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The Fort Worth Police use their power to do other strange things - some examples:
1) They sit on every highway in the city - all day, every day, spaced a few miles apart from each other, writing tickets
2) They invested several million dollars in cameras to put up around the city to catch people who are littering and pay several officers to sit in an office watching the cameras all day
3) They've started putting prostitutes' and Johns' pictures on the Internet
4) They make raids on ALL bars - "gay" bars AND "straight" bars and patrol downtown nightly looking to arrest ANYONE who is drunk
This is all while they solve murder cases at a rate of about 40%.
This police department's policies and goals are messed up in general - not only when their actions are motivated by "gay hatred."
But didn't you know; solving murders isn't nearly as financially lucrative as writing a ton of speeding tickets or ticketing bars, so it obviously isn't as important.
Last edited by Cav Scout wife; 06-29-2009 at 05:37 PM..
Reason: whoops, forgot the "you", lol
But didn't know know; solving murders isn't nearly as financially lucrative as writing a ton of speeding tickets or ticketing bars, so it obviously isn't as important.
Do you have to get "drunk" to go to a bar? I mean...college kids, yes, but not everyone.
While that is true, the law in TX is written so that even if you only have one drink, you are intoxicated, and anyone in public that is intoxicated can be arrested for it. Stupid really.
I am a FIRM believer that not all laws are correct, and quite a few of them are dangerous.
Here's a web site, that shows just how stupid some lawmakers can be, lol. (not to mention it gets you REALLY worried that someone had to actually do some of this stuff for them to make a law against it, lol!)
For example, in LeFors, TX it is illegal to drink more than 3 swallows of a beer while standing. And in Lubbock county, TX it is illegal to drive within "arm's reach" of alcohol, even if it is in someone else's bloodstream.
While that is true, the law in TX is written so that even if you only have one drink, you are intoxicated, and anyone in public that is intoxicated can be arrested for it. Stupid really.
I am a FIRM believer that not all laws are correct, and quite a few of them are dangerous.
Here's a web site, that shows just how stupid some lawmakers can be, lol. (not to mention it gets you REALLY worried that someone had to actually do some of this stuff for them to make a law against it, lol!)
For example, in LeFors, TX it is illegal to drink more than 3 swallows of a beer while standing. And in Lubbock county, TX it is illegal to drive within "arm's reach" of alcohol, even if it is in someone else's bloodstream.
I dont exactly agree with the laws. Hell I got an underage drinking ticket from an undercover ALE officer in college when I was in my own yard. I was 20 at the time. There were about 5 or 6 different parties on the same block and they were just walking around getting people.
I started off just trying to say that they didnt neccessarily go in to "bash gays" as some have alluded to. Got kind of derailed, though.
so the liqour guys needed to raid some bars, with the help of the cpos to make sure the bars had their paperwork in order? why need the cops? they knew people would be mad. getting rousted in a bar while you have a beer or two is wrong. I would be angry if the cops came busting in on a bar I was sitting at one night.
one person is all it takes to make sure a bar is in compliance with the law. far too many people assume the police are only doing their job and if people would only comply and be polite, they wouldn't have any trouble. it doesn't seem to dawn on these people that the police over stepped their bounds by raiding the place with a squad of men in the first place. authority sometimes has their own agenda shrouded in the guise of doing the right thing. this sounds like a bunch of thugs went out to knock some heads
While that is true, the law in TX is written so that even if you only have one drink, you are intoxicated, and anyone in public that is intoxicated can be arrested for it. Stupid really.
I am a FIRM believer that not all laws are correct, and quite a few of them are dangerous.
Here's a web site, that shows just how stupid some lawmakers can be, lol. (not to mention it gets you REALLY worried that someone had to actually do some of this stuff for them to make a law against it, lol!)
For example, in LeFors, TX it is illegal to drink more than 3 swallows of a beer while standing. And in Lubbock county, TX it is illegal to drive within "arm's reach" of alcohol, even if it is in someone else's bloodstream.
But another person at the bar witnessed Gibson's arrest (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/localnews/columnists/jfloyd/stories/063009dnmetfloyd.3bddb2c.html - broken link):
"They were hyped up. They were loaded for bear," said Todd Camp, a veteran journalist who was there celebrating his birthday with friends. "They were just randomly grabbing people, telling them they were drunk."
Camp told me he has been in bars during TABC/police "checks" before, "and it was never anything like this." Usually, he said, officers discreetly walk through, looking for anybody who has had too much. This was different. "They were shoving patrons," Camp said, "asking, 'How much have you had to drink?'"
and
Quote:
Gay men don't grope police officers when they enter gay bars. I find it inconceivable that the gay men drinking in the Rainbow Lounge in Fort Worth responded to a raid by attempting to grope the police officers. This "they groped us!" **** is a lie. As the owner of the bar, J.R. Schrock, put it at the protest the night after the raid:
"The groping of the police officer—really? We're gay, but we're not dumb," Schrock said to the crowd that gathered at the bar Sunday afternoon. "That is a lie, and I am appalled by it."
Pam's House Blend (http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/11819/fort-worth-police-chief-yeah-that-***-at-the-rainbow-lounge-deserved-the-beatdown - broken link)
Quote:
Monday, police chief Jeff Halstead said the officers' actions are being investigated. However, he also said that officers that entered the bar during the scheduled inspection were touched inappropriately. "You're touched and advanced in certain ways by people inside the bar, that's offensive," he said. "I'm happy with the restraint used when they were contacted like that."
News 8 talked with council member Joel Burns shortly after he visited Gibson in the hospital Monday afternoon.
"It's my hope that the fact that this is a gay bar and the violence that happened there are not in any way tied - obviously as someone who loves Fort Worth [and] as someone who is gay - I don't want those two things to be connected," he said.
Neither the TABC nor Fort Worth police revealed why the bar was selected for what police called a bar check. But, Halstead said the checks always result from either citizen or law enforcement concerns. The bar's owner questioned that and pointed out the Rainbow Lounge has been open for less than two weeks.
The article can be accessed from the front page; you may want to update the link.
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