I find it odd how many of the contributing factors to the OP's issue here have not even been discussed. Sure, we have all seen cops blow a red light and I personally dont give it a second thought. I figure upon the argument so many often give that he is running low to an emergency. However, I think many here and chosen to ignore or disregard what (to me) really is the issue that made it all such a big problem. The fact that the officer made an unsafe lane change WHILE almost merging into an innocent motorist displaying no lights or sirens. I dont give a diddly darn WHAT emergency he is going to, there is no need for wreckless behavior of that sort. Argue "well if your house was being broken into then. youd think differently" all you want but if the officer causes a traffic accident acting like an irresponsible tool and he or someone else gets hurt as a result...you can kiss your chances of that officer showing up at YOUR emergency goodbye. Its like an EMT driving irresponsibly and causing an accident or further injury to someone they are transporting. And if he needed to run silent to whatever he had to get to thats perfectly fine, but I highly doubt the "bad guys" are gonna see his lights from 20 miles away as he motions for a motorist to move over. Ive had officers who needed around me in a hurry and were running low, but he had the sense and decency to flash his lights and allow me to move over so he could safley proceed.

Nope, ive never been a police officer, but I and countless others tend to get sick of the "well your not an officer so you dont understand" talk. Thats like a parent passing the buck when they do something wrong and try to reconcile with their children that "they dont understand because they arent a grownup, theyll understand when they are older.." We arent a bunch of 3 year olds who are too ignorant to know the difference in what can be done..and what SHOULD be done. With that kind of attitude displayed I might as well get ready for the "Mad Max" days of police service where there is just a complete disregard for the saftey of the REST of the public during a call or pursuit.

To me it all embodies "selective accontability". And walking a beat that nobody cares about does not entitle you to choose what rules you wish to follow that day.

And now I too will get the barrage of all the LEO's who will tell me to "ride along, you dont know what your talking about" and thats fine. The dead horse beating will continue. I would have alot more respect for alot of LEO's if theyd reply to all of that with "Its too bad there are those bad apples that make it in, but im not one of them" rather than the "you dont understand, you dont know what your talking about, your stupid" attitude.

 

Being that I was an air traffic controller before doing this, I understand better than you might know about this subject. However, by your own words, you are requiring perfection, and that will never happen from anyone.

I'm not giving other LE a free ticket to ride so to speak. As for driving recklessly, it's not appropriate and I agree that in some cases, certain LEO's might present a danger when driving in such a manner. My argument is more against all of the generalizing that goes on as to why we do this or that.

 

Tx2500, you need to fully read the prior posts. It has already been stated, by the LEO's on here, including myself, that we dislike the bad cops as much as the next guy, probably more. Go read my post, it's there, as well in several others.

As far as your your comment "ride along, you dont know what your talking about." I don't know what you do for a living, but I would not make uneducated remarks about your job until I had a working knowledge of it. Doing so would be ignorant on my part. But rest assured, we will still show up to help you out when you call, and 99.999% of us will drive safely while getting there.

 

I was waiting for this to get addressed ... .


I really don't understand how TX_2500 can dispute "If your not one of them then you don't know what your talking about". I'm sorry but unless you have actually walked a mile in MY shoes ... you couldn't possibly speak FACTUALLY and completely understand what I do. LEO, FF, military .... we all deal with comments like that from uninformed people on a daily basis and like was stated before .... we keep on doing it because it's the right thing to do.

There's a reason armchair quarterbacks never leave their armchairs.

Cheers,
PISTOL

 

Good point, Pistol.

 

I think this one needs a breif prayer and some flowers..


its dead...

 

Nope, not requiring perfection. Just saying that certain professions can't go around letting their personal issues interfere with the job performance. Cops and air traffic controllers are only two examples. There are plenty of others, including surgeons and OR nurses, for example.

Remember, I was responding to a LEO who was certainly implying, if not saying outright, that if he got crap from his supervisor, the public shouldn't expect him to act as professionally as he might if wasn't getting crap from his supervisor.

That's unacceptable.

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------
I agree, it's done.