Police presents at upcoming D2 Football Games?

[Wildcat Khan]

The world isn't black and white. It doesn't have to be either-or.

Minneapolis is a violent city. They need police, and the vast, vast majority of residents agree. That being said, they also want more accountability for these unjust actions such as what happened to George Floyd, and they want new measures in place to prevent similar situations from happening again. Both totally reasonable assessments.

Nicollet Mall almost burned last night. The police did a wonderful job preventing that from happening. Not only were they totally justified in what they did, the suspect took his own life (and they even tried reviving him at the scene). Morons used it as an excuse to try and start another riot. There will be no large scale rioting or protesting tonight, because reasonable people saw the video - they know what happened. Without them there, it would have been absolute chaos.

Here's the thing - not all mental health calls are for violent individuals. Not all people experiencing mental health issues are carrying weapons or are even capable of violence. Some mental health situations are escalated by the police being there. What can we do to prevent these situations from getting to the point of justified lethal force? That's what we want to solve. There's this idea that every mental health situation involves some dude running around town with no clothes on and a gun, and while that does happen - that's simply not the case for everyone. Sometimes people call the authorities on themselves because they are having a crisis - imagine calling the police to help you, and then end up getting shot by them? That's what we don't want.

We also don't want those people who do have guns running around and shooting other innocent people. That's when we want a justified use of force to be used.

Sorry for getting heated, it's got nothing to do with you personally.

I can agree with what you said there. Not all police are corrupt, not all police are good. It is just like any part of society, there are good and bad. I also want to say not all protesters are violent rioters, but the violent riots need to be stopped. The reason for stopping them shows up nicely in your post, the destruction of property that isn't police related and effects others lives such as destroying stores like that mall and the AutoZone.

[SW_Mustang]

I dealt with a lot people with diagnosed mental condition. Just an observation on my part, the vast majority of those have been treated and prescribed a medication, and then became "non-compliant" (Doctor word for off their medications). The meds have been provided to them for free, but they have chosen not to take them. My last call for service was an individual who was stark naked waving a gun around terrorizing a lady inside the house saying that she was his girlfriend and he just wanted to talk to her to fix things up. I was able to talk him down but I got to tell you, when he pointed the gun at me and my partner, I pulled slack out of my trigger at least three times. Total encounter was less than 3 minutes...no way a social worker would have had time to arrive. And my experience on my final night of work is not unique or isolated. To be quite frank, I'm surprised that there are so few police involved shootings.

Police are asked to "fix" so many problems with society and the government that other much more "educated" and well paid people have been unable to do. Then they get spit on (literally), physically attacked , killed and "defunded" when one member of the approximately 1,000,000 officers across the country makes a tragic mistake.

That sounds like a horrible situation to deal with - especially on your last call.

I don't think anyone (in the thread at least) is arguing that police officers shouldn't have the right to defend themselves in those situations. You were looking out for yourself, your partner, and the other person in the home - which is very respectable. And yes - those situations do happen a lot too, and I get that. Having MHP's on staff at the local PD is not intended to tie the hands of officers behind their back. "I can't protect you because my social worker isn't here" is not what we're going for. It's a resource for officers to use to hopefully prevent certain situations from escalating. It's intended to make everyone's life easier - not harder.

That being said - while what you experienced is not uncommon, there are many situations in which the police are called to deal with non-violent people. It's not uncommon for people to call the police on themselves for help - maybe they are struggling with the idea of suicide, maybe they are just scared. It's the quickest way to get help. It's happened where the people who call the police for help, with no intention of hurting anyone, are shot in their own homes by the people sent to help. A lot of this can be avoided with training or with MHP's on staff. This is what we want to prevent.

Pills can be a powerful tool to help treat mental issues - but they are not the quick cure that we're told they are. As there's no blood test for depression or schizophrenia, people are often misdiagnosed a few times before finding what's correct. Taking pills for a condition you don't have is a very dangerous thing. Then there's also the side effects, which are sometimes harder to deal with than the actual issue itself. Some people do refuse to take them out of pure disobedience, but some people stop taking them because it limits their ability to function. Some feel they don't need the pills anymore and quit cold turkey. Sometimes the pills simply don't help, and sometimes people are afraid of becoming addicted.

I'm not discounting your experience, but I'm providing you with some of my own to share some perspective. It takes a lot more than a bottle of pills to properly fight a mental health issue, just like any physical ailment would. You can't cure a broken bone with a bottle of Tylenol. Honestly, the real tragedy sometimes is how the mental health system continually fails certain people.

[SW_Mustang]

More funding is needed upstream, not continuing to spend resources to bandaid the crisis but on fixing the crisis. More police, more LaW aNd OrDeR etc is not the solution. It's the only tool those who can't problem solve seem to have in their toolbelt. A hammer for every job, regardless of what the issue is.

"People shouldn't commit crime" is one I hear a lot. While that's absolutely a true statement - it's also a reality that's only going to exist in the clouds. People are going to commit crime, and often times it's in response to some societal issue (but certainly not always). Sometimes it's peoples' only means for survival. They're good caring people fighting for their life. It happens, a lot.

Treating those societal issues would hypothetically reduce (but not eliminate) the crime rate. I don't have the answers for what that is, but it's a component that "Defund the Police" originally tried to argue for before their message got hijacked and spun into radical nonsense. Do they have the best way of going about it? Probably not, but it's a more effective strategy than telling people to just not commit crimes.

Someone out there thought they could fix homelessness by telling homeless people to simply buy a house - and they didn't get very far.

[boatcapt]

That sounds like a horrible situation to deal with - especially on your last call.

I don't think anyone (in the thread at least) is arguing that police officers shouldn't have the right to defend themselves in those situations. You were looking out for yourself, your partner, and the other person in the home - which is very respectable. And yes - those situations do happen a lot too, and I get that. Having MHP's on staff at the local PD is not intended to tie the hands of officers behind their back. "I can't protect you because my social worker isn't here" is not what we're going for. It's a resource for officers to use to hopefully prevent certain situations from escalating. It's intended to make everyone's life easier - not harder.

That being said - while what you experienced is not uncommon, there are many situations in which the police are called to deal with non-violent people. It's not uncommon for people to call the police on themselves for help - maybe they are struggling with the idea of suicide, maybe they are just scared. It's the quickest way to get help. It's happened where the people who call the police for help, with no intention of hurting anyone, are shot in their own homes by the people sent to help. A lot of this can be avoided with training or with MHP's on staff. This is what we want to prevent.

Pills can be a powerful tool to help treat mental issues - but they are not the quick cure that we're told they are. As there's no blood test for depression or schizophrenia, people are often misdiagnosed a few times before finding what's correct. Taking pills for a condition you don't have is a very dangerous thing. Then there's also the side effects, which are sometimes harder to deal with than the actual issue itself. Some people do refuse to take them out of pure disobedience, but some people stop taking them because it limits their ability to function. Some feel they don't need the pills anymore and quit cold turkey. Sometimes the pills simply don't help, and sometimes people are afraid of becoming addicted.

I'm not discounting your experience, but I'm providing you with some of my own to share some perspective. It takes a lot more than a bottle of pills to properly fight a mental health issue, just like any physical ailment would. You can't cure a broken bone with a bottle of Tylenol. Honestly, the real tragedy sometimes is how the mental health system continually fails certain people.

Seens like everyone I had to deal with that was off their meds said that...I don't feel "right" when I'm on them. Typically these people were engaged in things like directing traffic on busy interstates or standing naked in their front yard at 2 AM threatening to kill the mayor because he's shooting microwaves into the heads of everyone. People left to deal with this are the police.

One of the major ways that people enter or reenter the public mental health process is via a police initiated psych hold. In FL its called Baker Act but every state has a similar thing. If the police engage with a person and the officer believes he presents a threat to himself or others, he can have them placer on a 72 Hr hold for a psych evaluation during which the doctor determins weather he has a history of psych treatment and medication and/or if he needs to held for further treatment.

Mental illness is complex and treatments dont always work. But it seems the person who most often has to deal with the outcome of a failed treatment plan is a police officer. And far too often, there is some sort of violence involved against a third party.

Sadly, the police have become the nation's father. Just as mothers used to say to unruly children, just wait till your father gets home. Dad would get home from work and meat out punishment and fix things. The police are responsible for telling people no and people now days don't like being told no to ANYTHING!

[SW_Mustang]

Seens like everyone I had to deal with that was off their meds said that...I don't feel "right" when I'm on them. Typically these people were engaged in things like directing traffic on busy interstates or standing naked in their front yard at 2 AM threatening to kill the mayor because he's shooting microwaves into the heads of everyone. People left to deal with this are the police.

One of the major ways that people enter or reenter the public mental health process is via a police initiated psych hold. In FL its called Baker Act but every state has a similar thing. If the police engage with a person and the officer believes he presents a threat to himself or others, he can have them placer on a 72 Hr hold for a psych evaluation during which the doctor determins weather he has a history of psych treatment and medication and/or if he needs to held for further treatment.

Mental illness is complex and treatments dont always work. But it seems the person who most often has to deal with the outcome of a failed treatment plan is a police officer. And far too often, there is some sort of violence involved against a third party.

Sadly, the police have become the nation's father. Just as mothers used to say to unruly children, just wait till your father gets home. Dad would get home from work and meat out punishment and fix things. The police are responsible for telling people no and people now days don't like being told no to ANYTHING!

No doubt. Adding in some extra resources wouldn't solve the problem entirely, but it would hopefully deescalate some situations.

I'm not a cop but I do have some experience with the mental health system in this country. It fails a lot of people, all the time. If everyone it failed were crazy like your example, the world would burn pretty quickly. Only a small minority of people who struggle with mental issues will dance naked in their neighbor's front lawn - which is important to remember. Some folks struggling with intense depression and anxiety reach out to police for that 72 hour hold, and are sometimes unjustly shot upon arrival. They are not waving a gun around in someone's face, the officer just didn't know how to handle the tense situation.

Nobody in history has wanted to be told "no." I'm sure it's gotten worse with the internet age, but that's one aspect of people that's existed since fish crawled out of the ocean.

At the end of the day, my belief is this - police officers are representatives of the government. The government should not have the power to kill it's citizens at will without a good reason. There are many police shootings which are justified, but there are many that are not. What can we do to decrease the amount of shootings that are not justified? Lawmakers have sat on their hands for far too long on this issue.

[boatcapt]

By an extreme margin, police don't just kill people for no reason and by a VAST margin,, most police shootings are warranted.. Also 99.99999% of police officers are unbiased and treat the people they protect fairly.

If a person presents a threat of inflicting severe bodily injury or death on either the officer or a member of society at large, deadly force is authorized. This can and sometime does include those running from the police. Couple of terms used in LE - Means, Motivation and Intent and Totality of the circumstances. Simple scenario to illustrate...officer rolls up un a scene and encounters a verbally agressive large muscular male. Individual is yelling f the police, im goung to kill them all and im going to start with you. Do you shoot or not? Clearly no. He is voicing his intent to kill you but he doesn't have the means (no weapon) and hasn't moved toward you. Now have him say the same things and put a knife in his hand...do u shoot? Still probably not even though he has the means (knife), motivation (highly agitated) and intent (his verbal statments). Depending on his distance from you, you're probably going to use pepper or taze him. Now he starts running at you. Is THIS a shoot situation? Now add some changes...the responding officer is a 110 lb female. Does the shoot/no shoot bar drop? Yes, it does. Same situation but the subject says I'm going in to my house right now and kill my wife and turns and runs toward the front door of a house. Do you shoot or hope he won't cary through? Talk about gambling with someone's life!!!

Now make that decision at 2 am and in about 2 seconds.

[SW_Mustang]

By an extreme margin, police don't just kill people for no reason. If a person presents a threat of inflicting severe bodily injury or death on either the officer or a member of society at large, deadly force is authorized. This can and sometime does include those running from the police. Couple of terms used in LE - Means, Motivation and Intent and Totality of the circumstances. Simple scenario to illustrate...officer rolls up un a scene and encounters a verbally agressive large muscular male. Individual is yelling f the police, im goung to kill them all and im going to start with you. Do you shoot or not? Clearly no. He is voicing his intent to kill you but he doesn't have the means (no weapon) and hasn't moved toward you. Now have him say the same things and put a knife in his hand...do u shoot? Still probably not even though he has the means (knife), motivation (highly agitated) and intent (his verbal statments). Depending on his distance from you, you're probably going to use pepper or taze him. Now he starts running at you. Is THIS a shoot situation? Now add some changes...the responding officer is a 110 lb female. Does the shoot/no shoot bar drop? Yes, it does. Same situation but the subject says I'm going in to my house right now and kill my wife and turns and runs toward the front door of a house. Do you shoot or hope he won't cary through? Talk about gambling with someone's life!!!

Now make that decision at 2 am and in about 2 seconds.

We certainly agree on the bolded. Cops don't go around shooting random people in the streets.

But how do we reduce those situations where it was not justifiable? That's what people want to solve.

[NWHoops]

By an extreme margin, police don't just kill people for no reason and by a VAST margin,, most police shootings are warranted.. Also 99.99999% of police officers are unbiased and treat the people they protect fairly.

If a person presents a threat of inflicting severe bodily injury or death on either the officer or a member of society at large, deadly force is authorized. This can and sometime does include those running from the police. Couple of terms used in LE - Means, Motivation and Intent and Totality of the circumstances. Simple scenario to illustrate...officer rolls up un a scene and encounters a verbally agressive large muscular male. Individual is yelling f the police, im goung to kill them all and im going to start with you. Do you shoot or not? Clearly no. He is voicing his intent to kill you but he doesn't have the means (no weapon) and hasn't moved toward you. Now have him say the same things and put a knife in his hand...do u shoot? Still probably not even though he has the means (knife), motivation (highly agitated) and intent (his verbal statments). Depending on his distance from you, you're probably going to use pepper or taze him. Now he starts running at you. Is THIS a shoot situation? Now add some changes...the responding officer is a 110 lb female. Does the shoot/no shoot bar drop? Yes, it does. Same situation but the subject says I'm going in to my house right now and kill my wife and turns and runs toward the front door of a house. Do you shoot or hope he won't cary through? Talk about gambling with someone's life!!!

Now make that decision at 2 am and in about 2 seconds.

Agree with all of this except the bolded. We ALL have bias, every one of us. It's what we do with that bias, understand that bias, and respond to that bias that determines whether or not it leads to discrimination. It's ok to see the differences we all have, but it's not ok to treat people better or worse based on those differences.

I think that is the concern right now- black man getting in his vehicle moving away from officers is shot 7 times in the back. White kid kills 3 people and is told what a great job he's doing and offered water by police. Charleston shooter is white and they take him alive and get him some Burger King before taking him in. Black man has counterfeit $20 and is killed by suffocation with a knee on his neck.

[Eagle74]

Yet another Police Officer was killed last night while trying to serve the peace.

He was killed by a man resisting arrest after committing a crime. The vast majority of people across America will never hear or know his name. No one in the NBA or any other professional sport will step up on a platform to denounce this tragic action, no matter how many times it happens. Last night a child lost his father, a wife lost her husband, and a mother lost her son, but to many, his life didn't matter. No protest, no boycotts, no riots, just another statistic.

This, like many just like it didn't have to happen. Early on, when I was a child, I was told over and over by my Mother that in the event I have an encounter with the police or law enforcement, simply comply with their request and never resist. I was told if I was ever pulled over in my car, roll down my window and place my hands on the steering wheel and never do anything stupid because that officer has no idea what I may be up to, if I'm armed or my motives, so again, simply comply and live to see another day.

So, if you really love your child or children, no matter the color of their skin, please instruct them to do the same. It's truly a game changer.

[boatcapt]

We certainly agree on the bolded. Cops don't go around shooting random people in the streets.

But how do we reduce those situations where it was not justifiable? That's what people want to solve.

We have a collection of experts on both sides that have have particular agendas and seemingly immediately will speak out about shooting with no more information than the color of the skin of the victim.

I think it starts by realizing that the number of unjustified shooting is very small by whatever metric you choose. I know at least in my slice of Law Enforcement, EVERY time an officer used any of his weapons weather it resulted in any injury or not, there is a thorough review of the officers actions (with statments from the officer and witnesses), agency policies, training and the officers past history of excessive force. And I note my agency was not unique in this review process.

[boatcapt]

Agree with all of this except the bolded. We ALL have bias, every one of us. It's what we do with that bias, understand that bias, and respond to that bias that determines whether or not it leads to discrimination. It's ok to see the differences we all have, but it's not ok to treat people better or worse based on those differences.

I think that is the concern right now- black man getting in his vehicle moving away from officers is shot 7 times in the back. White kid kills 3 people and is told what a great job he's doing and offered water by police. Charleston shooter is white and they take him alive and get him some Burger King before taking him in. Black man has counterfeit $20 and is killed by suffocation with a knee on his neck.

Yes, we all have bias (Even the NCAA selection committees!). But very few police officers act on those biases while they are working. Cant say it never happens but as with the number of police shootings of unarmed African Americans, the number is small.

I offer water to everyone I arrest and keep a pac of cigarettes to give one to arestees....I will also minimize what they have done. They are called conversation starters. Trying to develop a level of trust with the arestee to get him/her to talk. Heck, I've even told pedophiles that I didn't see anything wrong with what they did. THAT was hard given the fact that I just wanted to take them down a dirt road and shoot them in the back of the head.

[boatcapt]

Yet another Police Officer was killed last night while trying to serve the peace.

He was killed by a man resisting arrest after committing a crime. The vast majority of people across America will never hear or know his name. No one in the NBA or any other professional sport will step up on a platform to denounce this tragic action, no matter how many times it happens. Last night a child lost his father, a wife lost her husband, and a mother lost her son, but to many, his life didn't matter. No protest, no boycotts, no riots, just another statistic.

This, like many just like it didn't have to happen. Early on, when I was a child, I was told over and over by my Mother that in the event I have an encounter with the police or law enforcement, simply comply with their request and never resist. I was told if I was ever pulled over in my car, roll down my window and place my hands on the steering wheel and never do anything stupid because that officer has no idea what I may be up to, if I'm armed or my motives, so again, simply comply and live to see another day.

So, if you really love your child or children, no matter the color of their skin, please instruct them to do the same. It's truly a game changer.

People, at least athletes, social media warriors and a large segment of what passes for the media now days doesn't care about a police officer dying. Heck, I say there is a significant group that thinks any police officer being killed is warranted.

I wonder how many posters in this little slice of the internet have gone to their Twitter account and said anything in favor of the police??

[SW_Mustang]

We have a collection of experts on both sides that have have particular agendas and seemingly immediately will speak out about shooting with no more information than the color of the skin of the victim.

I think it starts by realizing that the number of unjustified shooting is very small by whatever metric you choose. I know at least in my slice of Law Enforcement, EVERY time an officer used any of his weapons weather it resulted in any injury or not, there is a thorough review of the officers actions (with statments from the officer and witnesses), agency policies, training and the officers past history of excessive force. And I note my agency was not unique in this review process.

Again, we agree completely - lots of people on both sides are jumping to conclusions before the details come out. You are also probably right in the sense that the vast majority of shootings are probably justified.

Even if it's a low percentage of shootings that aren't justified, that still equates to a lot of people - and we can be doing work to make things better.

[SW_Mustang]

I can agree with what you said there. Not all police are corrupt, not all police are good. It is just like any part of society, there are good and bad. I also want to say not all protesters are violent rioters, but the violent riots need to be stopped. The reason for stopping them shows up nicely in your post, the destruction of property that isn't police related and effects others lives such as destroying stores like that mall and the AutoZone.

Absolutely, total agreement there.

I maintain the position however that most of the rioting is either caused by political radicals or by people just trying to loot and are using the commotion as an excuse to cause damage. Do some of the protesters get mixed up in it? Absolutely - but most of them went home. Many of them gathered past the curfew as an act of civil disobedience. Most of them were zip-tied without any incident. Actually - some footage showed the protestors and the police having jovial conversations. They understood what they did was illegal and they'd be arrested and the police were doing their jobs, the officers understood they were non-violent, compliant, and were upset about societal issues. I suppose if you're gonna break the law, that's the proper way to do it. Nobody got hurt, no damage was caused.

What the media didn't show, conveniently, was all the protests in outstate Minnesota that were incredibly peaceful. We had one in our town, no violence. Fox News doesn't rake in ad revenue by showing that off, though - they need to divide people and sell their narrative to paint the BLM activists as violent, and neither does CNN for that matter. The only incident I recall off the top of my head outside of the Twin Cities was a small group of kids tried breaking into the Mankato Target. The police quickly apprehended them and they didn't get past the first set of doors. I believe some at the scene were trying to stop them, and some were obviously there to document it.

The Minneapolis riots were really kicked off when a guy wielding a hammer and umbrella calmly broke the windows of the AutoZone near the precinct. It was caught on film. What was also caught on film were a group of protesters yelling and screaming at him to stop - again, not shown by national media. He was dubbed "Umbrella Man" and after an MPD investigation, was found to be a white supremacist trying to incite violence. He succeeded. I never bought into the conspiracy theory that he was an agent provocateur from the St. Paul PD, turns out he was a right wing radical that got the left wing radicals to tear down the city.

[NWHoops]

Yes, we all have bias (Even the NCAA selection committees!). But very few police officers act on those biases while they are working. Cant say it never happens but as with the number of police shootings of unarmed African Americans, the number is small.

I offer water to everyone I arrest and keep a pac of cigarettes to give one to arestees....I will also minimize what they have done. They are called conversation starters. Trying to develop a level of trust with the arestee to get him/her to talk. Heck, I've even told pedophiles that I didn't see anything wrong with what they did. THAT was hard given the fact that I just wanted to take them down a dirt road and shoot them in the back of the head.

Completely understand. I know many officers who are fabulous people and great at their job. I also know many who were a$$holes before becoming officers and use it as a power trip. I have good friends who are officers. Believe me, I know it's a small minority who are not doing the right things.

Unfortunately, when other professions act on their bias it results in poor customer service, rejection of applicants for jobs/loans, etc. Police are one of the few where acting immediately on those can result in death. Getting that as close to 0 as possible should be a priority.