No one is paying much attention, but parts of New York City are like a police state for young men, women and children who happen to be black or Hispanic. They are routinely stopped, searched, harassed, intimidated, humiliated and, in many cases, arrested for no good reason hellip;
Herbert, whose excellent and persistent coverage of the uncovered that scandal, goes on to report about black teenagers, excused from school to attend the wake of a murdered friend, who were suddenly arrested for no reason. Or, wait, I guess there was a reason hellip;
Many of the kids were wearing white T-shirts with a picture of the dead teenager and the letters ldquo;R.

I.P. rdquo; on them.

The cops cited the T-shirts as evidence of gang membership.
No need to comment further really. You either get it, or you don't.

If it weren rsquo;t so outrageous, the whole thing would be laughable.
Same Topic, Other Bloggers: , , .
[No link to the Op-Ed given here, because, unfortunately, the NYT makes this a pay option only.

]
Jack Love at New Mexico Law and Society questions the recruiting requirements for Police in his neck of the woods. Apparently Albuquerque is experiencing a severe at the moment.

First, the idea of paramilitary police should be examined.

Some police ought to be paramilitary, just like there should be some other specialty teams. Mental health, SWAT, close-encounter rough and ready teams, of one or more, should be available. But the tedious, boring, hard and dangerous work of patrolling and answering calls may be handled by officers without special qualifications, and without special physical attributes.

He goes on to argue that not all p[olice recruits need to fit the SWAT profile. I agree in part, but would go further. Yes, the need will always exist for specialized units with young, physically fit officers on the ready to handle dangerous situations.

But, unfortunately, it rsquo;s our so called War on Drugs that has caused the recent explosion of and fueled the need for paramilitary police units and tactics. It rsquo;s just one more example of how our senseless drug policy in this country is draining resources from where they are truly needed.
hellip;and if they do, will a judge toss out any evidence they obtain as a result?

The short answer is: police in almost all circumstances are allowed to say whatever they want to get you to incriminate yourself. A short example follows:
When Al Pacino, the low level mobster, introduces Johnny Depp, the undercover police agent, to the other Mafiosos in , Depp rsquo;s character is justifiably met with some initial skepticism. Is an undercover police agent in this situation duty bound to reveal his real identity in this situation, if he is asked, ldquo;Are you a cop?

rdquo; Imagine the consequences.
Common sense tells us the answer is no. The undercover agent doesn rsquo;t have to choose death simply to maintain the constitutionality of the investigation.

(And the U.S. Supreme Court came to the same conclusion in .

Yes, the Jimmy Hoffa.)
Even before that decision, police ruses were commonplace, and they have become even more so in today rsquo;s drug war environment.
In the recently decided Krause v Kentucky, however, the state rsquo;s Supreme Court decided that a trooper went too far over the line in obtaining a drug suspect rsquo;s consent to search his home.

The police in this case woke the defendant up at 4 o rsquo;clock in the morning to tell him that his roommate had been accused of rape that very night. They needed to search the house to verify whether the accuser rsquo;s description of the apartment matched the scene of the alleged crime.
In fact, there had been no rape, not even an allegation, nor an accuser.

It had all been a lie, intended to cause the known innocent person to allow police entry, where they could then search for drugs. Cocaine was eventually found ldquo;in plain view rdquo;.
The Court decided to reverse the conviction (affirmed by a lower court) because requires consent to search not to be coerced.

Even that part of the Schneckloth decision has been watered down over the years, but the Court found that upholding the search would discourage future citizen cooperation in real cases.
Since the state decision was decided, at least in part, on federal Fourth Amendment grounds and federal caselaw, the State of Kentucky may appeal this all the way to the U.S.

Supreme Court. Part of me wants to know what the result would be, and the other part fears further erosions of our constitutional rights. As far as the drug war goes, is there no end in sight to the ridiculous police state we are becoming?

Don rsquo;t forget, this ludicrous set of facts led to a conviction which was initially affirmed.
(Hat Tip to the for initially posting about this case; also, please read that blog for useful tips on navigating the confusing Kentucky Supreme Court rsquo;s webpage, if you want to read the decision.