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Thread: Police shoot & kill 93-year-old woman

  1. #21
    Langlois Insider Vinny's Avatar
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    IN MEMORY OF BIG VINNY 1943 – 1979 “WHEN IN DOUBT KNOCK EM OUT”
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    Quote Originally Posted by b-diddy
    its the opposite. theres no way you can flush kilos in a few seconds, so on that amount alone, no knock is only justified by low amounts, not more (counterintuitive, but logical).

    Ahhhh...good point.

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    Quick piece by VINNY which was a logo style of his. VINNY also did two letter throw up's by the name of FI 2.



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  2. #22
    The Healer Black Dynamite's Avatar
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    illegal drugs still flow fairly well. so if we are trying we suck. The reality is that we aren't trying. If anything we're regulating it and have been for some time via bribes and a conveniently shitty border patrol from the south. War on drugs has been a joke for as long as its been around.

    There's No Justice in the War on Drugs

    By MILTON FRIEDMAN
    January 11, 1998

    STANFORD -- Twenty-five years ago, President Richard M. Nixon announced a "War on Drugs." I criticized the action on both moral and expediential grounds in my Newsweek column of May 1, 1972, "Prohibition and Drugs":

    "On ethical grounds, do we have the right to use the machinery of government to prevent an individual from becoming an alcoholic or a drug addict? For children, almost everyone would answer at least a qualified yes. But for responsible adults, I, for one, would answer no. Reason with the potential addict, yes. Tell him the consequences, yes. Pray for and with him, yes. But I believe that we have no right to use force, directly or indirectly, to prevent a fellow man from committing suicide, let alone from drinking alcohol or taking drugs."

    That basic ethical flaw has inevitably generated specific evils during the past quarter century, just as it did during our earlier attempt at alcohol prohibition.

    1. The use of informers. Informers are not needed in crimes like robbery and murder because the victims of those crimes have a strong incentive to report the crime. In the drug trade, the crime consists of a transaction between a willing buyer and willing seller. Neither has any incentive to report a violation of law. On the contrary, it is in the self-interest of both that the crime not be reported. That is why informers are needed. The use of informers and the immense sums of money at stake inevitably generate corruption -- as they did during Prohibition. They also lead to violations of the civil rights of innocent people, to the shameful practices of forcible entry and forfeiture of property without due process.

    As I wrote in 1972: ". . . addicts and pushers are not the only ones corrupted. Immense sums are at stake. It is inevitable that some relatively low-paid police and other government officials -- and some high-paid ones as well -- will succumb to the temptation to pick up easy money."

    2. Filling the prisons. In 1970, 200,000 people were in prison. Today, 1.6 million people are. Eight times as many in absolute number, six times as many relative to the increased population. In addition, 2.3 million are on probation and parole. The attempt to prohibit drugs is by far the major source of the horrendous growth in the prison population.

    There is no light at the end of that tunnel. How many of our citizens do we want to turn into criminals before we yell "enough"?

    3. Disproportionate imprisonment of blacks. Sher Hosonko, at the time Connecticut's director of addiction services, stressed this effect of drug prohibition in a talk given in June 1995:

    "Today in this country, we incarcerate 3,109 black men for every 100,000 of them in the population. Just to give you an idea of the drama in this number, our closest competitor for incarcerating black men is South Africa. South Africa -- and this is pre-Nelson Mandela and under an overt public policy of apartheid -- incarcerated 729 black men for every 100,000. Figure this out: In the land of the Bill of Rights, we jail over four times as many black men as the only country in the world that advertised a political policy of apartheid."

    4. Destruction of inner cities. Drug prohibition is one of the most important factors that have combined to reduce our inner cities to their present state. The crowded inner cities have a comparative advantage for selling drugs. Though most customers do not live in the inner cities, most sellers do. Young boys and girls view the swaggering, affluent drug dealers as role models. Compared with the returns from a traditional career of study and hard work, returns from dealing drugs are tempting to young and old alike. And many, especially the young, are not dissuaded by the bullets that fly so freely in disputes between competing drug dealers -- bullets that fly only because dealing drugs is illegal. Al Capone epitomizes our earlier attempt at Prohibition; the Crips and Bloods epitomize this one.

    5. Compounding the harm to users. Prohibition makes drugs exorbitantly expensive and highly uncertain in quality. A user must associate with criminals to get the drugs, and many are driven to become criminals themselves to finance the habit. Needles, which are hard to get, are often shared, with the predictable effect of spreading disease. Finally, an addict who seeks treatment must confess to being a criminal in order to qualify for a treatment program. Alternatively, professionals who treat addicts must become informers or criminals themselves.

    6. Undertreatment of chronic pain. The Federal Department of Health and Human Services has issued reports showing that two-thirds of all terminal cancer patients do not receive adequate pain medication, and the numbers are surely higher in nonterminally ill patients. Such serious undertreatment of chronic pain is a direct result of the Drug Enforcement Agency's pressures on physicians who prescribe narcotics.

    7. Harming foreign countries. Our drug policy has led to thousands of deaths and enormous loss of wealth in countries like Colombia, Peru and Mexico, and has undermined the stability of their governments. All because we cannot enforce our laws at home. If we did, there would be no market for imported drugs. There would be no Cali cartel. The foreign countries would not have to suffer the loss of sovereignty involved in letting our "advisers" and troops operate on their soil, search their vessels and encourage local militaries to shoot down their planes. They could run their own affairs, and we, in turn, could avoid the diversion of military forces from their proper function.

    Can any policy, however high-minded, be moral if it leads to widespread corruption, imprisons so many, has so racist an effect, destroys our inner cities, wreaks havoc on misguided and vulnerable individuals and brings death and destruction to foreign countries?

    Milton Friedman, the Nobelist in economics, is a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution.
    http://www.zpub.com/un/drug-mf.html

    Alot of these south american countries have wars, economies, and governments themselves funded on drugs. Yet we're arresting the same drug dealers time and time again who are replaced with another drug dealer as soon as they lock up until prisons get packed to the max in a repetitive cycle while the drugs themselves still move throughout urban communities. .

    I agree that this "war on drugs" as currently constituted is a crock of shit -- that's why I keep putting it in quotes. I do think there ought to be some sort of drug law / enforcement that makes sense and actually helps people, but that's not what we have today.

    But, quite aside from the "war on drugs", we have cops executing all kinds of search warrants and such, not doing the quick little bust in exchange for the potential big bust. Sometimes we pay off "the small fry" to get "the big boss", make all sorts of ugly and bad tradeoffs. By and large, this stuff doesn't see the light of day until inevitable public screwups happens. Then they spend all their time fixating on the screwups, rather than the overall policies that make such screwups possible. When I see stuff talking about "should cops knock", "videotape", "should SWAT be involved", we're already down the wrong rabbit hole and some amount of bad shit happening will be inevitable. Start at the beginning. Here's the fishy part... it appears the drugs were sold to either:

    1) Undercover officers
    http://edition.cnn.com/2006/US/11/23/atlanta.shooting/
    Quote:
    Police spokesman Joe Cobb said the three officers on that team had made an undercover drug buy earlier in day from a man inside Johnston's home west of downtown Atlanta.
    -or-
    2) A police informant
    http://www.11alive.com/news/news_art...?storyid=88163
    Quote:
    Chief Pennington said the case was built on a drug buy by a confidential informant, who claimed he purchased drugs inside Johnston's home.

    Already, the Atlanta police have flip-flopped on a key point. My hunch is that long before we get to the judge issuing a no-knock warrant and cops swarm in with bad consequences, there's rotten shit going on.
    yep its a mess no matter what way you cut it. I understand you gotta put grandma down if she busts at you. but the tragedy is in the effort to force this arrest that does little to improve the community there.
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  3. #23
    well, i dont disagree. drugs will never be legalized though, because it would be political suicide to even consider it. and im not sure legalization is the answer either.

  4. #24
    The Healer Black Dynamite's Avatar
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    It probably isn't the answer. But its not as bad as aressting the street dealers rather than taking the war to the south american countries. It just reflects how the money that drugs brings in makes it impossible for a government as corrupt as ours to ever be serious about stopping it. The war on drugs is a war on urban communities IMO.
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  5. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by b-diddy
    what is almost always overlooked is that more important than anything is the protection of the police officers. you may not like cops, but theyre out there trying to make your life better, and its important that we dont put an undue burden and make their jobs even more dangerous than they already are.
    The way warrants like the one hat is completely backwards. Protect and serve. The law and by extension, law enforcement exists to protect the rights and safety of the citizens, that is the most important thing. You keep trying to make this about "liking cops" or "hating cops" ... the same kind of red herring logic people use to equate "support the troops" with blind endorsement of the war.

    The way these kinds of warrants are being handled, people shooting cops and cops shooting the wrong people is an outcome that is predictable, preventable and should be unacceptable. Doing the job right isn't an undue burden.

    Quote Originally Posted by Gutz Gatsu
    I understand you gotta put grandma down if she busts at you. but the tragedy is in the effort to force this arrest that does little to improve the community there.
    Quote Originally Posted by Gutz Gatsu
    The Old Lady plugged some cops, so not much you can say to defend her.
    That brings me back to the question... what's the reasonable standard for a person defending their home?

    If those had been crooks instead of cops crashing through the door she would've been celebrated as the feel-good story of the week ... but since it happened to be cops there's not much you can say to defend her and grandma gotta get put down?

    That's why those tactics should only be used in only the most extreme situations because they are inherently dangerous for the police and people on the other side of the door.
    Last edited by geerussell; 11-28-2006 at 04:50 AM.

  6. #26
    NOT TO BE FUCKED WITH Uncle Mxy's Avatar
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    http://www.ajc.com/news/content/metr...TYWVVZV&urcm=y

    Informant in shooting says he never bought drugs at house
    He says police asked him to lie

    By RHONDA COOK
    The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
    Published on: 11/27/06

    An informant who narcotics officers say led them to the house where an elderly woman was killed in a drug raid is accusing the officers of asking him to lie about his role, Atlanta police Chief Richard Pennington said Monday.

    The informant, who has not been identified, complained to department officials that the drug investigators involved in the bust had asked him to go along with a story they concocted after the shooting, said Pennington. He said the informant had been placed in protective custody.

    The informant told an Atlanta television station that the officers asked him to lie to provide them cover in the shooting.

    Pennington confirmed the television station's account of what the informant had claimed and said it mirrored what the informant had told his Internal Affairs Unit over the weekend.

    "The informant said he had no knowledge of going into that house and purchasing drugs," Pennington said. "We don't know if he's telling the truth."

    All seven narcotics investigators involved in the raid have been suspended with pay pending the outcome of the investigation, Pennington said. Their names were not made public.

    "The complete truth will be known," Pennington said.

    After nearly a week of unanswered questions prompted by the northwest Atlanta shooting of Kathryn Johnston, the chief on Monday called for an unusual multi-agency review of the incident.

    Pennington announced the investigation at a news conference that featured officials from the U.S. attorney's office, the FBI, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the Fulton County district attorney.

    David Nahmias, the U.S. attorney in Atlanta, said federal agents "come to this investigation with an open mind" but he cautioned that anyone who lies could face federal charges.

    "No one should get in the way of the truth," Nahmias said.

    Johnston was shot to death last Tuesday night as the drug investigators burst into her house at 933 Neal Street. Johnston was shot twice in the chest by the officers, who have said that they were returning her fire. The 88-year-old woman - whose age was originally thought to be 92 - wounded three of the officers with a rusty revolver her niece had bought for her aunt's protection. One officer was hit three times, including once in the center of his bullet-proof vest, while the other two where shot once each. None of their wounds were life threatening.

    Police officials have said the officers went to Johnston's small brick house after the informant purchased drugs there from a man identified only as "Sam." Police have obtained an arrest warrant for Sam.

    In a court affidavit released Monday, Jason R. Smith, an Atlanta narcotics officer, said that the informant had used $50 of city money to buy crack cocaine from Sam at the house at 933 Neal Street. Smith, who could not be reached for comment Monday night, described the informant as a reliable source of information who has helped police make drug arrests in the past.

    In the affidavit, Smith said Sam greeted the informant at the front door and spoke briefly to him on the porch. Sam disappeared into the house and reappeared with two bags of crack cocaine, which the informant later turned over to the officers, according to the affidavit. Smith's statement also said that the informant had alleged that Sam had installed surveillance cameras at the house and monitored them constantly.

    Smith's affidavit was sufficient to persuade Fulton County Magistrate Kimberly Warden to sign a warrant allowing the officers to enter the house without knocking on the door. Smith asked for the special "no knock" authorization because of the possibility that officers would be injured or evidence would be destroyed. Warden signed the warrant shortly before 6 p.m., about an hour before the shooting.

    However, the informant has since denied to police and a local television station that he purchased the drugs. He also said there was no person named Sam.

    The informant, who said he worked with Atlanta police for four years, also told WAGA-TV that he hadn't been to 933 Neal Street. His identity hidden, he told the TV station that one of the drug officers called him soon after the shooting with instructions.

    Quoting the police officers, the informant told Fox 5 News: " 'This is what you need to do. You need to cover our (rear). ... It's all on you man. ... You need to tell them about this Sam dude.' "

    Pennington said investigators were trying to determine the truth. "I don't know if he went in or not," he said.

    Many questions and conflicting accounts have surfaced since police shot the woman, described by neighbors as feeble and afraid to open her door after dark. At first police said that the drug buy was made by undercover police, but later they said the purchase was made by an informant. Early on, police said narcotics were found at the house after the shooting, but on Sunday investigators said they had found only a small amount of marijuana, which police don't consider narcotics.

    Also, even though the affidavit said that the house was outfitted with surveillance cameras, Pennington said the informant had told internal affairs investigators that police officers had asked him to lie about the cameras. Pennington could not confirm whether the cameras existed.

    From the beginning, it has been unclear why police targeted the house on Neal Street, and the affidavit and warrant documents shed little light. The documents do not suggest that police had been keeping the house under surveillance and provide no rationale for entering it other than the informant's alleged buy earlier in the afternoon. The raid did not produce the cocaine, money, computers and other equipment related to the drug business alleged in the affidavit. The documents listed the only resident as Sam, who was described as at least 6 feet tall and 250 to 260 pounds. Johnston's family said she lived alone.

    Court officials initially refused to release the affidavits and search warrant even though state law makes such records available immediately. The documents were made public Monday, nearly a week after the incident.

    "There are many unanswered questions," said Pennington, who returned Sunday after being out of town for the Thanksgiving holiday when the shooting occurred.

    Mayor Shirley Franklin, who has said little about the shooting, said she had discussed the allegations with Pennington. Franklin said the chief has "my confidence that they will be transparent and honest and very thorough in their review. ...

    "I certainly share the concern that all of us have on the loss of life," Franklin said. "We were not expecting something like that could happen in the city of Atlanta."
    Maybe that's why I was fixated on looking at the police procedures before the no-knock warrant was issued and executed. I dunno.
    Last edited by Uncle Mxy; 11-28-2006 at 04:28 PM.

  7. #27

  8. #28
    The chick was going to die soon anyways... I don't even see why the media is covering this.

    Quote Originally Posted by WTFchris
    MoTown is right.

  9. #29
    The Healer Black Dynamite's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by MoTown
    The chick was going to die soon anyways... I don't even see why the media is covering this.
    police fuck ups is whats giving this story steam. Scandal will draw attention all day, and it looks like this might be a cluster fuck(if the informant is crossing up stories with the cops), which the media loves to juice to the max.
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  10. #30
    More on the police militarization angle--yes, it's my horse and it's not dead yet--from the wall street journal:

    http://online.wsj.com/article_email/...TcyNjk4Wj.html

    Simply put, the police culture in our country has changed. An emphasis on "officer safety" and paramilitary training pervades today's policing, in contrast to the older culture, which held that cops didn't shoot until they were about to be shot or stabbed. Police in large cities formerly carried revolvers holding six .38-caliber rounds. Nowadays, police carry semi-automatic pistols with 16 high-caliber rounds, shotguns and military assault rifles, weapons once relegated to SWAT teams facing extraordinary circumstances. Concern about such firepower in densely populated areas hitting innocent citizens has given way to an attitude that the police are fighting a war against drugs and crime and must be heavily armed.

    Yes, police work is dangerous, and the police see a lot of violence. On the other hand, 51 officers were slain in the line of duty last year, out of some 700,000 to 800,000 American cops. That is far fewer than the police fatalities occurring when I patrolled New York's highest crime precincts, when the total number of cops in the country was half that of today. Each of these police deaths and numerous other police injuries is a tragedy and we owe support to those who protect us. On the other hand, this isn't Iraq. The need to give our officers what they require to protect themselves and us has to be balanced against the fact that the fundamental duty of the police is to protect human life and that law officers are only justified in taking a life as a last resort.

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