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New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

innocenceproject.org

271–280 of 335 posts

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did your attorneys discuss fees with the opposing party prior to the suit? If not that’s why. This is common practice. It’s also why Google sent Oracle an extremely large legal bill when Oracle lost its first lawsuit over Java APIs.

You replied to: > In Germany, all costs associated with a lawsuit have to be paid/reimbursed by the losing party. with: > That is already how it works in US civil litigation. An optional agreement between parties is absolutely not the same as a mandatory, by-default, loser pays system. And yes, in my case getting an agreement like that was certainly going to be impossible. Also, re: Google and Oracle, the payment was…

Civil suits are optional. Discussions between parties in civil suits are mostly optional. The only thing about that isn't optional are the procedures and a final ruling on the matter. In most cases of civil suits the lawyers negotiate the expenditures going in. This is why many plaintiff lawyers won't accept every case that comes their way.

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Qualified immunity was made up by courts, their legislating from the bench should have no merit, and therefore revoking qualified immunity is the right thing to do under checks and balances. We need a replacement, one written in legislation, that puts fixed narrow limits on how immunity applies. If you break the law - you should receive no protections. There is no excuse for enforcers of law to not know the law. This…

> was made up by courts That's hardly unusual in a common law system..

Yeah but indefinitely precedent goes way beyond its intended purpose in achieving consistency. Especially when we have legislatures that rather not weigh on in issues whenever possible because they are worried about attack ads.

If I were to tweak it, I would make precedent expire, and even obligate the legislature to vote on a bill by the time it does that the courts ratify disambiguates the issue at and. Consistency and democracy.

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure it does. I don’t want paramedics prematurely giving up on saving peoples lives because there is fear of a lawsuit. Software developers don’t have this fear, so we get to kill people through releasing buggy bloated applications without any fear of personal liability.

Pure nonsense. Cite these cases where software engineers have built a decades-long track record of abusing power and murdering innocents under the guise of civil service and directly abusing qualified immunity to get away with it. Or maybe tone things down.

Perhaps that is data people should be tracking but aren't, which doesn't indicate an absence of such concerns.

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Invest in educational resources to teach communities how to deal with law enforcement. You have this exactly backwards. It's telling that instead of mentioning doing away with warrior training, for instance, you list things we, the people, need to do to deal with poorly trained cops with licenses to kill, which, in the case of the police, is exactly what this immunity grants. The police need better training to hand…

I agree with all of your points, except for your idea of "the people they serve and protect." If you read about the historical origins of the US police force, their (verifiably documented) lineage goes back to the days of English colonialism. Those original patrol groups were created to "protect" the damage/loss of property- namely to prevent runaway slaves from escaping their owner's control. The US police force has…

Way to go turning the whole of the police force into a bunch of racist bigots. With many family members serving in both law enforcement and the military, this is one of the most offensive things I have heard in a long time. 99% of the police are some of the best people you will ever meet, and they will even serve and protect people like you who don't appreciate them and would spit on them if had the chance.

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#275

I understand the arguments that "QI has reasonable goals in theory", but it is time to throw the baby out with the bathwater. If cops didn't want to lose QI, they should have held themselves to account for the last few decades. Maybe the unions should have spoken up when cops steal tens of thousands of dollars in cash from a suspect, and get away with it due to QI. San Antonio, TX will be voting in May on whether to…

How is it legal to vote to disband a union? Could you vote to disband the Screen Actors Guild?

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those are both irrelevant to the issue at hand: wrongful arrest. Wrongful arrest occurs when either the incorrect person is detained or when a person is detained without merit. In order for police to detain people they need to place them under arrest, which includes Maranda warnings, or have a signed warrant.

> In order for police to detain people they need to place them under arrest That is not true. Police can detain you for some period of time without placing you under arrest. You can be detained for “reasonable suspicion” that you were involved in a crime. There are naturally a lot of arguments about what qualifies as reasonable suspicion. This is why every “know your rights” organization instructs people to ask, “am…

> That is not true. Police can detain you for some period of time without placing you under arrest.

That is a 4th amendment violation. You are free to leave police presence at any time up until they place you under arrest. If you are detained without arrest the remedy is to ask to be arrested. At that point police must arrest you or release you, because any evidence or detention after that point is invalid and invalidate such in the future for the related matter.

Of course an even better answer is to just ask for an attorney, but either way the result is the same.

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#277

I understand the arguments that "QI has reasonable goals in theory", but it is time to throw the baby out with the bathwater. If cops didn't want to lose QI, they should have held themselves to account for the last few decades. Maybe the unions should have spoken up when cops steal tens of thousands of dollars in cash from a suspect, and get away with it due to QI. San Antonio, TX will be voting in May on whether to…

How is it legal to vote to disband a union? Could you vote to disband the Screen Actors Guild?

The same way you change any other service provider. You find another vendor or renegotiate. The people will vote to instruct their officials to do so. Pretty straightforward.

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#278

I understand the arguments that "QI has reasonable goals in theory", but it is time to throw the baby out with the bathwater. If cops didn't want to lose QI, they should have held themselves to account for the last few decades. Maybe the unions should have spoken up when cops steal tens of thousands of dollars in cash from a suspect, and get away with it due to QI. San Antonio, TX will be voting in May on whether to…

How is it legal to vote to disband a union? Could you vote to disband the Screen Actors Guild?

Short version: Texas state law establishes the right for cities to decide whether their police can engage in collective bargaining.

https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/LG/htm/LG.174.htm

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#279
post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with all of your points, except for your idea of "the people they serve and protect." If you read about the historical origins of the US police force, their (verifiably documented) lineage goes back to the days of English colonialism. Those original patrol groups were created to "protect" the damage/loss of property- namely to prevent runaway slaves from escaping their owner's control. The US police force has…

Way to go turning the whole of the police force into a bunch of racist bigots. With many family members serving in both law enforcement and the military, this is one of the most offensive things I have heard in a long time. 99% of the police are some of the best people you will ever meet, and they will even serve and protect people like you who don't appreciate them and would spit on them if had the chance.

> 99% of the police are some of the best people you will ever meet

The best people I would ever meet would not protect bad cops at every opportunity. The fact that police who stand up to bad policing are consistently removed from the ranks does not lend credence to your assertion.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/what-polic...

Re: New Mexico is the second state to ban qualified immunity

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In order for police to detain people they need to place them under arrest That is not true. Police can detain you for some period of time without placing you under arrest. You can be detained for “reasonable suspicion” that you were involved in a crime. There are naturally a lot of arguments about what qualifies as reasonable suspicion. This is why every “know your rights” organization instructs people to ask, “am…

> That is not true. Police can detain you for some period of time without placing you under arrest. That is a 4th amendment violation. You are free to leave police presence at any time up until they place you under arrest. If you are detained without arrest the remedy is to ask to be arrested. At that point police must arrest you or release you, because any evidence or detention after that point is invalid and invali…

No, it's not.

A traffic stop is a temporary detention without an arrest. You are not free to leave.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_stop

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