You have to admit that his story’s a little unbelievable simply because he’s still alive to tell it.
A little too real man.
That story reminds me of the people I know who have been pulled over for DWB. Always an excuse for bullshit like this. And it’s too easy for white America to ignore.
There’s a lot of stuff about that story which is kind of weird. If it’s true, it’s not just an indictment of the cop, but if the entire system wherever that took place. He would almost certainly have a legal case against them.
A judge would have had to approve a search warrant, for…a calculator? And why would they take anything else? That stuff would have had to be listed on the warrant.
It’s totally possible it’s true, and the system wherever it happened was totally fucked up, because we’ve seen that. But it’s also totally possible that some dude on Twitter made up a story.
Well that’s not some dude. it’s a verified account of an activist.
Now I am not saying information can’t be wrong or misunderstood, especially from the memory of someone who was a kid when it happened, but remember how shocked some people were about what’s going with police and the systems that support them in the country, like the footage of encounters that people have stated have been happening for years, for generations, and suddenly it’s true because a pair of eyeballs or a lens captured it… that’s why it kept happening, the instant doubt of the unbelievable, but look at at all those police stories. How many would most of you believe if none of them, not a single one had been recorded or witnessed by someone who was not a person of color. Sometimes the story is unbelievable because they’re unbelievably bad, not because they didn’t happen.
Lars Larson is a big far right radio guy here in Portland. Grade A dipshit.
Some of this stuff just doesn’t make any sense though.
I mean, if the cop was normally stationed at the school, he wouldn’t have been on the team of guys (in riot gear?) that would have served a search warrant… Ignoring the fact that it seems really weird that a judge would approve a no knock warrant for a calculator.
I mean, really, that doesn’t sound like it makes sense to anyone, does it?
I’m all about calling cops on their bullshit trampling of rights, but this seems fishy.
Literally none of that story is hard to believe.
If this was in the Sotputhm don’t forget those cops like to dress up in riot gear or dressed like warhammer zealots just to feel cool. I remember one town where half the group looked like morons with football and box bike gear on to try and look all police mad maxy.
But it is, isn’t it?
A cop who works as a high school getting a no knock search warrant over a calculator? That alone is hard to believe.
But then that cop, himself, being sent to execute the search with a swat team? That too is crazy.
And here’s a thing i learned while trying to figure out who this guy was: his mom is a lawyer. And she’s white. There is NO WAY that this kind of thing could go down against a lawyer without repercussions.
This guy isn’t some poor black kid from the projects. He grew up with money. His dad is a high school band director, and his mom is a successful malpractice lawyer.
Oh the idea of cops being over militarized is definitely not the part which i find hard to believe.
Okay, I admit that part made me laugh, him rolling in all that high school band directed moolah.
Might want to finish reading the sentence.
Yes, you’re totally right, but the band leader stuff was window dressing. And funny.
It wasn’t a no-knock warrant-- the knocking was mentioned in the story.
Some details in the story-- such as they kept the computer “for forensics” and returned it after a year, strike me as particularly convincing.
I think there’s a narrative where this makes sense:
Theft at school. Finger of blame gets pointed to this kid. Policeman confronts kid, who doesn’t own up (because innocent) and given his future activist status, gives policeman some attitude. Policeman threatens to escalate unless kid comes clean, and kid does not. Policeman decides to teach kid a lesson, gets warrant. Ridiculously militarized police serving of warrant, more or less as described. Afterwards, kid’s (well-off, one a lawyer) parents try to intervene, which hardens police response further.
Sorry, i thought he said the guys in miliary equipment busted in and held them at gunpoint.
A police officer can’t just “get a warrant”.
He’d have to go to a judge, and explain what crime had occurred and what he expected to get out of a search.
No reasonable judge would give a search warrant to a cop (who works on patrol at a school) over a calculator. Everyone understands that just wouldn’t happen, right? No rational judge gives you a search warrant because you want to “teach a kid a lesson”.
If it happened, that would indicate an absurd abandonment of judicial norms. Which could potentially happen, in our messed up system.
But his mom is a lawyer. She would have destroyed that police department and the judge if they had issued a search warrant and tossed her house over a freaking calculator.
School cop goes to a judge and describes the growing problem of small-electronics theft at School A. He lays out his suspicions and circumstantial evidence that this one kid might be behind a lot of the theft, even if they only have direct evidence for the one item. Give him a search warrant for that one item, and he’s sure they’ll turn up a LOT of other stuff and scare the rest of the (unknown number of) kids involved into going straight. Judge agrees.
I find that very hard to believe.
And i find it even harder to believe that his mom wouldn’t have gutted them in court afterwards.
Most people find this stuff to believe because they still don’t believe that police systems can just be corrupt over stupid shit. In order to still not believe that you have to ignore the literal bodies of unarmed people, the video recording of officers planting drugs, the bodycams mysteriously going off on all officers involved at the same time, the social media accounts of really messed up individuals paid to carry guns and service the public while talking about wanting to shoot people, hoping to.
There are really messed up individuals serving in the police force. We know that. It’s a fact. The only reason not to believe this person is to pretend that above doesn’t happen… and we know it does. We have proof it does, but requiring recorded evidence of these things happening or else it’s a like… that’s how we got here today. For everyone person we have a recording of wrong-doing there are hundreds, hundreds who are not afforded that protection
The only thing that is hard to believe about this story is why the knee-jerk rejection remains that it can’t happen.
I think I remember him. He had an issue because he wanted to carry guns wherever he goes and ran into an issue speaking at one of the schools because of it… think that was him.
I’m not seeing what’s so unbelievable about his story, when compared to things that have been proven to have happened. For example, rank these stories in order of likelihood:
a) Schoolkid is harassed by school cop, etc, as above.
b) Police roll up on 12yo kid sitting at park gazebo, based on 911 call about a likely fake gun, immediately shoot him dead.
c) Police respond to call about man pointing BB gun at customers, show up, immediately shoot 22yo man dead. Man was simply shopping, holding a BB gun, and talking on his cell phone at the store.