LA Sheriff's also have a gang called 'The Executioners' and several other gangs operating in the force.
Cops are held to a very low standard, especially for people who we place so much trust in. I would get fired for starting a gang at my job called 'The Executioners'.
Came here to post about the LASD cop-gangs. I think some of the best work on this comes from Knock LA [1].
The good news, if there is any, is that institutions as corrupt and violent as American police, who operate freely and with complete impunity and social sanction, respond to the same things that other, similar institutions -- like the mafia, for instance -- do: sunlight.
I think that shining light on this stuff is extremely powerful, and the proof is right in this story: opposition to this POS didn't go unnoticed -- he sought to stamp it out and hide that he was doing it. These people are deeply afraid of a critical mass of the population becoming sick of their shit. So this means it's working. Let's keep it up!
Not sure why this is getting downvoted. I’m sure the sheriffs in many counties are just fine. But even the national and international news covers the AlCo sheriffs abuse (check out the Colbert Report and The Guardian).
While this isn’t directly related to the AlCo sheriffs, you can also look up the “crime reduction” social media scandal from Oakland PD, a law enforcement agency within Alameda County.
He may be right that cops basically can't get fired but he's getting downvoted because he pivots to complaining that have adopted a particular branding he doesn't like. Of course that goes over like a lead balloon on a site where many people's day jobs includes thinking about the difference between specific cases and a general case. Replacing punisher skulls with rainbows and monster trucks with Teslas isn't going to change the fact that the police are capricious, unaccountable and feel enabled to rule with an iron fist.
"Branding he doesn't like" is a whole thing, though. Showing contempt for the norms of society by getting a bunch of obscene tattoos and driving a vehicle that violates every relevant stanza of the vehicle code is not a healthy behavior for individuals and organizations who are granted the exclusive franchise on violence.
Oh please, punisher skulls and lifted trucks are the white dude equivalent of pumpkin spice "outside the betlway".
It's no surprise that a "nice suburb" is serviced by garbage collectors and landscapers from the hood. Why is it a surprise that they have to hire hicks to be their jackboot?
I'd argue that it's less an issue of branding, and more an issue of credibility. If you were about to get surgery, and the surgeon came in and started talking about how the lastest InfoWars really nailed it, and how the US government was being manipulated by space lizards and CERN was just about to open a black hole, would you let him take you under the knife?
If these police are flagrantly ignoring the law, and are getting their news media from conspiracy theorists, they lose the credibility to be trusted in making rational decisions. You don't put people who aren't critical thinkers in positions of extreme power and responsibility.
If they were covered in Nazi tattoos, would you be saying the same thing? Tattoos don't make you into a bad person; bad people get bad tattoos, like ones glorifying ruthless comic book vigilantes specifically designed to appeal to the 70s law-and-order Dirty Harry audience.
Maybe, but it's a simple minded dig to a much better point. He diluted his own post by placing the police and about 50% of the population into a reductive stereotype. Not the best way to be persuasive.
Also, Villanueva, the LA sheriff is not only a Democrat, he was assisted by the Democratic Party in getting elected. Not only was the OP stereotyping but he was trying to shift blame to another party. Maybe Democrats in CA should start looking into their own party for the cause of these problems rather than giving them a free pass and shifting blame.
FWIW, I think the justice system in CA is hopelessly corrupt and brutal and has been for decades. That's a pretty serious problem Californians don't seem to want to address. Maybe corrupt, brutal justice systems suit the bosses of both parties just fine and the voters just don't want to admit their tribe is just as bad in this regard as the other tribe.
Oh well, divide and conquer strikes again. Enjoy your free nightstick massage and lead infusions.
Because they lie and uninformed voters believe them. Villanueva in LA county painted himself as some progressive champion against all this and once he got voted in he took off the costume and now stuff like this happens:
"Sheriff Alex Villanueva met with the Inspector General Tuesday to discuss deputy gangs in the department but the meeting abruptly ended when the sheriff's lawyer advised him not to take an oath to tell the truth"
Because the sheriff runs unopposed because only credentialed LEOs can run for sheriff in CA. And then the sheriffs have a habit of resigning in office and appointing an heir (i.e. incumbent). Our upcoming election in 2022 is the first competitive election in about 50 years.
And if you look at the vote totals, most people under vote on the sheriffs office (i.e. people just leave it blank or write in dumb stuff like “deez nutz.”)
I don’t want to get in to conspiracy theories. But imagine you’re a good cop with a nice life and a happy family. Do you put it all on the line to run against an entrenched incumbent? What kinds of dirty “tricks” might you be worried about?
Because if you run against literally your own boss in the primary election and lose, then your life will be sad. It's a bad system that requires reform at the state level.
Democrats demand the same results of their cops as Republicans do, they just can't stomach the process (which is a common cop critique of liberals.)
Relying on cops to fix a broken society is as bad as relying on teachers to fix a broken society. You end up with a bunch of sadists as cops, and a bunch of martyrs as teachers.
You actually have to change something, you can't just let the status quo continue and expect a different result.
But Dems don't demand the same results of cops as Republicans. There simply isn't any room for "both sides" logic in this instance. Only one side even entertains demilitarizing police forces, curtailing Civil Forefeiture, dismantling police immunity, legalizing recreational drugs and redirecting police funds to social services so that police don't have to get involved in the first place.
There is a reason that Punisher stickers, and Thin Blue Line imagery exist in law enforcement and Republican communities.
Get your Democratic majority to put forth a clean bill ending Civil Forefeiture and it'll pass easily. Other than one highway patrolman I know, nobody I know of supports that evil law.
"Democrats" is a broad term. That's possibly true of "centrist" / "moderate" DINOs, but if you look at, say, folks who set up the CHOP in Seattle (who might not proudly call themselves Democrats, but are far more likely to vote for a Democrat than a Republican), they very clearly did not want the cops to so much as investigate an actual murder.
I think most people realize that if they call for less policing, they're calling for less policing, and they really do mean what they're asking for.
(To be clear, I'm speaking about my own beliefs here: I think there should be less policing, and I fully realize that means less investigation of murders. You cannot give up essential liberty for temporary security.)
I can't take any source seriously when they push a clearly false narrative. Nazi helmet? Those tattoos look nothing like Nazi helmets. If anything, they look like US WW2 paratrooper helmets, but that obviously does not evoke the same sort of reaction they are looking for.
Well, it's straight from a citation from Loyola Law School. Following the citation takes us to Maya Lau's article titled, "Inked with a skull in a cowboy hat, L.A. County sheriff’s deputy describes exclusive society of lawmen at California station"[0]. This article makes no mention of The Executioners or the tattoo they use. For that you need to look at another LA Times article titled "After decades of problems, new allegations surface of a secret clique within L.A. County Sheriff's Department".[1] If we find the relevant quote in that article here's what we get.
"Aldama described a tattoo on his calf as a skull with a rifle and a military-style helmet with flames surrounding it. On the helmet are the letters “C P T” for Compton."
So at some point "military-style" was switched to nazi. I don't know why, but since there's apparent conflict let's do our own research. Googling Nazi helmet gave me plenty of images, and they generally have a large flare on the back and the brim turns up. The helmets also seem to typically have badges on the side and I didn't see any that had a band on them like in the tattoo. I think these helmets look far more like the type worn by US troops in the Vietnam war.
Where did you even come from? Absolutely nothing to with my comment, the comment above mine, or the one above that. I'm talking about helmets and issues in how Loyola cites their sources, not the effects of the Vietnam war on domestic policing. Go make your own thread if that's relevant to the article but you won't get a good discussion here.
You're right. See my other comment in this thread but it seems like Loyola changed the quote where it initially said 'military-style'. Personally the helmet reminded me of helmets worn in Vietnam but they definitely do not match the design used by Nazi's in WWII.
No, Nazi insignia buffs are far more likely to be (or sympathise with) Nazis than random people. It's a real problem anong historical reenactors (who are otherwise awesome imo, nothing cooler than living history.)
Given that a lot of war movies try to have the uniforms correct, I think that anyone who likes to watch war movies will have a good idea how uniforms of bygone wars looked like.
That is obviously a much larger set of people than closet Nazi admirers, even in the U.S.
And the previous poster might be an European from a country once occupied by Nazis, or even Germany, where such knowledge is part of the historic memory.
Most Czechs with at least elementary history knowledge could distinguish Nazi helmets from other ones at first sight; the Stahlhelm is a very distinct design and it is part of a very dark memory for us. It had some innocent uses too (Austrian firefighters or Chilean cavalry, IIRC), but it is tainted here forever.
How hard is it to perform an internet search for 'Nazi helmet'? I personally thought the tattoos looked like US army helmets so I did the search to see what a Nazi helmet looks like. Well, it is obvious the "researchers" never performed that research.
Cops are held to a very low standard, especially for people who we place so much trust in. I would get fired for starting a gang at my job called 'The Executioners'.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/police-gan...
https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/morning-brief-sheriffs-d...