Deputy's Big Deal Over Big Tires

[XLFD]

Here we are, 250 years exactly after our Declaration of Independence was signed by our forefathers, and we're still having to deal with petty tyrants trying to spoil our enjoyment of the occasion here in the little lakeside city of Ludington.  

This isn't about some sort of earthshattering decree or request for more tribute from our city leaders, but it's one of those small incidents that illustrate how endemic the problem is in Mason County, where a young boy riding his bicycle safely and lawfully in the Fourth Ward is traumatized when one of our county deputies decided to make himself feel like someone important. 

Incidents like these seem to happen way too often for both of the police agencies in Mason County and it seems that there are three main deficiencies in those departments:  1) lack of training, especially in deescalation, and/or 2) inability to follow the training they have, and/or 3) lack of knowledge of the actual laws they enforce.  Let's review what happened today on a Washington Avenue sidewalk, where a 14-year-old boy was driving his fat-tired bicycle north between Dowland and Melendy Streets around 5 PM, well after the Freedom Festival parade and crowds had dissipated.

A county deputy was driving southward on Washington when he saw this young man riding on the sidewalk, that bike looking like the one above, one of those bicycles which have no motors but have tires more appropriate for a pocket rocket.  For whatever reason, the deputy decided to make a traffic stop on the young teenager, explicitly telling the boy that he was not able to ride on the sidewalk.  

The boy was smart enough to know that he was in the right and said so to the deputy.  And rather than show the state law or local ordinance that backed up the deputy's statement, the deputy decided that the child's questioning of his authority was disrespectful.  The deputy had the youngster get off his bike and sit in the back of the patrol car, illegally detaining the youth while shaming him in front of other people in the area, and leaving him in shock for the severe abuse of his civil rights on such a day as the country's 250th birthday.  Here's what laws applied here:

Those familiar with the Ludington City Code know that there are some sidewalks that are off-limits to bicycles in town, these are quite limited, however, and all other sidewalks in the right-of-way allow for bicycles, these are all in the downtown area:

No traffic control orders exist in the area where this boy was that would be prohibiting bikes on the sidewalk, ergo the deputy making a traffic stop was unfounded, the traumatizing detention for doing nothing at all wrong was illegal.  

Unless the deputy had some sort of fetish for putting young boys in the back of his cruiser, the incident shows that he was ignorant of the laws pertaining to such a stop, that his skills at deescalating a situation was wanting, and that his training was either poor or ignored.  The deputy deserves retraining and discipline for inflicting such an emotional scar on one of our area's children.  Unfortunately, this very rarely happens when they make such mistakes, and in those rare cases it's almost always because the child affected has an important parent or two, which this one did not.

[Paul Jensen]

There are too many cops, which leads to bored cops and bored cops are dangerous cops.

All existing and future cops need to be vetted for low IQs, personality disorders and substance abuse, including steroids.

With great authority comes great responsibility.

We deserve better!

[XLFD]

Ludington is a great place to test the hypothesis of your first statement.  During the summer the amount of people interacting with the city more than doubles at times and it appears that the local police force(s) have enough manpower to do their jobs with less extracurricular activities (the incident above is an exception, but the harassment was more due to the deputy's knowledge of the city code and/or poor training).  

Once the 100 days between the Memorial Day weekend and Labor Day are over, it seems rational to assume that you get a lot more citations and criminal arraignments based on garbage police work by bored officers looking to fulfill some sort of quota set by their administrators.  I've seen too many productive members of society hauled into court on ridiculous charges (I've experienced that three times myself, winning it every time against corrupt Ludington cops and Beth Hand). 

Did you know that in Jordan v. City of New London, the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a police department could legally reject an applicant for scoring "too high" (an equivalent of an IQ of 125) on cognitive tests?  The court found that mitigating high turnover was a legally "rational basis" for the policy, rationalizing that high-IQ candidates are statistically more likely to get bored with routine patrol work and leave after costly training.  The dumbest have a tendency to rise to the top, which explains the success of Mark Barnett, Chris Jones, and Mike Haveman.

[Paul Jensen]

I wasn't suggesting replacing low-IQ cops with Mensa members. Only 5% of the population has IQs above 125, so the pool in the range I was hoping for is large. Personality disorders seem to be a bigger problem. Perhaps I should have led with that as a disqualification. The average IQ in law enforcement is 104, 21–22 on the Wonderlic Personnel Test. So how low do you think it goes for the lower half of that average? Many departments have seasonal hiring for increased needs.

[Paul Jensen]

Another thought to improve the quality of policing would be to have cops buy their own liability coverage as doctors do. Let the insurance industry weed out the bad cops, and they would not be able to move to a different department.

[XLFD]

I fear priorities in police training have shifted away from the basic civil rights of the public in order to heavily emphasize combat readiness, weaponry, and threat perception instead.  When trainees have it drummed into their head that the public is a hostile threat, it's harder for them to acknowledge they have rights too.  They also know that qualified immunity will protect them from almost any dereliction of duty, and this is why your concept of 'police malpractice insurance' and some relaxation of immunity is in order to get more accountability for officers who regularly violate the law and keep those with issues under more control or keep them off the streets.  Many police agencies won't do this self-policing themselves, but an outside agency who has an incentive to keep claims to a minimum would.

[Golf~6~Romeo]

All this idiocy is tacitly reinforced by the judicial system. Every judge should test higher and must be held accountable for the actions of the officers below them within their jurisdiction. A LEO cannot investigate without written authorization/jurisdiction that can only be given and supported by a judge. If during a police encounter, a LEO decides he has probable cause, a judge must ensure that the tree isn't poisonous. Mason county judges are not doing this. In fact, I'm certain that exact opposite has been done secretly against Ludington-ites.

We can be upset with how intelligent or daft our local LEO's are but this line of rumination will yield zero results.

Nationally, we now see officers being executed by criminals. It's happened here in Mason county. The responsibility for these atrocious acts fall squarely on the judges and procecutors. They are the checks and balances, they must ensure laws are adhered to by LEO's. Here in Mason county, we as citizens do not enjoy this freedom from tyranny.