Will Nanny soon regulate the size of the toilet paper we use to wipe our __________?

The cop forged a document. So he falsified a doc, right? Perhaps I’m parsing, but isn’t a falsification a lie? Even as it relates to documentation? If it isn’t, then why was it tossed?

How many times do I have to say I understand the difference as supported by court precedent and case law about how and when cops can lie? One of the terms is intrinsic and extrinsic misrepresentation.

My overall problem is with Butterflydragons comments that cops can lie all they want, whenever they want about whatever they want and that they are not held to higher ethical standards of conduct in the course of their duties. All of his assertions are demonstrably false.

Argue all you want. It wont make it true.

I suggest the woman wear a Birkuh and they would not have touched her.

SnakeintheGrass on March 31, 2011 at 8:15 AM

I’m not confusing anything. I’ve repeatedly stated – even provided linkage – to how the court interprets cops and how they can and cannot misrepresent a case.

Cops CANNOT LIE ABOUT THE FACTS OF A CASE! As your own comment says, a cop did and had a confession tossed.

I understand the difference.

Dukeboy01 on March 30, 2011 at 9:17 AM

That is the most apt description I think you will find over how stupid laws get enforced. I know the post is long but, if you skipped it, you would do well to go back and read it.

I have said to more than one person in reguards to stupid laws “I know it is stupid but just do it. Please don’t make me do my job.” And that is why we ultimately have to enforce them. It is part of our job weather we want to or not. It is the same as drug laws. I think they are a waste of time and money but if I find them I do what I am paid to do.

And to catmman

You are confusing lying and breaking the law. If I lie about your tail light being out and stop you for it I have commited an unreasonable search and seizure.

For instance lets say I am speaking to you about a burglary. I say I found your finger prints even though I didnt. If you then confess it dosent invalidate the confession. If you dont confess I still havent done anything wrong as long as I take it no further, such as lying in court about it or falsifying lab results or something.

There was a recent court case where a confession was tossed out because a detective faked a lab result and showed it to the suspect who then confessed. It was ruled that, while he was allowed to lie, he couldnt break the law to do so. He had forged a government document and, even though he didnt enter it into evidence or take it any further than the interigation, it was still illegal.

Just sayin’

Your tax dollars toll money at work.

profitsbeard on March 29, 2011 at 10:30 PM

fify

Go back and re- read my post. I’m saying that we tried mightily to do the right thing and one of your fellow, law- abiding “tax- payers who pay my salary” and who we are supposed to protect and serve would not let it go until action was taken that annoyed a bunch of his neighbors. If you think that any police department in this country doesn’t operate the same way, you’re hopelessly naive.

It’s not just police work. It’s every sector and agency of government service from the military to the post office to the schools to your local parks and rec department. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. Or, rather, the person who complains enough gets the speed limit lowered or the law passed requiring basketball goals to be taken down or the military sent to the far corners of the earth to intervene for humanitarian reasons. That same person, or some one else, complains to the appropriate government agency to have those basketball goals torn down, parking tickets written, or tin- pot dictators overthrown.

ButterflyDragon on March 30, 2011 at 12:24 PM

To put it succinctly – a cop cannot lie about the facts of any given case/situation.

I stated there is a difference – as stated by the law and court interpretation – as to how a police officer may and may not ‘misrepresent’ events.

I’m telling you that a cop cannot lie to you just because. A cop cannot lie under oath. Here’s a link explaining the pitfalls; also explaining the difference of ‘lying’ during a criminal investigation and otherwise.

Can the cops in your world plant evidence? That’s simply a lie in the course of their duties, right? Can the cops make up testimony from whole cloth? Can cops falsify arrest reports? Submit false citations for violations? WTH is wrong with you?

And talk about not knowing WTH you’re talking about. Cops aren’t held to a higher ethical standard during the course of their duties? Really? WTH do you live? This would be news to the Rampart cops in the LAPD, amongst others. Using your logic cops can’t get busted for bribery or theft or abuse of authority or any commonly held ethical behavior, right? A cop can lie to you about anything while performing their duties? Again, I think you’re the one with a slim grasp of reality.

Yeah, ask those defense attorneys and prosecutors what would happen to a given case if the cops lied about it.

Did the clear zone within 7 ft. of the street easement law really get passed to make sure no one put a basketball hoop up at the end of a residential cul-de-sac that was in no one’s way and wasn’t hurting anything? I seriously doubt it. There are times the easement law needs to be enforced for legitimate reasons. This was not one of them.

willamettevalley on March 30, 2011 at 1:08 PM

Does it get any clearer than this?

§ 149. Authority to adopt regulations governing state land.

(2) In keeping with the General Assembly’s legislative findings herein, and in order to promote safe neighborhood recreation, the Department shall make every effort to remove from public rights-of-way devices such as basketball hoops, hockey goals, shuffleboards and the like. The Department is further authorized and directed to establish such regulations as may be necessary and appropriate to enforce this activity.

The problem comes when you get busybodies in public service nuisance roles where they try to enforce the letter of the law in ways the original law was not really intended for.

Did the clear zone within 7 ft. of the street easement law really get passed to make sure no one put a basketball hoop up at the end of a residential cul-de-sac that was in no one’s way and wasn’t hurting anything? I seriously doubt it. There are times the easement law needs to be enforced for legitimate reasons. This was not one of them.

There are several local laws that I’m aware of that are just as invasive and selectively enforced. For instance, my transmission was slipping on my van and I didn’t have the money or time to get it fixed right away. I let the tags expire, and the van was parked on the street right in front of my house (and there is tons of parking available on my non-busy residential street). Within days, I had an annoying sticker slapped on my back window saying I had to get the van off the street within 72 hours or it would be towed as an “abandoned vehicle”. It took me a half hour to scrape all of that stupid sticker off my window. I then moved my van into my driveway where I had been parking my car, and started parking my car where the van had been parked in the street. Nothing gained for anybody.

I looked further into the exact regulations and found that even though the van was now off the street on my own property, according to the letter of the law, the city could have declared it an “inoperable vehicle” (also because of expired tags) and given me notice to remove it from my property or face a fine. That did not happen, but the city code is there just waiting for a city busybody to start enforcing it when they feel the need for a power trip.

I noticed another local city ordinance on the books that was ridiculous too, and is not really enforced but easily could be. According to the letter of the law, it is illegal for any vehicle, including RV’s, over 24 ft. to be parked on any city street overnight! And even for RV’s under 24 ft., they can only be on the street with the permission of an adjacent homeowner for up to 48 hours! So if I have relative with an RV come to visit me for a 3 days or more, they are in violation of this law if they park next to my house!

I regularly see a semi truck parked up the street (I assume a truck driver lives there). I’ve seen RV’s parked in the neighborhood for up to a week at a time. When my neighbor just moved away recently, he had a semi-sized moving van parked in front of his house for 3 days. All of these are perfectly fine and legitimate use of parking space, and should be legal, yet according to the ordinance they are not. I appreciate that they are not stringently enforced, but why are they on the books at all?

Show me where in any state in this country a cop is allowed to perjur himself.

You guys are being purposefully dense or you’ve been watching too much Law & Order.

catmman on March 30, 2011 at 11:02 AM

I’m sorry, but I failed to see where anyone was sworn in before this interaction occurred. You don’t even understand the difference between perjury and lying and you’re trying to tell us we don’t know what we’re talking about?

I’m sorry, but you are flat out wrong. Cops have the right to lie. They are not lawyers or judges held to an ethical standard in the course of their duties.

Bottom line is a cop can lie about anything they want while performing their duty. They can lie to you about evidence, they can lie about getting you a deal with the DA if you tell the truth. They can lie about being “off the record”. They can lie about about you keeping a basketball goal if it thwarts civil disobedience. They can do it.

Ask any criminal defense attorney. Ask any judge. Ask any cop. Quit living in some fantasy world and understand that a cop can lie to you and it’s perfectly okay.

We had a similar situation in another neighborhood. The neighborhood president was complaining about speeders. The speed limit was 25 mph. My captain sent an officer out and told him to write some speeding tickets. The officer came back and said that he didn’t observe anybody doing more than 5 mph over and that the complaint was BS.

A few days later the neighborhood president is complaining again. He insists that cars are speeding through the neighborhood, describing it as if “everyone” is doing 40 mph or more. The officer goes back out and runs more radar. Still no speed violations that warrant a ticket.

You know what happened next. The neighborhood president calls the Chief, calls the mayor, raises six kinds of Hell. Crap rolls downhill and the officer gets chewed out by the captain. So he goes back to the neighborhood and writes a couple dozen tickets for people doing 1-2 mph over the speed limit, making sure that they know exactly why he’s there.

We didn’t get any more complaints from that guy either.

So you are basically saying that your police department is basically being allowed to be influenced by one citizen and the politics work their way down until a couple dozen people got ticketed and fined for going 1-2 miles over the speed limit? And that story is supposed to make the police look good how? The fact that if one person makes enough of a stink they can get the police force to go do their bidding does not help the case I think you are trying to make here.

catmman on March 30, 2011 at 11:02 AM

Is it perjury if you aren’t under oath? I think what Officer Sweatpants did was unethical but legal. The best we can hope for is a citizen backlash that will live on in history.