The “ignoring medical complaints usually works out until it doesn’t” and is “technically” wrong comment seems coldly utilitarian. once youre in custody, for a short or long time, you’re at the mercy of the system and its players.
some small percentage of people may be actually innocent, a larger percentage overcharged, and some guilty, obviously, with each group potentially being a malingerer with a complaint…but everyone is dependent on the police to address medical needs. They have a duty to provide care, like a lifeguard has a duty to rescue, or a teacher has a duty to his charges…
cops obviously arent doctors, and probably presume virtually everyone is malingering or exaggerating symptoms to some degree, unless they’re visibly in shock or have juicy visible wounds. But if a cop is going to play doctor, and make a medical judgment, hey this ones a faker, then , well, they’re violating the law, by practicing medicine without a license, and open themselves up to all kind of liability.,
many hate the idea that inmates of any stripe get medical care at all, since those on the outside who havent been accused get no free medical care. but thats part of the cost of running a system of mass incarceration that we have. the medical bills are going to be high. For the police to “screen” complaints is essentially saying, let the police practice medicine without a license, be our gatekeeper, like some cop/nurse practitioner.
on the statistically inevitable times when they get it wrong, them it seems fair to hold their feet to the fire, civilly and criminally, for when their illegal medical practice goes haywire. feel free to play doctor, mr and madame constable, but dont be surprised if the community you serve finds your errors to be the result of a depraved indifference to human life when you’re judgment is so dumb it results in someones swift demise.
of course, if it were your kid who died in custody because he had a knife on him, after voicing complaint of some internal injury to the police, the heartlessness of a lack of medical treatment would not seem part of the cost of doing business. it would seem absolutely sick and depraved on the part of the police.
imagine your son was writing in pain on the floor of that van, in his death throes, pleading for his life, feeling the a pain tantamount to torture, as the police took him for their trademark rough ride, looking back in satsifaction as his frail sweaty body bounced on the cold metal floor of the van, causing his final departure from this earth, where he would never again be held in your arms, his life cut short so that he would never marry, you would never see grandchildren, you would never hear his laugh…well, you might continue to feel as you do…
if you could say a few final words to him as he lay dying on the cold metal floor, would you say, hey dont do the crime {no matter how trivial) if youre cant do the time or also are not willing to possibly die at the hand s of the police…would you say “hey, shit happens”……. or would you be banging on the door of that truck, trying desperately to catch the attention fo the police, just as your son was doing in his final death throes, . And at that moment, perhaps you would realize, hey, those are actual beloved, precious, irreplaceable HUMAN BEINGS the police are taking into custody…not meat to be taken to the slaughterhouse….
these are our neighbors, our beloved children, our fellow countrymen…it doesnt seem that way…we as a nation have come to think of them as human trash…but they are not…
i know in my heart that cold utilitarianism would be out the window if it was one of yours in that van.[/quote]
Can’t disagree with your summation there, scaredy, but there is more to the story, as well. Freddie Gray had a long criminal history…
(using snopes so that people don’t claim this is made up)
It’s very likely that the cops knew him, and possibly knew him pretty well. He wasn’t arrested for just for having a knife. When the cops looked at him, he ran, so they pursued him. When they finally caught up with him, he was found to have a knife that may or may not have been legal.
The cops had reason to believe that he had just committed a crime, or was in the process of doing so, or was planning to commit a crime in the near future (a reasonable assumption since he ran as soon as he saw them looking at him).
From everything I have read and heard, these cops were not guilty of severely injuring/killing him “for sport,” nor were they showing reckless disregard for his life; but I would agree that they probably viewed him differently than they would their own children. Many people would view him that way, IMO, including myself.
I’m going to get a lot of flack for saying this, but having had altercations with violent criminals in the past, I most certainly DO view them as different from and less worthy of compassion than decent, law-abiding people who never seek to harm others. Here comes the real zinger…yes, if my children were criminals who preyed on innocent people, I would view them differently, too. I would indeed be very sad if bad things happened to them, but if they brought it on themselves, there would be far less compassion than if they were innocent victims. I would be far more angry with my kid for the end result than I would be with the cops.
If I have to choose between showing mercy for criminals who have no regard for innocent people vs. cops who show little/no regard for criminals, I will come down on the side of cops every single time. Of course, I do hope that cops use discretion and maintain their composure when dealing with suspects and criminals, but I also understand that they can make mistakes, and that they are dealing with the dark underbelly of human society, which will definitely cloud their perspective.
Not saying that they were right in this case — as noted, they had violated some of their own rules — just that I’m not going to jump on the politically correct bandwagon in wanting to burn all cops at the stake if they make some mistakes. Yes, some additional training is in order, but people need to understand the volatile, fast-paced, dangerous conditions that cops have to work in day-in and day-out.
Please watch this video of a civil rights activist who took part in role-playing some “use of force” scenarios with police. He says it was eye-opening, and I think that most people would agree if they had to spend just a single day in situations where their lives were literally on the line, and where split-second decisions mean the difference between life and death.
And, because I know that many posters still haven’t seen it, here’s a real-life example of a cop shooting someone who is “surrendering” and putting down his weapon:
