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Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

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Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#261

Post by cgriswald »

actionfromafar wrote: post #130
cgriswald wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You want to give the government the legal ability to threaten the life of the entire civil service, judiciary, and all elected representatives. I’m sure that would never be abused.

The government already has that, since currently anyone (except the King) can get the death penalty.

I am opposed to the death penalty in all cases, for a variety of reasons.

However, currently the court has to at least find that a murder has occurred or in some cases child rape (sometimes with conditions like a second offense). These are categorically different offenses that are unlikely to occur during the normal course of a public servants job, except perhaps if police kill someone there may be a question whether it was murder.

If “violation of trust” is given the death penalty than any normal act in the course of a public servant’s service history could potentially be used to hang him by questioning the legitimacy of the act.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#262

Post by graemep »

kypro wrote: post #217
loeg wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of those arrested are just for mild insults, which are illegal under the censorious UK regime; not incitement to terrorism or threats.

Not UK but in Germany you can face criminal prosecution for insulting the chancellor, https://x.com/Pirat_Nation/status/2056692341399081235 While here in the UK you can be arrested and charged for saying mean things about the royal family on private whatsapp groups, https://www.itv.com/news/london/2023-09-07/five-former-met-p...

The second one was for specifically racist messages - i.e. breaching hate speech laws - not just being mean.

I am opposed to criminalising hate speech, BUT I think its important to be clear its not just "saying mean things".

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#263

Post by ubermonkey »

WillAdams wrote: post #249
Hnrobert42 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a lot of liability for police. They would likely buy insurance against it.

And insurers doing their due diligence and charging based on potential for liability would go a long way to mitigating abuses. Best solution would be to simply require licensing and conduct standards to be a police professional similar to that required for Registered Nurses.

Or barbers.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#264

Post by graemep »

implements wrote: post #232
okeuro49 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK 30 people are arrested a day for social media posts online. Only about 10 percent resulting in convictions. Police don't face criminal charges for this. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arr...

Excuse the whataboutism, but how many Americans are arrested for “disorderly conduct” each day? (Which from my YouTube police footage watching appears to be “being an annoying arsehole in public” [1] ie a broadly similar moral misbehaviour) > [1] An overt act or conduct in public (or affecting the public) that disturbs the peace, safety, morals, or order (e.g., fighting, making unreasonable noise, using obscene/abusi…

Similar in the UK, and there has been along history of the police misusing things such as "causing an obstruction" here

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#265

Post by AmVess »

contubernio wrote: post #28

The sheriff that arrested him should face criminal charges for misuse of authority. That he doesn't reflects a structural weakness in US law. In most European legal systems a law enforcement officer overstepping his legal authority would face criminal charges for it.

The same Europe where people who criticize the rapist of their child does more time for causing offense than the rapist did for the actual rape? THAT Europe?

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#266

Post by nyeah »

freediddy wrote: post #155

The fact that taxpayers and not the police themselves have to pay the settlement is the worst part of this. Every settlement against the police should be taken from their pension fund. This is something I've been advocating for decades now, because it creates an incentive not to do things like this. Right now, good cops don't patrol bad cops because it won't affect them. By aligning the incentives right, it will mean…

What if a majority of taxpayers voted for that sheriff?

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#267

Post by pipes »

newaccountman2 wrote: post #260
okeuro49 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the UK 30 people are arrested a day for social media posts online. Only about 10 percent resulting in convictions. Police don't face criminal charges for this. https://www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-make-30-arr...

[flagged]

Who cares? Well the grand parent post references Europe, it is presumably a response to that.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#268

Post by unethical_ban »

elicash wrote: post #71

I’ll cut against the grain here and say it’s ABSOLUTELY appropriate for taxpayers to pay the bill here. It’s pretty toxic that people don’t want to take responsibility for their own government in a democracy. In this case, it’s especially bad, given the sheriff is elected by the people directly. But I’d go even further and say even where control is less direct, we need incentives for voters to take this stuff serious…

You're on the right track - the services of government should be more accountable to the people, and the people should hold some responsibility for the actions of their government.

For police in particular, the unions prevent a lot of police accountability, and because of the power that police wield over the population, I am comfortable saying I support unions EXCEPT police unions. At best they should be ballot initiatives.

If I go further down my rabbit hole of systemic issues, I think citizens should be more involved in community policing in large populations.

Re: Tennessee man jailed 37 days for Trump meme wins settlement after lawsuit

#270

Post by eukara »

pipes wrote: post #267
newaccountman2 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Who cares? Well the grand parent post references Europe, it is presumably a response to that.

"most European legal systems" implies more than one system, they're most likely referring to the "European Union" and not the geographical continent of Europe, which the UK is not a part of anymore
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