To Protect & Serve?

[Lex Concord]

While the Supreme Court of the United States has ruled that police officers have no duty to do so, many, if not most, police officers do seem to take the words "To Protect and Serve" very seriously, and do their best to incorporate that mindset into performance of their duties, the Supreme Court's relief from any such requirement notwithstanding.

A case in point appears in today's news from Greenfield, IN:

Officer Hailed As Hero In Fire - Indiana News Story - WRTV Indianapolis

Officer Mullin is to be commended for his actions. He risked injury to himself to help his fellow citizens escape possible death. As he said, if he were in street clothes, he would have done the same thing. I would imagine most of the rest of us would also attempt to help by whatever means possible, though no one knows until immersed in a situation.

Here is what I am having trouble with, and I am hoping some of the officers on the board might provide some insight.

With all the good cops out there, how is it that the absolutely deplorable individuals that are in the profession (as exist in nearly every profession) seem to have an easier time holding onto their status as LEO than someone might have in another profession?

I know the media has a reputation for playing things up for sensationalism, but that really doesn't explain everything away.

Instances where officers with numerous complaints and, in some cases, even multiple lawsuits that have cost the governing authority tons of money are -- rather than being prosecuted and/or fired as appropriate -- are allowed to resign, often moving on to another municipality where the abusive behavior can (and sometimes does) start again.

I know that only the brass can decide to pursue termination, and I know that the Unions will usually fight this tooth and nail, making it a losing proposition.

My question is, in such circumstances, where you know you have a dirty/bad cop in your midst, do you push the brass to go for termination? If not, why not?

Having been in a union, I know that the mentality is that their job is often to protect the member's employment at all costs. But when bad officers are allowed to stay in their positions, it's not just a singular company and its profits that are being hurt, but the public at large.

I guess my question is this. If you take "protect & serve" seriously, do you consider protecting from bad cops to be part of that? Most media coverage would suggest a tight defensive brotherhood which puts protection of its members before such concepts. I'd like to read your side of the story, insofar as you care to share.

 

[level.eleven]

The Dallas Morning News just ran a feature about "gypsy cops" in the state of Texas. Maybe it could answer a few of your questions. The hiring/firing process is much different than that of other organizations. The article estimates there are approximately 100 cops operating in Texas with felony convictions.

With legal loopholes, troubled pasts often not factor in hiring of Dallas County deputy constables | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Latest News

 

[dross]

IBTL

 

[Indy317]

With all the good cops out there, how is it that the absolutely deplorable individuals that are in the profession (as exist in nearly every profession) seem to have an easier time holding onto their status as LEO than someone might have in another profession?

Instances where officers with numerous complaints and, in some cases, even multiple lawsuits that have cost the governing authority tons of money are -- rather than being prosecuted and/or fired as appropriate -- are allowed to resign, often moving on to another municipality where the abusive behavior can (and sometimes does) start again.

First off, I think folks lump all "bad cops" in the same boat, and that is wrong. Some cops are just punks/thugs, and always have been. Others are greedy and use their position to illegally pad up their personal bank account. Then there are the cops who are likely good people, but they really screw up. They might be ones who love to legally get involved in whatever (run lots of traffic, just go up to people and interact, etc.) and things go south and they can't control their attitude, actions, etc..

Now my response to some of your other questions:

-Keeping jobs, job history: Some departments take all complaints, even if the officer is found to have done nothing wrong. So you may have an officer with 10 complaints over five or ten years, yet the media might not tell you that all the complaints were from the drug dealers mom who is upset she no longer is getting her son's drug money for whatever. So she calls to complain, etc.. It happens, sometimes a lot. Also understand depending on the agency, an officer may interact with many people over the shift, so having one or two complaints isn't that big of an issue (for claims of attitudes, some behaviors).

-Why some of the worse keep their jobs: LE is having a hard time finding good quality people. No one has a tat that says "I will be a thief with a badge." "I won't be able to handle stress and will shoot someone unlawfully." The hiring process is long and involved. It also depends on the department. Some agencies can be picky, others don't have very many folks turn out, and they have to settle with what they get. If the towns folk wanted better officers, they will absolutely have to pay higher wages. Greenfield PD suffered for years from having officers come in for their low pay and no take home car (back in the day). Many officers left for other departments that were paying $5 to $10K more plus a take home car benefit. Just how things are. This also explains why some officers who get in trouble at bigger departments end up next door at some smaller, lower pay department. The hiring person(s) don't care about their past incident, they are desperate for someone who they think can do the job. This person not only can do the job, they have the academy, which may save the department money.

I have seen it both ways. I have seen people who shouldn't be cops (they really didn't do anything, just don't know how to act like an adult) get fired/quit or be fired from one department, only to get hired by another, and in some cases, eventually get fired from that department. Then I have seen good officers get hired, only to quickly get a better job at a department that is now paying almost $20K more per year, take home car, etc.. There is also the issue of 'diversity at any cost' hiring. Picking people based on religion, skin color, race, gender, etc.. That sometimes gets people who didn't test well on logic test in the door when maybe they don't have the logic needed to do the job. These folks eventually step on it and are lucky to last five to seven years (if that).

Here is a real world example of how hard it is to hire in LE: I applied twice to the same department in Hamilton County. I wasn't sure I really wanted the job, but decided to give it a shot. First stage is physical fitness test. In both processes, they had around 150 show up. Out of 150, about 40-50 folks couldn't get pass the physical standards. These standards have been on-line for years. There is no surprise, nothing like that. Yet some folks still think that they will magically get 29 sit-ups and they end up with 15.

So 100ish go on to the written test, which isn't that hard at all. They took about 60 from that for board interviews. I didn't make it past the board interviews the first time (they took the top 35 to backgrounds the first time). The second time I did much better, and barely made it (they took the top 25 the second process). When I got to the background stage, I spoke with the recruiter to get a feel of the job. I ended up deciding to stay where I was, I just had it too good there. However, I found out the background stage has another 50% cut rate. Even then, some folks get hired and don't pass the academy, or can't get through field training.

So much goes into hiring, training, etc., that if you have an officer who is good to awesome 95% of the time, do you just fire anyone who gets an attitude, curses someone, etc. no matter what? If so, how do you replace them? If you fired every officer with even a valid complaint for attitude, swearing at a person, etc., who is going to step up and do the job?

I don't know the answers. I do know that it is very telling that when a suburban PD that pays $55K+take home car+ over-time + ability to work off-duty, located in a very nice area, can only get 150 people to show up, in a metro area with 1.2 million people, something is wrong. Yea, so of the 1.2 million, say only 300K could even do the job (no felony convictions, 21-35 years old, no disability, etc). Still, with an applicant pool of at least 300K people, only 150 show up. And a good # of that 150 are the ones you see at other hiring processes. Oh, and I would say of the 150 in my two processes, at least 10 were from out-of-state, another 10-20 out of the metro area. So basically, we have a job that needs quality people, but a lot of the quality people don't even apply. What can we do?

 

[Eddie]

How deplorable individuals get into the profession:

Being a cop can be a cool job. There is action and adventure, you get to exercise power over others, you get to carry a gun and drive a car on emergency runs and vehicle pursuits. The list goes on. Bottom line is that a lot of people would like to have that job and not all of them want it for the right reasons. In the same way that a child molester might position themself to be around children or a burglar might case a business a person who would enjoy abusing the powers of a police officer might go to great lengths to figure out how to game the system and get hired. In the same way that a guy who wants to be a cop because he wants to help people, a guy who wants to be a bully or a thief with a badge will study the hiring process. The people doing the recruiting and hiring aren't perfect, they are human beings and they can make mistakes in who they pick. For every guy with a big heart who just can't do enough pushups or situps to be considered there might be a real jerk with the physical and mental capabilities to pass the initial tests. Once they get the job, if they were smart enough to game the system it may be a while until their fellow, honest cops catch on to what a d-bag they are working with.

As to why cops will come together to protect one of their own:

There are some dynamics of the job that will act to change the way a police officer views the world. Imagine watching every guy you arrest lie to the judge when he takes the stand, imagine having a false complaint filed against you by someone trying to get out of a traffic ticket, imagine being misquoted by the newspaper every tiem you give an accurate statement. The nature of the job works to create an "us vs. them" mentality. When a legitimate complaint is made against one of their own many officers will, based on their past experience, automatically assume that the complaint is false.

I won't say that these are the only reasons, just some personal observations.

 

[Jeremiah]

I don't like the worship of police officers people seem to have. Last semester in an English class I opened the eyes of some of my classmates to the dangers of compliance to police with out question. I asked the whole class ( with a mischevious grin on my face) If I came into the classroom wearing a police uniform would you let me handcuff you?

 

[88GT]

IBTL

Excellent point, but could you expound on the T? I concur with your I and L. And I wholeheartedly agree with B, but I'm not sure exactly what the connection T has to discussion. Particularly it's price in China.

 

[Lex Concord]

Indy317 and Eddie, thanks for offering your candid and insightful replies.

Eddie, I certainly understand the motivation for the bullies and such to get in and that the system can be gamed...I guess what I would like to figure out is what could be changed so that, once they have shown their colors and really screwed up (not just general complaints, but damaged persons, property, rights, etc.), how can they effectively be shown the door, permanently if at all possible. Maybe this happens more often than we hear about, but stories like the ones linked above indicate it probably doesn't happen often enough. This would indicate a broken system and I am, by nature, a problem solver.

It seems that one of the problems could be in the immunities for actions in performance of duties that officers are typically given in statute. I'm not suggesting they be repealed, but some exceptions might be in order. The tricky question is "where in the gray area betweem accident and willful criminal act should that stark line be drawn?"

Another thing you said is that it can take some time before they realize what a d-bag they work with....what then?...if it's something criminal, we'll assume that evidence of a crime will be given to IA or others as necessary...but what about the guy that's not a thief but uses his position to bully, uses his badge to shield him from his actions, actions that would get him three hots and a cot if he weren't in uniform. Do you pull him aside privately and say "ease up"? Do you take it up the chain of command if that doesn't work? I know that there are probably more answers to this than there are people in uniform because situations, relationships, degrees, etc. vary. I'm just trying to get an insight into how such things are typically handled.

Jeremiah: This is neither a "cop worship" nor "cop bashing" thread, and I definitely don't want to see it turn into either. I'm simply hoping to have a dialogue with those who are or were LEO who will have an insight to help me fill in some of my areas of ignorance, which are many.

Part of the reason I started this thread is that it seems the negative is continually highlighted (no, it should not be ignored), but solutions (apart from off with his head or give him a medal) are usually few and far between (again, guilty party speaking). Such threads may serve to pump people up and reinforce their biases, but offer more heat than light. Hopefully this will be a bit different; maybe we'll get some ideas to kick up to our legislators.

As far as your English class is concerned, I'm really not sure what your point is.