Florida Cops Will Now Be Held Accountable by Florida Cops

Sunday, January 12, 2025

At least 15 civilian review boards across Florida, which review investigations of potential law enforcement misconduct after they're completed, have dissolved or temporarily ceased operations after a new law targeting the panels took effect. The law assures that only law enforcement agencies will investigate reports of misconduct by law enforcement officers. It blocks outside civilian review boards from performing oversight in such investigations, moves civilian panels under the control of Florida police chiefs and sheriffs, and requires that at least one panelist must be a retired law enforcement officer.

Posted by reinheitsgebot at 02:33 PM | 21 COMMENTS | permalink

Comments

Has tiny d handed oversight of Florida law enforcement to Derek Chauvin yet?

#1 | Posted by reinheitsgebot at 2025-01-12 10:02 AM

The Posse Comitatus is alive and well in Floriduh.

So, the Blue Wall of Silence is reinforced in Florida?

When you elect a NAZI to be our governor what else would you expect?

About what I expect from Florida.

California is going to do the same thing with these fires.

Sad the government doesn't seem to care about it's citizens.

You're a fucking MAGAT cunt. Go fuck yourself.

Just at Florida for a convention. Most of the people who did volunteer to talk to me about the governor don't like him and hope for something different. I hope, too. Especially negative were their comments at the way higher education in Florida is being over-managed. Florida deserves better, but the people have to come to their senses. I shake my head at Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis being elected over and over.

Florida has 67 counties. Desantis won 62 of them. I'm guessing your convention was on,one of the other 5?

Most of the 62 are rural rwing populist (think swamp buggies) counties.

@#9 ... Florida has 67 counties. Desantis won 62 of them. I'm guessing your convention was on,one of the other 5? ...

That aspect aside ...

For the most part, I support the police and the work they do in the communities they serve.

Indeed, the police in my town have been nothing short of excellent, imo.

That said, regarding this topic ...

I have often noted the Blue Wall of Silence, and in my prior comments I noted how it seems to boost the concept tha i have seen proffered, that a bad apple n a police department rots the entire police team.

The "one bad apple spoils the barrel" adage.

My view of this news out of Florida not only seems to confirm that opinion, but also seems to encourage the worst of that opinion.

Police ~protecting and serving the community~ with no oversight from that community?

What could possibly go wrong?

What on earth gives you the idea there is no oversight from the community?

First of all, I have said this before, the "Blue Wall of Silence" is mostly TV and Movie fiction. In real life, good cops don't want to work around bad cops. We depend on each other to stay alive, uninjured and out of trouble. When we identify a "bad apple" in the barrel, we want him (or her) gone. Cops rat each other out all the time. That is how most misconduct is exposed, through IN-ternal complaints. When these kinds of stories come out, we are all embarrassed and upset, because it reflects on the entire profession.

Secondly, Municipal police chiefs are appointed and answer to an elected mayor as well as a city council which often includes a public safely oversight committee. Elected county sheriffs answer directly to their constituencies, and a county commission level oversight often exists as well.

Thirdly, the State Attorneys Office overseas investigations of police officers whenever a crime is alleged

Fourthly, FDLE and FHP often step in or are called in to take over an investigation whenever local police are implicated

Fifthly the Bureau of Criminal Justice Standards in Tallahassee reviews all citizen complaints at the state level and acts to strip officers of their certifications

Sixthly the DOJ acts at the federal level to investigate local law enforcement whenever a violation of rights is alleged

Seventhly, Florida has a broad sunshine law. Nearly all governmental records are open to public inspection and review. This includes citizen complaints, officers training and work history, investigations of misconduct, reports written, calls for service, body camera footage, written reports, radio transmissions, emails, texts messages, etc. Journalists, the ACLU and other citizens groups make frequent use of these resources.

So yeah......that is not enough, what we REALLY need is to select a group of random hairdressers, computer programmers, pet groomers, teachers, community organizers, cashiers etc..... to investigate and apply their "expertise" to make sure officers are held accountable. While they are convened, maybe we should get the same "citizens oversight committee" to review malpractice claims against doctors, determine the cause of airplane crashes, approve new medications and verify that buildings are constructed to meet hurricane codes!

Yes, corruption and bad groups of cops exist, but it is the exception not the norm. Citizen oversight committees are not the answer. If the seven levels of oversight described above can't root it out, a group of regular folks meeting at the community library once a month isn't going to break the case.

I got the name, wrong, the state organization is called the Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission

@#12 ... What on earth gives you the idea there is no oversight from the community? ...

From the cited article...

... At least 15 civilian review boards across Florida, which review investigations of potential law enforcement misconduct after they're completed, have dissolved or temporarily ceased operations after a new law targeting the panels took effect.

The law assures that only law enforcement agencies will investigate reports of misconduct by law enforcement officers. It blocks outside civilian review boards from performing oversight in such investigations, moves civilian panels under the control of Florida police chiefs and sheriffs, and requires that at least one panelist must be a retired law enforcement officer. ...

So much fukking bullshit and garbage.
Cops cover for cops - and when it's the Sheriff going after a good cop, they all pile on. I've seen it, I watched good cops's lives destroyed by it.
Sunshine Law used to be something we were very proud of in Florida. It is toothless now. Limping along at best. DeSantis and his cronies have been busy killing it slowly. "The Sunshine State" used to have meaning to us that knew what that motto was actually about. Now it's a slap in the face.

By the way - great job illustrating where you fall (right in line) with that Blue Wall.

@#13 ... First of all, I have said this before, the "Blue Wall of Silence" is mostly TV and Movie fiction. In real life, good cops don't want to work around bad cops. ...

"In real life" that may be the case, or not.

But, how do those "good cops" act "in real life?"

Blue wall of silence
en.wikipedia.org

... The blue wall of silence,[1] also blue code[2] and blue shield,[3] are terms used to denote an informal code of silence among police officers in the United States not to report on a colleague's errors, misconduct, or crimes, especially as related to police brutality in the United States.[4] ...

Given the multiple police body cams videos that have been shown, and the lack of any reports by fellow officers shown in those body cam videos, about what occurred in those body cam videos ... I mean, really. Why does it seem to require body-cam videos to see what police officers are doing?

Maybe it was that Blue Wall of Silence that provided the substantiation for the body-cam requirement?

#15 - Exactly, Lamplighter. The law is harmful, destructive, and dangerous.

Maybe it was that Blue Wall of Silence that provided the substantiation for the body-cam requirement?

Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! DING!

That's how we got oversight boards and commissions in the first place. Because cops repeatedly demonstrated they can't be trusted to "police" their own. FRICK this is obvious.

@#13 ... Yes, corruption and bad groups of cops exist, but it is the exception not the norm. ..

I agree 100%.

No question to that on my part.

But, then there is the whole, "one bad apple spoils the barrel" aspect that the Blue Wall of Silence seems to promote.

@#19

Bodycam video appears to show Baltimore police officer planting evidence in drug bust, public defender says (2017)
abcnews.go.com

... Bodycam footage allegedly shows a Baltimore police officer tampering with evidence by planting what appears to be drugs, according to the Maryland Office of the Public Defender.

The video was taken on January 24 when three police officers were searching for drugs in a yard filled with debris, Baltimore Deputy Police Commissioner Jason Johnson said in a press release Wednesday.

The footage purports to show one of the officers hiding a bag of drugs in a can and then later "finding" the drugs, while two other officers "look on and take no action," the public defender's office said in a press release. ...

"Body cameras have an important role to play in the oversight and accountability of police officers but only if they are used properly and the footage is taken seriously," said Debbie Katz Levi, head of the Baltimore Public Defender's Special Litigation Section. "Officers should not be able to decide when to turn the cameras on and off, and footage like what was presented here needs to result in immediate action by the State's Attorney and the Police Department." ...

Yeah, it seems that officer did not know that the body-cam remembers and saves the 30-seconds of video it captured before it was "turned on."

Body cam video shows police officer planting drugs, attorneys say (2017)
www.cbsnews.com

... "What we think we see, and if you slow down the video especially in the first five seconds, the officer appearing to place a red can underneath some trash, push the fence up, and hide it," said public defender Debbie Katz Levi.

The footage was caught on camera in January, but not discovered by a public defender in Levi's office until this month.

Levi says the alleged act of planting drugs was caught because Baltimore police body cameras capture the 30 seconds before an officer actually hits the record button, but without audio.

When the sound does kick in, "he then walks down the alley and miraculously goes to the same space where he appeared to have just planted the can with the suspected narcotics," Levi said. ...