AWOL Sellers AWOL Some More
Here’s a news bit from our pal Lou Ponsi about Sort-of-Former Police Chief Sellers requesting another 30 day add-on to his medical leave – the one that started the night angry residents bombarded him with abuse for his dereliction in the Kelly Thomas killing.
It makes you wonder what the Three Dithering Diplosaurs think, given the fact that they’ve been taking (well-deserved) abuse in the months following Seller’s two hour ordeal and hasty retreat.
Anyway, it just goes to show how coddled out supposed “heroes” truly are. Here’s an assclown making over $200K a year, more than the Secreatry of Defense, and he wilts like an old lettuce leaf under a little pressure. And of course the taxpayers are stuck paying this zombie almost twenty grand a month to sit on the beach. Great system, huh?
I heard this is just a delay tactic to get 1% more for retirement. Then in 60 more days he will say thanks but I don’t need the medical retirement I’ll just take my 95% normal retirement and catch ya on the backside. Maybe he’s just f’ing with everyone like the 3 mice? Or pigs? Oink? 🙂
Tax free retirement after one year of medical leave!!!!!
what happened with that independant med eval he was supposed to get?
What about his contract that requires he’ll move to Fullerton?
Why is he allowed to collect his big bucks in San Clemente?
Seriously—send a few sign-bearing concerned citizens to stand outside his guarded gate San Clemente complex!
Why should San Clemente benefit from all his purchasing power? Fullerton isn’t good enough for him?
READ THE CONTRACT!!!
Because someone here clarified that the contract doesn’t require that he live in Fullerton, just that he try. Nice contract LOL.
Because the people of Fullerton didn’t give a damn, or didn’t know what the hell was going on within their city government, until Kelly Thomas was murdered. THAT blew the lid off the pot!
Sorry , but they still won’t know what’s going on because the Council will continue to be told that all personel issues are confidential. Heros have special rights you know.
Bingo. 🙂
What a way to end a career as a coward and in shame. I guess he has his price. So sad. What a legacy to leave his family.
Do you really think his family thinks any different of him now or during his career the last 35 plus years? Really? They are probably proud of him for retiring now instead of dying quicker. Life expectancy for cops is 5 years after retirement so now they might get 7 because he left before all this drama. If you really think his family thinks he’s a coward, again that shows you aren’t real clear on reality. 🙂
Oh, he’s a coward, and that die 5 years after retirement is just a lie perpetrated by your union.
Who cares what his family thinks of him?
Nope. Check PERS. they will tell ya the years benefits are paid to the retiree and the years paid to the spouse. You will be surprised. Facts hurt sometimes huh? 🙂
So you’re saying the average cop-death is age 55? Hahahaha! Even stooge like you can’t buy that horseshit!
http://www.newgeography.com/content/001145-police-pensions-and-voodoo-actuarials
Police warn residents about high-risk sexual offender in their area
Fullerton Police today (Dec. 7) are making a neighborhood notification in south Fullerton of a full-disclosure sex registrant living in the area.
Officers and detectives are posting and handing out flyers to warn neighbors about a man living at 1325 S. Jefferson in Fullerton.
Fullerton Police Sgt. Andrew Goodrich said that Antoine Denell Jordan, 50, has been living at the house on Jefferson for some time. Police were made aware of his presence last month when Jordan reported to Fullerton PD to register as a sex offender, something he is required to do for the rest of his life. Since then, police have been conducting a background investigation on Jordan, meeting with him face-to-face, and have had him under surveillance.
Jordan was arrested and convicted in the early 1980s of kidnapping and sexually assaulting multiple women at knife-point in the area of USC in Los Angeles. He served his time in prison, and was released in 2005. He is no longer on parole, but is subject to registering at the police department in any jurisdiction where he lives.
Police are posting flyers, and handing them out to neighbors in a roughly quarter-mile radius around Jordan’s home. Fullerton Police Acting Chief Kevin Hamilton said, “In the interest of public safety, we are notifying our residents about this full-disclosure sex offender.”
http://www.ci.fullerton.ca.us/news/displaynews.asp?NewsID=1208
What Hamilton SHOULD have said in the press release is: “to cover our asses in the event a poor woman gets raped at knife point in Fullerton and the press finds out, we are notifying our residents about this full-disclosure sex offender.”
Too bad Hamilton never handed out fliers alerting Fullerton women that Albert Rincon was on the loose.
Hey! That sounds like a great post!
Go for it!
go TFH… sounds like a hit
He’s not considered a “sex offender” (but he should be) Hey, why isnt he?
Is Rincon back on the force?
I’ve gotta say, what a friggin RACKET the city has going on with Sellers. We taxpayers are footing the bill on probably a BS diagnosis!
It is odd. He is maxed out and can get his full retirement anytime he wants. I think he had a prior approved medical case and will get the 50% tax free based on that. He’s in the wind. I think he was on the way out before this all happened.
http://www.ci.fullerton.ca.us/depts/police/about_fullerton_police/chief_michael_sellers.asp
Your Hero.
Naaaaa. Just another Chief. You know Chiefs only last 2-3 years on average right? Just short term gigs. They get fired or not being pawns to the politicians in the city. Next guy comes in promising to be their Biatch, then they say F off and they are out the door too. A door that opens and closes often. 🙂
Oh and look, he teaches classes in ethics and leadership.
Yes a coward and a disgrace as he abandoned his post in one of fullertons darkest hours. That is pathetic. I have worked with people with terminal cancer who didn’t milk the system. They at least left this earth with their integrity.
Yeah, in my city there have been 6 or 7 police chiefs in the 28 years that I have lived here. They seem to just move on to another city. I have always wondered why.
There’s several reasons. The main one being politics. Another one is that the Chiefs job is at will. They basically don’t have cops rights anymore so they can be fired at anytime by a council or city manager win an ax to grind. For that reason, Chiefs are hesitant to take a Chief job unless they are over 50 and close to being maxed out on retirement. That way when they get fired they just transition right into their retirement. Chiefs that survive find that perfect blend of being a good politician and a good cop.
🙂
Sounds like one hell of a big headache!
Reality Is – I have wondered all along about the Kelly Thomas murder. I don’t know if you are a cop or not, but why would these guys want to beat Thomas so badly that he would eventually die? He was not a hardened ex-con posing a dangerous threat to the community. He did not have any weapons, nor did he violently resist. I will be honest in saying that if the person who was murdered by Fullerton P.D. was a child molester or violent killer, the department might be viewed in a much more positive light by citizens for eliminating a dangerous threat to public safety. I have two cops in my family and they both agree that the individuals indicted went way too far.
One,
Only those guys know why they kept going and going. I’m confident in saying that they didn’t go on shift that night with the intention of killing someone. I’m also confident that they didn’t intend to kill him even as the fight went on and on. I’ve been in many fights myself that got pretty ugly on both sides, resulting in injury, where people were fighting for their lives and even at that point I know myself and others were never trying to kill the person. Even when a guy was going for an officers gun and had it unhooked, and he was struck in the head (lethal force), the hope was to knock him out and not kill him.
So I don’t believe death was even a thought that night after it was all over. Death is an unfortunate, unexpected part of the job.
I agree with you though. It’s much easier seeing a hardcore gangster or child molester death than an innocent person. I see innocent people dead all the time. It’s no fun. But death is never planned and always unfortunate.
Yes, something went wrong in this incident. How far it went wrong will be shown at trial. I think that Kelly fought for his life and that’s why the strikes kept coming. It will be up to the jury to decide if that fight he gave back to the cops justified the force used or not. The jury will decide their fate and if they did wrong, they will be punished. I don’t think anyone will do any significant jail time even if found guilty, but that’s a fault in our system.
Funny how you draw conclusions without a single fact. So much for reality.
The behavior of Ramos, Wolfe and Cicinelli indicates a deliberate attack. Cicinelli in particular seems to have been intent on killing Thomas.
Those innocent dead people you see all the time were victims of accident or crimes committed by non-cops (I hope, but now I’m starting to wonder).
Aw, give Reality a break. Bad things happen to good cops. Like when their tasers are used to bash a guy’s head in.
“But death is never planned and always unfortunate. ”
Stating the obvious because he/she doesn’t really care that much. All in a day’s work.
Reality Is,
Thanks for bringing to light the reasons why C.O.P. is short term.
I hope you are typing up a response to One for the Books question.
What do you mean COP is short term? I only talked about Chiefs.
I just saw what he wrote. Missed it before.
I meant thanks for explaination why COP(Chief of Police) is a short term position.
You answered response to OFTB question above.
Copy. Makes sense. Yea COP short term job.
I’ll bite. Your responses are designed to induce angry retorts. Sellers exit style is embarrassing to all public safety officers, and unfortunately it is a “style” that has been gaining in popularity. So much so that 70% of Sheriffs exit on disability, a practice they feel is a “benefit.”
With salary data easily accessible online, the public is armed with fact, and not just wild speculation about public employee payroll. Sorry, but we all “get it” pal.
Yep. Fire is even worse. Until last year, firemen all claimed disability prior to retiring to get their 50% tax free. Big investigation in Vegas last year where for years they all called in sick multiple times each month to get overtime for the other fire mans. Now that most overtime is gone, that stuff has slowed down but the disability retirement part is still active. What Sellers did is normal. I’m sure many people actually are disabled at that age with all those years, but there has to be some that are a total scam too. Hard to tell.
Above c
omment intended for “Reality Is”
Publish a link to your claim.
I’ll look. I had one from a few years ago. Old news now. People are dying faster now, so I’m sure the life span is down too.
There are tons of articles, and tons of opinions. I’ve seen things from both sides. I’ll post one from a few years ago that covers both sides, and other myths too.
🙂 🙂
A key argument that public-safety officials use to justify their absurdly high pension benefits –- i.e., “3 percent at 50” retirements that allow them to retire with 90 percent or more of their final year’s pay as early as age 50 — is this: We die soon after retirement because of all the stresses and difficulties of our jobs. This is such a common urban legend that virtually every officer who contacts me mentions this “fact.” They never provide back-up evidence.
Here is one article I’ve been sent by police to make their point. It was written in 1999 by Thomas Aveni of the Police Policy Council, a police advocacy organization. Here is the key segment: “Turning our attention back towards the forgotten police shift worker, sleep deprivation must be considered a serious component of another potential killer: job stress. The cumulative effect of sleep deprivation upon the shift-working policeman appears to aggravate job stress, and/or his ability to cope with it.
“Even more troubling is the prospect that the synergy of job stress and chronic sleep indebtedness contributes mightily to a diminished life expectancy. In the U.S., non-police males have a life-expectancy of 73 years. Policemen in the U.S. have a life expectancy of 53-66 years, depending on which research one decides to embrace. In addition, police submit workman’s compensation claims six times higher than the rate of other employees …”
I don’t doubt that police work can be very stressful, but many jobs are stressful, many have long hours, many are more dangerous, many involve sleep deprivation. As intelligent adults, we all need to weigh the risk and benefits of any career choice. Aveni uses the high amount of workers compensation claims as evidence of the dangers of the job, but given the tendency of police and firefighters to abuse the disability system – miraculously discovering a disabling injury exactly a year from retirement, thus getting an extra year off and protecting half the pension from taxes – I’m not convinced this proves anything. Given the number of officers who are retired based on knee injuries, back aches, irritable bowel syndrome, acid reflux, etc., this suggests that police game the system and know their fellows on the retirement board will approve virtually any disability claim.
There are so many legal presumptions (if an officer develops various conditions or diseases it is legally presumed to be work related, whether or not it actually is work related) that bolster the scam. “Disabled” officers often go right out and get similar law enforcement jobs, which calls into question how disabling the injury really is. Regarding sleep deprivation, police and firefighters have secured schedules that minimize the long hours; then the officers often choose to work overtime for double salary, which perhaps is the real cause of sleep problems.
The big whopper in the Aveni article, however, is the claim that officers live to be 53-66. If that were so, there would be no unfunded liability problem because of pension benefits. Police officers would retire at 50-55, then live a few years at best.
But, for example, according to the state of California pubic employees’ retirement system (CalPERS) actuary, police actually live longer than average these days, which isn’t surprising given that the earlier people retire and the wealthier they are, the longer they tend to live. And according to a 2006 report to the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System, these are the age-60 life expectancies for the system’s workers (meaning how many years after 60 they will live):
— Police and fire males: 22.6
— General service males: 23.4
— Police and fire females: 25.7
— General service females: 25.7
So we see that police and firefighters who retire at age 60 live, on average, well into their 80s. That’s real data and not the hearsay used by apologists for enormous police pensions.
CalPERS actuary David Lamoureux sent me a CalPERS presentation called “Preparing for Tomorrow,” from the retirement fund’s 2008 educational forum. The presentation features various “pension myth busters.”
Here is Myth #4 (presented as part of a Power Point presentation): “Safety members do not live as long as miscellaneous members.” CalPERS officials explain that “rumor has it that safety members only live a few years after retirement.” Actuarial data answers the question: “Do they actually live for a shorter time?” The presentation considers the competing facts: “Safety members tend to have a more physically demanding job, this could lead to a shorter life expectancy. However, miscellaneous members sit at their desk and might be more at risk to accumulating table muscle!” Fire officials, by the way, make identical claims about dying as early as police officials.
For answers, CalPERS looked at an experience study conducted by its actuarial office in 2004. It looked at post-retirement mortality data for public safety officials and compared it to mortality rates for miscellaneous government workers covered by the CalPERS system.
Here are the CalPERS life expectancy data for miscellaneous members:
— If the current age is 55, the retiree is expected to live to be 81.4 if male, and 85 if female.
— If the current age is 60, the retiree is expected to live to be age 82 if male, and 85.5 if female.
— If the current age is 65, the retiree is expected to live to be age 82.9 if male, and 86.1 if female.
Here is the CalPERS life expectancy data for public safety members (police and fire, which are grouped together by the pension fund):
— If the current age is 55, the retiree is expected to live to be 81.4 if male, and 85 if female.
— If the current age is 60, the retiree is expected to live to be age 82 if male, and 85.5 if female.
— If the current age is 65, the retiree is expected to live to be age 82.9 if male, and 86.1 if female.
That’s no mistake. The numbers for public safety retirees are identical to those of other government workers. As CalPERS notes, average public safety officials retiree earlier than average miscellaneous members, so they receive their higher level of benefits for a much longer time.
Here is CalPERS again: “Verdict: Myth #4 Busted! Safety members do live as long as miscellaneous members.”
The next time you hear this “we die early” misinformation from a cop, firefighter or other public-safety union member (most of them probably believe it to be true, given how often they have read this in their union newsletters), send them to CalPERS for the truth!
I expected these numbers for the recently retired, given the pension enhancements and earlier retirement ages, but it seemed plausible that police in particular might have had a point about mortality rates in earlier days. But even that’s not true. A 1987 federal report from the National Criminal Justice Reference Center, “Police Officers Retirement: The Beginning of a Long Life,” makes the following point:
“’The average police officer dies within five years after retirement and reportedly has a life expectancy of twelve years less than that of other people.’ Still another author states, ‘police officers do not retire well.’ This fact is widely known within police departments. These statements (which are without supporting evidence) reflect a commonly held assumption among police officers.
“Yet, a search of the literature does not provide published studies in support. Two suggested sources, the Los Angeles City Police and Massachusetts State Police, have provided data which also appears to contradict these assumptions. Reported in this paper are results from a mortality study of retired Illinois State Police (ISP) officers. It suggests that ISP officers have as long, if not longer, life expectancy than the population as a whole. Similar results also arise when examining retirees from the Ohio Highway Patrol, Arizona Highway Patrol, and Kentucky State Police.”
The report also casts doubt on the commonly repeated statistic that police have higher rates of suicide and divorce than other people. The federal report found the divorce rates to be average and suicide rates to be below average. This is important information because it debunks a key rationale for the retirement expansions, although more recent data need to be examined on divorce/suicide rates.
Police have an oftentimes tough job, but many Americans have oftentimes tough and sometimes dangerous jobs. This needs to be kept in perspective. Public officials need to deal in reality rather than in emotionally laden fantasy when considering
Have you read that book by Greenhut, Plunder? It’s a one sided book on how the public pension system has ruined the world. Orange County write up, which in the end lost in the fight to change their system, but good reading if you want to blame the pension system on the collapse of the world.
This was a review written by someone on that other side too.
How’s your government treating you lately? I thought so. Unjust wars. Torture. Inflation. Wild spending. Record deficits. Record debt. Bankruptcy. Police brutality. Officious officials. Depression.
It’s time to get even. Or at least get an explanation.
That’s just what you get in Steven Greenhut’s shocking Plunder!: How Public Employee Unions Are Raiding Treasuries, Controlling Our Lives and Bankrupting the Nation. Although it covers government at all levels, it mainly focuses on state and local governments’ assaults on citizens’ pocketbooks and liberties.
Greenhut is familiar to LRC readers as the deputy editorial page editor and columnist for The Orange County Register from 1998 to 2009. He was my colleague there for eight of those years. He is the best journalist of local and state government in America, digging into the roots of corruption, largesse, and repression that have grown so alarmingly in recent years.
This fall he left The Register to head the new Investigative Journalism Center and News Bureau at the Pacific Research Institute in Sacramento.
You won’t find a better writer, so this is an easy read of 240 pages – plus some resources in back to continue the fight. But you’ll find yourself stopping every few pages to open a window, stick your head out, and scream, like Howard Beale in Network, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not taking this any more!”
Although the central (“federal”) government’s oppression is increasingly pervasive and poisonous, most of us still deal more often with local or state authorities. Most of us also have a favorable opinion of a great school teacher, a fireman who brought down a child’s cat from a tree, or a cop who helped change a flat tire on a car. And most of us have local government workers as our neighbors and friends. Government is so big now, it’s hard not to.
But in just the past three decades, government has far outstripped any rational limit on its size. As Greenhut reports, as recently as the 1970s (and I can confirm this from memory), government workers usually were paid a salary slightly less than private-sector counterparts. But they got great benefits, a decent pension, and sterling job security.
Since then, government pay and benefits have ballooned like Gov. Schwarzenegger when he used to inject himself with steroids. An example: The local firefighters’ union in Orange County “gets annoyed when anyone refers to” their average annual pay and compensation of $[…], Greenhut writes. “Officials there confirm its accuracy, but complain that it unfairly angers taxpayers because the number includes the cost to the county for every benefit that firefighters receive.”
Poor babies. Imagine buying a new car for $[…]. When you pull out your checkbook, the salesman says, “Actually, it’s $[…]. We have to ad in pension and other benefits for the auto workers.”
And though firefighting is an essential job, Greenhut notes that in most communities volunteer fire departments do the job.
*Dangerous jobs?*
But aren’t public safety jobs among the most dangerous in America? Not really. Here’s the list of most dangerous jobs, as complied by the Bureau of Labor Statistics:
1. Fishing-related workers.
2. Logging workers
3. Pilots and flight-related workers
4. Iron and steel workers
5. Taxi cab drivers
6. Construction workers
7. Farmers and ranchers
8. Roofers
9. Electrical power workers
10. Truck drivers and sales-related drivers
11. Garbage collectors
12. Law enforcement
Moreover, people going into these jobs know they might be dangerous. That’s their choice. An Alaska crab fisherman, whose fatality rate on the job is 90 times that of the average worker, knows he could drown. Yet he chooses to do the job anyway.
A widely quoted 1999 article by Thomas Aveni of the Police Policy Council claims that the job so stressful that police officers, on average, live to be only 53-66 years of age. “If that were so,” quips Greenhut, “there would be no unfunded liability problem because of pension benefits.”
In fact, policemen and firemen live about as long as everybody else. Greenhut quotes a study by the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System on the age-60 life expectancies for the system’s workers (the years they can expect to live after 60):
* Police and fire males: 22.6.
* General and service males: 23.4.
* Police and fire females: 25.7.
* General service females: 25.7.
*Pension tsunami*
These facts have not prevented the recent trend – caused by overwhelming union power over politicians – of pension spiking. Not just police and fire, but many other government retirees get “3 percent at 50.” Greenhut explains: “So if a police officer starts working at age 20, he can retire at 50 with 90 percent of his final salary until he dies, and then his spouse receives that for the rest of her life. The taxpayer typically makes the complete retirement contribution throughout the officer’s years of work.”
And pay is, indeed, generous. “If he earned a slightly above-average California police salary of $[…] a year (base, not counting overtime, which is not calculated in the retirement formula), he would receive $[…] a year until he dies.”
In his mid-50s, the retired officer commonly would take another job – often in government, with another tax-funded pension.
Taxpayers are on the hook for 100 percent of the pensions – no matter how bad the economy gets. And taxpayers are stuck paying for bad investments. The California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) stupidly invested heavily in the recent real estate boom.
Greenhut writes, “The bubble burst and CalPERS lost 103 percent of the value of its housing investments in one fiscal year. Here’s the kicker: CalPERS not only blew its investments on some shady deals, it borrowed money to leverage those deals. So it has to pay back the borrowed cash as well.”
The replenishment money comes, of course, from taxpayers – the same taxpayers who took hits on their houses, 401(k)s, and other investments during the current bust, but can’t get reimbursed.
The pension abuse now is breaking the backs of the budgets of many cities and states. The California city of Vallejo went bankrupt after 75 percent of its budget went to police and fire benefits and salaries. California’s ongoing budget crisis of the past 10 years – if honest numbers are used, it hasn’t balanced a budget since 2000 – is the direct result of outrageous public employee pay and benefits.
*Abuse of power*
Even worse than the extravagant pay is the abuse of power by union-protected government authorities. Greenhut cites the case of teacher Carlos Polanco, who was accused by the Los Angeles Unified School District of “immoral and unprofessional conduct” for making fun, in front of his class, of a student who had just returned after a suicide attempt.
Greenhut: “That’s horrifying and a good reason to fire this cruel man, who obviously has little concern for the safety of his students and lacks common decency. The school board voted to fire him, but that’s just the first part in the Rube Goldberg-like maze of the firing process in a district that…fires far fewer than 1 teacher per 1,000 a year. No wonder. The union-dominated Commission on Professional Competence overruled the Polanco firing. The commission found technical reasons why it could not rule on the unprofessional behavior accusations – the notice of dismissal wasn’t provided by the proper deadline. And then the commission unanimously found that Polanco’s behavior was not immoral because `it was not established that Javier was ever suicidal, that he ever intended to harm himself, or that he in fact had ever been hospitalized’.”
Then there are the abuses by the guys with guns. Police now commonly are protected from even the most reasonable scrutiny of their activities. Due to state laws and court rulings, Greenhut observes, “I’ve found that in covering cases of alleged excessive force, or when police are involved in deadly shootings, that it is no longer possible to find out if the officer has a history of abusive or violent behavior…. And even a watered-down bill that would have restored some level of open records to the process was shut down thanks to the unified efforts of Republican and Democratic legislators. Police unions used the most heavy-handed and dishonest tactics to stop the legislation.”
He provides a horrifying example: “After Huntington Beach officers Shawn Randell and Read Parker fired 15 shots at Ashley MacDonald in September, killing the distraught teen as she held a pocketknife in a nearly empty city park, I expressed shock in print: You mean two male officers could come up with no better way to subdue a young girl than to shoot her to death? In response, the usual suspects (the police chief, the police union, unthinking defenders of anything that police do) argued that I should not rush to judgment. I should not draw a conclusion before the official investigation, handled by the Sheriff’s Department, is completed and the results released, they argued.
“So I went back to an incident in Huntington Beach 2½ years ago in which Steven Hills, a distraught man who, according to police, had called 911 and made threatening statements, was shot by police 29 times and killed. The report of the investigation is done. Plenty of time has passed. Since the HBPD tells me that I shouldn’t rush to judgment on the MacDonald case, but wait until the report is complete, I thought it only fair to look at the report about Hills. Well, the police department and the Sheriff’s Department won’t release that report. It is exempt from the public records act. That’s quite a scam: Shut up until the investigation is done, but once it’s done, it’s none of your business.”
*What should be done?*
The ongoing Depression is finally making Americans wonder why they stand in unemployment lines while government workers enjoy lavish pay, perks, and benefits. And cases of brutality are making many wonder why police and prosecutors have been given such excessive powers.
Greenhut calls, first, for outlawing public employee unions: “There is absolutely no public good served by it, especially in a world of civil service protections. In fact, such unionization is a relatively recent phenomenon,” dating only to the 1960s.
Would that violate government employees’ rights to influence their own government? Hardly – because they are the government. A government union sits on both sides of the negotiating table, representing the employees who get the benefits on one side – and, on the other side, influencing the politicians who use tax money to pay the benefits.
Greenhut ads, “Legislatures should impose tighter restrictions on union political contributions. States should also pass paycheck protection measures that allow union members to withhold dues payments that are used for political purposes.”
During the last government-caused Great Depression, the one in the 1930s, citizens revolted against government excesses. It’s well past time for another revolt. Plunder! provides the facts, the outrage, and the ammunition.
Get it. Read it. Use it.
No, I don’t believe any of those cops planned to kill anyone that night. I have heard that Kelly was considered a nuisance by the PD because of the petty things businesses complained about. So, I think they probably just wanted to teach him a lesson, but apparently, Ramos created a situation that led the others to lose self control. Maybe zap him once with the Taser and then two guys could have easily subdued him and cuffed him.
I don’t have a problem with street justice, if it’s a guy like Alejandro Avila; the slime ball convicted of raping and murdering 5-year-old Samantha Runnion. I soo badly wanted just 5 minutes with that guy! The killing of an innocent, non-violent person by authorities, especially a member of the lowest class in society, will always draw the ire of the general public, and rightfully so.
If Reality Is was/is a cop, then his/her fellow cadets were Mahoney, Hightower, Hooks, Jones, and Tackleberry.
Is there a condensed version of your two posts above RI?
I want to read them but I got to go to work.
Reality Is,
What Fred A. said above: “Cicinelli in particular seems to have been intent on killing Thomas” appears more accurate to me.
Pat McKinley also like you, but more so, says he guarantees Ramos and Cicinelli did not intend on killing Kelly Thomas.
Based on what I heard from two different witnesses is when Cicinelli showed up, he immediatley broke out his taser and tased Kelly twice, then systematically and accurately proceeded to hammer on his face and head with the butt-end of his taser. I forgot, this was after he viciously dropped a couple of knees on him.
Fred I believe is correct.
Hopefully all this will be engraved on his tombstone.
Cincinelli’s frenzied attack had to be an episode of some sort, there’s just no other way to explain it. It was an over zealous rage that didn’t stop even when Kelly was unresponsive.
I know many cops are saying Kelly fought hard against 6 cops, so Ramos and Cincinelli will be found innocent. Sorry, the blood tests already show there wasn’t any drugs or PCP in his system, so stop trying to use that tired old excuse in this case. He was on the ground unarmed and if 6 armed, well trained cops couldn’t easily restrain him, they need to find some other kind of work.
Yes, we citizens don’t always understand the dangers of policework, , but if they try to use that in court, it will only serve to get the jury angry at them for thinking everybodies stupid. Use a little common sense in your reasoning, as to not insult the listener………
Aside from the beating of Kelly Thomas, , what bothers me a great deal is why would Ramos think it was OK to slowly put on his gloves in front of Kelly’s face and tell him he was going to f**k him up, even if Kelly never received the beating……what kind of shit is that? Do they think it’s OK for the cops to act just like the bad guys? If so, somebody better tell them they’ve already lost the battle.
He was supposed to run. Right into the waiting taser of Cicinelli.
As horrific as I’m sure it is, I can’t wait to see that video feed from the parking lot cam as well as the DAR recordings.
Hopefully this worldwide public viewing will touch the hearts of even the ‘rogue-type’ police officers and get them to clean up their act.
What is taking this Recall so long. I am losing confidence in it. Fraud happens everyday in Fullerton, and the Fraudsters are still there. Enough is Enough, Fullerton. Get these Sociopath’s out.
It’s a long process. Long time just to get signatures to attempt to get them out. Still working on signatures, then verification, then a vote sometime in the future, then trying to find people to vote into the offices they vacate. Then in a few more years when he people that took the spots become full fledged politicians and do the wrong thing, another round of recall and replacement LOL.
Now that I read this article on release time, I wonder what the policy on release time is for FPD….
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/12/08/taking-the-unions-to-court-in-arizona/
It should be in the MOU. If it’s not in the MOU, then there is no release time. In most cities, the union members contribute some of their earned leave time, say 2 hours per year, for the union guys to do their business.
🙂