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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPolice Accidentally Record Themselves Conspiring to Fabricate Criminal Charges Against Protester
The ACLU of Connecticut is suing state police for fabricating retaliatory criminal charges against a protester after troopers were recorded discussing how to trump up charges against him. In what seems like an unlikely stroke of cosmic karma, the recording came about after a camera belonging to the protester, Michael Picard, was illegally seized by a trooper who didnt know that it was recording and carried it back to his patrol car, where it then captured the troopers plotting.Lets give him something, one trooper declared. Another suggested, we can hit him with creating a public disturbance. Gotta cover our ass, remarked a third.
.......
So Michael was out on Sept. 11, 2015 in West Hartford. He shows up, has a big sign that says cops ahead, remain silent. Its handwrittenthis is not threatening stuff. He stood on a small triangular traffic island. He was standing there for an hour, hour and a half without any problems. Then, the state police officers who were working the checkpoint come over to Michael, and the first thing they do is slap the camera out of his hand so it hits the ground. He thinks its broken.
It was really brazen. Theres another video showing that the first thing the state trooper does is walk up and with his open hand slap the camera down to the ground. He doesnt even say anything like put that down, or please lower your camera. He just slaps it to the ground. Then he interacts with Michael as if nothing happened, as if, Im just allowed to do that, and I dont even have to tell you why I just broke your camera. Its an amazing level of hostility.
The troopers search Michael, and theatrically announce that he has a gunwhich they knew he had, and which he was carrying legally under Connecticuts open carry law. So they take his gun, and they go run his pistol permit. As theyre doing that, Michael picks the camera up off the pavementits a nice SLR that can also record video. He picks it up and tries to turn it on as one of the cops walks back over, and thats where the video starts. The cop announces that taking my picture is illegal. Michael debates with him a little because hes very knowledgeable about the law and the First Amendment, and the end result is that the trooper snatches the camera, walks away, and puts it on top of the cruiser, without realizing that it is working and is recording video.
So we get the three troopers at the cruiser talking about what to do. Michaels permit comes back as valid, they say oh crap, and one of the troopers says we gotta punch a number on this guy, which means open an investigation in the police database. And he says we really gotta cover our asses. And then they have a very long discussion about what to charge Michael withnone of which appear to have any basis in fact. This plays out over eight minutes. They talk about we could do this, we could do this, we could do this .
In Connecticut, police officers have clear requirements under the law to intervene and stop or prevent constitutional violations when they see them. But at no time did any of the three officers pipe up and say, why dont we just give him his camera back and let him go.
In the end they decide on two criminal infractions: reckless use of a highway by a pedestrian, and creating a public disturbance. They have a chilling discussion on how to support the public disturbance charge, and the top-level supervisor explains to the other two, what we say is that multiple motorists stopped to complain about a guy waving a gun around, but none of them wanted to stop and make a statement. In other words, what sounds like a fairy tale.
It was really brazen. Theres another video showing that the first thing the state trooper does is walk up and with his open hand slap the camera down to the ground. He doesnt even say anything like put that down, or please lower your camera. He just slaps it to the ground. Then he interacts with Michael as if nothing happened, as if, Im just allowed to do that, and I dont even have to tell you why I just broke your camera. Its an amazing level of hostility.
The troopers search Michael, and theatrically announce that he has a gunwhich they knew he had, and which he was carrying legally under Connecticuts open carry law. So they take his gun, and they go run his pistol permit. As theyre doing that, Michael picks the camera up off the pavementits a nice SLR that can also record video. He picks it up and tries to turn it on as one of the cops walks back over, and thats where the video starts. The cop announces that taking my picture is illegal. Michael debates with him a little because hes very knowledgeable about the law and the First Amendment, and the end result is that the trooper snatches the camera, walks away, and puts it on top of the cruiser, without realizing that it is working and is recording video.
So we get the three troopers at the cruiser talking about what to do. Michaels permit comes back as valid, they say oh crap, and one of the troopers says we gotta punch a number on this guy, which means open an investigation in the police database. And he says we really gotta cover our asses. And then they have a very long discussion about what to charge Michael withnone of which appear to have any basis in fact. This plays out over eight minutes. They talk about we could do this, we could do this, we could do this .
In Connecticut, police officers have clear requirements under the law to intervene and stop or prevent constitutional violations when they see them. But at no time did any of the three officers pipe up and say, why dont we just give him his camera back and let him go.
In the end they decide on two criminal infractions: reckless use of a highway by a pedestrian, and creating a public disturbance. They have a chilling discussion on how to support the public disturbance charge, and the top-level supervisor explains to the other two, what we say is that multiple motorists stopped to complain about a guy waving a gun around, but none of them wanted to stop and make a statement. In other words, what sounds like a fairy tale.
the rest:
https://www.aclu.org/blog/free-future/police-accidentally-record-themselves-conspiring-fabricate-criminal-charges-against?utm_source=fark&utm_medium=website&utm_content=link&ICID=ref_fark
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Police Accidentally Record Themselves Conspiring to Fabricate Criminal Charges Against Protester (Original Post)
kpete
Sep 2016
OP
anoNY42
(670 posts)1. Disgusting stuff like this deserves a prison sentence nt
lonestarnot
(77,097 posts)2. Bastards.
lame54
(35,137 posts)3. More bad apples...