Atlanta Shooting

[Bailey Guns]

Without Qualified Immunity, police officers across the country will be just like the average joe citizen (and therefore completely unnecessary), who is repeatedly told by any good self defense instructor that unless their life is in serious jeopardy, just be a good witness. I realize that is precisely what many pushing “police reform” really want.

Qualified Immunity does not indemnify police from criminal acts (either civilly or criminally). It gives them some protection from personal civil liability while acting under the color of law only. It also doesn’t mean citizen’s can’t sue. It merely means the department or government entity takes on the financial liability for their actions and civil defense.

I was sued personally and while acting officially for $17M about 20 years ago by a kid who claimed I hit him. He was drunk, I arrested him, he was mad and whacked his head on the security screen and put a 3cm cut on his forehead. Depending on which version of the complaint he filed I hit him with 1) my hand 2) my nightstick (I didn't carry one) 3) a flashlight and finally 4) the butt of my gun. Completely fabricated story but he needed to tell mom and dad something. Mom and dad, both being convicted felons, saw $$ once they saw their baby boy with a bloody face and a cut on his forehead. They hired an expert witness that was able to say with absolute certainty in his report that I hit him with the butt of Glock 17 pistol and the edge of the magazine caused the cut. But, I carried a S&W 4006 TSW. No problem...we'll just revise the expert witness report to reflect that little error. It was complete bullshit and everyone knew it. However, I had to endure about 18 months of listening to what a horrible person I was, what a bad, heavy-handed cop I was, how I liked to brutalize people, etc. Of course I couldn't say anything because of the pending trial. Trial in US District court lasted 7 days. It took the jury minutes to come back with a "Not Liable" decision (same as not guilty). It was so fast we left the courtroom to go get lunch, left the bldg, walked across the street and got the call to go back to the courtroom because the jury was back.

The point of all this is...several things.

1. Cops can still be sued with QI. It's easy. Just allege a civil rights violation...because that's illegal and you're not protected from that. Just about any lawyer can get a case into court. Even an ambulance chaser like the asshole that represented this kid. Don't have a real case? No problem...just make one up.
2. I was covered by dept insurance so I didn't have to pay atty fees. But their liability insurance only covered $1M. Any judgement over that and I was on my own.
3. So don't tell me cops can't be sued due to QI. Because I will politely tell you you don't know what the fuck you're talking about.
4. Just like the good cops vastly outnumber the bad cops, the bad lawsuits against cops already vastly outnumber the good, legitimate lawsuits against cops. And without QI it would be far worse.

[sako55]

We've all lost loved ones too soon, and in the end it doesn't matter if they were serving the community, or had a run in with cancer. I haven't bought a crotch rocket ever since I've been able to afford one, because I want to come home at night for my family. I get touchy and refer to it as rhetoric because in the context of this discussion, and police work, I feel it's often thrown around as a defense for bad behavior. That might sound like splitting hairs, but with the heightened emotions of the discussion, I'm sure you can understand. Just as I understand the people who spend so much time defending police officers as a whole, that they tend to forget to address the actions of the bad ones and gloss over the perceptions of the non-police community.

As I've said before, almost every angle of this discussion has some truth to it. People are upset about mostly outlier events. Everyone is mad, and everyone is right. It's not a simple, or comfortable discussion and will take acceptance and understanding from all sides to actually get anywhere.

Will never defend the bad ones. Hate them.

Get it and can agree. Yes loosing loved ones early sucks. In my opinion sucks more when they are lost doing a job. Regardless of what that job is.

[Irving]

I agree

[Bailey Guns]

This is what the streets of Atlanta look like without police:



https://twitter.com/i/status/1274990852704780290

[crays]

She seems pretty calm for taking one in the leg. I guess she must have some training beind her, the way she was methodically addressing the injury with supplies from her own pack.

So were these folks "citizen safety patrol" or what. At opening of clip, blue track suit appears to be carrying an AR and the white tshirt to his left has a hadgun.

[buffalobo]

Late at nite in major metro area shithole...

Imagine that.

[Gman]

Keep voting Democrat. That'll fix it.

[VDW]

Do you have any idea what the legal cost of your defense and trial was, Bailey Guns? I imagine it would have been easily affordable on your salary.

[Bailey Guns]

It amounted to about $450,000 over almost 2 years, give or take a bit. After the verdict came in and the jury was dismissed the judge summoned both sides into chambers. First thing he said was he wanted to discuss trial and attorney costs. I was nicely told to be on my way at that point but my attorney told me later the judge entered a judgement against the kid for court and attorney costs in that amount. Almost 20 years later he's still probably trying to figure out how he's gonna pay almost a half million dollars in costs.

[FoxtArt]

It amounted to about $450,000 over almost 2 years, give or take a bit. After the verdict came in and the jury was dismissed the judge summoned both sides into chambers. First thing he said was he wanted to discuss trial and attorney costs. I was nicely told to be on my way at that point but my attorney told me later the judge entered a judgement against the kid for court and attorney costs in that amount. Almost 20 years later he's still probably trying to figure out how he's gonna pay almost a half million dollars in costs.

Probably discharged it in bankruptcy. So, outside of their own attorney fees already paid at that point (if there were any)...