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The long arm of the law to get a little longer tonight
By adamg on Tue, 06/15/2010 - 8:13am
We hear it's all hands on deck tonight as every available Boston Police officer is being called in to make sure drunken out-of-town college students revelers don't try to tear the town down tonight if the Celtics win. And if they lose? They'll do it all over again after game 7.
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Comments
Waste of taxpayers money
and police time.
How about BPD respond to any issues instead of creating them?
The Score
Police deaths after any sporting event in the last decade or two: 0
Citizens killed by citizens after a sporting event in the last decade: 1 (James Grabowski, part of a rioting crowd, struck by an SUV driven by a drunk driver)
Citizens killed by police after a sporting event: 2 (Victoria Snelgrove, David Woodman)
So....
Woodman died because of a heart condition...
go ahead, start it up again.
And Snelgrove died because of a weapon that should have never been used regardless of the training involved.
#1:
#1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eggshell_skull
#2: And this absolves BPD of the murder how? They publicly stated that they accepted full responsibility for her death.
#1
#1 I didn't hear the DA's office or medical examiner bring up the eggshellskull defense? And what if this kid pulled out a gun and shot at the police and the police shot back and killed him. Would you include that cop killing in your little scoreboard? And look up use of force cases in tort law before you bring up eggshell skull issues. One does not outdue the other.
#2 I didn't say they were absolved. The weapon was advertised as a "less than lethal" weapon when it wasn't. Even with training that gun cannot be used in that purpose and it was the City's fault for not realizing it when they implemented it.
Not doing yourself any favors
The "City's fault"? Look, I hate Menino as the Mayor for a lot of good reasons, but one of them isn't his decision to put pepper bullets in the hands of cops. That was a police decision. The "City" didn't ask them to equip themselves with what you're calling incorrectly-advertised weapons and then shoot indiscriminately into a crowd at head level which wasn't in the manual no matter HOW they were advertised.
You'd be better off trying to dismiss Brett by pointing out the changes that have been made to procedure to compensate for the poor performance of the BPD after the death of Ms. Snelgrove than trying to argue that the situation arose out of a situation not in their control or something.
You're also better off staying away from trying to link an open container to a shootout with the cops. That's just stupid and a total strawman.
Open container
He coulda been hiding a gun in there, see?
could you imagine the
could you imagine the response if he had a LTC and was doing so?
Woodman died because of a heart condition...
they keep saying that. they keep saying he was drinking and he deserved to be arrested... they keep saying he resisted arrest and he deserved to be slammed to the ground... they keep saying the road rash on his face was his fault... they keep saying he stopped breathing but the BPD wasn't paying attention when he did so his brain suffered oxygen deprivation and brain damage, they tried to revive him when they finally noticed he wasn't breathing but they could not, they keep saying they called for a bus to get him medical care but it didn't come, they keep saying they flagged one down, they keep saying its not unusual for all nine officers on the scene to submit themselves for stress to the nearest hospital immediately after the incident, they keep saying its not unusual for none of the officers to file a report, they keep saying he was unconscious in the hospital for many days and when he awoke he spoke with his mother briefly, became unconscious, and then (they keep saying) Woodman died because of a heart condition...
"they"
You mean the doctor and district attorneys office.
no I mean
the BPD, Dan Conley, the coroner, and of course you and Conley's PR hack
You see in the debate of whether the BPD used necessary and sufficient force or excessive force against the man (suspected of drinking in public), and whether his death was in any way attributable to the treatment he received by the BPD, is the issue of how he ended up in the hospital.
That wasn't a result of his heart condition, nor was the road rash on his face, that was a result of the forced used to arrest him.
Subsequently, he was cuffed and left face down. The BPD has a duty to insure his well-being while under their control. They failed and he ended up in the hospital in a coma. So when they say, David Woodman died becuase he had a heart condition, they are also excusing all of the other official actions and the consequences of those official actions.
No mas No mas.
So much for the accountability of the BPD.
force necessary due to the circumstances.
actually pretty clear cut here considering use of force history and other legal cases in situations like these (where 99.999% of the people don't die when resisting arrest and are met with proper force [compliance techniques] to arrest the person.)
Anonymous you really need to study use of force cases and their legal standards. Use of force is 99% of the reason why no one was charged here.
Victoria Snelgrove
Is possibly a better example of what you're trying to prove.
BPD takes responsibility? Nope; "punks" killed Snelgrove
Selective reading......
Boston Police Department Commissioner Kathleen O'Toole accepted the department's responsibility,
yet still blamed the "punks" who turned the event into
a near-riot.
physician, heal thyself.
They deserve some blame I think.
.
Two way street
If you get to blame the faceless "punks" for causing the inappropriate actions of the officer that killed Ms. Snelgrove, then I get to blame the faceless "pigs" for how they cause the inappropriate actions of cop killers who kill cops.
Even if you accept as a premise that Ms. Snelgrove was not abiding by the law at the time, the "punks" didn't hand that cop his weapon, didn't not train him, didn't ask him to fire into the crowd incorrectly and inappropriately, didn't do anything that contributed to her death by cop.
Cops are to serve and protect the public. All of them. Even the ones who screw up...the "punks". They did not serve and protect Ms. Snelgrove that night. The rest of us non-"punks" were not served nor protected by her loss either. The blame is solely on the cops failing to live up to their own purpose for that.
Yea you are right.
But that isn't all I was trying to say.
Take this 16 year old girl who tried to sail across the world as an example. Who do you blame for her failure here? I say there are several factors to blame, and not all the factors are equal. The biggest cause of her failure is the storm. The actual storm is probably 75% (maybe more) of the reason she failed. If there was no storm, she probably would have made it the whole way. Another factor in her failure is her inexperience. At 16 years old, she may have gotten through this storm if she had sailed through other storms like it and succeeded. That comes with experience. If this girl decided to wait a few years so she could experience sailing in more storms, she would not have failed. Another factor is her parents. They could have told her that the world record is not worth the danger of what could happen here. If her parents did not let her sail, she would not have failed.
It is like if my young daughter asked me if she could go to the movies by herself or with a friend. She could probably do it herself without me driving her, or going up to buy the tickets for her and picking her up again. If something ever happend to her, most of that blame would be placed on the actual event (robber, drunk driver, thug, etc.) The rest of the blame would be on me for letting her go down there and not teaching her that it is unsafe for her to do somethings on her own, and many of those things would be dangerous regardless of her age.
I would not let her go to Kenmore Square if there was a chance there might be a riot. And if something did happen to her, I could blame the actual cause, but I would have to take most of the blame for letting her go into a situation that has proven to be dangerous in the past. And where the danger comes from doesn't matter. It could be out of control cops, riotous thugs, drunk drivers, college kids throwing bottles, etc.
Bottom line is that the entire situation is dangerous and I would blame her or myself if she went down there in the first place.
The Stern Commission wrote a
The Stern Commission wrote a report on Woodman. It's online at http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/Ste.... It refutes almost every single allegation you make. It criticizes the the supervisors at the scene for not establishing custody of Woodman and the officers for not searching him immediately. It completely exonerates them of brutality charges. It calls the arrest for public drinking "justified and reasonable." It calls bullshit on the allegation that the cops were trying to get their stories straight.
In all the ways that seem to matter to you, Stern comes to the same conclusion as BPD, the DA, the ME, the US Attorney, the administration of Mass General Hospital, and the Woodman family attorney, who knows there's not a dime to be made in a wrongful death suit because there was no criminal or civilly negligent behavior to support one. It's over, Anonymous. The cops didn't kill that kid. His own heart did.
Who hired Stern's law office to do the investigation?
The Police Commissioner
And who's side was everyone else on?
That basically came up with the same conclusions?
the city thinks the BPD did $3,000,000 in damages to David Woodm
that's why they're paying his family $3,000,000.
Am I surprised the police commissioner, Dan Conley and his PR flack, Atty Stern all, in a loud chorus, said "move along, nothing to see here" as if putting the kid in the hospital and causing brain damage is perfectly ok during an arrest. No I'm not surprised. It's simply means that the people we rely on to enforce accountability cannot be relied on. It means the BPD is not accountable for its actions, even actions that put people into the hospital, in a coma, with brain damage.
Attorney's for the city knew the Woodmans had a claim against the BPD for its actions in that case. If they didn't think so, they wouldn't pay a cent.
It's just too bad we can't rely on the DA to assess the situation fairly an hold our policemen accountable for how they conduct themselves in the course of doing their duty.
The commissioner talked about having civil rights attorneys train police crowd control, attend the roll call meeting, witness crowd control in action at large gatherings, and write post-morten reports for the BPD so they can adjust their training. Now that the city has paid $3000000 in damages to the Woodmans, you'd think we could get this program off the ground.
the city doesn't necessarily think it did $3M
...in damages. it could be, and often is, that the city thinks it is worth $3M to settle the case. civil cases can drag on for a long time, and they cost a lot of money, and they keep the case in front of the press. both government and private parties will often settle to either save money or to just end it.
nobody said what happened is okay. Dan Conley didn't say it, the PR people didn't say it, Stern didn't say it, and the city didn't say it. all basically agree, what happened is a tragedy.
Exactly Bandit.
It would also cost the city more to investigate this further and/or go to court over it. This is what the city does with thousands of lawsuits it gets every year (that insurance pays for anyway) Insurance also pays for most of this so the city might not pay anything in the end. Add that on top of the fact that they might demand more money from the Celtics and other teams for security, 3 million dollars really isn't that much.
City/Police in the fact the City insurance pays for it.
First off the City does pressure the police to obtain more less than lethal types of weapons and they actually approve and don't approve them. This includes tazers, automatic weaopns, pepperball guns, batons, shields, etc. That wasn't really my point though. The Police should have known it wasn't a safe weapon to use regardless of what the City wanted or didn't want.
Pepperball guns are impossible to control, even if they are shot at ground level because hard balls bounce and have been known to bounce 8+ feet if they don't break. The cop wasn't 'officially' trained in the weapon but I guarentee that he would have shot it the same way if he was trained because he actually knew about the weapon and how to use it.
My question about cop shootouts was just to see where Brett would put that death on his scorecard, not compare it to the Woodman Death.
control
police officers do their job during these seasons, i just hope people would learn to respect and obey the law.
Cops, too?
Yes, obeying the law. That goes for the cops, too. Doing their job means obeying the laws and knowing what those laws happen to be. I have far more respect for a police officer who can do his or her job while acknowledging that the laws actually put limits on their behavior.
According to the Globe,
According to the Globe, they're also shutting down the area around Fenway and the Garden to pedestrians, which IMO is a step too far. 99% of the revelers are peaceful and just want to be around fellow Celtics fans, do a little bit of chanting and what not and go home safely.
Arrest the fools who damage property and incite violence, but don't shut down parts of the city to the public. I understand the reasoning but it's still a bit too authoritarian for my tastes. We're basically treating the public en masse as criminals instead of actual doing something about the troublemakers.
I watched Game 6 in '08 at the Greatest Bar on Friend Street and didn't break anything or hurt anyone afterwards and neither did 99.9% of the other people there and I would have loved to do the same this year.
What's next? Banning alcohol during the playoffs? Actually, that might not be a bad idea. Heck, we get way more deaths in this city from alcohol than all the sports celebrations combined so let's just ban it completely. Sure the majority of people can handle it but not everyone can so let's ban it for everyone always! We'll live in a utopia free of drunk drivers, drunken revelry, and all the other negatives associated with alcohol. Why didn't we think of this before?
BEAT LA.
How late do the trains run?
Um, not everybody who would be around cares about the ball game. On the other hand (and I'm sure this is news to the MBTA and the BPD), some people actually work late and need to get home by ... taking the T!!
"pick up that can citizen"
"pick up that can citizen"
.
!
I was in NYC when the yankess
I was in NYC when the yankess won last time, and I didnt see a single cop outside the packed bar I was in or on the way home. The only "disorder" I saw was some random honking.
Perhaps maybe the violent environment in Boston is created by the expectation that there will be a violent environment?
Compare that to New Years Eve....
When 20,000!!!! cops are forced to work because of potential problems there.