Cop outburst caught on dashcam (1 Viewer)

Saw this on the news this morning. Talk about a power trip.

sounds a whole lot like plenty of times that i have been pulled over unfortunately.

Good thing he "just happened" to have that audio/video system set up in his car, huh?

We are all human, including the police, and if our buttons get pushed enough, there will be the high probability of something bad being said or done.

IMHO, the young man was trying to provoke something and get it on tape. Looks like he succeeded.

Sure everyone gets their buttons pushed and might lose it once in a while. But this guy is talking about making up charges to arrest this kid. Thats a bit much.

Sorry but these rationalizations just don't wash.

I have no doubt that the young man was trying to provoke the officer but the reality is the officer is suppose to be a professional and this one certainly is not. His performance was an embarrassment to himself and an embarrassment to the profession. Even if this is a one time event he should lose his job but he probably won't.

This guy is on record that his mission is to go out and try to provoke cops to get a reaction. I just don't get that mentality.

I can't agree with Patrick about the rationalization not washing. Yes what the cop did was wrong, and he should get an appropriate amount of punishment based on what he did, but to expect police to be something other than human, with other than human reactions to provocations is unrealistic, IMHO.

That's all very well and good, as long as you remember it later. There is a very prevalent attitude, both among the police and among the general public, that a patrolman is something more than human, that he is Authority personified and can do no wrong. If we excuse his faults, we cannot treat him as infallible.

Walking up to a parked car at night in an empty parking lot is very high on the list of stressful things a policeman can do. It's akin to doing a traffic stop along a quiet highway or road at night which, any cop will tell you, is one of the most dangerous and stressful things they do in their day to day job.

Threatening to make up up charges....not a good thing to do obviously, and he should be discplined for it. Firing him straight off because of this would be absurd however. He should be evaluated psychologically and a judgement should then be made to determine if he's fit to be out there on the street or not.....This would be the approprate way to walk the line between expecting cops to be perfect vs. understanding that they are indeed human.

The kid, whoever he is, should be arrested and charged with whatever crime applies to his actions. What he did was intentionally occupy this police officers time to provoke him, and this intentional act on his part took that police officer and made him unavailable to do the job he was hired to do in situations where he is truly needed. This is akin to making a false report of a fire to the fire department, and puts the safety and well being of people and communities unncessarily at risk.

He did? I didn't see him flip off the cop and speed off. Heck he put on his blinkers for both turns we see and stopped in a public parking lot. He then asked the #1 question you are supposed to ask a cop, "what did I do?" The cop didn't reply and instead went on a power trip. If anything, the kid kept a belligerent cop out of public harm for 10 minutes.

Simply unbelievably obtuse in it’s logic. Pulling into a public lot that is open is not a crime. Please point out how he intentionally occupied the officer’s time?

By the way here are some updates on the story.

The officer has been suspended without pay pending review. I’m glad it is without pay since he doesn’t deserve a paid vacation for his thuggish behavior.

The chief is on public record as saying the “officer's actions were not justified”.

The DA is investigating to see if charges will be filed against the officer.

And one last tidbit, this police department’s policy is that any contact the officer has with the public has to be on tape via the video camera installed in the officer’s car. Inexplicably the video from the officer’s car is missing.

This officer is toast.

The cop was obviously out of control, but he didn't get an attitude until the driver gave an attitude first. I have been pulled over twice for speeding, and deserved it both times. One officer chose to give me a ticket, one officer let me off with a warning. In both cases, I was courteous to them and they were courteous right back. In the later case, the officer gave me directions to my destination.

The public is outraged whenever a public servant loses his cool. I've been a public servant off and on for the past six years, and I can tell you that I've seen people that make that cop look like a gentleman. I never lost my cool, and I'm not forgiving his behavior one iota. But people in this country need to remember that a little decency and respect go a long way.

Anyone else wonder if this kid knew this was going to happen or wanted it to happen? I mean, why else setup a camera on your own dash firing backward and park in an empty commuter parking lot? What the heck was he hoping to video otherwise? Darkness?

In a news interview he said he has been driving with a camera for quite some time after getting a ticket he said he didn't deserve. How much of that you want to believe is up to you.

This supposed victim is the owner and originator of the video, thus he has shown and/or released only what he wants the public to see. Someone with the technical skills to hardwire and permanently install a video camera into a vehicle, certainly has the ability to purchase and operate off the shelf video editing equipment and software. If nothing else, he controls when it is on or off. It is very easy to perform a dangerous moving violation with the camera off, and only turn it on for the traffic stop itself.

I cannot take someone at face value who says it's their mission to get cops for a supposedly undeserved ticket years ago.

And the above statement does nothing to diminish my opinion that the cop should be sanctioned for losing his cool.

Where is the "attitude" from the driver? A cop drives up to you in a commuter lot, you wouldn't have asked those questions? You wouldn't have asked what you did wrong? I do not see a single question there that was not warranted or was meant to bait. The last question is the quote "I'm what?" came because the officers previous statement was slurred and unintelligible (watch the video again).

People's judgement is being corrupted by the knowlege of the driver's intent. That intent in obvious later in the confrontation. He is clearly baiting. But at the time the cop lost his cool, the driver had said absolutely nothing wrong and out of the ordinary.

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H

Link

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php...show_article=1

Something about this whole thing still smacks wrong. I'm wondering what we are not seeing.

Yep. There isn't much out there though, especially when people get behind the steering wheel. We've had these discussions before, but what is it that make people feel like gods when they are driving a car?

Maybe it will be a good thing when we run out of gas and are forced to walk or ride horses again.

Looking at things from from the cop's perspective, it is well known that car stops are the most dangerous part of that job. In an area known for break-ins you see a car after midnight turn onto a street that has no other way out (you can see the "no outlet" sign when he makes the turn) and park into a commuter lot. Commuter lots are generally disused that time of night, so coupled with the reports of car break-ins, the car that just passed you and parked is suspicious. When you walk up to the car, the person is not lost & looking at a map, or pulled over momentarily to talk on a cell phone; they are just sitting there. Also suspicious. Also, various electronics are plainly observable in the car including a police scanner monitoring transmissions (which can be heard up to and including when the police lights come on). If I were a cop, at that point all these things would be adding up wrong, and all kinds of bells and whistles would be going off. Is this person here to commit suicide? To ambush me? To break-in to a car? I think a reasonable person would be pretty apprehensive in that situation.

Now it turns out he was just there to bait the cop into a confrontation, but the cop didn't know that initially and had to go through all the other "what if"'s going through his head. I think I would be pretty upset after coming off an adreneline dump like that.

I understand that the cop may have been apprehensive, and I'll even let slide his initial attitude. But what I find inexcusable is his threat of making up charges to arrest the kid. "Do you want to go to jail for some (expletive) reason I come up with?"

I think he should be fired. Someone mentioned earlier that if not fired, that his future arrests may come under scrutiny, but I'll go a step further and suggest that all his previous arrests should come into question. How do we know that he hasn't done this before?

I agree. That was completely unjustified and the officer should be punished.