to lock him up for a few hours or a night then isn't that the better option for everyone concerned.

Just try to put yourself in a cops shoes. Try to imagine what that guy or gal has to deal with day in and day out and try to understand that cops never really know what someone might do. That's all I'm saying here. Is that from a police officers perspective an abusive individual is first and foremost an unknown threat.

Like I said before though, treat people how you want to be treated. Especially cops or you are just asking for trouble or even wanting trouble.

BTW PJ, good to read you back here

skavenhorde said:

Like I said before though, treat people how you want to be treated. Especially cops or you are just asking for trouble or even wanting trouble.

Click to expand...

I dont think anybody is arguing these common sense issues, it was about momma jokes not being against the law.

skavenhorde said:

I edited my response above before you posted, but yes of course it can be abused. Do I think the good outweighs the bad, yes. For one an officer has to deal with the unknown every single day. He has to be 100% correct every single day or people may die. It's one of the few jobs that when you go to work you may not come home or you may end up killing someone. Officers are just humans they aren't super heroes or super villians. They are just normal people trying to do a job.

Click to expand...

They're also normal people with a great deal of responsibility. The potential for abuse of that responsibility is enormous. The problem is that a large part of the (reasonably law-abiding) community in the US doesn't trust the cops -- they see them as just another violent, racist, armed gang -- and one backed up by the might of the state. There are reasons for this attitude, and one reason is that in the US cops routinely get away with stuff that would lose them their badge and very likely land them in the clink in most other civilized countries.

"I believe that Sgt. [James] Crowley acted in a way that is consistent with his training at the department, and consistent with national standards of law enforcement protocol,"

"Crush your enemies, see them run before you, laugh at the lamentations of the women"

By the way, I came across this unusually thoughtful appraisal of the case, from Brandon del Pozo, Captain, NYPD, currently working on police corruption cases:

I have come to expect a wide range of conduct from police officers, some of it excellent, most of it acceptable, and some of it sadly lacking. My feeling was one of being let down by both the sergeant and by Professor Gates. The sergeant is acting under the color of law, and all Gates is required to do is exercise his rights as a citizen. True enough. Still, I expect more from thoughtful and wise people than from people who are less reflective and considerate.

Click to expand...

[ http://crookedtimber.org/2009/07/23/police-discretion-a-different-perspective/#more-12139 ]

Having read that piece, I get a feeling that there are lots of knees jerking on this thread... and one of them just might belong to me.

Prime Junta said:

They're also normal people with a great deal of responsibility. The potential for abuse of that responsibility is enormous. The problem is that a large part of the (reasonably law-abiding) community in the US doesn't trust the cops -- they see them as just another violent, racist, armed gang -- and one backed up by the might of the state. There are reasons for this attitude, and one reason is that in the US cops routinely get away with stuff that would lose them their badge and very likely land them in the clink in most other civilized countries.

Click to expand...

That's what IA is for. I think they are a little bit above us normal citizens and it should be that way. Of course, you should also have the IA and a healthy news media that will pounce on real corruption and abuse of power from the police force, but this isn't even close to abuse of power.

I personally don't agree with this statement,"they see them as just another violent, racist, armed gang" Even when I was basically on the opposite side of the law I still never viewed them that way and they never treated me that way either. They tried to help me actually or at least one did.

Edit:

Prime Junta said:

Having read that piece, I get a feeling that there are lots of knees jerking on this thread... and one of them just might belong to me.

Click to expand...

Yea, me too, but I'm a little biased I guess when it comes to the cops. Hell even the cops over here are nice. One even downgraded a "making a right turn at a red light" ticket to a Jay walking ticket.

Better to just not shout at the police IMHO. There is something to be said for low profile.

Now I know how to do burglary in US without any problems. I will fake an ID card which list me as residence at that adress, try to break into it and if the police come show them my ID card. If they want to take me to the station I would say remmember the Gates case???

skavenhorde said:

I personally don't agree with this statement,"they see them as just another violent, racist, armed gang" Even when I was basically on the opposite side of the law I still never viewed them that way and they never treated me that way either. They tried to help me actually or at least one did.

Click to expand...

It's clear that you don't, but lots of people do. I know some of them personally.

falafel said:

Insulting a police officer is not a crime.

Click to expand...

Here it is. One can be punished for that. Insulting can be punished in general, in really bad cases.

One of the imho worst cases was when someone called a police officer a "Schlumpf", whhich is the German word for "Smurf". He got punished, and had to pay a sum for that.

We have something similar popularly called the "police, police, potato pig" clause, which simply means that you can get a small fine for insulting a police officer. It's seldomly used though.

Prime Junta said:

By the way, I came across this unusually thoughtful appraisal of the case, from Brandon del Pozo, Captain, NYPD, currently working on police corruption cases:



[ http://crookedtimber.org/2009/07/23/police-discretion-a-different-perspective/#more-12139 ]

Having read that piece, I get a feeling that there are lots of knees jerking on this thread... and one of them just might belong to me.

Click to expand...

Great linkie there. And while we're probably all going half-cocked since there's still a lot of unclear details, it seems that for most of us it's going to come down to our personal impression of the police. For my part, I'm going to give the benefit of the doubt to the professional that didn't play the race card.

I think in general people critisize the police too much, whatever happens it is the police fault, just recently there was a wanted criminal which the police hunted and he drow into a living are and drobe over a boy that died, and after that the police was blaimed........... but if you allow all criminals who drive crazily to go free without hunting them, I guess more and more would begin to do it since they know the police would not hunt them? secondly he could have driven over someone by crazy driving anyway........

Police are aware of the dangers of chases though. So they have to judge if the chase is a danger to the public or not. If they are putting the public at risk over a criminal do you believe that to be correct then?

skavenhorde said:

+1
What I found surprising from this article is that the neighbor didn't recognize him. How long had he been living there? She had to of seen him at least once.

Click to expand...

Yeah I thought that was kind of odd also.

falafel said:

She may have "forgotten" who he was just to get him back for being a pain to live next to.

Click to expand...

Kind of a stretch...

Prime Junta said:

There are reasons for this attitude, and one reason is that in the US cops routinely get away with stuff that would lose them their badge and very likely land them in the clink in most other civilized countries.

Click to expand...

Right....and that only happens in the US.