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Christopher Dorner - Keith Millea - 13-02-2013
Quote:It was murder
Sure was...
Christopher Dorner wanted to bring honor back to his name and the LAPD.By killing a number of people,he has done just the opposite.He will be remembered as a murderer.So be it...
Christopher Dorner - Peter Lemkin - 13-02-2013
Keith Millea Wrote:Quote:It was murder
Sure was...
Christopher Dorner wanted to bring honor back to his name and the LAPD.By killing a number of people,he has done just the opposite.He will be remembered as a murderer.So be it...
While I don't agree with and would not have chosen if in the same situation Dorner's methods...we MUST separate out the wrongdoing and crimes of the LAPD to him and the People from the way he chose to deal with it. I find his manifesto a viable document and active incitement of the LAPD who have been implicated in everything from Ramparts, Rodney King, RFK and more.....they are a VERY ugly Police dept....but personally, I only know a handful of decent ones...in small towns with progressive people for the most part. Those I know, I'd not name on a public forum. I know one where the Sheriff declared that NO ONE would be arrested, no matter what Federal or State law said, for any crime without a victim!...how progressive is that!..but I digress....
Sadly, Dorner is likely dead and won't be able to speak to the injustices he saw and was subjected to.......mini-Waco.
Christopher Dorner - Jan Klimkowski - 13-02-2013
As for Original Sin, certain members of the Symbionese Liberation Army were torched.
See c1:40 onwards in the trailer for Guerilla.
Fire destroys.
The evidence.
I once had a recording of the entire documentary but no more. Here's another clip:
Christopher Dorner - Lauren Johnson - 13-02-2013
by Scott Creighton
This is a slightly interesting development.
According to Brian Todd of CNN reporting on a statement from Chief Kirk Ellington of the U.S. Marshal Service, the suspect in the cabin that was torched by the cops in San Bernardino, attempted to exit the burning building via the back door and was "pushed" back inside.
Here is the entire CNN transcript from Anderson Cooper's show which talked about it.
Our Brian Todd is hearing new information about exactly the sequence of events.
Brian, what have you learned?
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via phone): Anderson, I just spoke with Chief Kirk Ellington of the U.S. Marshal Service. He's a district chief out in California. He just told me that at one point during the standoff, the suspect tried to escape. He said he tried to escape out the back. I'm not sure exactly where the back is in relation to where you know, some of the pictures that we were seeing, but he said he tried to escape at the back and was pushed back inside.
Not clear how he was pushed back inside. I asked him when that occurred during the sequence, and he said about the time when the fire started. He also I asked him about any weapons that he had, what kind of weapons. They're not sure what kind of weapons that he had in there. It was his understanding at that time when I just spoke to him that there were no hostages in there. But again that's that was his understanding at time.
That's I don't think that's been confirmed yet by anyone at this point. But he did tell me that at one point the suspect tried to escape out the back and was pushed back inside.
COOPER: Kyle Martin, whose mom owns the cabin and still with I think on the phone.
Kyle, when you hear that the suspect attempted to leave through the rear of the cabin, I'm not sure what image you're looking at right now on television, but what we're showing, can you tell me, is that the front of the cabin, the rear of the cabin, what are we seeing?
MARTIN: Right there from what I'm looking I'm watching CNN. So it looks like that's the front of the cabin. That looks like directly down as the the main road right there.
COOPER: And
MARTIN: The barn there's also a barn right to the left of it that's kind of obscured by the trees.
COOPER: So you're saying there's a number of cabins on this property. This is kind of the main cabin of and there one they're rented out? Traditionally.
MARTIN: Yes, just rented out, you know, over the wintertime, people go up there and stay. And that's another thing, too, is when they said he was trying to escape through the back. You know, if he directly runs up on the TV anyway there's other small cabins in there, you know, he can take refuge in.
COOPER: That was going to be my next question. If he had left through the rear, where I mean, how big a property is this besides the other cabins on the property? Are there other houses nearby?
MARTIN: On the property there's yes, there's six and there's about 10 acres of the property itself. Other nearby cabins of other people are a little ways away. You know, like a mile away or so.
COOPER: Right. Kyle, stand by if you can.
Chris Voss, the former FBI hostage negotiator, is also with us.
Chris, I'm just wondering, as you have watched this play out over the last couple of hours, what has been going through your mind? Or what are your thoughts?
CHRIS VOSS, FORMER FBI HOSTAGE NEGOTIATOR: That's ultimately the indicator whether or not law enforcement has got an opportunity to talk him out. You can't negotiate a gunfight or a riot. If he takes the time to stop shooting long enough to communicate, then you find out whether or not he loves himself enough to try to survive to carry on his cause.
Just as we're hearing this, the one thing in a strange sort of way I'm encouraged about the report of him trying to escape out the back, it doesn't sound like it includes him using trying to use a human shield. So that tends to indicate more that he might have been alone in the cabin, which, of course, would be very good news. CNN transcripts
What does "pushed' back inside mean in this context, I don't know. Was he forced back by gunfire? Seems like they would have just shot him in the back yard, right? Does it mean he was physically forced back into the burning building? How is that possible if this was the 270 pound ex-marine?Brian, what have you learned?
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via phone): Anderson, I just spoke with Chief Kirk Ellington of the U.S. Marshal Service. He's a district chief out in California. He just told me that at one point during the standoff, the suspect tried to escape. He said he tried to escape out the back. I'm not sure exactly where the back is in relation to where you know, some of the pictures that we were seeing, but he said he tried to escape at the back and was pushed back inside.
Not clear how he was pushed back inside. I asked him when that occurred during the sequence, and he said about the time when the fire started. He also I asked him about any weapons that he had, what kind of weapons. They're not sure what kind of weapons that he had in there. It was his understanding at that time when I just spoke to him that there were no hostages in there. But again that's that was his understanding at time.
That's I don't think that's been confirmed yet by anyone at this point. But he did tell me that at one point the suspect tried to escape out the back and was pushed back inside.
COOPER: Kyle Martin, whose mom owns the cabin and still with I think on the phone.
Kyle, when you hear that the suspect attempted to leave through the rear of the cabin, I'm not sure what image you're looking at right now on television, but what we're showing, can you tell me, is that the front of the cabin, the rear of the cabin, what are we seeing?
MARTIN: Right there from what I'm looking I'm watching CNN. So it looks like that's the front of the cabin. That looks like directly down as the the main road right there.
COOPER: And
MARTIN: The barn there's also a barn right to the left of it that's kind of obscured by the trees.
COOPER: So you're saying there's a number of cabins on this property. This is kind of the main cabin of and there one they're rented out? Traditionally.
MARTIN: Yes, just rented out, you know, over the wintertime, people go up there and stay. And that's another thing, too, is when they said he was trying to escape through the back. You know, if he directly runs up on the TV anyway there's other small cabins in there, you know, he can take refuge in.
COOPER: That was going to be my next question. If he had left through the rear, where I mean, how big a property is this besides the other cabins on the property? Are there other houses nearby?
MARTIN: On the property there's yes, there's six and there's about 10 acres of the property itself. Other nearby cabins of other people are a little ways away. You know, like a mile away or so.
COOPER: Right. Kyle, stand by if you can.
Chris Voss, the former FBI hostage negotiator, is also with us.
Chris, I'm just wondering, as you have watched this play out over the last couple of hours, what has been going through your mind? Or what are your thoughts?
CHRIS VOSS, FORMER FBI HOSTAGE NEGOTIATOR: That's ultimately the indicator whether or not law enforcement has got an opportunity to talk him out. You can't negotiate a gunfight or a riot. If he takes the time to stop shooting long enough to communicate, then you find out whether or not he loves himself enough to try to survive to carry on his cause.
Just as we're hearing this, the one thing in a strange sort of way I'm encouraged about the report of him trying to escape out the back, it doesn't sound like it includes him using trying to use a human shield. So that tends to indicate more that he might have been alone in the cabin, which, of course, would be very good news. CNN transcripts
It's an interesting development especially when you consider Dorner stayed across the street from the manhunt headquarters for a week and they just happened to "find' his wallet next to the charred remains of a body after first finding the wallet in another town last week. I wonder who they "pushed' into that burning building.
http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2013/02/13/person-in-cabin-tried-to-escape-out-the-back-when-fire-started-he-was-pushed-back-in/
Christopher Dorner - Lauren Johnson - 14-02-2013
Edit: you know they did when they officially deny it.
Christopher Dorner - Magda Hassan - 14-02-2013
Christopher Dorner: 'police discuss burn plan' - audio
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2013/feb/13/christopher-dorner-police-burn-planChristopher Dorner - Peter Lemkin - 14-02-2013
Again, it was premeditated murder by fire on the part of the police....they wanted him DEAD and didn't want him to be able to be tried and bring up the crimes of the Police force - past or present! Sick...and now the story will just fade away...with no examination nor change of the LAPD.....
Christopher Dorner - Peter Lemkin - 14-02-2013
Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, miners would bring canaries with them into coal mines to warn them about the presence of dangerous gasses. The small birds and their tiny respiratory systems were more sensitive to methane and carbon monoxide fumes than those of humans and so when the canaries would die, the miners knew that something was seriously wrong -- hence the expression "like a canary in a coal mine." Christopher Dorner is one such canary.
One well-armed and purportedly well-trained man was able to wreak havoc on Southern California for seven days. There were thousands of officers involved in the manhunt for Dorner -- imagine the consequences if 10 or 100 well-armed and well-trained men decided to do the same thing? For the officials who appear poorly prepared for the very real threat of domestic terrorism, this is their canary.
During the hunt for Dorner three innocent people who did not resemble the suspect even slightly (two of which were women, one of whom was a white male) were fired upon.
The officers who opened fire on the two innocent women (who were delivering newspapers at the time) unloaded over 25 rounds into their truck. Thankfully the officers were as incompetent at aiming their weapons as they were in discriminating valid targets and both women survived.
The third innocent victim, on his way to the beach to go surfing, was rammed by a police cruiser at high speed. The officers leaped out and began firing at the vehicle. His pickup truck purportedly "resembled" Dorner's. Again, thankfully both officers were just incompetent enough to fail to injure him.
Had these three innocent people been killed, the LAPD would have been responsible for nearly as many deaths as the suspect they were chasing. In both cases the police did not identify themselves and did not ask the vehicles to stop or issue any warnings, they simply opened fire.
The only other police forces with which I'm familiar that behave in this fashion work in the third world and are typically called "death squads" as opposed of officers of the law. This kind of reckless endangerment of ordinary citizens, the folks who are ultimately the police's employers and those they are hired to protect, is unacceptable.
Dorner is not a martyr or hero; he is a murderer of innocent people. The allegations contained in Dorner's manifesto however, merit serious investigation if for no other reason than to repair of the LAPD's reputation.
They are not "ramblings on the internet" as Chief Charlie Beck of the LAPD inaccurately characterized them, but detailed descriptions of events with dates, times and names. A quick and incomplete synopsis of Dorner's allegations are:
That he (Dorner) was fired from the LAPD for refusing to cover up police abuse of a mentally disabled man (testimony from the disabled man's father supports Dorner's claim that the man was kicked in the chest and face).
That pictures of recently deceased bodies are taken by officers with cellphones and a game played to see who has the most graphic images of dead people.
That officers looked forward to 187 calls (murder) so as to accrue the overtime pay and would see dead victims as "ATV's", "Waverunners","RV's" and "new clothes for their kids."
That Police recruits were singing Nazi songs celebrating the burning of Jews.
That officers involved in the Rodney King or Rampart scandals have been promoted or are still employed with the LAPD.
All of the court documents are available here.
Regardless of whether or not they are true, these claims have resonated with the public -- Dorner's Facebook group has over 14,000 likes and was founded only seven days ago.
The extent to which his claims have found currency with ordinary people should be extremely troubling to the LAPD. Dorner is dead and gone but he is a warning of far more serious problems that must be dealt with. We ignore this canary at our own peril.
Christopher Dorner - Peter Lemkin - 15-02-2013
JUAN GONZÃLEZ: Medical examiners in California say they have positively identified the body of former Los Angeles police officer Christopher Dorner, the man authorities say killed four people over the last two weeks in a campaign of terror against the LAPD. Dorner's body was found in the burned-out ruins of a California mountain cabin, ending the most extensive manhunt in California's history. Dorner was chased into the cabin on Tuesday afternoon amidst a massive gun battle in which one San Bernardino County deputy was killed and another badly wounded. Police say the first shotthey first shot conventional tear gas into the cabin, but it failed to force Dorner to flee the house.
AMY GOODMAN: Authorities then shot flammable tear gas canisters into the cabin. The building soon erupted in flames and burned to the ground. Police had been alerted to Dorner's possible whereabouts after he had broken into a nearby vacation home, tied up a couple there, and made off in their car. The couple managed to free themselves and alert authorities.
Questions are now being raised over whether police intentionally set the cabin on fire. An audio recording from a police scanner appears to show officials from the San Bernardino Sheriff's Department planning to deploy "burners."
MALE VOICE: All right, Steve, we're going to gowe're going to go forward with the plan, withwith the burner.
MALE VOICE: We want it, uh, like we talked about.
MALE VOICE: Seven of the burners deployed, and we have a fire.
FEMALE VOICE: Copy. Seven burners deployed, and we have a fire.
JUAN GONZÃLEZ: Police say the phrase "burner" referred to a grenade-like canister containing flammable tear gas. In another recording that was aired live on the TV station KCAL, a police officer can be heard in the background shouting, "We're going to burn him out," and "Burn it down."
KCAL REPORTER: We do know that authorities were searching for a man in a Dodge pickup truck.
POLICE OFFICER: The last location of the suspect [inaudible].
POLICE OFFICER: We're going to [bleep] burn him out!"
POLICE OFFICER: [inaudible] I don't know.
POLICE OFFICER: Let's burn it down.
POLICE OFFICER: Get going, right now!
POLICE OFFICER: Burn this [bleep]!
KCAL REPORTER: Police officers, understandably, upset.
AMY GOODMAN: On Wednesday, San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon admitted his deputies deployed the highly flammable hot gas canisters, but denied they intentionally started the fire.
SHERIFF JOHN McMAHON: I can tell you that it was not on purpose. We did not intentionally burn down that cabin to get Mr. Dorner out. The tear gas canisters that we usedfirst off, we used a presence when we showed up. Secondly, we used a cold tear gas. Then we usedthe next tear gas was that that was pyrotechnic, does generate a lot of heat. We introduced those canisters into the residence, and a fire erupted.
AMY GOODMAN: We asked a representative from the San Bernardino sheriff's office to join us, but they declined. But for more, though, we are joined by two guests: Norm Stamper, former police chief of Seattle and the author of Breaking Rank: A Top Cop's Exposé of the Dark Side of American Policing, and in Washington, D.C., we're joined by Radley Balko, a senior writer and investigative reporter for The Huffington Post. He's author of the forthcoming book, Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces, which is due out in July.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Chief Stamper, why don't we start with you, former Police Chief Stamper? Can you react to how the San Bernardino Police Department dealt withwith Dorner, the burning down of the cabin? What is your understanding of what happened and what was used?
NORM STAMPER: Well, I think the sheriff has articulated what might be seen as escalating levels of force. He started with the mere presence of the deputies, presumably surrounding that cabin. Then they used cold tear gas, so-called cold tear gas. And then they went to the pyrotechnic version, or the incendiary version of CS gas. And whether it was intentional or not, a very predictable outcome of deploying seven burners in what appears to have been a wooden cabin would predictably leave it in rubble.
AMY GOODMAN: And what's your assessment of that? Do you think they should have done that?
NORM STAMPER: You know, I'm not going to second-guess it, but I think over the days and weeks ahead it's imperative that that agency and the rest of the country, all of us riveted by what happened there, understand what decisions were made and why they were made. I can tell you that I am troubled by the use of incendiary chemical agents. By definition, these pyrotechnic versions of tear gas start fires. They are intended for outdoor use. They are not intended for contained structures, particularly wooden structures.
Another observation that I think bears real careful examination, and that is the almost hysterical command to use those burners. The expletives that were used begin to suggest that emotion rather than professionalism, rather than a calm and deliberate approach to extracting Mr. Dorner, if in fact that was possible, were simply not used.
AMY GOODMAN: We're going to go to a break, and then we're going to return to this discussion. Norm Stamper is former Seattle police chief, author of the book Breaking Rank. And we're also going to be joined by Radley Balko, who is writing the book Rise of the Warrior Cop. After that, we'll be joined by Ben Jealous, president and CEO of the NAACP, who will talk about President Obama's State of the Union address proposal in dealing with obstacles to voting. This is Democracy Now!. Back in a minute.
Christopher Dorner - Peter Lemkin - 15-02-2013
AMY GOODMAN: Our guests are former Seattle Police Chief Norm Stamper and Radley Balko, Huffington Post writer, author of the forthcoming, "Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces."
JUAN GONZÃLEZ: I'd like to ask Chief stamper, on this issue you say you have concerns about the use of these incendiary devices. Of course, this is not the first time in a major high-profile police action that we have had these devices used and have raised controversy. It was 20 years ago this year, in 1993, that the FBI used incendiary devices to end their siege of the Branch Davidian complex crisis in Waco. At the time, authorities claimed the cult members intentionally burned down the compound. I want to play a clip of CNN 's live coverage from April 15, 1993 when that fire had just begun.
REPORTER: Engulfed the vast majority of this compound.
REPORTER: Bonnie, the entire roof is gone.
REPORTER: The entire roof is gone, Mike. What else can you tell us? Any sign of firefighting equipment?
REPORTER: No, none whatsoever. And there is our shot from you'll remember, Bonnie, what we referred to as the farm-cam that is looking from the north side into the compound. Apparently, the north side is not involved yet, but, it appears the rest of the compound is filled with an orange fire and acrid black smoke.
REPORTER: Also, within the past 10 days, past week, federal authorities surrounded the compound, very close to the compound, with razor sharp concertina wire to prevent people from running out. That may, in this case, prove to be hazardous.
REPORTER: Still no sign of anyone coming out, Bonnie.
REPORTER: Mike, at this point, the latest figures we have is that there are 95 people inside, of them 17 or below the age of 10. A total of 25 below the age of 18.
JUAN GONZÃLEZ: That was CNN coverage from 1993 of the FBI siege of the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco, Texas. It was not until much later that federal authorities acknowledged they had used incendiary teargas, but they insisted they did not contribute to the fire that consumed the compound and left their leader, David Koresh, and 54 other adults and 28 children dead.
Chief Stamper, you're familiar with other incidents around the country where these devices have been used. So there is a, pretty predictable, as you said, result of their use in terms of people who are holed up in a particular or barricaded in a particular compound.
NORM STAMPER: Yes, I think if you think about the names applied to this particular weaponry pyrotechnic, incendiary, burners those all suggest that these devices do in fact start fires. The first thing I thought yesterday and certainly on Wednesday was Branch Davidian and the absolute necessity to learn from these experiences. SWAT officers typically have at their command the use of and frequently do employ so-called flash bangs or concussion grenades. They are cased in paper or soft plastic. They're not known for starting fires. But what they can do is create great disorientation in the barricaded suspect. I am surprised that that particular technology was not used. And I think it is vital to understand that unless these officers knew for certain that there were no hostages in that cabin, that the use of the pyrotechnics is doubly questionable.
AMY GOODMAN: Radley Balko, can you give us the history of the use of these incendiary devices? They are, in fact, not used that much.
RADLEY BALKO: The incident in Waco, I guess, is the first one that comes to mind. Chief Stamper and I agree on a lot, but I would actually disagree with him on the flash grenades also there are a number of fires that I have reported on and other people have reported on that were started by flash grenades as well. In this case, were you have an actual somebody who already killed a lot of people, certainly, I don't think anyone would object to the flash grenades. They are used pretty frequently in drug raids, people suspected of nonviolent crimes. In there, I think they become a little more problematic.
AMY GOODMAN: The history of them from Waco to MOVE.
RADLEY BALKO: The history of the tear gas?
AMY GOODMAN: Yes, of the use of these incendiary devices.
RADLEY BALKO: Well, I mean there are these particular high-profile incidents. I don't know Chief Stamper could probably answer better than I could about how often they're used day to day. I would imagine it is only usually in situations like this where you have people holed up or barricade-type situations. Chief Stamper might be able to answer that better than I could.
AMY GOODMAN: Why don't we give an example. We have a clip; a well-known example of police using incendiary devices on people under siege as the 1985 attack in Philadelphia that culminated in the helicopter bombing of the headquarters of the radical group known as MOVE. The fire from the attack killed six adults, five children, destroyed 65 homes, an entire neighborhood. Despite the two grand jury investigations and a commission finding top officials were grossly negligent, no one from Philadelphia government was criminally charged. MOVE was the Philadelphia-based radical movement that was dedicated to black liberation and a back to nature lifestyle. It was found by John Africa. All its members took on the surname Africa in 2010. Ramona Africa, the sole adult survivor of the bombing, told DEMOCRACY NOW! what had happened as the bomb was dropped on her house.
RAMONA AFRICA: In terms of the bombing, after being attacked the way we were, first with four deluge hoses by the fire department, and then tons of tear gas, and then being shot at the police admit to shooting over 10,000 rounds of bullets at us in the first 90 minutes there was a lull. It was quiet for a little bit. And then without any warning at all, two members of the Philadelphia Police Department's bomb squad got in a Pennsylvania State Police helicopter and flew over our home and dropped a satchel containing c4, a powerful military explosive that no municipal police department has. They have to get it from the federal government, from the FBI. And without any announcement or warning or anything, they dropped that bomb on the roof of our home. Now, at that point, we didn't know exactly what they had done. We heard the loud explosion. The House kind of shook. But, it never entered my mind that they dropped a bomb on us. But, the bomb did in fact ignite a fire. Not long after that, it got very, very hot in the House and the smoke was getting thicker. At first we thought it was teargas. But as it got thicker, it became clear that this wasn't tear gas but this was something else. And then we could hear the trees outside of our house crackling and realized our home was on fire. And we immediately tried to get our children, our animals, our dogs and cats, and ourselves out of that blazing inferno.
JUAN GONZÃLEZ: That was Ramona Africa describing the 1985 the sole survivor of the 1985 police attack on the House of the radical group MOVE group in Philadelphia, that left six adults and five children dead. I was a reporter at the Philadelphia Daily News and I covered that particular event. And what amazed me in watching the fire unfold was that the fire department trucks arrived on the scene, but then for more than an hour, did not turn on their hoses as the house burned. We were later told the MOVE members had attempted to shoot their way out through the back of the House and there was an exchange of gunfire between police and MOVE members. But, it took a commission report later on, an independent commission, to report that in fact some of the members had actually been shot to death, killed as they came out of the burning house. I wanted to ask Chief Stamper, this whole issue of people trapped in these houses and a fire erupting as a result of police action, what the responsibility of the police is at that point when these fires erupt? Even though you may have a criminal or some one that you're involved in a standoff with, your responsibility as a police officer to try to capture these folks alive if possible?
NORM STAMPER: Your number one responsibility is the protection and preservation of human life. And when we employ tactics of the type that we've been talking about this morning in order to achieve what has essentially transformed itself into a military or certainly military-like mission, when we escalate tension and escalate tactics that predictably lead to death, we have violated our most basic, indeed, our most profound responsibility, and that is the protection and preservation of human life.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to play a comment from Stephen Graham, whose book "Cities under siege: The New Military Urbanism" looks at the increasing influence of military technology on domestic police forces. He spoke to Democracy Now! in 2011.
STEPHEN GRAHAM: Well, there has been a longstanding shift in North America and Europe toward paramilitarized policing, using helicopter style systems, using infrared sensing, using really, really heavy militarized weaponry. That's been longstanding fueled by the war on drugs and other sort of explicit campaigns. But, more recently, there has been a big push since the end of the Cold War by the big defense and security and I.T. companies to sell things like video surveillance systems, things like geographic mapping systems, and even more recently, drone systems that have been used in the assassination raids in Afghanistan and Pakistan and elsewhere, as sort of a domestic policing technology.
AMY GOODMAN: That is Stephen Graham, his book, "Cities Under Siege: The New Military Urbananism." Radley Balko, if you could further comment on this, because that is the subject of your upcoming book, "Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces." And also talk about the police actions leading up to the ultimate fire and the killing of Dorner.
RADLEY BALKO: I think that the militarization I think was troubling enough when it was reserved for drug raids which is what it was mostly used for, these sorts of paramilitary tactics throughout the 1990's. But, really, in the 2000's we started seeing it being used more routinely on patrols and we also see it and this what I think is really disturbing, we are seeing it used not because not after an assessment of the threat that the police are facing, but to send a political message.
One example I would give is, you see these federal raids on medical marijuana dispensaries in states that have legalized the drug for medical purposes. I mean, nobody really thinks that these dispensaries are a threat to federal agents, that the people running them are going to pull out guns and open up on federal drug agents. The show of force is about sending a political message. And when the government is using force, and deciding how much force it wants to use based on politics and not a realistic assessment of the threat, I think we have entered kind of a scary new territory.
The other thing I wanted to mention a little bit here is the reaction of the LAPD after an officer went down is sort of typical of what we have seen in a lot of these cases where, when a police officer goes down, there is kind of a mentality and I think this goes back to the warrior mindset that we have inculcated in too many police departments but when an officer goes down, there is this mentality that all bets are off, that the police no longer have to abide by the rules, that one of their own went down, so now they can sort of run roughshod over civil rights because now we have sort of entered new territory.
We saw this in the last couple weeks when we saw two separate incidents where we saw police officers open fire on vehicles that actually did not even look like the truck that Dorner was supposed to be driving. They were vaguely similar to the truck. In one case, the police officers filled an entire neighborhood with bullets they found bullets in trees and garage doors and front doors, in addition to the pock-marked truck that we saw pictures of. And I think this is we see this mentality reinforced in TV and movies, and it is this idea that once a police officer goes down, once someone kills a police officer, everybody's rights are suspended at that point until they take care of the problem. That is really kind of a battlefield mentality that I think is the result of this militarization.
JUAN GONZÃLEZ: And of course, the issue that Dorner in his warped way attempted to raise, of continuing racism within some of these police departments, clearly I want to read an excerpt of the manifesto that Dorner posted online when he wrote, "I know I will be vilified by the LAPD and the media. Unfortunately, this is a necessary evil that I do not enjoy but must partake and complete for substantial change to occur within the LAPD and reclaim my name. The department has not changed since the Rampart and Rodney King days. It has gotten worse... The consent decree should never have been lifted. The only thing that has evolved from the consent decree is those officers involved in the Rampart scandal and the Rodney King incidents have since been promoted to supervisor, commanders, and command staff, and executive positions." He went on to vow to, "bring unconventional and asymmetrical warfare to those in the LAPD uniform. So, clearly, this was a man who was taking extreme and criminal actions, but at the same time, was raising issues that resonate, not only in many black communities, but even among black officers in many urban police departments. I am wondering your take on this.
RADLEY BALKO: I guess I should say, first of all, it is really unfortunate that there are people who have sort of tried to make Dorner into a martyr. I think if you're going to make him a martyr for your cause, you're really doing a disservice for your cause. Not only did he take out vigilante justice against police officers, he also killed two people who, their only alleged crime in his mind was been related to a police officer. I think we should point out this guy isn't and should be a martyr.
The problems that he points out have been present in the LAPD a long time, going back to the commission that issued a study before the Rodney King riots in the early 1990's, and, yes, he does raise issues. Even the initial incident that got him fired where he reported his field training officer kicking a suspect while the suspect was on the ground, I mean, it's sort of well known in police departments that when rookies I hope chief stamper will correct me if I am assuming too much it is sort of well known when you get out of the academy and you're assigned to a field training officer, that is sort of a time when you are tested to see how much you can be relied upon to defend your fellow officers. It's kind of the induction period to the blue code of silence. So, even that incident sort of rings true. I think it is unfortunate that it took a crazy person to get these issues back in the light again. But, actually, I do think that the L.A. police chief and the LAPD deserves some credit. They have actually said they are going to go back and look at these incidents and see if there's any merit to them, which is a pretty admirable thing to say given what was going on at the time.
AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Norm Stamper, what you want to see come out of this as a former police chief yourself in terms of investigations?
NORM STAMPER: Clearly, we have to look at the tactics from the beginning of this entire operation to its tragic conclusion. But, we also, I think really need to look at systemic instances of racism and other forms of discriminatory or bigoted behavior. It is one thing for police chiefs and sheriffs to denounce racism, to announce that there will be no tolerance of that kind of behavior, it is another to actually affect the working culture of police officers. The majority of whom, I think, have gotten the message. But, there are still pockets in every police department that are very pernicious and very troubling and they need to be rooted out. There are some people who should not be police officers.