zlacker

>>mnm1+(OP)
I'm curious - it's obvious what abuses of qualified immunity are driving this, but the law must have been originally put in place for a reason. Are there any examples where a police officer was shielded from prosecution for something that, if you or I did it would definitely be a crime, but that a reasonable person would say, "yes, this is a good application of qualified immunity"?

>>comman+9m
Lets say you want to build a deck. You put together the plans, take them to the planning commission, and they rightfully reject it for being structually unsound.

Qualified immunity is what prevents you from personally suing each member of the planning commission to pressure them in to reversing their decision. Think of it like the legal system throwing an exception, we aren't even going to consider this because your beef is with the city not an individual employee.

Police have qualified immunity because otherwise they would face personal lawsuits every time they wrote a rich guy a speeding ticket, or a convicted murderer has nothing better to do but get his law degree in prison.

In my opinion, qualified immunity is _not_ the problem. If an officer does something in their official capacity that is wrong, it is up to the department and the DA to deal with. Just like if the hypothetical planning commission did something illegal. Unfortunately police unions prevent that from being a viable option.

>>dsl+Hq
> Unfortunately police unions prevent that from being a viable option.

Exactly: this should really be in the realm of criminal prosecution, not civil suits, in which case the positives of qualified immunity could remain in place. But we have such a toxic, broken, in-group culture in our police force that we cannot rely on self-directed justice to happen. So I think we have no other option but to open the floodgates on civil suits.

>>_bxg1+Zs
Most other countries have a police-police, whose only job is to prosecute misbehaviours of the police.

Anyone can make a complaint to them, and they will investigate, and if they believe the law has been broken, can prosecute individuals (in a regular court) or fine police departments as they see fit.

>>london+pD
Sounds great. In the U.S. I wouldn't be surprised to see such a group develop a shared identity with the regular police and become corrupt, but maybe it's worth a try.

>>_bxg1+GG
The thing we already have is worth a try?

Every police department with more than a couple officers has an official structure for reporting abuse to leadership (either police leadership, or civilian leadership). State agencies and police forces absolutely have jurisdiction to investigate local departments, and the FBI and DOJ can investigate anyone they want.

>>pc86+2i1
By having a team of people whose only job is to investigate the police, they look bad if they don't uncover issues like this.

I suspect the mistake in the US is that all the people who could punish the police are 'too busy' with other things. Make a dedicated team who has nothing else to do, and suddenly they'll be snooping around like journalists looking for dirt so they can make a conviction and get a promotion.

>>london+Jj1
Exactly this.

FBI doesn't want to investigate LAPD. They need LAPD, down the line, when there's some case for which they'll need cooperation.

What's needed is a Federal policing agency tasked with investigating and prosecuting police misconduct. That's the whole remit; police misconduct is their alcohol, tobacco, and firearms.