Plain Old Justice

Child Abuse by Police

In Rochester, NY and Aurora, CO

by K. W. Locke

    You probably have heard about police in Rochester, New York, pepper spraying and handcuffing a 9-year-old girl.  But do you know what the police officers' union said about how the cops acted?

    Reason Magazine's Billy Binion reports that the union president defended the cops' actions.  

    Pepper spraying the girl "resulted in no injury to her," Union President Mike Mazzeo said at a news conference.  "Had they had to go and push further and use more force, there's a good chance she could have been hurt worse. It's very difficult to get someone into the back of a police car like that."

      So, let me get this straight.  The cops pepper sprayed and handcuffed a 9-year-old child because otherwise, she might have gotten hurt when they put her in the police car.   

 Sadly, Rochester, New York is not the only place where police have abused children.

A Village of Idiots

    Well, Aurora, Colorado isn't really a village.  About 380,000 people live there.  And obviously, all those people aren't idiots.  You won't find 380,000 idiots in one place, not even at a convention.

    But the people running the city can't be too bright.  For years, the city has been paying large sums of money to settle lawsuit after lawsuit arising from police misconduct.  Yet they keep letting the cops behave in the same way.

    And you have to wonder about the intelligence of some of the police officers, too.

     Consider this incident: A license plate reading device scanned a car bearing a plate with the same number as that of a vehicle reported stolen  It was parked outside a nail salon and the driver, 29-year-old Brittney Gilliam, was talking on a cellphone.  Also in the car were the woman's 6-year-old daughter, her 17-year-old sister, and her two nieces.  One of the nieces was 14, the other 17.

    Sounds like a dangerous group, right?  The cops must have thought so.  They drew their guns as they approached the car and ordered the occupants out.

    They told the women to lie down on the pavement on their stomachs with their hands over their heads.  Then, the cops handcuffed the women and kids, except for the 6-year-old, whose wrists were so tiny the handcuffs wouldn't fit.

    Ms. Gilliam offered to show the officers her car registration.  They weren't interested.

    Does that sound strange?  They were investigating a possibly stolen automobile but did not want to see the car's registration!

    Ms. Gilliam owned the car and was never charged with any crime.  Later, the Aurora police chief apologized publicly for this "horrible" mistake but took the position that the officers had been "following department procedure."  The chief observed that the department should give officers discretion to deviate from the standard procedure "when different scenarios present themselves."

    They didn't have that discretion already?  Were they robots?

    And you have to wonder, what kind of police procedure for investigating a possible car theft would instruct officers to hold women and children at gunpoint and force them to lie on their stomachs on the pavement, but not to check the car registration?

     Wouldn't checking the registration be the first thing to do in any case involving a suspected stolen car?  Checking the registration also might have kept the officers from embarrassing themselves.  They had made a really stupid mistake.

    The license plate number of Ms. Gilliam's SUV did match the plate number of the stolen vehicle, but that vehicle was a motorcycle.  Another slight discrepancy:  The stolen motorcycle was registered in Montana.  Ms. Gilliam's SUV was registered in Colorado.

    Anyone can make a mistake but it takes total incompetence - or racial prejudice - to compound it into an ordeal for two women and 4 girls.  Even after the officers allowed the women and kids to stand up, the cops continued to detain them, two hours total.  

    All Ms. Gilliam and her family had wanted to do that Sunday was go to the nail salon and then get ice cream.

    Ms. Gilliam sued the city and police under a new Colorado statute which curbed the qualified immunity doctrine which shields officers in almost all other states and makes it difficult to hold them accountable.

    If you are wondering about whether the Aurora officers were merely incompetent, or worse, you should read the complaint which Ms. Gilliam filed in court.  It details a long history of police misconduct directed at Blacks and Hispanics.

    In the last 2 decades, the city of Aurora has paid more than 4 million dollars to settle cases brought by victims of police abuse.  So, why didn't city officials see long ago that there was a serious problem which needed immediate correction?  Were they blinded by prejudice or stupidity?

      Besides eliminating the immunity defense, the new Colorado statute gives officers a powerful reason to act lawfully.  In some circumstances, if a victim wins a lawsuit, the cop might have to pay up to $25,000 out of his own pocket.

    The new law also requires officers to intervene if they see another cop breaking the law.

    The Colorado "Law Enforcement Integrity" Act doesn't raise taxes and places little burden on police departments.  It provides a good model for legislators in other states.

    But will lawmakers outside Colorado have the courage to enact similar measures?  Or will they dally while more people, including children, are abused?