I don’t know what kind of a person Darren Wilson is, and I don’t know if he was justified in shooting Mike Brown. But it there is increasing anecdotal evidence that a lot of police officers have a cruel, vicious and callous streak as evidenced by their attitudes toward animals, and to me, this suggests that are a lot of people in uniform with the authority to use deadly force who should not be police officers at all.
Jonathan Turley highlighted two nauseating cases in recent days.
The first unfolded in Baltimore, when Nala, a young Shar Pei, escaped from her owner’s yard over the weekend and a neighbor tried to check the dog’s tags. Don’t try this with unfamiliar dogs that might be stressed, everyone: Nala snapped at her, causing a minor wound. The neighbor then summoned police to deal with the dog, though she has acknowledged that the bite was her own fault, and Nala was just frightened.
The police and took control of Nala using the long dog-control pole. The neighbor reported that the two police officers abused the dog without cause in the process, twisting its neck and hurting her. One officer kneeled on Nala’s chest, causing her to whimper in pain.
They were just warming up.
Officer Jeffrey Bolger then said, according to multiple witnesses, “I’m going to fucking gut this thing.” As the neighbor and others watched in horror, Bolger pulled out a knife and slit Nala’s throat while Officer Thomas Schmidt held her down. Witnesses say that the dog was already immobilized against the ground and was posing no threat. Animal cruelty charges have been brought against both Bolger and Schmidt.
So you see, that animal control officer who shot the wild kittens as children watched wasn’t so bad after all.
The second episode, incredibly, is just as disturbing as what happened to Nala., and perhaps even worse. Do you doubt that is possible? Listen to this:
In Atwater, Minnesota, Police Chief Trevor Berger enforced a city ordinance prohibiting fowl from being kept in the community, responding to the failure of the Turnbull family to comply with an order to get rid of three chickens and two ducks. Berger killed the Turnbull’s 5-year-old’s pet rooster (he had just received it as a birthday present) by clubbing it to death with a shovel, then…are you ready?—cut off its head and left it on the property along with the heads of the other birds..as what? Terrorism? A warning? A joke? He apologized , explaining that he did not know the rooster was a pet.
Oh! Well then it’s okay to engage in bird terrorism, then. Never mind!
Actually, that apology is dubious, since when the family called the police station to ask the chief if he had come on their property and slaughtered little Phoenix Turnbull’s pet, his response was, “Yup. Any questions?” Berger later was quoted as shrugging off the incident, saying that “most of the people think it’s rather silly” when “there’s such uproar about a chicken.”
That’s not what the uproar is about, you brutal, monstrous, Idiot With A Badge.
The uproar, as in Baltimore, is about a law enforcement official revealing themselves as sadists, and showing an appalling lack of human compassion, not to mention proportion, good taste and common sense.
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Facts:Res Ipsa Loquitur 1, 2
Ethics Alarms 
He was in fear of his life.
Zoe, that is the cost of outrageous criminal misconduct from sadists who should never be police officers. The good one, put in a situation where he has to protect his or another’s life is painted with the same brush. These guys destroy trust and cause rational folks like you to roll your eyes at the rest.
We warned the nation back when Clinton came out with his “100,000 officers on the streets” charade. The backbone of America’s security from within and without is the armed citizen. When you disarm the citizen and put a vastly expanded police force in place, you do two things: 1) You place citizens in utter dependency of armed police and the danger to liberty that comes with that and, 2) the quality of police professionalism will invariably decline along with the level of respectful interaction between police and citizenry.
There are few better ways to judge the worth of a man’s character than his regard for innocent life that is dependent on his good graces at any given moment. It’s said (and is likely true) that the career of a monster begins with the abuse of small animals for the fun of it. If such passions are in evidence in adulthood- and in the persons of armed men with authority- then we should all be oiling down our own firearms, for the guardians have become the predators. It’s only a small step from killing household pets to killing households.
The two officers in Baltimore need to be immediately discharged because they have demonstrated no concern for life or property. The other should be terminated for his general willingness to abuse his power.
I am of the personal opinion that pets should not be treated as property under the law. This point of view allows this type of attitude to prevail; “so what it’s just a” . . . dog or cat or fill-in the blank when the animal is killed or maimed by accident or on purpose. Pets are not disposable. They are family.
Destruction of life for mere enjoyment or out of frustration should not be seen as an error in judgment it should be seen a s a significant character defect.
I am sorry I even heard about these cases.
I second that!
I think police need to compelled to actually respect property. Treating livestock as a special case is fine, but the general disregard police have for property as a concept is a bigger concern to me than how it plays out with respect to pets in particular.
Destruction of life for mere enjoyment or out of frustration should not be seen as an error in judgment it should be seen a s a significant character defect.
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Absolutely.
Who raised these idiots?
I think you have the distinction backwards.
If the police officer in the Minnesota case were responding to a code violation of bicycles left in the front yard, and smashed a bike with a sledgehammer (leaving the handlebars as a warning?) then there would be serious questions about the officer’s mental stability. If the police in the Baltimore case were playing games with a car on a tow-truck and one of them said “I’m gonna fucking destroy this thing” before pouring acid all over the engine, there is little chance the officer wouldn’t be wearing a jacket with sleeves that tie in the back.
While destruction of life for mere enjoyment or out of frustration is often contested as an error in judgement, similar destruction of non-life is almost always seen as a significant character defect.
Jesus. F***ing. Christ.
Ditto, Neil
Yes! You know, I was going to make this a Kaboom!, thought about your complaint that was resorting to that trope too often (see, I really do pay attention!) and now you provide the perfect designation! This is a Jesus Fucking Christ if there ever was one. Bingo.
1) Correction: “when the family called the police station to ask Turnbull if he had come” [swap out Turnbull for Berger]
2) I wonder when Berger left the heads and took the carcasses of the chicken, where those carcasses ended up? Did he take them home, cook them and eat them? That could change or add some kind of theft charge.
Both links go to the chicken incident.
I should clarify: both links inside the post. The two at the end are fine.
I stopped reading your post Jack once I saw where it was headed.
So did my wife. I didn’t like writing it much. But how can you help address a serious problem if you won’t consider the data?
It’s too overwhelming. You can report on extreme abuse without going into the details. I stopped doing pro bono work for indigent and neglected children because I thought I would become clinically depressed. The same thing happened to me with death penalty work. My volunteer work now involves animal shelters and even then I have to mentally detach from certain details or else risk possibility of me slapping people in the face.
“You can report on extreme abuse without going into the details.”
Who would listen? Who would believe you? Who would care?
Do our law professionals now come equipped with knives and shovels, did they steal those from the pet owners, or did they bring their own? One way or the other… Fuck.
Chris Marschner: “I am sorry I even heard about these cases.”
Beth: “I stopped reading your post Jack once I saw where it was headed.”
Thanks to both of you. I’m glad I read your comments before I read the post!
There aren’t many days when I pat myself on the back for doing something similar to what CNN has done – proactively blocking smut from my senses.
Horrible!
The neighbor who reported the loose chickens was quoted by the paper as saying, “As for the neighbor, Rierson is quoted as saying that, if killing the chicken was the only way for the police chief to address the problem, “then I’d say he’s doing his job.” What a gem to live next door to. As the article states, it’s a good thing Rierson wasn’t complaining about noisy children!
Does animal control exist in these places? People paid or volunteer to collect stray animals? What if that was a stray cow? Just because it stepped on your foot is no reason to kill it. I know they are considered immune to lawsuits in the line of duty, but when something is done that is NOT in the line of duty, there should be a cost to them personally. If some teenager or twenty-something did that kind of animal abuse, they’d have all kinds of repercussions and police would watch then as budding serials. These pets can often cost thousands and they should not be allowed to shrug off the cost on the department or town for their bad behavior. Maybe their oaths should include a warning of ‘first do no harm.’