1 in 115 California LEOs has a misdemeanor

[0ddl0t]

https://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/article237089834.html

630 out of California's 79,000 current sworn officers have misdemeanor convictions that would disqualify them from working as LEO in other states. Most were DUI & domestic dispute charges, but there was also one officer who fell asleep at the wheel and killed two cyclists and another whose 7 year-old discharged a firearm he left in his car at school.


edit: title correction: 1 in 125

[TGS]

No doubt there's bad apples, but this article is fishy and 100% a hit piece that is misrepresenting shit to make the LE profession look completely crooked.

It even uses examples of people who were convicted and lost their jobs (that means the system IS working) to try and get the reader outraged. The article also posits that officers who are domestic violence offenders are still cops, which is patently false...…..that'd be against federal law. They may or may not have been actual scumbags, but you can't write an article like this with any sense of credibility and claim (or imply) somebody has a specific criminal conviction when they're not even convicted of it.

The list at the end of "Cops with Convictions" is also misleading, because it includes cops who were convicted of felonies and fired/can no longer be LEOs.....a bunch of them still serving decades long sentences.....even though the aim of the article is cops with convictions who are still allowed to be on the job. This gives the casual reader the impression that you can be convicted of murder, rape, child molestation, etc and still be a cop.

ETA: What's interesting to note is that most of the names I googled ended up being reserve officers...…..not full time professional LEOs.

[0ddl0t]

No doubt there's bad apples, but this article is fishy and 100% a hit piece that is misrepresenting shit to make the LE profession look completely crooked.
The article is definitely biased, but I found the list interesting. Locally we have a surprising number of COs who lost their jobs after being convicted of sex acts with inmates.



It even uses examples of people who were convicted and lost their jobs (that means the system IS working) to try and get the reader outraged.
I even found a couple of cases where the officer had retired before the crime took place. From further reading, it looks like less than 1 in 5 officers kept their job meaning about 1 in 625 current California LEOs has a misdemeanor conviction.


The article also posits that officers who are domestic violence offenders are still cops, which is patently false...…..that'd be against federal law.
Depends on if they were charged & with what. One of the more egregious examples is a small town chief who hired his brother in law despite a long record of domestic violence incidents that either went unprosecuted or were pled down to minor offenses like "disturbing the peace."

https://www.northcoastjournal.com/humboldt/power-and-control/Content?oid=3134795

[BehindBlueI's]

Depends on if they were charged & with what. One of the more egregious examples is a small town chief who hired his brother in law despite a long record of domestic violence incidents that either went unprosecuted or were pled down to minor offenses like "disturbing the peace"

Then they aren't convicted of any domestic offense. Like TGS said, if they were they would be Brady disqualified.

As far as misdemeanors, meh, I'd bet my department is more than 1 in 625 if you count DUIs in their past. It wasn't an automatic no-go when I was hired, although you'd need some years between you and it. Get a DUI after being hired and it's a 30 day suspension (assuming you are off duty and in your own car) and then fired on your second.

[Hambo]

The article is definitely biased

So what's the point? If they were doing serious reporting instead of outrage porn, they'd be straight up about the stats. They would also include a no doubt larger list of officers who were fired for misconduct, as well as those convicted of crimes after being investigated by their own department.

[Erick Gelhaus]

The "one in one hundred twenty-five" is deceiving, at best. 630 out of 79,000 comes out to 0.0079% - if my calculator use is correct.

[0ddl0t]

So what's the point? If they were doing serious reporting instead of outrage porn, they'd be straight up about the stats. They would also include a no doubt larger list of officers who were fired for misconduct, as well as those convicted of crimes after being investigated by their own department.

That is what started the series. The public has not had access to those records in the past. The law changed last year, but the unions & departments have been fighting the release of disciplinary records. These criminal records are what has been released so far, but there will be much more to come once the journalists get access to things like public complaints & internal investigations...


The "one in one hundred twenty-five" is deceiving, at best. 630 out of 79,000 comes out to 0.0079% - if my calculator use is correct.

You forgot to move the decimal 2 places to the right when adding the percent sign. 630 out of 79,000 is 0.00797 or ~0.8% (which equals 1/125). But that counts cops who lost their jobs -- only 1 in 5 stayed on the job (so 1/625 active LEO).

For comparison, according the to FBI about 1 in 3 Americans have been charged with a felony in their lifetime (though not necessarily convicted). So police are way, way, way less prone to crime than the average American.

[paherne]

So, better than doctors, lawyers and Catholic priests?

[trailrunner]

For comparison, according the to FBI about 1 in 3 Americans have been charged with a felony in their lifetime (though not necessarily convicted).

Really?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[TGS]

Depends on if they were charged & with what.

Please tell me how the law works. :rolleyes:

As Hambo said, the article is outrage porn. Nothing more. If they wanted it to be legitimate work, they could have gone that route instead.

[0ddl0t]

Really?1 in 3 adults that is, according to a Politifact fact check of Cuomo:

https://www.politifact.com/new-york/statements/2017/aug/18/andrew-cuomo/yes-one-three-us-adults-have-criminal-record/


The FBI considers anyone who has been arrested on a felony charge to have a criminal record, even if the arrest did not lead to a conviction. The FBI only counts those with a misdemeanor if a state agency asks the bureau to keep it on file.

So by the FBI’s standard, 73.5 million people in the United States had a criminal record as of June 30.

The Census Bureau lists the adult population in the United States at 249.4 million. That means the FBI considers about 29.5 percent of adults to have a criminal record.

[BehindBlueI's]

1 in 3 adults that is, according to a Politifact fact check of Cuomo:

https://www.politifact.com/new-york/statements/2017/aug/18/andrew-cuomo/yes-one-three-us-adults-have-criminal-record/


The FBI considers anyone who has been arrested on a felony charge to have a criminal record, even if the arrest did not lead to a conviction. The FBI only counts those with a misdemeanor if a state agency asks the bureau to keep it on file.

So by the FBI’s standard, 73.5 million people in the United States had a criminal record as of June 30.

The Census Bureau lists the adult population in the United States at 249.4 million. That means the FBI considers about 29.5 percent of adults to have a criminal record.

One doesn't need to be an American, or even a resident of the country, to have an FBI number.

[Totem Polar]

Locally we have a surprising number of COs who lost their jobs after being convicted of sex acts with inmates.


Unsurprising to anyone possessed of genitalia and a hypothalamus. Locally, my dept. at the state U had to fire two area directors in a row in the last several years; the first for banging his grad student (among other problems), and then his direct replacement—for sending sexually explicit texts to undergrads in his class. Both those dudes were championed/installed by admin over the dead bodies of everyone who is functional in the dept., incidentally.


For comparison, according the to FBI about 1 in 3 Americans have been charged with a felony in their lifetime (though not necessarily convicted). So police are way, way, way less prone to crime than the average American.
That is a bit mind-boggling, if even close to true.

[GardoneVT]

No doubt there's bad apples, but this article is fishy and 100% a hit piece that is misrepresenting shit to make the LE profession look completely crooked.

It’s pretty shitty even for a hit piece. Smartphone math shows an average of 63 officers convicted per year across the whole state of California in the 10 year period examined. If we assume the 2017 total roster of 119,500 active officers applies to each of those 10 years, we get an annual conviction rate of .052%.

In other words, LE Training staff in CA deserve Federal commendation for exemplary performance.

[TGS]

One doesn't need to be an American, or even a resident of the country, to have an FBI number.

Wait, you mean to tell me that a significant portion of people with a criminal record in the US aren't actually Americans?
Unpossible. We have a reason to hate law enforcement, here!

HCM to reference the trend of IAs in federal prison.

TCinVA to rage over the problem of under incarceration.

[HCM]

One doesn't need to be an American, or even a resident of the country, to have an FBI number.

True.

All aliens arrested for violation of U.S. Immigration laws, administrative or criminal, are fingerprinted and issued an FBI number.

Approximately 1/3 of federal prison inmates are aliens. This does not include aliens detained solely for deportation proceedings.