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| All Cops Are Bastards? |
I fucking hate cop shows with a passion. There are a few exceptions. Usually comedies like Brooklyn Nine-Nine or The Job. But there is a serious cop show that I *do* like: The Shield. I contend that it's the cop show for people who hate cop shows. Who hates cop shows? People who know what the police are actually like instead of the soap opera most people see. The Shield is a great cop show because it shows them for what they really are: predators and criminals.
Am I exaggerating? Let's turn our attention to Jackson, Mississippi, to a li'l town called Rankin. A bit more than a year ago a resident called the cops because two Black males were seen living in the neighborhood and were acting "suspicious." We know what that means, and I know I said I would leave race out of it, but it's the instigator in this particular case. A white guy calls a white police force, and a group of white cops show up. They're known locally as the "Goon Squad." Doesn't have quite the same ring as Vic Mackey's Strike Team, but it's a contender.
How did the Goon Squad know to show up? Their leader, a guy named Middleton, reached out to his team and said they had "a mission." Does that sound like something a professional police officer should be saying?
So they kick the door down and find the two guys. What happens next is very important. I can't stress how important. But the two men COMPLIED WITH THE POLICE'S ORDERS. And shortly thereafter THEY WERE HANDCUFFED.
Now it's time for verbal abuse. The cops want to know where the drugs are. What drugs? you might be wondering. Good question. That's the first I've heard of it in this story, too. Eh, who cares? It's time for some scare tactics now. One of them fires his weapon out the back of the house and demands to know where the drugs are.
There are no drugs.
The taunting begins. I'm sure you can guess which word gets thrown around quite a bit here. And now it's time for the threats. They find a sex toy and a BB gun, and they threaten to use them against the two guys. The police make it very clear that rape is definitely on the table, here.
And now for the physical torture. They pour milk, booze and syrup all over them, and they force the two guys to drink it until they're bloated. They throw eggs at them until one of them probably realizes that they don't want their vehicles to get dirty. They order them to shower and change clothes. Then the two men are beaten with pieces of wood and a GODDAM SWORD and tased. Remember THEY WERE HANDCUFFED. They OBEYED THE POLICE.
And now for the main event. One of the cops grabs one of the guys and makes him kneel before him. The cop then puts his gun in the guy's mouth, probably tormenting him a little before pulling the trigger.
The chamber is empty.
I can see the cocky grin on that fucker's face as he racks the chamber and does the whole thing again. Except this time, unexpectedly, the gun fires. Don't worry. Our guy lives. It busts up his mouth and jaw, and the bullet exits the back of his neck, but he's all right.
The cops realize the deep shit they're in, so now it's time to cover their asses. What would Vic Mackey do? They burn all the evidence they can. They get the hard drive from the home surveillance system and chuck it in the creek. To make sure there were no questions later about why they were there, they plant a gun and some meth and planned on telling the world it was a drug raid. They even try to get their victims to go along with their cover story. They try to convince them that if they stick to that story, they'll be released from jail.
Would you believe that line of bullshit?
If there's anything I've learned in my life, it's this: DO NOT TRUST COPS. Ever. Even when you think they're telling the truth. ESPECIALLY THEN. Do not trust a cop ever. Even if they threaten you.
Keep in mind, these motherfuckers were called the Goon Squad BEFORE this incident. Turns out, they've been doing this shit for years going back to 2004. They were notorious for it. A lot of their raids resemble the one described above (except for that ending). They'd waterboard people. Choke them with lamp cords. Beat people with flashlights. And if you think that last one is silly, you've never held a cop's flashlight before. You could easily kill a guy with one. And they fucking loved their tasers:
At least 32 times over the past decade, Rankin deputies fired their Tasers more than five times in under an hour, activating them for at least 30 seconds in total — double the recommended limit. Experts in Taser use who reviewed the logs called these incidents highly suspicious.
“This is not typical Taser use,” said Seth Stoughton, faculty director of the Excellence in Policing & Public Safety program at the University of South Carolina. “There’s just no justification for that.”
This story has a . . . I'd hesitate to say a happy ending. After all that violence? Who could possibly be happy? They got at least some form of punishment, which I can't say for a lot of cops. If they didn't resign, they were fired. All of them. Personally, I'd be a lot happier if they did some time. The victims are suing them, and I can only hope they take the Goon Squad to the cleaners.
Just a few bad apples, eh? It's . . . odd that so many of them just came together in the same spot. It's almost as if . . . hear me out . . . they're all rotten to the core?
When you're supposed to stop crime, but instead you *commit* crime, that makes you objectively bad at your job. But let's switch gears a little and tell you about a neurodivergent eight year old in Wyoming. He's called JD because he's a minor, but remember what I said about cops and their need to be cruel to kids?
This one seems to still be under investigation, so I'm just going to say this is the alleged story.
JD eats his lunch every day in the principal's office as part of his specialized education plan. That day he'd been a bit rambunctious, and the principal and teacher were talking to him about maybe apologizing to the cashier in the lunchroom. The school resource officer was there and knew about the kid's disorders, which meant he also knew that deescalation is what JD needs when in trouble. This officer was trained in this, allegedly.
JD got up to leave, just like he did every day, but for some inexplicable reason this officer grabbed JD by the arm--against the administrative code in WY--and pinned the kid to the floor, slamming his face repeatedly into the tiles. No one knows why this happened. The principal and other staff did not request any help with anything. This fucking guy just flew off the handle for no reason and beat the shit out of a defenseless eight year old. An adult man put his entire weight on a 68 pound child. JD couldn't breathe.
Who else couldn't breathe?
JD begs to surrender, but the officer's response is batshit crazy: "No, it's all me! Do you understand me?! I should be taking you to jail!"
The principal called JD's dad to come pick him up, and when he got there he demanded to know why the officer laid hands on his boy. The officer said, "Because, as a law enforcement officer, that's my primary function."
Oh? Really? I thought it was to serve and to protect. Apparently the primary function of a police officer is to beat the shit out of neurodivergent kids. Got it.
Am I exaggerating? Was this officer acting within the bounds of the law? Then why did he erase the worst parts of his body cam footage? (And we'll talk about body cams again, probably in part 5.) Why did he violate JD"s private personal records at the school and use excerpts in his official report? Because he knew he was in deep shit, and now he was covering his ass. Just like the Goon Squad.
This officer was not punished. The department condoned his actions, calling them "appropriate and justified." He's being sued, and the results are not yet in. I hope he gets taken to the cleaners, too.
I don't know about you, but I've had my fill of horror stories for tonight. To be continued tomorrow.
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