Qualified immunity.
That’s a good point, and I’m certainly not a self-described expert on much at all, but I’ve been using the term regarding the fascistic police powers @samul has highlighted. These are not really present in the USA. The stylish Italian uniforms don’t really help much, either.
I have a problem with bad laws that can be broadly described as fascistic, but in the USA we’re fortunately operating in a system where that’s a rather simple change to make, if we decide it should be made. I’d prefer that all of adulthood become legally available at 18, but that’s just me.
“The court of appeals reversed the grant of qualified immunity and remanded the case for trial. The court held no reasonable officer could have believed there was probable cause to arrest Bell based on the plainly exculpatory evidence readily available to them.”
Read that part and take note of the reasonable part. In the case of fighting words, it could be unreasonable to expect a cop to know Constitutional law.
It is completely reasonable to expect a cop to know simply calling someone names isn’t a crime.
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Isn’t it cops’ job to enforce laws?
But we aren’t talking about that. Imagine you are a white guy, walking around Harlem and calling every black person you see the n word. You don’t think that person would get arrested? maybe even held for psychiatric evaluation?
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Enforce and interpret are two different things. Not even the Supreme Court can come to unanimous consensus on the laws. Hence, qualified immunity.
And here it comes. It was maybe the second week of lockdown, April of last year. No exit from one’s house was allowed, except for buying groceries, medicines, and other minor edge cases like walking the dog or doing physical activity alone.
I live in a pretty isolated neighborhood–it looks more like living in the woods than living in a city; not much people or houses, lots of trees, you get the idea.
Throughout the whole lockdown, I would take walks at night as my form of cardio. That would happen on an empty street near my place.
One night (might have been 10.30PM) I was walking down that street and I saw a police car drive by. They immediately pulled over to the side I was walking on. The driver uttered the words:
“Where’d you hide the coke?”
To which I replied, “what?”
After that, they asked what I was doing to which I replied, “just talking a walk. Is it not allowed?”
“Absolutely not.”
To which I replied, “as far as I know, the [insert name of then-active covid order] allows that.”
Wanna know what the officer answer to that was? I remember it like it happened yesterday.
“Don’t talk to me about laws or I’ll take you to the police station.”
Then he added, “if you’re just taking a walk, say that, don’t be talking laws.”
“That’s what I said. I’m taking a walk.”
“Sounds good. Goodbye.”
And off they drove.
See, it sounded nothing like they wanted to enforce laws or anything. What it sounded like to me, was they knew they couldn’t really do anything to me, yet they still wanted to intimidate me or feed their egos or something.
This is the general feeling you get from police (of course, it’s not true for every officer, but I just couldn’t help but notice this feel they give off, and how different it is from what I observed watching US police interaction videos).
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Something I have to say in favor of Italian police is, from what I’ve been able to gather watching about US police, that I would probably feel less at ease interacting with US police, even in light of all the points I raised.
For example, you’ll never hear an Italian policeman go with the “keep your hands out of your pockets for me please,” and you’ll get funny looks if you say “officer, I’m going to reach into my pockets to grab [whatever]”.
(As a complete aside, you’ll also get looked at as an alien if you ask, “am I free to go or am I being detained?” Not to mention there isn’t even a word in Italian that translates to “detained” in the sense it’s used in that sentence. And you’d probably get them upset because you aren’t being polite by asking to leave. Seriously.)
Never does it feel like they are on the verge of drawing their gun, or ready to shoot you. I’m not saying this is what it feel like on the daily in America, because of course I can’t know that, but it is the vibe watching American police gives me.
It also doesn’t feel like they’re constantly looking for something to incriminate you. I have never heard anyone in Italy suggest that you don’t talk to the police or say it’s detrimental to do so. Honestly, if I had to describe what it’s like to talk to Italian police, it’s more like they’re going to scold you or something like that. As opposed to, “here, lemme get your ID so I can cite you or arrest you for something.”
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We aren’t talking about THAT. You said “Walk up to a black person here and call him the n word.” Calling one Black person the n word is not a crime. It’s disgusting and stupid, but not illegal.
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As an European we have probably identical system and police to Italians. ID stops are normal. Car pulls as well. I was stopped twice this month. Nothing really happend. First time they checked my documents and everything was fine and let me go. Second time they pulled me, recognised me and let me go.
Police is respected here And they act friendly. Sitizens seem to act friendly towards them as well. We have police officers often hanging out in local bars and coffees, eating in restaurants uniformed and you can hear sitizens greetin them nicely.
I have a 50 year old policeman in the gym who stopped me once for a serious road offence. I speeded and passed a truck on a pedestrian road. The guy pulled me, recognised me and wrote me a ticket for 20 EUR, instead of losing license points and getting a 100 EUR fine. He explained to his colleague im a good guy who probably spend 10 mins more on the gym and was in a rush for work, and that he knows i am not a trouble maker
However there is a contempt for police setting speeding cameras. The most popular facebook groups are for local speeding cameras, and we flash like madmen to the oposite direction drivers when we spot such cameras on the road.
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This, if they don’t have their neck broken first.
We’ve had this for over 6 out of the past twelve months. They also impose 5km radiuses… It’s fucking ridiculous, I can run further than that in like 25-30 minutes.
@twojarslave you mention sobriety checkpoints being problematic. You can lose your license, incur a fine in the 1000$+ range etc for smoking a joint two days ago, driving and going through one of these checkpoints in Australia.
Even during our strict lockdowns to ensure public safety, somehow random drug tests/sobriety checkpoints aren’t currently off the table. Too risky to leave the house because you might catch covid, but police can handle hundreds/thousands of samples of saliva daily
Lol you’ll get a ticket for a few hundred AUD if you’re pulled over for going like 4km over the speed limit… Which happens all the time here
The main reason why I learned Italian as a kid.
North of the Raffaella Carra line seems pretty ok to me.
I’ve been stopped by polizia stradale many times (mostly for speeding), even by the carabinieri. I was always at ease, cracking jokes and communication and general demeanor by all involved was very laid back - “thirty over the speed limit? In this piece of shit vehicle? You must be completely delusional” (well, except for one carabiniere that had a Slovenian surname and hence a big chip on his shoulder)
My interactions with the police in the States were much, much more uncomfortable - don’t get me wrong, the troopers were very polite - but there was a seriousness that conveyed the fact that they believed that there’s a non-negligible possibility that I’ll pull a gun on them during a traffic stop. I wrote about one of these encounters a few years back on the Forum.
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exactly! Like I said, having never been to the US, I can only speak from watching other people’s experiences, but I get the vibe you’re describing every time I watch one of these videos.
on the other hand, (I might have failed to mention that) my father is a police officer himself, and I can’t take him seriously if my life depended on it. So maybe that plays a role in my perception of Italian police…
oh wow. We do not have that severe tickets. The idea was people here seem to have good relationship with police. And the police shows respect back. They need to write tickets to survive, but they will be neglitent and write you a smaller ticket.
I’ve gotten off with warnings every time I’ve been pulled over since my last ticket 20 years ago. I don’t think it has anything to do with my looks or charm. Here’s what I do.
Make sure I’m pulling over somewhere safe. Turn on the interior light. Open the windows including the rear so he can see inside easily. Have both hands on the steering wheel with my license, registration, insurance info and concealed carry permit ready to hand over.
Doing all of this tells the cops quite a bit about me. I’m making the stop easier for them, considerately informing them I have a firearm and presenting one of the only government issued good guy cards available to civilians.
This protocol has gotten me out of a ticket for 20 mph over (in front of the police station, no less). 10 mph over and one headlight out and another 10 over stop.
Maybe I just got lucky but I don’t think I would have been lucky if I was a rude jerk.
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Tell this to a cop in Aus “I have a gun in the back of my car”
you’ll be kissing the pavement and assigned a court date/be jailed with a super expensive bail prior to the court date.
20mph over the speed limit here? Instantaneous loss of license, car will be impounded and probably crushed. Doesn’t matter how upstanding you are, we are the nanny state of nanny states!
I understand, but the point both myself and @samul are trying to make is that in Europe none of these things you listed would ever cross our minds during a traffic stop. The nature of police-civilian interaction is radically different.
I’m not saying that is somehow better, it’s just that there’s a different paradigm at play. I’m pretty sure it would probably make more sense if the European cops were more risk-conscious during such interactions.
During police interactions in Europe I (unintentionally) did things that would have gotten me killed in the States.
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