Canton OH Officer who threatened concealed carry holder fired

[X_Digger]

Some of you will immediately remember this case, discussed here- http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=118&topic_id=438626

Here's the video-

&feature=player_embedded

The case against the concealed carrier was dropped November 9, last year.

http://www.cantonrep.com/carousel/x76455408/Citizen-in-Harless-video-gets-his-day-in-court

Well, now another shoe has dropped. Officer Harless has been fired.

http://www.indeonline.com/news/x638339306/Daniel-Harless-fired-from-Canton-police-force

[div class='excerpt']CANTON — A city police officer at the center of a controversial traffic stop involving a man with a permit to carry a concealed handgun has been fired.
...
“It is quite clear that (Harless’) actions represented a pattern of behavior where inappropriate verbal abuse and threats of death or great bodily harm of the various complainants occurred,” Ream wrote.

“This escalating pattern of potentially dangerous behavior cannot be justified or excused and clearly illustrates the seriousness of the departmental infractions.”

The next shoe to drop? A civil suit, I'd imagine.

[SteveW]

1. Boy, about time. Canton's treasury is about to be reduced. nt

[TheWraith]

7. Probably, but sad for the taxpayers.

The city is going to get the short end of the stick for employing this guy, when he should have to pay for his behavior himself.

[X_Digger]

8. If he'd been booted for the first incident, sure..

The fact that there are now what, three? incidents that the department let him slide on tells me that there's some institutional blindness that needs to be corrected with some pecuniary punishment.

[spin]

2. Good. (n/t)

[burf]

3. How long was the jerk on

paid administrative leave (aka vacation)?

[X_Digger]

4. After admin leave, he was on medical leave, then other officers donated their sick days to him.

His last day was in June.

[Atypical Liberal]

23. Paid leave is important.

It is important when a police officer is suspected in a wrongdoing that he be removed from his duties during the course of the investigation. It is important because you don't want a potential bad person still doing police work, and because you don't want him to be able to tamper evidence, paperwork, or otherwise influence the investigation.

But the officer should also be presumed innocent during this process, as he should be. It is thus not fair to financially ruin a police officer under investigation by depriving him of his livelihood during the process of investigating him, especially if he turns out to be innocent.

Yes, paid leave seems unfair when a bad police officer is being paid while under investigation. But paid leave probably seems quite fair to those who end up being cleared of wrongdoing.

[E6-B]

5. What a jerk

The cop was so focused on being a jerk that he threw police procedure and his safety out the window. He should have been fired for that alone.

[We_Have_A_Problem]

6. Should have been more than fired....

...he should have been fired AT....

[MicaelS]

9. And his brother officers and union are STILL defending him.

Harless was placed on medical leave and other officers donated their sick days to him when his paid sick-leave time ran out.

The union had asked for an extension for the disciplinary hearing due to Harless being diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

[We_Have_A_Problem]

10. His brother officers and the union...

...should be ashamed of themselves.

[burf]

12. The Buckeye Firearms Association

had some info on Officer Harless just last week. Seems as though he skipped out on his last disciplinary hearing. It also looks as though he is gonna try the ptsd defense and he was unable to help with his own defense even though he was well enough to testify in a murder trial.

http://www.buckeyefirearms.org/node/8141

[Logical]

17. Also, he just HAPPENED to file for disability before he was fired! What a POS!

[DissedByBush]

11. He'll be picked up by another city

One that doesn't believe in 2nd Amendment rights and doesn't mind cracking down on legal owners.

Maybe San Francisco or DC.

[TPaine7]

14. Maybe not

Hiring an officer who has been fired for highly publicized abuse would seem like a too obvious set up for trouble. Especially one who used a mental impairment defense--PTSD.

However the possibility of him being hired by another police agency, though slight IMO, is another reason he should have been prosecuted and convicted of a felony or two.

[michreject]

22. Cleveland

He wouldn't even have to sell his house.

[TPaine7]

13. Great news!!!

The decision not to prosecute is BS.

Threatening to "put lumps on ya" is a definite physical threat--a serious felony.

As I recall, one poster in the prior discussion took it for granted that the woman was guilty of prostitution and even compared this hulking thug's threat to put lumps on the much smaller woman to a loving mother's (transparently hyperbolic) threats to harm her child. As if that overbearing thug had deep, parental affection for a random woman he stopped on the street!

I wonder if anyone will show up here in defense of police abuse and felonious threats directed at non-resisting women? I know that to some, literally anything is justified in the service of gun control or the suppression of gun rights.

I hope the CCW holder and the "prostitute" get enough money to make the department seriously control their officers. This is what a legitimate cause for lawsuits looks like.

[Ikonoklast]

15. He'll have more time to do steroids.

And maybe be a greeter at WalMart.

[Logical]

16. POS cop! I hope the driver sues his ass. The driver was very polite the whole time!

[E6-B]

18. Everyone in the video is a POS.

That driver was there looking for hookers. The passenger was the pimp and/ or drug dealer.

The woman who the POS cop told to go away, she was a hooker.

[TPaine7]

19. I only saw one person commit a crime. I only saw evidence of one crime--unless you want to count

"illegal stopping" or whatever "crime" the CCW permittee was convicted of.

The cop searched the car, took physical custody of the people involved (to his satisfaction) and came up with no evidence of drugs. No one was convicted of drug dealing, use or prostitution.

There was a thug with a badge who threatened physical violence to a non-resisting woman.

[Logical]

21. The driver was polite to the cop!

[mvccd1000]

20. The backlash cometh...

... just not from the direction some think it should come from.