Breonna Taylor Killed In Her Apartment by LMPD Officers

[sportsfan41]

22 minutes ago, Colonels_Wear_Blue said:

When I was a federal contractor, the first thing we had to do when we were working in the Census Bureau, in the DEA offices I worked in, and in the FBI offices I worked in was put in camera systems that recorded every bit of work that I and my crew did the entire time we were on the job. You know what we did when they told us we had to do that? We said, "Well, pay us more to do it." So likewise, if that raises the cost of law enforcement, so be it.

And yes, if a job required that I wear a full-time body camera to do it, and if I wanted the job, I would willingly wear a camera on me at all times.

I'm not slamming cops. Don't know where you thought I slammed cops. I don't see what argument can be made for any "downside" to cops having body cameras, so that's why I suggested it. One of my good friends is a career cop and is a police chief now...he begged for body cameras for all of his officers - and got them. His reasoning: That way, when it comes in question what happened, what went wrong, or who did what, we just check the tape.

And for what it's worth, I'm very much in favor of requiring further qualifications for cops. Nurses have to have a bachelors degree and national licensure in almost all states and hospitals now. I'm also in favor of paying them accordingly.

Great in theory but hard to do.  In Kentucky, areas like NKY, Louisville, Lexington, Paducah, Bowling Green and a few others can probably do that to some extent.  There's less funding and resources in rural areas which actually make up the majority of police departments across the United States.  It won't happen unless the additional funds for salaries come from both federal and state funds.  In a time in which many are calling for defunding the police or shifting funds, I just don't see how it happens.

[John Anthony]

There was a big push to hire cops with bachelors last decade, which I get in principal, I think it has drawbacks as well.

[GrantNKY]

1 hour ago, Colonels_Wear_Blue said:

And for what it's worth, I'm very much in favor of requiring further qualifications for cops. Nurses have to have a bachelors degree and national licensure in almost all states and hospitals now. I'm also in favor of paying them accordingly.

This. We should hold police to the same standards we hold all of our other essential services in this country. Almost every profession requires a 4 year degree in the field of study, a license to practice in the state, and required continuing education to maintain that license. I don’t see how anyone could be against that for police officers. Pay them whatever they want. Being a police officer should be held to an extremely high standard and some of the best people I know and some people that have mentored me my entire life, are officers. What’s going on in this country is causing them a lot of pain because they just want to help, but don’t know how. If we pay cops more, then we’ll get more qualified, good people wanting to enter the profession. If we can help create better cops who are active members and have relationships in ALL of our communities, we’ll be much better off. It all starts in my opinion with having to increase the qualifications required to become an officer. 

[sportsfan41]

20 minutes ago, GrantNKY said:

This. We should hold police to the same standards we hold all of our other essential services in this country. Almost every profession requires a 4 year degree in the field of study, a license to practice in the state, and required continuing education to maintain that license. I don’t see how anyone could be against that for police officers. Pay them whatever they want. Being a police officer should be held to an extremely high standard and some of the best people I know and some people that have mentored me my entire life, are officers. What’s going on in this country is causing them a lot of pain because they just want to help, but don’t know how. If we pay cops more, then we’ll get more qualified, good people wanting to enter the profession. If we can help create better cops who are active members and have relationships in ALL of our communities, we’ll be much better off. It all starts in my opinion with having to increase the qualifications required to become an officer. 

I will say this, many of the things being suggested by national media, have been standard practice in Kentucky for a very long time.  It's mind boggling that they aren't as common in other states.  The reasons i keep hearing or reading from those states though, is lack of funding.  

[GrantNKY]

6 hours ago, sportsfan41 said:

I will say this, many of the things being suggested by national media, have been standard practice in Kentucky for a very long time.  It's mind boggling that they aren't as common in other states.  The reasons i keep hearing or reading from those states though, is lack of funding.  

The standards practices didn’t keep Breonna Taylor alive so I would say even Kentucky needs to make drastic changes to how they educate and fund police departments. 

[John Anthony]

10 hours ago, GrantNKY said:

This. We should hold police to the same standards we hold all of our other essential services in this country. Almost every profession requires a 4 year degree in the field of study, a license to practice in the state, and required continuing education to maintain that license. I don’t see how anyone could be against that for police officers. Pay them whatever they want. Being a police officer should be held to an extremely high standard and some of the best people I know and some people that have mentored me my entire life, are officers. What’s going on in this country is causing them a lot of pain because they just want to help, but don’t know how. If we pay cops more, then we’ll get more qualified, good people wanting to enter the profession. If we can help create better cops who are active members and have relationships in ALL of our communities, we’ll be much better off. It all starts in my opinion with having to increase the qualifications required to become an officer. 

This goes both ways while a degree gets you a “better” overall candidate, we cannot inherently see talent, and we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover.  A resume simply put, is the table of contents of your own personal work-book.

[GrantNKY]

39 minutes ago, John Anthony said:

This goes both ways while a degree gets you a “better” overall candidate, we cannot inherently see talent, and we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover.  A resume simply put, is the table of contents of your own personal work-book.

I agree. There are way more things that need to be done to increase the number of good candidates. First and foremost you have to make it where people want to become officers. That starts with an increase in pay. If we can make it a more appealing job and the candidate pool would increase. With an increased candidate pool we would be able to create an environment where we could have increased standards on what it takes to become an officer and stay an officer. We just have to do something to change the relationships between our officers and all of our communities. Cops need to stop shooting people at the very least because it has created an environment where cops are now all viewed under the lens of the officers who are committing these heinous acts. 

[TheDeuce]

9 minutes ago, GrantNKY said:

I agree. There are way more things that need to be done to increase the number of good candidates. First and foremost you have to make it where people want to become officers. That starts with an increase in pay. If we can make it a more appealing job and the candidate pool would increase. With an increased candidate pool we would be able to create an environment where we could have increased standards on what it takes to become an officer and stay an officer. We just have to do something to change the relationships between our officers and all of our communities. Cops need to stop shooting people at the very least because it has created an environment where cops are now all viewed under the lens of the officers who are committing these heinous acts. 

Cops and firefighters have been grossly underpaid from the jump in most communities. Some of that can be fixed with reallocation of funding within the departments, and a bigger portion can be fixed with our local and national leaders providing more funding for compensation to these folks. 

[John Anthony]

9 minutes ago, GrantNKY said:

I agree. There are way more things that need to be done to increase the number of good candidates. First and foremost you have to make it where people want to become officers. That starts with an increase in pay. If we can make it a more appealing job and the candidate pool would increase. With an increased candidate pool we would be able to create an environment where we could have increased standards on what it takes to become an officer and stay an officer. We just have to do something to change the relationships between our officers and all of our communities. Cops need to stop shooting people at the very least because it has created an environment where cops are now all viewed under the lens of the officers who are committing these heinous acts. 

I think another problem a lot of these college educated guys and gals, which there’s nothing wrong with of course, haven’t really been exposed to city life.  Heck, I know so many people who are afraid to go to Reds night games.  We have to really broaden our recruiting pool.

Then again, I think we’re about to see a major cop shortage, who would want to do it at this point?

[TheDeuce]

2 minutes ago, John Anthony said:

I think another problem a lot of these college educated guys and gals, which there’s nothing wrong with of course, haven’t really been exposed to city life.  Heck, I know so many people who are afraid to go to Reds night games.  

This is an important point, IMO. You can't be afraid of the communities you are policing. If you are, that's already a bad start. 

[John Anthony]

25 minutes ago, TheDeuce said:

This is an important point, IMO. You can't be afraid of the communities you are policing. If you are, that's already a bad start. 

1000%.  I’m a psychology guy as well, I like to study and observe.  How many of these police incidents are with minority officers?

[TheDeuce]

5 minutes ago, John Anthony said:

1000%.  I’m a psychology guy as well, I like to study and observe.  How many of these police incidents are with minority officers?

None that I am aware of, but I'm sure it's happened. 

[theguru]

I am not for four year degrees for officers.  I would rather have someone that served in the military or someone with solid work experience over a degree.  I am not saying degrees are bad but I think their importance is way overblown for police officers. 

[sportsfan41]

5 hours ago, GrantNKY said:

The standards practices didn’t keep Breonna Taylor alive so I would say even Kentucky needs to make drastic changes to how they educate and fund police departments. 

As 00Rocket has already mentioned, there is nothing standard about shooting through a wall or window when an officer can't see what's on the other side.  Suppressive fire is not a standard practice.  Based on everything that's been released thus far, including the fired officer, that's what happened.  

 

I understand and can certainly appreciate the frustration in how long the investigation is taking.  

[TheDeuce]

1 minute ago, theguru said:

I am not saying degrees are bad but I think their importance is way overblown for police officers. 

I agree. How a person interacts with other people is FAR more important than a four year degree, IMO.