Militarized Policing

Free Speech, Militarized Policing, Police, Police Brutality, Police Misconduct

Baltimore Policing Protest

Those demands include ending Baltimore’s use of armored vehicles and refraining from use of riot gear unless extreme circumstances warrant, the AP said. A group spokesperson told the AP that protesters also want police to make wearing badges and name tags a matter of policy.

A handful of protesters remained at the building as of early Thursday morning, according to a Baltimore Sun reporter. The group leading the protest has called for a rally in front of City Hall early Thursday morning.

Via Grasswire.

Militarized Policing, Police, Police Brutality, Police Misconduct, Unions

Police Unions Defending the Indefensible, Daily

Conservative Ross Douthat acknowledges a nationwide problem: Last December, my colleague David Brooks noted that police unions are resisting change on every issue where police reform might be contemplated, from body cameras for officers to reversing the militarization of local law enforcement. But after the untimely death of Freddie Gray, no issue looms larger than…

Militarized Policing, Police

Policing with Military-Grade Devices ‘Hotter than Lava’

Those stun grenades your local department has been purchasing, and using, aren’t sleeping pills: Dukes had been hit by a flashbang, a $50 device used by the police to disorient suspects, often during drug raids. First designed nearly 40 years ago to help military special forces rescue hostages, flashbangs create a stunningly bright burst of…

Militarized Policing, Police

St. Louis County: A Police Culture Rotten to the Core

In St. Louis County, a police culture so rotten is not clueless, but defiant and contrary to ordinary standards of decency and morality: The St. Louis County And Municipal Police Academy, which encompasses Ferguson, is offering a “Continuing Education” course in October entitled “OFFICER-INVOLVED SHOOTING — YOU CAN WIN WITH THE MEDIA.” The class is…

Militarized Policing, Police Misconduct

Police Militarization: Where Even the Worst Get the (Undeserved, Ill-Fitting) Best

No one has bothered to limit military-grade weapons to censured civilian departments: LOS ANGELES (AP) — A Pentagon program that distributes military surplus gear to local law enforcement allows even departments that the Justice Department has censured for civil rights violations to apply for and get lethal weaponry. That lack of communication between two Cabinet…

Militarized Policing, Police

St. Louis police chief convinced he was right in Ferguson, MO

Twenty-eight years of the wrong outlook: CLAYTON, Mo. – St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar defended his department’s use of tear gas, smoke, batons, rifles and armored trucks in the days of civil unrest that followed the Michael Brown shooting, saying that the military equipment is sometimes necessary to patrol “very urban areas.” He…