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gigag04 wrote:I think this is a loose-loose scenario for LE. Do what it takes to catch a bad guy, and run the risk of crossing the line.

Let him go, and you'll get accused of being lazy, corrupt, or incapable.

I think they missed it here, but I'm definitely not claiming to have the answer, especially in the heat of the moment.

Hopefully it's a learning point for all involved and a better, more thought out response can be called upon in the future.

Thanks for the response. This is the type of response I was hoping for from you. I agree that it is a lose/lose situation for the individual officer for the reasons you've stated. But that said, I think that these are the types of events that must force any conscientious agency to self-examine—not to see how far they can push and still be within some strained near to breaking definition of the law, but rather to see if they are still in compliance with the fundamental tenets of the Constitution which they take an oath to uphold. The former makes their jobs easier because their standards are lowered.....with the corollary that their convictions go down and the municipalities pay out more in damages. The latter makes them more effective. I say "effective" because the latter is what inspires trust within and cooperation from the communities in which they work. That increased trust and cooperation will ultimately lead to more arrests of criminals, and more charges that stick, and ultimately to reduced crime and to safer streets. Those are the yardstick by which a police agency's success is measured.

Charles L. Cotton wrote:This is absurd and the Chief's defense of the officers is both shocking and troubling. The FBI should be conducting a civil rights investigation and they can start with the guy who was wearing an FBI jacket.

There is a point at which the cost of "catching the bad guy" and/or solving a crime is too high; this action was way beyond that point.

Chas.

You're right....there he is, and I didn't even notice him the first time I watched the video:

pbwalker wrote:Surely those who are pro-DUI checkpoints are pro-this incident? Stop everyone, prove innocence before you can pass. Both are for "public safety"...think of the children, right?

I'm not in favor of those check points. I am in favor of police stopping a vehicle when they observe the driver to be driving in a manner which might indicate that the driver is impaired by drugs or alcohol. I don't think that we have a "right" to drive in an impaired condition, on the two principles that A) impaired drivers unquestionably produce higher accident statistics than sober drivers, and B) your right to drive impaired stops where my right to expect minimum standards of safety on the roads begins. But neither do I believe that police have the moral authority to randomly stop vehicles on the odd chance that one of them might contain an impaired driver.

This situation is different though, and in a sense, your objection is a small bit of a red herring. The reason I say that is that your objection above is to a scenario in which there is only a random expectation of catching a random person in the act of breaking the law, whereas the story in the OP concerns the search for a specific person whom they knew he had already committed a specific crime. They just didn't know who he was. Not a huge difference, but different none the less. Again, I don't like what the Aurora PD did and I'm not defending it.

BUT..... in all fairness to the PD, we're hearing detailed descriptions for those who got rousted, and very little substance from those who did the rousting, and all of this is seen through the lens of media who have their own agenda at play. I would like very much to know the true details of the tip, why it was deemed "reliable," the tipster's identity, and why the tipster's information would have been reliable. Only the police can provide those details. When/if they do, those details must be unassailable—otherwise the least desirable interpretation is the truth. I would question their methods even if the tip was unassailable, but if it is anything less than that, then the only interpretation of the events is that the Aurora PD has gone rogue. I'd hate to think that was the case.

VMI77 wrote:Some of your analysis depends on the assumption that there was an anonymous tip. Given the history of "anonymous tips" I think there is good reason to doubt there was any such tip in the first place. But even if there was, the "anonymous tip" is easily abused. The police have been known to have a fellow officer phone in an anonymous tip, but really, all someone has to do is say they got one from a passerby on the street. I think the issue comes back to probably cause, and the fact that they had no description of either the perp or the vehicle and had to stop and detail some 19 vehicles proves they didn't have it.

Quoting the article:

Police said they had received what they called a “reliable” tip that the culprit in an armed robbery at a Wells Fargo bank committed earlier was stopped at the red light.

“We didn’t have a description, didn’t know race or gender or anything, so a split-second decision was made to stop all the cars at that intersection, and search for the armed robber,” Aurora police Officer Frank Fania told ABC News.
Officers barricaded the area, halting 19 cars.

I did not use the word "anonymous." I based my analysis on the wording used in the article, which was "reliable." By definition, a "reliable" tipster would not be "anonymous," unless that tipster was able to reveal knowledge of the crime known only to police. That alone would make the tipster "a person of interest".....or it should. That allegedly "reliable" tip did not include a description of the vehicle or its occupant, including his/her race and gender. I question the reliability of the source. The cops should have questioned that reliability too. Instead, they detained and handcuffed the occupants of 19 vehicles based on thin evidence. To me, it sounds like I could phone in a "reliable" tip to the Aurora PD, stating that "there's a man with a gun at the intersection of Main and Elm," and they'd go down there and cuff and search everyone looking for a gun. And, since Colorado issues concealed carry permits, there's even the likelihood of someone there actually having a gun....who has it quite legitimately.

I think the Aurora PD bandies about the term "reliable" without regard for its actual meaning. I think that the citizens of Aurora have a problem with their police department that needs to be addressed before it festers into an un-policeable situation. I think the Aurora PD Chief needs to go before the media, acknowledge the unreliability of the tip, and announce that they are reviewing their procedures to ensure that this never happens again. I think that his/her superiors in the city's administration should either respond in a way to deal with the problem, or they should be held politically accountable in the next election.

When I say that I understand the "tactical necessity," that does not mean that I approve of that necessity within the larger context of society. It merely means that I understand the internal logic of that decision....the same way your could read "Mein Kampf" and understand Adolf Hitler's internal logic without validating his conclusions. In other words, that internal logic may be illogical in the larger context. The "tactical necessity" of handcuffing and detaining 19 carloads of people while searching their vehicles for no other reason than they happened to be at a location where a demonstrably UNreliable tipster said a bank robber could be found is damaging in the larger context to the strategic goals of providing good community policing—which increases trust and cooperation between police and the community in which they work.

Here's what I think actually happened: one or more police officers thought that they might find the bank robber they were looking for at a certain intersection because he had left headed in a certain direction, and he could have only gone so far. Those officers convinced the rest of the officers of that probability. They picked the likely intersection and they acted. Afterwards, seeking to justify what they had done, they claimed that a "reliable" tip told them where to find the guy, but they also admitted that this "reliable" tip did not include any information whatsoever about model/make/color of the vehicle in question, and/or any description of the perp including his/her race and gender.

There was no tip.

I know what my own thoughts on the matter are, but I would be particularly interested in gigag04's and any other currently active LEO's opinions on this kind of thing. On one hand, I completely understand why the police in this story did what they did. That does not mean I agree with it, but I do understand it. I agree that it is troubling, not just for what actually happened, but eveen more importantly because of the precedent it sets. It IS a slippery slope. I can easily see such tactics being used in other situations going forward because this police department got away with it in this situation. "Detain everybody and sort them all out later" could easily become the law of the land.

It's one thing to detain everybody in one car, pending identifying which one of them is the wanted person. It is another thing entirely to detain every person at a busy intersection (19 carloads, if I remember correctly) to find the one. There ought to be some kind of minimum threshhold of detail provided in a tip which must be attained in order to act on it. That threshhold should include a physical description of the wanted person, and at least a general description of the car ("it was a blue compact"). If not, then the automatic extension of what happened in this story is when police get a phone call saying that a bank robber of unknown description is hiding in a house of unknown description located near the intersection of Main and Elm streets. Well, that description would include every person in every home extending a block down Main in both directions and a block down Elm in both directions. It could amount to several hundred people, depending on the neighborhood. So in this case, the police knock on each door, announce that they are looking for a bankrobber, ask for permission to enter and search the home, but handcuff everyone in the home........all without a warrant.

It really doesn't matter if the residents cooperate and agree to be handcuffed. What if they said "no," and refused to submit to being cuffed? Are they criminals for "impeding" an investigation, or are they citizens standing up for their rights? OR.......do we no longer have any rights? Just how much or how little credibility does an informant have to have before his/her tips result in a general detention of everyone in the area? In their zeal, did the police department in question help or hurt community relations? Was the trade off in loss of community good will worth the apprehension of the suspect? And finally, where does it all stop?

When I ask for LEO opinions, it is not in the spirit of "J'accuse!" I genuinely would like to know how police departments balance the mission of capturing an armed and dangerous felon with the need to be respectful of the rights of those whose taxes pay their salaries; and to what extent they train their officers to have that respect for individual rights while still performing the mission.

I am pretty sure that none of the founders would have submitted to being cuffed and detained in a general search of the population, either in their carriages or in their homes. One could say, "well everybody knows Ben Franklin....of course we're not going to assume that he's the robber." But Ben Franklin would be one of the first to remind the officers that citizens have rights and to mind that they (the officers) don't behave like the redcoats. WHAT IF the Mayor of Aurora Colorado had been in one of those vehicles? Would they have cuffed and detained him during that search? The probable answer is "no," they would not have. But if not, why not? Does the mayor have rights not available to "mere" citizens? In a day and age when mayors have been known to traffic in crack cocaine and accept huge bribes for favors rendered, how can anyone claim that a mayor is any less likely to be an armed felon than any other citizen?

As I said at the top, I completely understand the tactical necessities with which the police in Aurora thought they were dealing, but how far can "tactical necessity" be pushed before police have crossed a line from "law enforcement" to "law-breaking," and what exactly IS the common LEO's view of the rights of the citizenry? Are they viewed as an impediment to getting the job done, or are they viewed as something sacrosant which must be honored in the breach, even when it makes their job more difficult?

This is a critical question because there is absolutely no doubt that an orderly society needs an effective police force, but the effectiveness of a police force is directly correlational to the relationship it has with the community in which it operates. If the police are viewed as a beneficial presence in the community, then they will have the cooperation of that community and their job will be easier. If the police are viewed as armed invaders imposing an unwanted authority on the community, then their job will be much harder. The latter scenario is the one which produces a higher body count on both sides. Worse yet, once that threshhold from beneficial presence to unwanted authority has been crossed, the community trust which is absolutely essential to effective policing has also been broken. The blame for this can be accrued to both sides. Corrupted culture can be as much to blame as overarching authoritariansim, but the poisonous effects of culture can rarely be changed. Police departments, on the other hand, ought to know better. They DO know better. The only variable is how much importance top level managment places on being mindful of whom they serve—the citizenry, or the political structure in place. In any case, such scenarios are often beyond redemption once attained, which is exactly why this is a slippery slope issue.