Hoboken Disbands SWAT Team After Hooters Photos

[derby378]

Hold on to your butts...

The Hoboken, N.J., police SWAT team -- which is taking heat for racy pictures showing its members frolicking with Hooters waitresses -- is no more. Hoboken's newly named public safety director disbanded the SWAT team shortly after being sworn in on Friday, authorities confirmed.

"The unit itself has been disbanded permanently," Public Safety Director Bill Bergin told the Jersey Journal. He is a former deputy chief with the Hoboken Fire Department.

...

The SWAT team officers will remain on the force and continue normal police duties, the Jersey Journal reported. Bergin ordered the team's commander, Lt. Angelo Andriani, to return from vacation and assigned him to desk duty.

Andriani is seen in many of the photos, which were taken outside a Hooters restaurant in Alabama two years ago. The girls posed with weapons for some photos.

http://www.myfoxny.com/myfox/pages/News/Detail?contentId=4961189&version=7&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.2.1

:rofl:

[AlCzervik]

1. probably not a great idea to have the hooters girls holding their err gun?

[derby378]

3. Let's say that you own an AR-15

Would you be a responsible owner of the gun? Would you take it to an establishment where alcohol was served? Would you allow someone who doesn't know a damn thing about firearms to handle it, even for photos, without giving them at least a basic but firm safety lecture?

Just boggles my mind, this does...

[AlCzervik]

6. um no. imo it was piss poor judgment and they're lucky no one had an accident.

[gratuitous]

2. They should have tazed them

Right in the Hooters. Then these guys would still have their elite boys club.

[AX10]

4. Finally, a victory against the terrorists.

That's what SWAT teams are. They are not a peacekeeping force but a wannabe military.
:nopity:

:bye:

[derby378]

5. I would not paint all SWAT teams that way...

Ours is actually a fairly responsible bunch.

What I'd love, however, is if Blackwater's mercs were caught doing the same thing. :rofl:

[Didereaux]

7. Bah, it was an economy move, they couldn't afford...

...to buy all those black shirts, white ties, pin stripe suits and fedoras to dress them in...in Hoboken it is cheaper to outsource to the 'pros' and put the doughnut boys back into the Winchells' where they are more at home.
;)

[Nevernose]

11. Sarcasm aside, I think you're right

SWAT teams seem mostly for PR purposes. "Look how tough we are on crime! We've got a SWAT team to go after the better-armed bad guys!"

SWAT teams are a holdover from the 80s Drug War, a war that virtually anybody who was involved in, on either side, will at least in private say that is better won through education and rehabilitation.

The tour bus driver in New York this summer referred to the heavily-armed police there as "Operation Overtime," which is little more than an extension of the Drug War.

[Syrinx]

8. photos

That Hooters is only a couple miles away from me.













http://www.nj.com/hudsoncountynow/index.ssf/2007/11/hooters_cops_more_photos.html

[nadinbrzezinski]

12. I am amazed they are still in the force

[aikoaiko]

13. Hooters girls: good trigger finger control, muzzle sweeping bad

;)

[benEzra]

20. I noticed that...not a single finger on a trigger.

Comparing those photos to others I've seen, apparently Hooters staff are far more competent to handle guns than most congresspeople are... :eyes:

[lurky]

14. I bet that last pic is the one that did it.

He's grabbing her tit and she doesn't look happy about it. It's bad for a department's image when its "elite" cops are seen groping women. In most places, that's considered sexual assault, isn't it?

[Syrinx]

16. looks like feigned protest to me

It looks like she's playing along. I wonder how much Hoboken city money went for tips?

[tabasco]

9. These are the guys who bust people with some pot plants in their closet

and act like they took out a heavily armed al qaeda cell.

[AX10]

10. They are shameless!

[FatDave]

15. You know, I thought this was going to be people overreacting

But those guys appear to be on the clock. I mean, they don't get to run around in uniform, in the truck, with weapons when in their off hours, do they? And what is that he's drinking?

Letting your waitress pose with your deadly weapons? I assume they weren't loaded, but it's still irresponsible.

[trof]

17. These guys are WAAYYY too stupid to be cops.

I mean...GLEEFULLY posing for those pix?
PHOTOGRAPHIC (with the emphasis on GRAPHIC) EVIDENCE?
What WERE they thinking?
"Aw hell, we're just down south here with a buncha dumb rednecks and these pix will NEVER surface back home. Great souvenirs. Yeah."

[KharmaTrain]

18. Hint...Next Time Leave The Cameras At Home...

Reminds me of a party at a Chicago Firehouse a couple years ago that featured some strippers and videos came out of them doing a real "pole dance". The TV stations couldn't get enough of the story. Oh, the outrage...that firefighters and cops have hormones? They like to party and get rowdy? As a cop friend once told me..."gotta keep our edge on and our badges shined"... :rofl:

I know Jersey City is a large city and its proximity to NYC requires something of this sort, but the thought of a SWAT team in Jersey kinda makes one chuckle.

:rofl:

[mmonk]

19. What would happen if someone's gun went off?

[derby378]

21. A Darwin Award, for starters?

That shotgun may not have the same range or accuracy as the AR-15s, but it's the deadliest firearm of the bunch if you're only 5-10 feet away.