Kids and Cops Behaving Poorly

I will admit to my inherent bias in favor of law enforcement officers, at least in America. This is not to say that I automatically accept the word of a cop, and certainly not to say that cops can do no wrong. But the cop who is out on the street making the arrest usually does not have the luxury of acting out a cleanly scripted routine resembling anything from Emily Post's Book of Etiquette. Moreover, cops, like everyone else, have their own biases and character flaws.

The jobs which the cops must do are not always the cleanest.

The story of a run-in between cops and teenagers last June is now gaining traction in the press. The kids were coming off a party in Manhattan's East Village at about 1 AM, and, if the reported facts of the story are anything near correct, one or more of the teenagers yelled at some plainclothes officers, who took the occasion to make the arrest. One of the kids kept his cool and attempted to calm down the others, except that he did so in their native language, which seemed to upset one or more of the arresting officers.

Up until this point, I'm with the cops. There seems to have been some ethanol and cannabis usage involved on the part of the kids, not at all unusual for parties in places such as the East Village.

One of the cops made some anti-semitic remarks to the kids. While this does not particularly add any luster to his profession, it must be remembered that he is not out there to be an Albert Schweitzer or a Mother Theresa or any other proponent of the universal brotherhood of mankind, but rather, is out there to detect and apprehend wrongdoers. So, while I do not hold this particular cop in personal high esteem, I'm still able to defend his on-the-job performance at this point.

Oh, yes, the audio portion of the incident was recorded by the kids on a cellphone. Cops everywhere should welcome this technological memorialization of the record, because, presuming that the cops were acting legally and professionally, such recordings can be invaluable in deconstructing the whinings of spoiled brats who scream "police brutality!" in their lawsuits. Even after hearing the recording, I'm still able to defend the cops.

Or at least I was until it was asserted that there were TWO cell phone recordings, but that the arresting officers erased one of them. Which is probably why all charges have been dropped -- not because Mamma's Golden Boys & Girls were given a bad rap by the cruel and heartless bigoted policemen, but because the spoliation of the evidence by the cops would not have played well at the trial.

Bad Cops! Bad Boys & Girls! And a good meal ticket for the ABC News producers who made hay of the story.


The Festival of Sukkoth is almost upon us, so I've got to log off. Chag Sameach to everyone!!