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Verbatim from BPDnews: "WHEN TOLD TO GET OUT OF THE STREET … WHY NOT DO IT???"
By Anonymous on Sun, 01/30/2011 - 12:57am
Verbatim from BPDnews.com
WHEN TOLD TO GET OUT OF THE STREET … WHY NOT DO IT???
Posted by MediaRelations on January 29, 2011
At about 1:26am, Saturday, January 29, 2011, an officer performing a paid detail in the area of 262 Friend Street requested back-up. On arrival, officers spoke to the detail officer who stated that he was working the detail at the Greatest Bar when bar personnel approached the officer requesting assistance in their efforts to escort a patron from the bar. According to bar personnel, the patron was creating a sizable disturbance. When asked to the leave the establishment, the suspect began to verbally disrespect the officer. Once outside, the suspect ran into the middle of the street and started yelling that he was all wet because he didn’t have his jacket. When asked to get out of the street, the suspect, again verbally disrespecting the officers, refused. When officers instructed the suspect that refusing to get out of the street could result in his arrest, the suspect told the officers that he couldn’t listen to cops who only make ten bucks an hour and only have GEDs. As officers approached the suspect, a 2nd individual stepped between the officers and the 1st suspect in an effort to shield his friend from police. Given the both suspects refusal to comply with lawful instructions, as well as, their refusal to get out of the street, officers arrested both suspects.
Officers arrested Andrew Clark, 23, of Brighton and Ryan Kehoe, 23, of Brighton and charged both Being Disorderly and Resisting Arrest.
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Comments
An officer on detail who gets
An officer on detail who gets paid to help remove an unwelcome patron from an establishment is acting as an agent of the business and not as a law enforcement officer, and yet his position to give "lawful" orders is unquestioned. On the street, the officer's decision to arrest the guys for being 'verbally disrespectful' and 'not getting out of the street' seems like the use of law enforcement authority as payback for lack of due respect rather than a violation of law.
It's not a big deal and I trust I wouldn't bait an officer like this guy did nonetheless the officers instinct to arrest the two guys because he was not treated respectfully is the wrong one. Think about it. The guys was arrested for not getting out of the street when the officer told him to. Really? He got arrested for that? Bullshit. Two guys were arresting for "verbally disrespect the officer" and for "refusal to comply with lawful instructions, as well as, their refusal to get out of the street." Which one was the lawful order the vilation of which makes for a common sense arrest? Is there a law requiring citizens verbally respect an officer?
Sounds like you were there.
Can you tell us what happened?
I was there
The kids were standing on the sidewalk the entire time. Granted one of them was talking back to the cops, but they were never in the street, and to me it seemed the police had no right to arrest either of them.
According to LinkedIn, two
According to LinkedIn, two gentlemen of the same names graduated from Northeastern in 2010. I know that the Globe reported last week that Northeastern's applications have soared in recent years, but this is the sort of rank snobbery I'm more accustomed to seeing from folks who went to school on the other side of the river.
These guys were arrested for contempt of cop. It's that simple. The officer should have de-escalated the situation. And once the guy was out of the bar, that should have been the end of it. Instead, his pride wounded, the cop provoked a confrontation with a drunk.
If this ever sees the inside of a courtroom, it won't bring a conviction. But that's not the point. The punishment here was the humiliation of the arrest. The crime was disrespecting an officer - even one who'd hired himself out to a private employer.
If the report is even half correct, it's tough to feel any sympathy for the obnoxious drunk. But I'd sure like to see the officers involved rapped on the knuckles for their own part of the mess. Their charge isn't to protect and defend their dignity and authority. It's to serve. And if there was a public interest being served in all of this, it's awfully tough to detect.
Heres the thing Cynic
There are probably a few hundred interactions between the police and drunk college students like this every night in the city of Boston. Rarely do they end up in arrests, and of course you don't see any of that on the internet.
What do you want a cop to do if someone is screaming and swearing in the street? How long do you give them before you take some sort of police action? 5 minutes? 15 minutes? How many people should have to wake up and call the police before the police should take some sort of action? Should the cops just go back into the bar and ignore the drunk screaming in the street?
And why do you think this won't bring a conviction? It isn't because the judge isn't going to believe the cops or bouncers thats for sure. It will be because these students will apologize for their actions and the courts will dissimss it based on that.
Agree 100%. Also, if the cop
Agree 100%.
Also, if the cop had done nothing and the asshole got hit by a speeding taxi, the OP would be clutching his pearls and wringing his hands in furor at the lazy pigs who did nothing to protect someone was too intoxicated to know what he was doing.
So it's basically a no-win.
Why do you assume that
Why do you assume that attacking the abuse of authority constitutes disrespect for authority? I want to see officers who overstep the bounds of their office held accountable for their conduct because it's unusual, and it needlessly makes life harder for the rest of the department.
I haven't defended the drunks. Click through to my posting history, and you won't find me bashing cops. So why turn obscene and abusive?
When the police department chooses to highlight a case like this on its official blog, it sends the wrong message. That message, in effect, is don't mess with us, or you'll regret it. And that undermines a host of other departmental initiatives designed to foster trust between officers and the community. I still can't see the hazard posed in this case; but it's not hard to see the damage.
Sorry, disagree, 32,450% that
Sorry, disagree, 32,450% that there was any abuse of authority.
I thought the point of the post (and really, when did words on the interwebz become "abuse of authority," srsly, lol?) was: don't mess with on duty officers because from time to time, despite some citizens' knee-jerk reaction are that cops are overpaid, lazy ne'er-do-well pigs ... the cops actually do know better when telling you to get out the street. And that's mainly so that you don't wander three blocks away--still in the middle of the street--cause an accident that kills someone (or yourself!), leaving BPD with a lawsuit for "not doing enough to prevent this tragedy," and all the pearl-cluthers/hand-wringers gasping for breath in the Boston Glob's comment section at the INJUSTICE OF IT ALL.
I'd invite you to also review my posting history: I'm pretty firmly anti-union, anti-patronage, etc., etc.
That said, my ... ahem ... "official" run-ins with BPD have been decently fair to positive. Have I interacted with them while being unruly, and loud, and maybe once in 2001 while trying to fit my body into a Globe newspaper box in order to hide from a crazy stalker girl?
Sure. But do I think that they (presumably sober) know better than me (probably drunk)? Absolutely. So, you know. Whatever.
When you're at the point in the night where you're in the street hollering at BPD, after multiple warnings, perhaps a night in the drunk tank is the best medicine.
(I know, I know: TL;DR. I feel better though.)
You're making my point. If
You're making my point. If there are indeed "a few hundred interactions" like this one on a nightly basis, and most don't result in arrests, isn't that a good reason to believe that this one didn't have to end in an arrest, either?
Most cops do their jobs well all the time. Some do their jobs well most of the time. But there are those who are prone to abuse their authority on occasion. And turning a blind eye to that, or granting them the presumption of rectitude because of the honesty and dedication of their colleagues, simply serves to besmirch the reputation of the force as a whole.
Charges of resisting arrest that don't stem from any injuries to the arresting officers rarely stand up when the arrest itself is deemed to have been dubious. It's just a bonus charge. The crux of this is the charge of disorderly conduct. And if these guys stand up in court, acknowledge having been obnoxious, and promise to reform, it's almost certainly going to be continued without a finding - with some change of an outright dismissal. They'll have to keep their noses clean for a little while, and unless they get a very good attorney, they may have some CORI problems, because the charge will show up on their record. But they're not going to get a conviction for arguing with a cop on a private detail.
It's not about the judge, really. It's about the prosecutors looking at a case like this, realizing what took place, and doing their best to move on to something that actually matters.
I'm not defending the drunks. But it's possible for all parties to be in the wrong (c.f., arrest of Henry Louis Gates on the same charges). The taxpayers of Suffolk County will foot the bill for the arrest, the transport, the booking, the magistrate, the hearing, the prosecutors, the judge, and ancillary costs. Does this really justify all of that? And does anyone here believe the arrest would have taken place if the guy was simply rowdy and drunk, but didn't insult the cop? This officer's revenge is going to cost the city thousands.
ok
No it isn't good reason. It could mean that this one didn't have to end in an arrest, but it could also mean that 10 of the other hundred should have ended in arrest. You have to make an arrest for public order crimes in many situations because people simply won't follow an officers instructions up until that point the arrest should be made. If someone is swearing loudly in the street at 3am, an officer should attempt to calm that person down and try to see if he can get that person to stop swearing loudly without having to arrest him. As you know, drunk people don't always use good reason and arrests have to be made.
Although CORI is now changing, the disorderly charge will always be on their record no matter if it is CWOFd or dissmissed. And resisting arrest charges can stand for a variety of reasons. The charge is what it is. If you resist arrest, you resist arrest and should be charged with it. The justice system frowns apon those who resist arrest and are generally uncooperative with the police. And your point would have been the same if these two college kids sold cocaine to one another. First offense and the charge will get CWOF'd as well. If these kids cause a disturbance 2 months from now in Allston and get charged with disorderly and resisting, you can bet a judge isn't going to cwof it as easy.
The prosecutors don't really have a choice. These are easy cases to try and the state usually will make money off them because they don't go to trail and there is no jail time involved. The state might lose 15 bucks on the prisoner meals if the arrest happend on a Friday and the kids weren't bailed till late on Saturday. It certainly isn't going to cost anyone thousands.
also cynic
I would disagree with your premise about snobbery on "the other side of the river". Harvard and MIT kids very rarely show disrespect to police officers like an NU kid would show. Granted there are probably more NU kids getting drunk and stupid in Boston than Harvard or MIT kids, but that isn't really true from my experience.
Two things to add: First,
Two things to add:
First, Harvard and MIT kids are subject to the laws of Cambridge, not Boston. There is a difference in tolerance and enforcement between the two towns.
Second,(having dated a Harvard undergrand and being personally intimately familiar with MIT's undergrad environment), students at the two big Cambridge schools have a greater chance of run-ins with their school's own security detail -- thereby making it a matter for Student Life, not city cops -- than they do city police.
Never mind the fucking fact that it's utterly retarded to blame Northeastern University here, as if NEU should personally chaperone every single one of their shitwad students, just cause statistical anomoly, percentage-wise, of their students occasionally cause a ruckus not on school property in the wee hours of the morning.
HELLO!?! This is what 20-somethings do! They cause ruckuses! Why? BECAUSE IT'S A RUCKUS IS FUN WHEN YOU'RE TWENTY-SOMETHING AND DON'T HAVE A JOB TO GO TO THE NEXT MORNING! Cripes.
Move to a farm in Pennsyltucky if you want peace and quiet from dusk 'till dawn, already.
anon, the report says right
anon, the report says right there that officers on duty made the arrest. The detail officer made a call into BPD. You cannot refuse a lawful order from an officer, and staining in the middle of a road is easily against the law.
"standing in the middle of a road is easily against the law."
I don't think it is against the law to stand in the road. Pedestrians have the right to use the road, they can stand in the road all night if they're not obstructing passage or causing a safety hazard. This arrest is about obeying "lawful" orders without 'disrespecting' the officer. "Lawful" not because any significant law was being broken but because the officer uttered it. This isn't about whether the officer can find a reason to arrest them. Of course, an officer can always find a reason. The question is whether the officer should find a reason not to arrest them.
You can't stand in the middle of the street and scream and yell
Because eventually, someone would actually call the police and what do you think would happen?
911 operator: "911 what is your emergency"
Caller: "there is someone standing in the middle of the street swearing and screaming"
911 operator: "sorry that isn't a crime, have a nice day".
This whole thing has to do with common sense and reason by the police and suspect. Could the police have handled this differently? Possibly. Could they have done all they have could within reason? Possibly.
Many laws aren't "significant".
Just glad . . .
. . . that they are kids and not 40 something overgrown babies.
Meh
I saw this last night and decided against posting anything about it. Maybe I'm just getting too jaded - I certainly would have posted about it a couple years ago - but it sounds like some drunk kid was standing in the middle of the street outside a bar being an asshole and when he wouldn't move the cops brought him and his pal in, then decided to up the ante slightly by public embarrassing them. The GED/$10-an-hour stuff was just the cherry on the top (note to drunks everywhere: Cops make more than $10 an hour). In other words, hardly something worth making a big fuss over.
Meh
According to police reports, it was the 'disrepectful' smart mouth comment of David Woodhouse that led to his arrest, too. You may think a low bar is enough for Boston police, that as soon as someone takes a drink and says some shit the cop takes an offense to, that its ok for them to make an arrest on bullshit charges. I don't. I expect a higher more professional standard, thick skin, and less use of law enforcement authority as a response for personal affront.
Read the report, the kid was complaining that his coat was inside.
Try thinking about it this way. If it's your kid, drinking a bit too much and showing bad judgment using a smart mouth comment (IE "there must be a lot of crime on this corner") at the wrong moment, should they end up in court because the BPD officer's nose is out of joint?
show me the actual report anon
not just a news blurb.
And yea, if my kid was drinking in public, made a wise ass comment to the police and then resisted them? I would expect him/her to get arrested and rightfully so.
If he just made a wiseass comment then no, I wouldn't expect him to get arrested.
Sounds like you were there.
Can you tell us what happened?
heh
Did you really just use that as an example?
My little snowflake would get his ass kicked at home (figuratively) for being such a punk. Being drunk isn't an excuse to act like a ass. And being an adult means taking responsibility for your actions.
Kid could have easily asked the detail cop if he could get his jacket, or have his friend go get it. Come back the next day, or a load of other options. Instead he choose option derp:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfOEMwKO4Vo
Yeah really . . .
. . . how badly are you out of touch if you think cops only make 10 bucks an hour and only have a GED? I'm no lover of police. Don't fawn and fuss over them and don't think they are "heroes" automatically- but the old timer in me just has little tolerance for such nonsense- screaming drunks in the streets. I see cops on detail in stores and outside bars on Friday and Saturday nights- and I can't imagine a more thankless job- having to deal with drunks- even happy ones- would just make me lose it. I couldn't do it.
the old timer in me Come on,
Come on, you're only forty-one. You're not THAT old.
Age . . .
. . . is a state of mind. And these days I mentally feel like I am 70. Skateboarders, for example, bother me- that's a good sign that I am now officially a curmudgeon.
The GED/$10 oper hour comment
The GED/$10 oper hour comment makes the BPD News report, but they didn't print the insults the cops might have used. I've been called far worse things by police after doing far less.
Who's going to take Pete up
Who's going to take Pete up on his "unless you were there you're not in a position to discuss it" argument?
Sounds like you were there.
By Pete Nice
Can you tell us what happened?
and then all of his other arguments about why your arguments are wrong even though he wasn't there. ROFL
It's a cop out But to be
It's a cop out
But to be fair, there's lots of people that can make an opinionated police officer have a very bad day if he says the "wrong" thing. Better to leave those who job it is to look into these things to it. Unfortunate, but reality.
You can discuss it.
Just don't make up stuff like:
Plus you were wrong when you said the detail is not there to act as a law enforcement officer. That is exactly what they are there for. Trespassing is an arrestable offense in presence, and is one of the reasons why having someone with arrest power and a radio is there in the first place.
If you can show me where I say something happened when it may not have, I will shut my mouth for you.
Why not get out of the street when told to?
See Hess v. Indiana 414 U.S. 105 (1973)
During an anti-war protest by University students, several students blocked the street and refused to let cars through. Officers told the protesters to clear out and get off the street.
Gregory Hess, one of the student leaders, ordered the protesters to comply yelling "we'll take back the fucking street later."
He was arrested for disorderly conduct.
It would appear that if you comply you get arrested, and if you don't you get arrested. So, why not at least have the satisfaction of having earned the arrest good and proper
At least tell us who won the
At least tell us who won the case of the disorderly conduct charge!
Really Anonymous? No problems
Really Anonymous?
No problems with me on this one. douchbag kid is so inebriated that instead of talking to the officers, he's be disruptive and possibly dangerous. He's also standing in the middle of a busy street, a danger to himself and possibly others.
Also, from the sound of the report, officers showed up and made the arrest, as is normally done. The detail officer was the one to make the request to BPD.
All done by the book, and some drunk hot head got to cool off and sober up.
Although I agree arrest might be excessive here, I'm not sure it's legally possible to detain drunks for their own protection anymore. Pete, can you comment on that? In the old days, a drunk kid would usually get put in the drunk tank and a call to mom and pa, which would be a punishment worse then arrest.
No you can still detain drunks for their own protection
but it is frowned upon. Unless you are breaking the law and charged with a crime, you don't get brought into the station in handcuffs as a PC (protective custody).
lesson?
seems to me that the kid had every opportunity to pack it up and head home, yet he chose to continue being a drunken d-bag in the middle of the street.
Lesson learned - don't be an drunk a-hole and challenge the cops, because you're always gonna lose that battle.
Ask the judiciary if they
Ask the judiciary if they want this case in court. LOL
Seems like a payback arrest
Seems like a payback arrest for disrespecting the office.
It's called "Drunk &
It's called "Drunk & Disorderly". People have been getting arrested for it for 100's of years. If you are so drunk you are getting tossed from a bar by a police officer who whether or not is working a detail or not is still a full fledged officer of the law, he orders you to leave and you resist the officers request, then go into a public area or a street with vehicle activity & start acting like a foolish loud mouthed drunk you 100% desreve to get arrested. And so does the dumbass friend who in a potentially volatile situation put himself in the cops face threating his safety. What don't you people get about this? The cop did his job.
iterate to consensus
Is there some consensus yet that the BPD officers had ever authority to make these arrests but that a better choice for would have been for the police to get the guy his coat from inside the bar and send them home without arrest?
No
The bar and the police told the guy to leave. It isn't the cops job to get some guys coat that already tried to start fights in a bar. You get it the next day.