Sheriff to L.A. Cops: Be More … Cautious
The headline was, as headlines ought to be, an attention-grabber: “Deputies chasing armed suspects ordered to be more cautious.” Some questions immediately came to mind: If one is the cautious type, why would he have chosen to become a sheriff’s deputy in the first place? And at what cost does this increase of caution come, and who must pay it?
The story, by writers Andrew Blankstein and Richard Winton, appeared in last Thursday’s Los Angeles Times, and it concerned a new directive from Los Angeles County Sheriff Leroy Baca to his deputies. “In policing cultures around the nation, there is a tendency for us to put ourselves in harm’s way right away,” Baca told reporters gathered for a news conference at Sheriff’s Department headquarters last week. He wants his deputies to be more reluctant to place themselves in the line of fire. “You don’t have to go barreling in on every case and then find yourself in a position where you have no choice but to use your gun.”
Which may sound reasonable enough, as far as it goes, but in cities like Los Angeles, one must always be suspicious of political motivations behind any changes to law enforcement policy, no matter how reasonable they may sound on first hearing. And indeed in the Times story there are hints that there are reasons other than the safety of his deputies that has led Sheriff Baca to urge more caution when confronting suspects believed to be armed.
“The new tactical approach was recommended by a panel of veteran deputy training officers that Baca convened in September after a rash of shootings,” write Blankstein and Winton. “The sheriff said he asked the panel to answer a defining question in law enforcement: ‘If a person who you believe is armed runs from you, what should you do?’”
Thus Sheriff Baca seems to have concluded that his deputies have been involved in too many shootings, and that since he is powerless to regulate the conduct of those who present a threat to deputies, he must reduce the number of shootings by circumscribing the deputies’ response to those threats.
The sheriff’s new guidelines are encapsulated in a 30-page booklet titled “Split-second Decision, The Dynamics of the Chase in Today’s Society” (available online in pdf format here). The booklet serves as a useful primer on issues surrounding the use of deadly force by police officers, including the applicable California and federal laws. And it presents a series of actual scenarios in which Los Angeles deputy sheriffs were suddenly forced to make life-or death decisions. Reading through the booklet was at times spine-chilling for me, for it brought back memories of experiences of my own that were similar to some of those presented. No matter how many cop movies you may have seen or how many police procedurals you may have read, until you have experienced it you will never know quite how it feels to be suddenly confronted by a person you believe is trying to kill you.
Hats off to the men and women in blue who are attempting to protect society from the dregs that continually rise to the surface. They are, as a rule, underpaid, undermanned, undergunned, yet they keep going. . . .Thank you, police officers!!
LAPD, Sheriff’s Department have their hands full to say the least.
To perform the job they’re sworn to do, all the while recognize, adhere to nanny state rules and regulations.
On top of this the gauntlet to obtain a CCW in Lala land is very difficult.
A sad state of affairs for the law abiding citizenry and those who wear the badge.
And thus every cop film within the genre of PC gone mad from Bullit, through Dirty Harry to whatever is current now is vindicated.
The county I reside in has at any one time two Sheriff’s deputies on duty to cover a large area, during the day these two also act as baliffs at the courthouse and do other legal running around as required. In time of need calling 911 will not get you a Deputy not even one because one requires back up and the back up deputy may be on the other side of the county.
Calling 911 will not get you an EMT or ambulance as these are private commercial interest at most and over worked by the nursing care system at best.
Calling 911 will get you a volunteer fireman, in his fire truck and at least two or three in their private vehicles.
How much help they can give you in a burglary, assault, robbery or rape is a matter of who arrives. You will get very good EMT help and fire suppression if your property is on fire.
Once you do get a Sheriff’s deputy on scence they are courteous and professional.
And of course left unmentioned are the alternate scenarios in which the perp escapes from the building while the police, with an abundance of caution, wait for back-up and he goes on to maim and/or murder other innocent citizens subsequently–to be followed by civil law-suits from the victims/victims families bankrupting the police involved thru either attnys fees and/or civil judgments. Not to mention the interminable and possible career-ending internal police investigations that would probably insue.
As one criminalogist once pointed out, we ask people with often only HS educations to make split-second life and death decisions that attorneys, PhD psychologists, sociologists criminalogists, and senior police administrators often still cannot agree about even with the luxury of months of analysis second-guessing in the safety of their offices.
So, I can safely assume that the author, in most every case, would support the home owner that shoots at police who, unannounced, try to forcibly enter their residence at the wee hours of the morning?
“They are, as a rule, underpaid”
Police officers are rarely underpaid. On the contrary, the leftists have made a point to bribe them. It is time for the blunt truth: police unions are often buddy-buddy with The Democratic Party establishment. The typical policeman and policewoman may usually be culturally conservative—but they also enjoy benefiting from the welfare state. California is in deep economic trouble because of the insane pensions paid out to police officers and other government employees.
Put a group of cops together and they can devise any number of ways in which a police shooting might have been avoided if the involved officers had exercised more caution and used different tactics.
Failing that, and after they’ve shot six people by accident, that same group of cops can come up with a series of alibis to put the blame on the victims.
NEW ORLEANS — On Sept. 4, 2005, with floodwaters of Hurricane Katrina still standing in much of the city, Lt. Michael J. Lohman of the New Orleans Police Department arrived at the Danziger Bridge in eastern New Orleans. A group of police officers had rushed there just ahead of him in response to a radio call for assistance.
At the bridge, Lieutenant Lohman found that six civilians had been shot by police officers, two fatally. None of them had weapons.
Almost immediately, federal authorities said Wednesday in a blistering series of accusations, he and the other officers began to plot a cover-up, planting a gun near the site to make the shootings appear justified.
That action led to Lieutenant Lohman’s appearance in a federal courtroom on Wednesday afternoon, where he pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to obstruct justice. It is the first charge in a wide-ranging inquiry into police misconduct that led to civilian deaths in the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina, and it is unlikely to be the last.
“Know this,” Jim Letten, the United States attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana, said to reporters after the hearing. “The investigation continues. It is ongoing.”
It is also not the only federal investigation into civilian deaths caused by the police force in the days after the hurricane. The fact that the accusations go beyond the shooting to a larger cover-up “is really indicative of a systemic integrity issue,” said Rafael C. Goyeneche III, a former New Orleans prosecutor who is the president of the Metropolitan Crime Commission, a watchdog group. “It’s going to rock the Police Department to the core.”
How boring to write about such things, and in your defense, I know you probably don’t read the NYT. It is biased, but its probably more likely that you have trouble with such lengthy articles
I have a news flash for you, Mr. Thomson: Police officers and firefighters do a greater service for society than, say, a union plumber. They fully deserve a more generous pension. You cannot equate what they have to do with other occupations and try to lump every government employee together.
David Thompson@#7
For many years thru the end of the 70s the police in Democrat controlled New Orleans could retire w.fully vested pensions after FIFTEEN (15) yrs service! This, in a city essentially broke since as far back as the early 50s and controlled by the Democrats since the Civil War even unto this day.
“They fully deserve a more generous pension.”
You need to define “generous.” Many fireman and police pension plans border on the ridiculous. They are bankrupting countless municipalities across the country. Ruthless labor bosses and cowardly politicians hammered out unsustainable financial agreements. The day of reckoning is already here. And no, I do not speak as a liberal, but a committed center-right conservative. California is currently experiencing de facto bankruptcy. Other states are also in jeopardy.
David Thomson: Not all police and deputies are union members nor have any generous pension that they themselves do not provide for. I speak from personal experience. But I would rather provide a generous pension to a police, deputy or firefighter than a clerk in the dmv or paper pushers and bureaucrats or definitely politicians.
Let’s see: we can’t use airpowwer in Afghanistan because we might kill civilians (unless we, literally, get the go-ahead from a lawyer), we can’t do night raids over there anymore because it causes “Social Irritability” (no, really, A freakin’ General said that!), so now back home we have namby-pamby rules for cops?
Does anyone actually get to protect us from bad guys?
Isn’t “depraved indifference” a punishable offence? If so, shouldn’t we just throw our political class in jail?
When you pin on that tin target you commit yourself to laying it all on the line as often as necessary, to protect the good guys from the bad guys; even if many of the good guys hate your guts and ignorantly work against you and, therefore, self-destructively.
“Now” is the peace officer’s imperative. The more quickly he acts the better the result will be.
Sending for help and waiting for it, invites disaster. The bad guy gets away and goes on to harm more innocents.
The nutcakes who want cops to throw a net over an armed suspect or negotiate with a Duster with a Niner are ignorant and silly.
Perhaps my LAPD pal could fix them up with a ridealong on Saturday night in 77th or Newton precincts and bring such into the real world.
Look at the composition of the LA Police Commission and see why these absolutely unqualified people and politicians pretending to be cops, like Baca, shouldn’t even be allowed in the building, let alone in charge of the troops/
To #7, David Thompson. Wrong and ignorant. Police and sheriffs are paid by cities and counties; not by the CA state government. The state police are very few in number and are only used to secure government buildings. They are, in effect, security guards. Revenue from the citations written by the CHP can more than subsidize its operation. It is true that the prison guards are grossly overpaid. But they are offered almost no authority over or protection from the inmates, who, believe it or not, are unionized!One of the major costs to California is the subsidization of illegal aliens; almost all from Mexico.
Wasn’t the decision made after Columbine that, rather than cautiously waiting for SWAT teams to arrive and then hiding behind them, the first cop(s) on the scene of whatever is going on should immediately go in guns blazing?
Ditto the Mad Muslim Hussein shooting — if *those* first responder cops had hung back, cautiously waiting for backup.
I think this is stupid, and I think Baca is trying to avoid lawsuits by the families of perforated (minority) bad guys who deserved to become perforated. (And their obnoxious mouthpieces named Jesse and Al.)
“Some questions immediately came to mind: If one is the cautious type, why would he have chosen to become a sheriff’s deputy in the first place?” Well, there’s been a lot of progressive changes in the last 40 years. Hiring, retention, and promotions have to be approved by the League Of Women Voters. Jails are run by the psychiatrists, they’re now non-smoking, are client centered, and new ones have to meet those kinder and gentler federal mandates–threaten suicide and you can get a sex change operation on the state dole while doing time. It’s a brave new world in modern American corrections: I’ll kill myself if you don’t give me a vagina. Oh, and community policing means being a probation officer with a gun–just don’t use it, unless you’re shot first. Oh, and those unconstitutional traffic ticket quotas for making up budget shortages are OK, if you call them officer performance standards. And, of course, officers have to rely on citizens and snitches to do the racial profiling to establish probable cause. I think that about covers it when it comes to managing risk and officer safety.
Well Jack, I think you need to get a few facts on the table.
1) The first rule of policing is to go home alive at the end of your shift. I didn’t make that up, my brother, who is a retired LAPD officer told me that – and he’s got a medical retirement after being shot in the line of duty, twice, so don’t even attempt to deny it.
2) No one is going to protect your life with more determination then you yourself. This is one reason that sheriffs and police chiefs like may issue CCW, that and of course campaign contributions. Basically they want you dependent. It keeps them employed.
3) Don’t expect someone else to bleed for you. Cops know that their blood is worth more than your money. Since women got the vote they’ve been under the delusion that they could buy protection, and we’ve got a lot of politicians who cater to their votes. When it really comes down to it, be prepared to defend yourself.
David Thomsen: come to SC( esp. Greenville County ) and see what the cops are paid here. Then look them in the face and tell them they are overpaid, C’mon, I dare you. . .
David Thompson is right: the pensions for field officers that are hurt are not begrudged by taxpayers. But we have a problem with cops who were never shot or hurt retiring at age 50 or 55, and taking another job while receiving a pension. Don’t tell me they “work under stress.” Who doesn’t? (trauma nurses, paramedics, lawyers closing big deals and working till 400am, public school teachers in inner cities…..don’t carry on about stress). The issue is how rich those pensions ought to be and for who. They are out of control. One California city went BK because of rich police pensions alone.
No 15: state police like CHP are on the roads in comfortable cars, ticketing motorists exercing their constitutional rights to go 85 on a 65 mph freeway. Many guard buildings or politicians and hardly merit the pay of the front line guys and women at LAPD. Yet they too get nifty pensions.
New York firefighters have been able to retire after 20 years–so starting at 20 meant retiring at 40 with a fat pension indexed for inflation plus health benefits no one else has. Irrespsective of injury or disability.
Many sheriffs in LA seem to have endless time to guard politicians, judges, tell people in court to “shhh,” and ticket drivers in palces not covered by LAPD. And let prisoners out of jail by mistake. Once again, the question is what they deserve and why: just being a sheriff is not enough.
These men and women in blue have as much right, though not as much chance, of going home safely after each shift. Therein lies the dual-edge sword.
If they exercise caution, average citizens must be more prepared and willing to perform personal safety and security obligations that, falsly, social engineers claim are the responsibility of the government/police. More cautious officers means more criminals escape early capture or termination.
If they do not exercise caution, it is society’s obligation to prepare them, equip them, and train them for the agressive and confrontational job of pursuit-to-terminate. To that end, we should be arming our officers with fully-automatic weapons, high-powered weapons, semi-or-fully-automatic shotguns, and innovative tools like drones and battle gear.
But never think we are doing the citizens or the police a good turn by asking them to be less agressive or more so. Make them invincible in a street confrontation with a dirtbag — and give the average citizen as much access to the same tools and weapons so we do not fear, as we should, excessive force when police are granted such unequal power.
Whether or not we admit it, in a free republic, the citizen is the first line of protection and defense against domestic and criminal threats. The police should be granted no access to weapons or tactics that we cannot use as private citizens for self-protection.
The citizen should not shrink one inch from his/her duty to himself/herself and the general public. We must all be prepared and diligent.
(PS: Can someone find a kindergarten for these wimpy “top cops” to run who think we can nice-nice our way into utopia? Maybe it works with four-year-olds. It doesn’t work with gang-bangers.)
A couple points here.
First the officer writing the article is on target. I spent twenty years having to deal with Monday morning quarterbacking about my actions and the actions of my fellow officers. Much like lawyer who cannot help but put their fingerprints on everything placed in front of them, the trainers and bosses have to say something about what you did. You could have done it properly and they’ll admit that but then offer some criticism because they are unable to hold it in, like a Taco Bell driven fart.
Second, the toughest decision I had to make was running into danger to get the job done. When I was a young officer it was “Katy bar the door.” But years of getting by on luck and then being looked at like I had three heads by my bosses taught me to slow down and sometimes let the bad guy get away. The old saying goes, “He may get away this time, but he’ll screw up again and we’ll get him the next time.” However, the danger to the public was the potential harm he could cause others. However, life is a risk and you have to weigh risk against benefit. The same decisions you are seeing now in L.A. were made on the issue of pursuit. When I started twenty years ago, we chased everybody for everything. But the crashes and injuries to innocents and the subsequent law suits we had to pay out made all the departments across the nation revisit the issue and put in new policies. The author is correct. The bad guys figured out right away we stopped chasing for most crimes and they just took off, knowing we would let them go. Crime went up and new victims replaced the potential ones we were worried about. It is a hard balance to achieve and should be set by the community that the officers serve in.
Third, the minute you put on the badge you accept the good and the bad that goes with it. One of the bad things is having to put up with being second guessed. Heck I’ve been sued for arresting a crackhead you sued me and his black female probation officer for doing our jobs. I’ve been looked at by supervisors, put on report because they didn’t like the way I did my job, and on and on. And I was a middle of the road kind of guy. Some of my brothers in blue were constantly being reviewed. One year they issued us pepper spray because during fights we were beating people with our issued batons. Our moderate leadership did not address WHY we were getting into fights (bad guys were trying us) and instead figured it was our fault. So we used the pepper spray instead of fists and batons, and soon the bosses complained we were spraying too many people. Like I said, can’t win.
Fourth, for the guy complaining about NO during the hurricane a couple of facts might help. One- Parts of New Orleans was and is full of gangs and thugs and is about one goat and a mud hut short of a third world country. Two- during the meltdown there, criminals took advantage of the situation and robbed, assaulted and terrorized hundreds of innocent people and businesses. Three- they were warned not to screw around and didn’t listen. This was a war zone and the police were kidding. You got shot it was because you were running with a TV in your hands, had shot at the police (which happened all the time), or failed to follow orders in a Martial law situation. Fourth- I had friends and fellow officers in and around that city. Many of the “killings of innocents” were cops killing real bad guys. A sort of no quarter given purging. It didn’t happen all the time, but it happened. You have a gangbanger roaming the street and he is a known felon, a violent criminal and you catch him out and armed. You are not going to warn him even once. The little old lady you carry out on your back. The banger catches one in the forehead and you move on. In addition, I heard more than one story where the Sheriff in a surrounding parish got a posse together and blocked the exits from NO into his jurisdiction with the intent to prevent bad guys from getting into his area and causing HIS people trouble. That ended up in several shootings including several gang members trying to flee the area in a stolen car. They were warned to turn back, they didn’t listen. So don’t apply Katrina to normal police duty. There was nothing normal about it.
Life Model Decoy (no. 8 above):
As it happens I do read the New York Times on occasion, though perhaps not with the regularity of someone of your obvious sophistication. And of course as a conservative, most especially one who toils in ignorance as a police officer, I have trouble with some of the big words. But, after several references to the dictionary, I did manage to slog through the article you cited. And, having now received the approval of my editorial master at Pajamas Media HQ, I’ll be writing a column on it soon.
I know it causes you great discomfort to wade into the muck on such websites as this one, but so strong is your sense of duty to your fellow man that you nonetheless are compelled to do so, if only for the chance to point out to us yokels the many, many errors of our ways. If I may be so bold as to speak for my fellow contributors, we are forever in your debt.
Why so much hate for the men in blue? Yes, some of them have ‘undeserved’ pensions but unlike a postal worker, teacher or an IRS agent et al, these guys are putting their lives on the line for some really shiteous human feces that comes down the pike. I would never want to do their job.
You think the Nam vets got spat on?
1. RickGreenvilleSC:
“…They are, as a rule, underpaid, undermanned, undergunned,”
6 digit salaries, the backing of the bloated bureaucracy, armored vehicles, full-auto weapons, grenades, quasi-dictatorial powers…” Jeebus sagging mammaries in jackboots… quite the deal when compared to the limited powers and rights of the peasantry…
4. HEP-T:
“..
How much help they can give you in a burglary, assault, robbery or rape is a matter of who arrives. You will get very good EMT help and fire suppression if your property is on fire.”
Exactly.
6. Sean:
So, I can safely assume that the author, in most every case, would support the home owner that shoots at police who, unannounced, try to forcibly enter their residence at the wee hours of the morning?
I don’t know about the author- But I certainly do.
Tacking a tin star on your tit doesn’t exempt automatically exempt a person from basic standards of decency- nor should it provide legal protections in the event that they violate the rights of others.
7. David Thomson:
8. Life Model Decoy:
Excellent points.
9. Don Bear:
I have a news flash for you, Mr. Thomson: Police officers and firefighters do a greater service for society than, say, a union plumber.
Here’s a news flash for you, Mr. Bear:
Granted, firefighters perform a useful function in society….police: not so much. Plumbers make their living by fixing the cause of any crap-storm that may be raining down on your head… cops, more often than not, via asset forfeiture laws, the war on drugs and numerous other anti-freedom laws, are, more often than not, the motivational force behind the crap-storm.
13. Don Rodrigo:
“Does anyone actually get to protect us from bad guys?”
Have you ever considered putting down that Big Mac and taking actions to protect yourself?
14. white tiger:
“When you pin on that tin target you commit yourself to laying it all on the line as often as necessary.”
What a load of pig manure. I spent 20+ years as a commercial fisherman in Alaska. Between my self and my former colleagues, we placed ourselves in more danger on any given day than the majority of jack-booted tax feeders will during the entire course of their careers.
15. Anonymous:
“The state police are very few in number and are only used to secure government buildings.”
Hmmm…. I suppose that explains why I once spent nearly 4 hours on the side of the road just south of the Oregon border humoring some inbred CHP clown with a mangy mutt who was erroneously convinced that I might have- at some point in the past- been in possession of politically incorrect flowers.
Oh, well…. ignorance is bliss, I suppose.
Obviously, I could go on…and on…. but those few who still possess the power to think and act for themselves already know what I’m talking about.
As for the rest of you….may the chains of slavery rest lightly upon your necks.
Over the years I have notice a common denominator in police brutality stories. More often than not, the “victim” has a string of prior arrests.
Now, I may lead a sheltered life but I don’t know anyone who has an arrest record. In fact, in my whole life, the only guy I knew who had a felony arrest was a college acquaintance who was dealing drugs.
It makes me wonder why police only pick on guys with arrest records.
So the next move for Sheriff Baca is for her to move to England and teach our sniveling cousins over there how the west was won [over to PC], apparently? You say I’m confused on gender? Sorry, I was just going by the good office-holder’s public records and statements. He’s far from being a man, imo, and even further from being a cop. Block must be rolling over in his grave. Only a weasel publicly second-guesses so many officers in such a condescendingly humiliating way.
Police Officers are NOT paid for what they do…….They are paid for what they are WILLING TO DO! Now get over it!!
#25 Burrow Owl
Awwwww, did the mean old CHP officer scare you? I know that you Alaska fishermen are not only the bravest, most intelligent, and best mannered of all the trades, you also hold the distinction of being the very last service provider the entire world would do away with. Numerous studies have consistently shown that the overwhelming majority of those polled would much rather give up all public safety services instead of losing the opportunity to add a side order of crab legs to their entree at Red Lobster. Sir, a grateful public salutes you!
29. Ben Theighr:
FYI, regarding the CalCHIP incident:
He finally pissed me off to the point where I invited him to participate in an anatomically impossible act, got in my car and left the sorry little fuctard standing on the side of the road with gaping gums as I sprayed gravel in his face.
Not that you would understand…..Your comments indicate that you are either:
1) A tax-feeding parasite yourself
or
2) Someone who would (and probably does) gleefully lick the genitals of tax-feeding parasites in lieu of actually having to think and/or act for oneself .
Such is the idiocracy that we currently live in…
Oh brother! After you, “…sprayed gravel in his face.” and drove off, did Elvis and the Tooth Fairy give you a high five?
How’s it going in mom’s basement, is she still restricting you to 5 hours of W.O.W. a night?