Fire chief shot by cop in court over tickets (another police out of control story)

[tblue37]

Fire chief shot by cop in court over tickets
By Jon Gambrell - Associated Press Writer Sept. 4, 2009

http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2009/sep/04/fire-chief-shot-cop-court-over-tickets/

Cops really are getting out of control in the US!:

Jericho, Ark. — It was just too much, having to return to court twice on the same day to contest yet another traffic ticket, and Fire Chief Don Payne didn’t hesitate to tell the judge what he thought of the police and their speed traps. The response from cops? They shot him. Right there in court.

Payne ended up in the hospital, but his shooting last week brought to a boil simmering tensions between residents of this tiny former cotton city and their police force. Drivers quickly learn to slow to a crawl along the gravel roads and the two-lane highway that run through Jericho, but they say sometimes that isn’t enough to fend off the city ticketing machine.

You can’t even get them to answer a call because normally they’re writing tickets,” said Thomas Martin, chief investigator for the Crittenden County Sheriff’s Department. “They’re not providing a service to the citizens.”

<SNIP>

“When I first moved out here, they wrote me a ticket for going 58 mph in my driveway<emphasis added>,” 75-year-old retiree Albert Beebe said.

And yet, despite all that ticket revenue, the town can’t pay its bills. Someone in power has been lining his pockets, and you just know those cops were getting kickbacks, too.

[tblue37]

1. I get two recs--but no comments. Maybe the whole thing just

speaks for itself.

[Zix]

3. I think we're all just waiting to see who posts "why are you against the POLIIIIIICE" first.

Every time anyone on this board posts a story about some ludicrously stupid and sadistic thing a policeman does a certain two or three people show up (and its only ever these same two or three) and try to pretend that the OP's anti-police instead of anti-.

It's an utterly disgusting, slithery, completely transparent piece of petty message board spin that achieves nothing more than obfuscation and I think most reasonable people can't be bothered to kick it all off.

[dgibby]

4. My dad was Chief of Police,

He would have arrested, then fired that officer on the spot. I detest rogue cops. They give the good ones a bad rep, and make their jobs even more difficult and dangerous than they already are.

As for that town, time for the citizens to call in the state law enforcement division and the FBI.

I hope the fire chief recovers and sues their asses off.

[tblue37]

8. Cool. I posted this way early in the morning, right after reading my morning

newspaper. Then I went to work. After work, I took a long nap. I just woke up and went on DU--and found that people had recc'd it and replied. I sort of figured it wouldn't be seen at all because I posted it so early. I am glad to see that most DUers did get a chance to read the article, despite my very early posting, because it had been recc'd to the "greatest" page.

Thanks, guys.

[coyote]

2. Wow...1 police officer for every 24 residents....

my public school (teacher : student ratio) cannot even beat that.

[Th1onein]

5. Kicked and Rec'd

These people are out of control. I used to live in a little town where the cops would give tickets to people who had just borrowed a family member's car to go to the store. They would cite them for no insurance, because the insurance wasn't in their name. Completely illegal, yet the judge would uphold it in court and make the driver pay a fine of over $500. I talked to a lady in town, who ran an insurance company and she said that she knew it was going on, and knew it was illegal, but was scared to say or do anything about it. Bacliff, TX was the town, and as far as I know, they're still doing it. It's one of the poorest areas in Galveston County, and the Galveston County cops are fleecing the poorest citizens because they can get away with it.

[Gold Metal Flake]

6. "Doctors in Memphis, Tenn., removed a .40-caliber bullet from Payne’s hip bone"

A .40. He's lucky to be alive. I don't know how far this hellhole is from Memphis but if that bullet had hit his liver he'd have probably bled out.

I like this part: "Mayor Helen Adams declined to speak about the shooting when approached outside her home, saying she had just returned from a doctor’s appointment and couldn’t talk.

“We’ll get with you after all this comes through,” Adams said Tuesday before shutting the door.

A white Ford Crown Victoria sat in her driveway with “public property” license plates. A sales brochure advertising police equipment sat in the back seat of the car."

I guess she's gotta find another hideyhole for her kickbacks before the Sheriffs get the FBI involved.

How many of those seven crooked cops are republicans?

[oligarhy]

7. Discusting

...