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I think making a false complaint should be considered a serious crime.
Me to? I don't see anything silly about it, a false claim or complaint can ruin an officers life, and I see many people out there who hate cops, all cops are corrupt, all cops are trigger happy and on and on....which is not true, any intelligent person would know that?
It's actually HB 2698 and the relevant parts that are consistent with every slander/libel law in existence are:
OK, so the bill says if you are going to file a complaint against a cop for misconduct, you are going to have to make it official and sign your name to it before they'll move on it. Nothing unreasonable here. If you are going to jeopardize someone's livelihood, you better be willing to sign a statement saying your accusation is true to the best of your knowledge and be ready to back it up. This is followed by...
OK, so the complaint form you sign will tell you that you better mean it, because your signature makes it an official statement in a court of law, where lying is called perjury, and perjury = bad. This is followed by...
If we figure out you were lying and just trying to ruin someone with your false official statement, we'll slap you down so others behind you might think twice before making crap up to get cops in trouble just because they are pissed off about getting a speeding ticket.
The bill's sponsor is the Kansas House Committee on Corrections and Juvenile Justice, which I would assume is majority Republican, given that the Kansas House is 92-33 Republican-Democrat.
But I see nothing in the bill untoward, and I say this as a pretty fierce libertarian and defender of natural individual rights, who typically thinks even casual conversation by government is akin to tyranny. Law enforcement are individuals with natural rights to life liberty and property same as those they serve/protect, and like any other citizen, should have legal protection from and recourse for slanderous/libelous accusations. The best parts of the bill are not the "you have to sign an official statement, and it better be true or else" but rather the parts where it says once a statement is proven false, it is trashed, nuked, forgotten as if it never occurred and shall not be part of an officer's complaint file.
Remember, we live in a society where people call 9-1-1 if they get 9 chicken nuggets instead of 10 at the drive through, and think they are victims of police brutality if the officer doesn't say "please" after "license and registration." These complaints go in a file that dictates a person's future employment prospects, so they should only keep the ones that are valid, and they should discard the ones that are clearly false.
Very well said, thank you for researching and explaining, it is time! Period...I'm sick and tired of people slandering police officers! They do a thankless job and deserve so much more! I see your point of view and understand! If you file a false complaint about anyone, you should have to pay some kind of price.
Last edited by cremebrulee; 03-19-2014 at 12:44 PM..
LOL. If you file a complaint you are going to jeopardize someones livelihood? OMG tell me another one. We have cops with 100+ complaints that arent worried about losing their jobs.
All this is is yet another way to intimidate people from filing justifiable claims. Thats all. If claims were acted on in any sort of way this might be relevant.
years ago, we called it slander, and then, you'd better make certain you were saying something truthful, as you could be arrested for it and prosecuted, no more today.
I'm all for laws that protect our police...as I said before, slander can destroy a cops life....future, etc.
LOL. If you file a complaint you are going to jeopardize someones livelihood? OMG tell me another one. We have cops with 100+ complaints that arent worried about losing their jobs.
All this is is yet another way to intimidate people from filing justifiable claims. Thats all. If claims were acted on in any sort of way this might be relevant.
I can see both sides with potential for abuse.
If you have a well run police dept. with good oversight then a couple cranks and whatnot can overwhelm your ability to investigate claims of abuse.
If you have a poorly run, corrupt dept. then you're open up to reprisal and even harm for stepping forward without any shield of anonymity.
The news is full of both examples.
I'm not quite sure I've reached an informed enough opinion on the topic yet.
If you have a well run police dept. with good oversight then a couple cranks and whatnot can overwhelm your ability to investigate claims of abuse.
If you have a poorly run, corrupt dept. then you're open up to reprisal and even harm for stepping forward without any shield of anonymity.
The news is full of both examples.
I'm not quite sure I've reached an informed enough opinion on the topic yet.
heres the thing, and please correct me if I'm wrong (anyone) but I thought every officer has a file, and in that file goes everything, even complaints that are not valid, then if something happens, those might be used against him/her? Is that wrong?
LOL. If you file a complaint you are going to jeopardize someones livelihood? OMG tell me another one. We have cops with 100+ complaints that arent worried about losing their jobs.
All this is is yet another way to intimidate people from filing justifiable claims. Thats all. If claims were acted on in any sort of way this might be relevant.
I am not saying this does not have the potential for mischief, and it represents one of the great "how it is vs how it should be" dilemmas that making being a consistent libertarian a real pain. That said, if the private citizen has laws and procedures that protect them from slander/libel, public servants should have it as well. No more, no less, just same.
What has happened is people circumvent law with bureaucracies that allow courts of public opinion to make real world legal decisions with, and that's wrong in either direction. So I don't actually find issue with a law that says complaints against someone that can and do affect their employment should be official and as such should be true.
years ago, we called it slander, and then, you'd better make certain you were saying something truthful, as you could be arrested for it and prosecuted, no more today.
I'm all for laws that protect our police...as I said before, slander can destroy a cops life....future, etc.
I used to think exactly like this, but then I lived for a number of years in a part of the country rife with corruption and cronyism.....and that gives me pause. Certainly a tough issue.
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