When Missoula police officers smarted off with some illegal speed entrapments, I was incensed.
I wrote this letter (below) to the Missoulian newspaper. Would you like to write one like it?
Tristan Scott of the Missoulian wrote a story, Crossing guard,
revealing that police are speed trapping near Saint Patrick Hospital.
The story highlights the difficulty we have in communicating. Tristan
called it a “sting.”
The proper word is entrapment. The area forces motorists to speed.
Officers then hand out citations, claiming that motorists should know
better.
All entrapments are illegal but police often mistake citizen leniency for
permission.
Illegal entrapments do not raise awareness nor do they decrease accidents. If
signs on such broad roads remain unchanged, accident rates will
remain unchanged. That's a communications problem.
Five officers on this one entrapment cost somewhere around $875 per day.
That figure could buy effective signs that would end accidents,
rebuild respect and last 20-years.
It was especially disappointing to see Tristan's story speak of a
“bipedal” officer. That suggests that there is also a unipedal
officer. Another goofy, uncommunicative title is “Quality of Life
Officer.”
When the Missoula Crime Fighters mentioned that torture and capital
punishment administered by the law enforcement community could be
reduced by citizen monitoring, officer Mark Woodward told the
Missoulian that might be too harsh. Whatever was meant was not
communicated. When Missoula Crime Fighters went to listen in on the
Neighborhood Watch Program they were told, “We can't help you.”
That makes no sense either.
Somehow, we've got to communicate better so that law enforcement can serve and
protect.
Robocop?
I am reading The Caves of Steel again and wonder about your bipedal officers. R. Daneel Olivaw was both bipedal and an officer. Since it would be very unusual to state the obvious fact that a human officer is bipedal, maybe he is speaking of a robot. Perhaps Tristan had also been reading Asimov recently as well.
Police shouldn't be concerned with quality of life for anyone but themselves. I can imagine that career police officers would be insulted by such a thing. Think of it: you invest your life toward a career as a policeman only to be stuck in such a job, working outside your chosen career path. Oh how I can relate.
Speed traps aren't about enforcing laws or even improving the qulity of life or the community. It's glorified tax collection, nothing more.
I'll be the police union in Missoula is as upset about all this as you are.
I mostly agree
I completely understand the frustration level. I reject the very idea that "low speed"="safety". I think it's outrageous for officers to perform duties that are not requested by the public they are sworn to serve and protect.
On the other hand, Entrapment is the act of a law enforcement agent in inducing a person to commit an offence which the person would not have, or was unlikely to have, otherwise committed. So, for instance, if a police officer comes up to you, undercover, and hands you a brick of herion, and you take it, that would be a mild case of entrapment. If you refuse to take it, and he says, "C'mon... I know a guy who will by it from you for, like, $10,000! Follow me!", that's a more clear case of entrapment. The point is, the police are causing you, or impelling you, to do illegal stuff.
Now, I can't agree that this enforcement is entrapment. Is it unethical? Maybe. But it's not entrapment, and here's why: all those people speeding would be speeding whether the police were there or not. The fact that a police officer is there doesn't suddenly make speeding illegal, that just makes it enforceable. It was illegal all those times that the cops weren't there too, and the people were doing it "of their own free will and accord"!
I will say, I really think that the government has screwed The People by making law enforcement a for-profit business. The police no longer "Serve and Protect". They are out there to find YOU doing something wrong, and make you PAY for your misdeeds. The thinking is backwards.
If someone calls a cop, God bless him for showing up. However, if no one called you, and you don't see a real, blackstonian crime taking place, you really aren't doing anyone any favors by enforcing an unapportioned tax.
Read my blog ( http://trollingforretreads.blogspot.com ). I talk about this a WHOLE lot.
By the way ... I'm a cop. I mean everything I said, too (and I'm bipedal).
KE7CJV http://trollingforretreads.blogspot.com
Speed bumps
Excellent points Tim. I completely agree that low speed doesn't always create the safest condition.
Entrapment would be to put a 25 MPH limit on a long hill with a 5 or 6 % grade and then place traffic cops at the bottom. That is also a conspiracy since you know it takes more than just the cops to make that happen. Rare for sure.
Law enforcement really has become for-profit. The problem is that it's flawed logic.
A couple of years ago I sat in a Sandpoint city council meeting while they discussed with their chief of police (yes, lower case) how they could increase revenue from his department. They discussed various methods before drifting from law enforcement to parking enforcement. Their focus was on maximum revenue, not efficient and fair parking for the public downtown. They had no shame, they were not embarrassed to discuss this publicly. They felt they had a right or some obligation to profit this way.
Consider your average mall parking lot. The focus of the mall is to profit. They do this by leasing space to merchants. Merchants profit by selling goods. All this takes customers and customers need a safe place to park. Customers won't come to a mall if it's not safe, and if the customers don't come then nobody makes money. Speeding in a parking lot is unsafe.
If you were a city government, your solution to the mall parking lot would be to hire enough officers to patrol the lot at all times. You would set a speed limit and then instruct your officers to measure speed and issue citations to anyone traveling in excess of the posted limit. You would generate income this way.
A business man won't even bother to tell you that you'll never cover the expense of the officers and their equipment. A businessman won't bother telling you that this solution will reduce the profit of the mall overall. The businessman won't bother because he's somewhere else, making profit in ways the city council can't grasp. The businessman has already had speed bumps installed in the parking lot. Those speed bumps accomplish the goal of safety quite well and everyone involved get on with more important things.
Everyone in a town profits, just like everyone at the mall, when conditions are safe and parking is readily available. Our towns are just like big malls. I'm not saying that we need to put up speed bumps everywhere. I am saying that everyone (city council, cops, businessman, customer) needs to re-examine their goals and stay focus on what really is important to them. If speed is an issue, there are ways to limit speed through intelligent design and logic. Writing tickets doesn't accomplish anything but pissing off the customer.
You're right...
I like the analogy. The customer is the voter, and I think that the voters need to direct their anger more specifically.
The problem with a "teflon man", like the one you're talking about, is that no one says, "We're voting you out, Mayor, and it's because of this guy that you keep around for some inexplicable reason..." Maybe then there would be a positive result.
Also, maybe they should hire someone who hasn't swallowed all of the FBI and IACP crap...
KE7CJV http://trollingforretreads.blogspot.com
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