this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2026
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THE POLICE PROBLEM

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    The police problem is that police are policed by the police. Cops are accountable only to other cops, which is no accountability at all.

    99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.

    When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.

    When police are fired — which is all too rare — they leave with 'law enforcement experience' and can easily find work in another police department nearby. It's called "Wandering Cops."

    When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.

    Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.

    The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.

    All this is a path to a police state.

    In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.

    Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.

    That's the solution.

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Our definition of ‘cops’ is broad, and includes prison guards, probation officers, shitty DAs and judges, etc — anyone who has the authority to fuck over people’s lives, with minimal or no oversight.

♦ ♦ ♦

RULES

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Saying ~~cops~~ ANYONE should be killed lowers the IQ in any conversation. They're about killing people; we're not.

Please don't dox or post calls for harassment, vigilantism, tar & feather attacks, etc.

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♦ ♦ ♦

ALLIES

!abolition@slrpnk.net

!acab@lemmygrad.ml

r/ACAB

r/BadCopNoDonut/

Randy Balko

The Civil Rights Lawyer

The Honest Courtesan

Identity Project

MirandaWarning.org

♦ ♦ ♦

INFO

A demonstrator's guide to understanding riot munitions

Adultification

Cops aren't supposed to be smart

Don't talk to the police.

Killings by law enforcement in Canada

Killings by law enforcement in the United Kingdom

Killings by law enforcement in the United States

Know your rights: Filming the police

Three words. 70 cases. The tragic history of 'I can’t breathe' (as of 2020)

Police aren't primarily about helping you or solving crimes.

Police lie under oath, a lot

Police spin: An object lesson in Copspeak

Police unions and arbitrators keep abusive cops on the street

Shielded from Justice: Police Brutality and Accountability in the United States

So you wanna be a cop?

When the police knock on your door

♦ ♦ ♦

ORGANIZATIONS

Black Lives Matter

Campaign Zero

Innocence Project

The Marshall Project

Movement Law Lab

NAACP

National Police Accountability Project

Say Their Names

Vera: Ending Mass Incarceration

 

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

A Black Texas man who aspired to become a police officer spent 16 months fighting felony accusations that he assaulted two officers during a “welfare check” at his home. A jury acquitted him after his son recorded video of the arrest.

The video caught Huntsville police and prosecutors by surprise, Stewart said, because they had expected to secure a conviction based on the officers’ accounts.

The cops accused Stewart of spitting in one of their faces and shoving the other officer, but none of that is captured on video.

“I don’t like to call people liars,” Stewart told ABC 13 Houston after his acquittal.

“But fabrication, yes. Cover up, yes.”

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[–] Armok_the_bunny@lemmy.world 110 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Police testimony should never be admissible as evidence without bodycam footage to back it up, not these days.

[–] VitoRobles@lemmy.today 68 points 5 days ago (6 children)

I was kicked off a jury for saying that.

The judge asked us all if we can all agree that the words of the cops was considered valid evidence.

I said no, because cops are human and infallible like all of us, and they can lie.

Judge got so mad and I wasn't part of jury after that.

[–] defaultusername@lemmy.dbzer0.com 48 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Nitpick: "infallible" means not capable of failing.

Also, judges and cops often times work together very closely, which is a practice that needs to stop.

[–] fratermus@piefed.social 12 points 4 days ago

judges and cops often times work together very closely, which is a practice that needs to stop

cop - prosecutor interdependance is also a problem.

[–] Tollana1234567@lemmy.today 11 points 5 days ago

we had jury duty last sept, and they asked the potential juror pools, most got kicked off one reason or another. of course the prosecutor/defense attorney tried to sus out if people are doing it to quickly ge of jury duty as well. some courts will drag this on if they can.

[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 7 points 4 days ago

ALL cop testimony is fabricated.

[–] fyzzlefry@retrolemmy.com 4 points 4 days ago

Next time stay quiet

[–] Cethin@lemmy.zip 2 points 4 days ago

Unless you're trying to get out of it, don't admit that next time. Don't even consider it a lie. There's probably some situation, like if it's backed up with video, where you'd consider trusting it some. But you admitting that ensures everyone there does take their word as the truth. It makes the issue more pervasive. There's a chance that you staying quite could have changed the outcome, and you could have talked to the other jurors about how often cops lie.

Yup. Require them to wear body cams at all times. If anything is taken to court and "malfunction" "broken "corrupted data" is ever an issue then their testimony is immediately thrown out.

I guarantee you will start seeing 100% uptime on those body cams after that.

Also yes, always record cops

[–] minorkeys@sh.itjust.works 55 points 5 days ago (1 children)

"To beat charges.."? You mean, prove his innocence?

[–] neukenindekeuken@sh.itjust.works 28 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Innocent until proven guilty comes with a skin color and bank account requirement.

[–] 13igTyme@piefed.social 3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Don't forget praying to the correct made up person that controls the universe.

[–] ZebulonP@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Nah, plenty of brown and poor people pray to the same god.

[–] 13igTyme@piefed.social 3 points 4 days ago

All three are required.

[–] schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works 31 points 5 days ago (1 children)

In a sane world, every case revolving around those officers testimony would be thrown out.

[–] gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world 37 points 5 days ago (3 children)

In a really sane world they'd be arrested for attempted false imprisonment

[–] manxu@piefed.social 17 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It boggles the mind that police officers are not held to the same standard they hold others to.

[–] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 10 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

In the US that comes down to Harlow v Fitzgerald, ç 1982. The crux of the case is §1983. Should have been fairly straightforward, as when 1983 was written and passed by Congress, in 1881 it stripped all legal immunity from all civil servants. In 1884 an unnamed secretary took it upon themselves to remove a 16 word clause that, by said removal, reversed the intent of the law. This occured when said secretary was given the task of directly copying The Congressional Record, word for word, in 1884. The SCOTUS of 1982 was handed the illegally amended wording, though they probably didn't know that, given the wording of both the majority and dissent opinions.

http://web.archive.org/web/20230520080201/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/15/us/politics/qualified-immunity-supreme-court.html

[–] schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works 3 points 4 days ago

I mean, I'm going for the most insane of sane world to keep my expectations low.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

they’d be arrested

By whom?

[–] Zannsolo@lemmy.world 16 points 4 days ago (1 children)

There is no way is ever vote guilty if I was on a jury based solely on police testimony. I feel like there's should be an every evolving standard packet of police lying in reports and in court that every defense lawyer submits as evidence that police testimony is not reliable on its own.

[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago (2 children)

If I were on a jury I would 1000% consider police testimony as biased and unreliable.

Sadly, I probably won't ever get picked for jury duty, because I know what jury nullification is, and I will absolutely tell my fellow potential jurors all about it.

[–] Hasherm0n@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago

I once when through selection for a trial and told the prosecutor that I did not accept testimony alone as valid evidence as there has been shown to be far too many issues with it over the years.

I was dismissed before the woman sitting next to me whose answer to the question about relationships to law enforcement started with her husband being a judge, her kids were both cops, and she herself was homeland security.

[–] dropped_the_chief@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

You don't have to outright tell them, but you can strongly hint at it, and not use the words "jurry nullification".

We have been living in fascism for a long time and it requires people to get smart and keep their mouths shut to beat it.

[–] HerbGrower@slrpnk.net 25 points 4 days ago (5 children)

Guilty until proven innocent seems to be increasingly common...

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 6 points 4 days ago (2 children)

Police testimony consistently gets the benefit of the doubt among plebs who don't understand that these people are constantly lying.

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[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 5 points 4 days ago

Increasing more exposed to have already been common.

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[–] EpeeGnome@feddit.online 19 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

Prediction: The police will get in no trouble whatsoever for provably committing perjury.

Perjury? What are they Democrats?

[–] Archelon@lemmy.world 18 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

“I told them, ‘I do not give you consent to come in my house’ but I guess the word consent triggered the officer because they pushed past me and started grabbing on me,” Stewart said.

Edit: just felt this line needed to be highlighted.

[–] A_norny_mousse@piefed.zip 20 points 4 days ago (1 children)

A jury acquitted him after his son recorded video of the arrest.

Causality seems messed up here.
Shouldn't this read "A jury acquitted him after seeing his son's recorded video of the arrest." or some such?

[–] EpeeGnome@feddit.online 5 points 4 days ago

It describes a technically accurate sequence of events: His son recorded the video, and some time after that the jury acquitted him. But yeah, the wording weirdly seems to imply the son did the recording because the jury wasn't yet convinced, and only then did they decide to acquit. Your phrasing is way better.

[–] isleepinahammock@lemmy.blahaj.zone 28 points 5 days ago (4 children)

Every police officers should have to wear a body cam at all times while on duty. That body camera should have a bright outward pointing light on it and other means of clearly indicating it's recording.

It should also be legal to kill any on-duty police officer that turns their camera off. See a cop without their camera on? Perfectly legal to pull out a gun and drop the pig.

[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 11 points 4 days ago

Police testimony should not be allowed. The body cam is their only voice. If they turn it off, then they have no testimony, so without it, you better have some other evidence, or the guy is going free.

[–] LodeMike@lemmy.today 8 points 5 days ago

At this point I will never believe a single cop's word.

[–] cynar@lemmy.world 5 points 4 days ago

There are times it's reasonable for an officer to turn their camera off. E.g. some people might be willing to share information, but not go to court over it. Turning off their camera to get information unofficially then makes sense.

That said, a malfunctioning body camera should be seen in the same light as destruction of evidence. It is assumed to be the worst case, unless proven otherwise, or reasonably explained.

FYI, apparently a lot of UK police love the body cams. It makes their paperwork so much easier. It's also apparently quite satisfying to watch a hungover idiot realise exactly how rude they were to the officer trying to defuse things outside a pub.

[–] HubertManne@piefed.social 2 points 4 days ago

officer testimony should be inadmissable. they should be required to just use body camera. its on them to have them always going.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 17 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (2 children)

If the pigs are just gonna turn off their body cameras, we all should be recording everything those fascist fucks do. We need our own body cams.

[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 12 points 4 days ago

If body camera footage doesn't get xist, then there is no crime, and the person goes free, no matter what the cops testify to.

Cop testimony is ALWAYS fabricated, and should not be allowed as evidence. The body camera is their only voice. If it doesn't exist, there is no evidence.

[–] HugeNerd@lemmy.ca 3 points 4 days ago

Or a small swarm of recording drones.

[–] Smeagol666@crazypeople.online 6 points 4 days ago

My youngest brother was a guard at a county jail 20 years ago. Those sneaky pigs can turn cameras on and off at the press of a button. They can turn it off, antagonize a prisoner by calling them a slur, then turn it back on making it look like a random attack. Fuck the goddamned pigs.

[–] cheers_queers@lemmy.zip 16 points 5 days ago

i dont mind calling them liars, theyre murderous psychopaths

If a cop says the sky is blue there's a hell of a sunset going on outside.

[–] ViceroTempus@lemmy.world 5 points 4 days ago

If anybody ever wonders why I celebrate when a class traitor gets killed, this article exemplifies why. ACAB, fuck reform, the ranchers' dogs deserve to be put down.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago

Black Texas man beats cops with son's cell phone.

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