High Ranking Police Folk Allegedly Behaving Badly

[Bruce Monkhouse]

Fourth one facing disciplinary in the last little while. Come on clowns, you're supposed to be leading the good guys and gals....

MANDEL: Senior cop accused of interfering in probe of nephew's car crash

Another high-ranking TPS officer is accused of misconduct - find out why

torontosun.com

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Nothing that happens in Toronto surprises me anymore.

 

[brihard]

Ouch. TPS hasn’t been having a good run of luck with senior officer conduct of late.

Taking what’s alleged here at face value, if it’s true, that’s a pretty blatant boneheaded move. An officer could potentially face jeopardy beyond just the police services act if they’re seen as deliberately interfering with an investigation.

I don’t envy an officer placed in the position of getting a call like that from a family member, but there are lines you just can’t cross, and that’s a decision you make when you take the job.

 

[Bruce Monkhouse]

Not sure its fair to blame a city.......biggest force, most potential problems.

It just has to be demoralizing for the rank and file. I mean if this whole thing is true it's "what not to do 101".

EDIT: same thing, same time post as Brihard

 

[lenaitch]

A colleague once said that all coppers have a 'self destruct circuit', like a GFCI outlet, and some like to push the 'test' button just to see what happens.

Coppers that work in smaller services or deployed services that live in and police small communities, often face similar decisions on a regular basis, particularly if it is the town they grew up in. A lot of professions are expected to make make tough moral decisions, that sometimes suck. This wasn't one of them.

 

[mariomike]

Not sure its fair to blame a city.......biggest force, most potential problems.

Policing the fourth largest city in North America - Mexico City is number one, followed by New York and then L.A. - will always have potential problems.

 

[CBH99]

Rough year for TPS senior brass, especially when the head of the disciplinary board is currently charged himself with what is yet again, a jaw dropping no brainer.

But let’s look at the plus side…senior members are being held accountable, and the public is being made aware of it.

In the end this sounds like a good thing. Some more junior members who deserve those positions & would respect those positions if they got them, will soon have a chance to pursue them.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Too bad they weren't being held responsible when Blair was Chief. In 2020 Toronto had to pay a $16.5 million dollar settlement for his caging of approx 400 Canadian citizens during the G20, ten years previous.
He literally abrogated their rights and detained them in fenced in compounds.

$16.5M settlement in class-action suit over Toronto G20 mass arrests

A decade-long legal battle over mass arrests at the 2010 G20 summit in Toronto has come to a close after police and hundreds of protesters and others reached a…

torontosun.com

 

[mariomike]

A colleague once said that all coppers have a 'self destruct circuit', like a GFCI outlet, and some like to push the 'test' button just to see what happens.

Coppers that work in smaller services or deployed services that live in and police small communities, often face similar decisions on a regular basis, particularly if it is the town they grew up in. A lot of professions are expected to make make tough moral decisions, that sometimes suck. This wasn't one of them.

LAPD Chief Bill Parker put it this way, "We'll always have cases like this because we have one big problem selecting police officers, we have to recruit from the human race."

 

[brihard]

LAPD Chief Bill Parker put it this way, "We'll always have cases like this because we have one big problem selecting police officers, we have to recruit from the human race."

Sure, but those kinds of behavioural patterns should be identified and weeded out earlier in the career and at lower ranks. Not to say that does happen. Just that it should.

 

[mariomike]

Sure, but those kinds of behavioural patterns should be identified and weeded out earlier in the career and at lower ranks. Not to say that does happen. Just that it should.

I don't know about out of town, but I responded to 9-1-1 calls with Metro officers - the "lower ranks" .

Did I see any laws broken? None that I recall.

Did I see a few corners cut from time to time? Sure I did.
Show a little "professional courtesy" now and then? That too.

I remember being told to "wait outside" for a few minutes. "You can come in now."

Most of this was in the old days. Before body cams and cell phone cameras , cameras basically everywhere now.

My uncle was on the Metro force for 30 years and shared some interesting stories with my father and me.

 

[Eaglelord17]

Stuff like that isn't new, it's just a matter of getting caught.

A couple decades ago we had a similar case of cop family member protecting the drunk driver, got him to drink a bunch of alcohol to 'calm' his nerves after hitting and killing a kid. So he never got a DUI charge and because there was no witnesses and he claimed the kid just jumped out in front of him no manslaughter either.

The problem with attempting to weed out this type of behaviour from the police is until a situation like this comes up you don’t know how someones going to act. The whole everyone has a plan until they are punched in the face saying applies here.

I also question the actions of the other police involved as they should have recognized the conflict of interest (provided they were aware it was her nephew) and told her to get out of there. Oh well it will be interesting to see where this case leads.

 

[dapaterson]

Legislation needs stronger teeth - continuing liability for offences even after retirement, and even the ability to strip pensions.

Perhaps even as an incentive, an officer who reports an incident that results in another officer losing their pension gets some proportion of the benefit stripped.

 

[mariomike]

Perhaps even as an incentive, an officer who reports an incident that results in another officer losing their pension gets some proportion of the benefit stripped.

Your partner gets your pension for turning you in. Wow.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Legislation needs stronger teeth - continuing liability for offences even after retirement, and even the ability to strip pensions.

Perhaps even as an incentive, an officer who reports an incident that results in another officer losing their pension gets some proportion of the benefit stripped.

Just like the nazis and Russians telling you to report on your parents and neighbours.
You tell, you get their pension.
Nothing could go wrong with that idea at all.

 

[Jarnhamar]

Your partner gets your pension for turning you in. Wow.

Would you have turned your partner in?

 

[btrudy]

I don't know about out of town, but I responded to 9-1-1 calls with Metro officers - the "lower ranks" .

Did I see any laws broken? None that I recall.

Did I see a few corners cut from time to time? Sure I did.
Show a little "professional courtesy" now and then? That too.

I remember being told to "wait outside" for a few minutes. "You can come in now."

Most of this was in the old days. Before body cams and cell phone cameras , cameras basically everywhere now.

My uncle was on the Metro force for 30 years and shared some interesting stories with my father and me.

Your partner gets your pension for turning you in. Wow.

I mean, it's clear here that you were a part of the problem, and didn't have any qualms turning a blind eye to injustice, as long as you could maintain some thin veneer of plausible deniability.

So... what would your proposed solution be? What would you suggest be put in place to ensure that police stop prioritizing covering up each other's abuse of authority, and instead focus on actually doing their damned job of promoting justice?

 

[PPCLI Guy]

focus on actually doing their damned job of promoting justice?

What does "promoting justice" even mean as an action, let alone a job description.

How does it manifest itself?

What skills, tools, processes, etc would be required to do that, if it is in fact a thing that can be done?

Is pulling me over for speeding promoting justice? Catching a thief? Arresting a suspected murderer? Intervening in a domestic dispute to stop ongoing harm to a spouse and/or children?

I am not being factious. I just wonder how you see such a role being performed? And what the Measures of Effectiveness would be?

 

[SeaKingTacco]

Legislation needs stronger teeth - continuing liability for offences even after retirement, and even the ability to strip pensions.

Perhaps even as an incentive, an officer who reports an incident that results in another officer losing their pension gets some proportion of the benefit stripped.

I think this might have unintended second/third order effects…

 

[dapaterson]

I think this might have unintended second/third order effects…

Definitely. The second suggested item might incite misconduct. It's a "way out there" idea to start conversation, not a fully-formed idea / draft legislation.