[Peace-discuss] Chicago police -- holding out until the lawsuits stop?

[Barbara kessel]

Whatever he might have meant, it has gone down in history with wide
dissemination as "the police are here to preserve DISORDER." Barbara

On 7/7/08, C. G. Estabrook <galliher at uiuc.edu> wrote:
> After the Chicago police riot at he Democratic party convention 40 years
> ago, Mayor Daley I explained the matter succinctly:
>
>  "Gentlemen," he told his first press conference after the battle of
> Chicago, "get this thing straight for once and for all. The policeman isn't
> there to create disorder. The policeman is there to preserve disorder."
>
>  (A Chicago friend says that, given the local accent, the mayor may have
> said "...preserve THIS order.")  --CGE
>
>
>
>  E. Wayne Johnson wrote:
>
> > Actually I am a bit skeptical that Police have all that much to do with
> stopping murders.
> > I would suppose that the Police actually get called to the scene after the
> event, and that Police are
> > actually doing very little to prevent murders since they would have no way
> of knowing whether or
> > not one is about to occur.  I think the Chicago Police is trying to pull
> the wool over the people's eyes.
> > On the other hand such a confession to a deliberate dereliction of duty
> should lead to immediate dismissal of those
> > so motivated as to "let the bodies pile up".
> >
> > A 10% change could just be a chaotic fluctuation in the data or it might
> be a reflection of the declining economy
> > leading to an increase in urban misery showing up as  increased homicide
> rate.
> >
> > Stuart Levy wrote:
> >
> > > At yesterday's AWARE meeting I mentioned hearing, on NPR station WBEZ in
> Chicago,
> > > a report that (a) the Chicago murder rate is up this year and (b) that
> may be
> > > because (some?) Chicago police are unwilling to risk being sued/charged
> for
> > > misconduct as a few have been recently.  (Also, "juries in 2008 are
> different,
> > > they are much less inclined to just believe the police version of
> events.")
> > > Therefore, the suggestion is, police are taking it easy on law
> enforcement,
> > > declining to apprehend people that they would have pursued in the past.
> > >
> > > One police officer is quoted ("a grim assessment") as saying that they
> would
> > > just let the bodies pile up until there was enough pressure from the
> public,
> > > and from the police officials, to let the police do their work
> > > undisturbed by misconduct lawsuits.
> > >
> > > Several appalling things about this, including the reporter's lack of
> > > criticism in a couple of directions:
> > >  - of the police (if there's truth to this theory), and
> > >  - of the theory itself.   When trying to find this story, I ran into
> > >    various articles online about large-city murder rates, which are
> > >    up in other cities as well.  So it could be happening for reasons
> other
> > >    than this kind of hold-the-city-hostage behavior.
> > >
> > > Here's the source:
> > >
> > >
> http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Content.aspx?audioID=26287
> > >
> > >    We're now halfway through the year and the homicide rate is up more
> > >    than 10 percent compared to last year. A police source says the
> > >    unofficial tally is around 230 murders in 2008 compared to just over
> > >    200 by this date last year. There are many theories as to what's
> > >    causing the rise. Chicago Public Radio's criminal justice reporter
> > >    Robert Wildeboer shares one of them—a theory that's held by some
> > >    of the officers themselves.
> > >
> > > For the audio of the story (~6 min), follow the above page's
> > > "Download" link to MP3 audio:
> > >    http://audio.wbez.org/848/2008/07/848_20080702a.mp3
> > >
> > >
> > > Also, a blogger (apparently a lawyer), outraged at hearing the same
> story, wrote about it:
> > >
> > >
> http://chicagocrimelaw.wordpress.com/2008/07/02/police-misconduct-and-the-increased-homicide-rate/
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Peace-discuss mailing list
> > > Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
> > >
> http://lists.chambana.net/cgi-bin/listinfo/peace-discuss
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Peace-discuss mailing list
> > Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
> > http://lists.chambana.net/cgi-bin/listinfo/peace-discuss
> >
>  _______________________________________________
>  Peace-discuss mailing list
>  Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>  http://lists.chambana.net/cgi-bin/listinfo/peace-discuss
>