New York City Ends Qualified Immunity For Police Officers, Becoming 1st In Nation To Do So

I think you are generally correct about that, but the truth is that prosecutors and cops work together. When most prosecutors (there is always the rare exception) investigate cops, they treat them with kid gloves. If the cop in the Floyd case had not been filmed for 9 minutes, likely the case would not have been brought.

 

It's a vastly false statement as officers can't act with impunity in assaulting, maiming and killing innocent people. Not even REMOTELY accurate!

Even our Spanish speaking friends understand this as they understand what dealing with the Federales who act with impunity.

 

So which is it, are you for or against.

 

Sure they can. They just need to be able to argue that their is no precedent pertaining to their exact circumstances that what they did was wrong.

 

I'm for it, but it needs to be fixed. QA is essential to the ability for police to do their jobs effectively, but is being abused. I spelled out my position in post #47 where I stated: "I propose that police should have immunity as long as they don't violate someone's rights, or force someone to voluntarily give up their rights under duress, through deception, intimidation, or physical force."

 

Then that's not with impunity.

There are thousands of cases of officers being arrested for breaking the law. Granted, there are several cases where the police union protected bad cops which should never happen, but to even remotely say officers can commit crimes with impunity is wrong, inaccurate and downright distasteful.

 

I disagree, no one should have special legal priveldges, all should ge equal.

 

It has that affect more often than it should. It’s a bad law.

 

So, I ask again: If a police officer is chasing a bank robber 100mph through a residential area and performs a pit maneuver to cause the bank robber to run across a manicured lawn and crash his car into a power pole, causing damages to the lawn, the power pole, and both cars, and causing the robber to be injured, should the police officer's personal assets be exposed to civil penalty from the power company, the lawn owner, and the robber himself?

Police officers are granted special powers, and so require special protections. That's what QA is supposed to be for. So the cop can do his job without fear of personal liability.

You are really just advocating for anarchy.

 

What’s that saying? “With great power comes great responsibility.”

Something like that.

 

Single scenarios are not enough. Too much legal credence. Each incident if questionable should be reviewed.

 

Exactly that. Police using QA to be bullies need to be reigned in. That is why, in post #47 "I propose[d] that police should have immunity as long as they don't violate someone's rights, or force someone to voluntarily give up their rights under duress, through deception, intimidation, or physical force."

Under current QA rules, police can violate people's rights without fear of personal exposure. They are only exposed to IA investigations, and protected there by police unions. (IA investigations commonly end with: "We investigated ourselves and found no wrongdoing.") Instead they only expose the taxpayers to liability. That has to end.

 

Well, just review the hypothetical given. Do you think that officer in that scenario should be liable for damages? He acted within his authority, didn't violate anyone's rights, took a dangerous criminal and a dangerous driver off the streets. That is what the taxpayers expect police to do. How would you feel about it if the cop just said "he's running, I'm not going to give chase because I'll get sued."

 

acted within his authority
That is what needs to be addressed. With the immunity there is nothing he is guilty of.

 

Who do the property owners sue to recover their damages? Without QA, they can sue the individual officer.

 

So the property owners should have to pay up for doing nothing ??

 

They can sue the state for their damages. The officer is acting as a agent of the State. The point is, if police officers fear individual lawsuits, they will be less inclined to do their jobs. Compounding that, if officer hires are not given protected from litigation, departments will not be able to recruit new officers, because no one will want the liability. QA is broken, and way too permissive, but it needs to remain in place to protect cops who are doing their jobs honorably.

 

Try getting falsely accused by corrupt police sometime.

 

Which is wrong and our justice system has failed people like this. I don't think anyone disagrees with you here. Removing qualified immunity actually harms people, not help them.

Stop and frisk was a MASSIVE constitutional breach of authority which I was the first to say was wrong and illegal.

 

No question that happens way too often. QA is not the main culprit there, police unions and the "thin blue line" are.

 

You are nimbly sweeping under the rug the simple fact that I stated, "All of government has had some degree of immunity since forever." You're avoiding the mountain for the ant hill.

 

QA prevents any action to take against the officers or even DAs.

 

Removing QA will help people that are wrongly affected by bad cops.

 

But that is factually inaccurate. If it's deemed that an officer violated your rights during an interaction, an officer can 100% be held accountable in a civil proceedings. It's the language in the qualified immunity that needs to be amended so there is no gray areas that the police unions get get bad officers defended from.

 

(Apologies to everyone, I have been using "QA" instead of "QI" throughout this thread to refer to Qualified Immunity. I don't know why.)

Yes it does, and it should. Once "corruption" is introduced into the equation, everyone involved should lose QI.