More than a dozen newly minted Port Authority police officers are under investigation for partying so hard after their recent graduation that local police had to be called, DNAinfo New York has learned.
The embarrassing behavior followed the graduation of 249 PAPD probationary officers, the largest class in agency history, at the Dunn Sports Center in Elizabeth, New Jersey, on Aug. 22.
Following the swearing-in, a large contingent headed out to celebrate at a few bars, along with a lieutenant from the academy.
“Everyone was drunk,” a source told “On The Inside.” “They were telling people they were cops and to f— off, and some were fighting with patrons and themselves, and there was maybe even a little ass-grabbing.”
Eric Garner never had a chance if this is what NYC cops are like during their academy graduation celebration.
Alex S.
many cops = dudebros not tough enough for the army
Belafon
The lieutenant should have been sober enough to tell them “Not until you’ve started your job, your not.”
David in NY
These are guys who wanted to be NYPD officers and had to settle for jobs with the Port Authority. Wannabe’s are always the worst.
But yes, this is fundamentally who wants to be a police officer, in too many cases. Somebody who gets a kick out of being able to order people around. And being able to get even with them if they won’t comply. Most of the bad cop stories begin this way — “I told him to …X…, and he wouldn’t do it.”
The other main problem with cops is the related, “I’m always right.” So when they decide that a bunch of rowdy kids must have assaulted that runner in Central Park, that’s their story and they’re sticking to it (even after the DNA shows they’re wrong). The mystery is why DA’s go along with them even when their story has obvious flaws (e.g., none of the kids’ confessions matches each other or the facts). But maybe that’s the same reason, too many DA’s are just wannabe cops, and they’re in love with the guys with the badges.
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
boys will be boys, amirite?
Jacks mom
Wow. Just wow. They aren’t even trying to disguise their culture or wrap it in that “protect and serve” camo. How do we change this.
sharl
Yep, Justice Vaffanculo is the gift that keeps on giving:
beltane
I vaguely recall a similar incident involving newly sworn in NYPD officers back in the late 1980s. This type of thing is not new, though I suspect that most “cops behaving badly” stories were swept under the rug in the post-9/11 authoritarian fervor.
JGabriel
David in NY:
When DA’s go along with clearly wrong or fabricated evidence, it’s usually because they are more afraid of being called weak on crime than they are of sending an innocent man to jail or death row.
Amir Khalid
Doesn’t the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey’s police academy teach its trainees how to conduct themselves as police officers?
(He asked innocently.)
the Conster
@David in NY:
The local cops I knew from my town were the kids who liked to be in and around trouble. If they don’t find it they make it, since they’re the bullies and troublemakers from high school.
beltane
@David in NY: In my experience, most DAs are not wannabe cops. However, many of them are wannabe congress reps, governors, judges and presidents. They are careerists first and foremost. In order to advance their careers, they need to win as many convictions as possible. Maintaining good relations with the police is necessary for them to further their career objectives. It’s really that simple.
OzarkHillbilly
@beltane: this
Mandalay
a source? Red flag.
maybe? Red flag.
allegedly? Red flag.
Nobody else is reporting the story. Red flag.
There is nothing to corroborate the claims of the “source”. Red flag.
I’m as predisposed as anyone here to assume the worst about police behavior but this crap is a waste of an FP when there is so much real cop misbehavior out there to expose. I thought your bullshit detector was better than this.
sharl
As long as socioeconomically blessed white folks are fearful of people of color, all kinds of shit will be tolerated from “law enforcement” folks, as long as that shit isn’t directed at the aforementioned white folks.
Relatedly, rowdy cops were major players in Rudy Giuliani getting elected Mayor in “liberal” NYC in the 90s, and were awarded by being permitted to run wild. And I wouldn’t be surprised if Democratic statehouse Rep Jeffrey Roorda (Missouri) – major guy behind the mysterious fundraising supposedly for the policeman who killed Michael Brown – has probably seen his career advanced by similar sociopolitical forces, despite his sordid history.
Bystander
The NYPD allowed a motorcycle gang (which counted we don’t know how many NYPD officers among its number, but at least 2) to take over a huge swatch of the West Side Highway months ago. The gang terrorized anyone who happened to be on the highway. All the focus was on the motorcycle gang and the crimes they perpetrated on a panicked family. Zero discussion of how the NYPD allowed this to happen despite multiple 911 calls.
How many billions have been spent on arming and “training” these guys in the name of 9/11? But they allow a gang to take over the uptown side of the WSH with nary a peep?
David in NY
@beltane: Yeah, you’re probably right, though there is often a real alliance between the two that the term “wannabe” does not capture (or distorts). The reason that the crooked Brooklyn cop who framed so many guys was successful was that the DA’s in the homicide bureau were in awe of him (to set aside the possibility that they were in on the scam).
Violet
@Mandalay:
NJ.com reports:
CONGRATULATIONS!
Tailhook 2014
different-church-lady
@Mandalay:
My BJ BS detector now starts flashing on the front page and doesn’t stop until the comment numbers stop increasing. It doesn’t matter if it’s Ferguson or iCloud or Snowden — I’ve just seen too many people pulling too much stuff out of too many asses with UTTER CONVICTION! I don’t even have faith in the garden chats at this point.
That being said, I have no reason to believe it didn’t happen, although it probably didn’t happen exactly as said by Mr. Source.
Betty Cracker
Not even pet chickens are safe from testosterone-poisoned cops! Rather than cursing the darkness, let’s light a candle: There are some good cops out there, but obviously there’s a HUGE cultural problem within police departments nationwide. Anyone got any solutions?
Here’s an idea: Only women can be cops. I know, it sounds crazy. And yeah, there are some women who are bullies and get off on ordering people around in a BIG BOOMING VOICE.
But has a female cop ever been videotaped beating a homeless man to death? Do female cops routinely shoot unarmed teenagers to death? I’m not saying it never happens, but it’s pretty damn rare, even accounting for women’s woeful under-representation among police ranks (around 15 percent).
Women are generally less physically aggressive and have a greater tendency to cooperate. We can argue about why until the cows come home, but the evidence is overwhelming that this is the case. Are these traits not exactly what is needed to reform policing?
samiam
Also they are known to help people and keep our streets safe 99.999% of the time.
I see Cole is back talking out of his ass again about things he knows nothing about.
Amir Khalid
@samiam:
Always good to see you here in these threads, derf.
Another Holocene Human (now with new computer)
@Bystander: I know it makes a good story the way you tell it, but the driver in the “panicked family” ran over a motorcyclist.
And the motorcyclists, including the cops, were arrested. Still waiting for that SUV driver to get indicted for attempted murder …
crickets …
crickets …
NYC almost never pursues vehicular homicide against drivers. For one thing, it makes their numbers look better, and that’s what the mayor and commissioner want. For another thing, if you’re a pedestrian, you’re a peasant. Fuck you! If you’re on a bicycle, you’re a public nuisance, and you’re going to jail. If you’re on a motorcycle, you had it coming. Pursuing and beating that man was wrong, but I could understand why they did it. That dude tried to kill one of their friends.
Amir Khalid
@Betty Cracker:
Gee, I don’t know. I too would like to believe that women are generally better people than men. But I fear that this might be wishful thinking; that the thuggish, bullying type is not much less common among women than among men. And that the women who pass a police selection process that winds up picking male high-school bullies and troublemakers would be the meanest and nastiest of the mean-girl crowd.
g
To be fair, PAPD are not NYPD.
SteveM
@sharl: More on that 1992 Giuliani-led police riot here.
Origuy
A white Oakland Police officer held a black firefighter and his kids at gunpoint in his own fire station.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid: I’m half kidding, but I really do think police departments that were 50% female would be better than police departments that are 85% male. It’s not that women are better people, necessarily, but they tend to approach problems in a different way, whether through societal conditioning or physiological factors or both. Lacking dicks to swing, women tend to be less dick-swingy.
beltane
@Amir Khalid: The behavior of female prison guards at Abu Gharaib was no better than that of the males. Although there may be less of an issue with steroid abuse among female cops, giving one group of humans absolute power over another group will tend to make people act like dicks regardless of gender.
Jay C
@Bystander:
Your recap of the “Biker Road Rage” incident last September is a tad faulty: The crowds of motorcyclists on the West Side Highway weren’t a “gang” – they were part of a sort of rally (unauthorized and still hazardous) of bikers who just swarmed into the City: The ‘terrorized family” weren’t quite simply innocent passers-by, they had stopped short and injured a biker: then, trying to flee, ran over (and paralyzed) another one. That’s not by way of excuse for the violence, of course, but the NYPD undercover cop who took part in the later attack on the SUV has been indicted, and AFACBD, will stand trial along with the other “ragers”.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Betty Cracker: I agree. Since we’re not conditioned to solve everything with a show of force. a different approach is often the case. Often, men have been conditioned that in the end, force will work. Women, we’ve not had that experience so much, given that there was usually stronger force in opposition. So I’m quite persuaded it would be a great idea to have an equal – or nearly so – gender split.
big ole hound
@Alex S.: They would all wash out of the military as unfit yet we give them guns badges and PENSIONS goddamnit.
srv
Good luck with that, as Syria and Iraq are already living Hells.
Belafon
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): The evidence I’ve seen suggests that on average, women would be as bad in their own way (one of the reasons the cops get away with bullying is they have guns, sticks, and generally the authority to use them). Pushing for more women would hopefully lead to better people because you are increasing the pool of people being drawn from.
Svensker
Port Authority cops are not NYPD. At all. I’m no big fan of NYPD, but the P.A. “cops” are flunkies with flat feet, lack of intelligence and (usually) a piss poor attitude. They are mostly tasked with getting taxis to move along at the big bus station on 8th Ave. The ones I knew who lived on the Jersey side of the river (including one guy who was killed on 9/11) got their jobs because of their, um, family connections.
BGinCHI
This does not sound very student-centered to me.
http://www.localnews8.com/news/gun-fired-on-isu-campus/27845854
Guy is going to have to change the “course outcomes” on his syllabus now.
Nicole
@Betty Cracker: I remember reading an article (it makes me nuts that I can’t track it down again) that workplaces that are evenly co-ed tend to be more congenial places to work than male-only ones. I wish I could find the article, because it managed to explain it without sounding as awfully sexist as this will, but what I took from it was, for whatever reason, men behave better when there are several women in their group. Not just one; she either has to become one of the guys or is harassed, but when it’s closer to 50-50 behavior improves. Maybe it’s an evolutionary thing, maybe it’s fear of lawsuits, who knows. So I think you are on to something- more women on a security force would likely lead to a better behaved force. Not perfect, of course, but an improvement.
Amir Khalid
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
While the gender imbalance in police forces that Betty Cracker points out is indeed a problem, the institutional culture of police forces must also play a large part. And thanks to the gender imbalance, that culture is shaped mostly by the dick-swingers. And wouldn’t such a sexist and testosterony culture see the less-violent approach as the wimmins failing to measure up?
ETA: At least, until there are enough women around to civilise the culture somewhat.
Trollhattan
@Nicole:
Best boss I ever had is a woman.
Worst boss I ever had is a woman.
My conclusion is don’t presume jack (jill?) when it comes to predictions of competence and effective interpersonal relationships based on gender.
Roger Moore
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
There’s a serious question of how well that would survive police training. It seems to me that one of the big problems with the police right now is that they’re trained to see every situation as a confrontation and any refusal to comply as a threat that must be met with violence. That’s probably a bit of an exaggeration, but there’s clearly a serious training issue, with officers taught to use violence more than they ought to. It’s not at all clear to me that women’s general socialization not to use violence would overcome the specific police training to the contrary.
Another Holocene Human (now with new computer)
@Origuy: Holy WTF Batman
Heard about something like this months ago, some white cops tackling a black firefighter in the South somewhere. But these kinds of things are everywhere.
Oh noes, he was wearing a hoodie. Not like it’s chilly at night or anything.
Remember those candid camera videos of men pretending to steal a bike … the white actors actually had bystanders help them do it?
beltane
@Roger Moore:
A good example of your point is the IDF. As long as we’re dealing with a fundamentally adversarial, cops against the people (especially certain shades of people) school of policing, gender equality in the police force will not change anything that much.
Nicole
My uncle was a state trooper for many years. He is not an authoritarian type by any stretch of the imagination. That said, he had some pretty awful stories, that, from his telling, he didn’t consider so awful. He once earnestly told me that the police only planted evidence when they were sure someone was guilty (sigh), and I remember him telling a story of being in Philadelphia working a parade, and seeing one of the Philly cops punch a guy who was already in handcuffs. Now, yes, the man was in handcuffs because he had just thrown a lit firecracker at the cop’s horse, injuring it, but hello, handcuffs (my uncle was of the opinion that city cops are much more violent than state troopers, though I suspect he was severely biased).
I have little faith in police (I myself have not had good encounters with them), but I do think things are probably improving, albeit slowly. That St. Louis cop caught spouting all that stuff on video at an Oath Keepers rally was forced to retire. It sucks that he still gets his pension, but he had to leave the job before he wanted to.
Nicole
@Trollhattan: I’m not talking about bosses (like you, my best and worst were also both female, and in fact, worked in the same damn office); I’m talking about the percentage of male-to-female in a workforce. Co-ed workforces seem to be preferable to single sex. I don’t know if the same applies to all-female workforces because as I recall, it wasn’t what the article was looking at. If I ever find it again, I’ll post it in an open thread or something.
Mike in NC
Several of New York’s Finest — retired NYPD and FDNY — live in our community. Racist authoritarians every one.
WaterGirl
@Origuy: Open season on black males. Now with children!
If you live in fear all the time, as these guys must, you should not be a cop. I used to think being a cop required bravery.
rikyrah
no shock in the least
rikyrah
@Origuy:
no shock in the least
Nicole
@WaterGirl: I really think cops should be required to live in or very close to the areas they are assigned to. I think when people are your neighbors, you have to develop a different attitude when dealing with them. If they don’t want to have where they live dictated to them, then they are not the right stuff to be a cop.
Chet
@Bystander: I remember that story. I also remember this WND piece blaming it all on Teh Negroes.
Chet
This blog, written by “a retired police officer from a large metropolitan agency in the mid-west”, gives a good look into what’s going through the minds of some of our men in blue.
http://www.ambrosekane.com
Mandalay
@Violet:
What a story! What a scoop!
Steve in the ATL
“DA’s are just wannabe cops”
Wow–you just offended every lawyer here!
Steve in the ATL
Best boss I ever had was female, but a lesbian. How does that affect our anecdata?
FridayNext
Another red flag:
It’s “couldn’t!” They “couldn’t have cared less.”How am I suppose to believe ANYONE who can’t get that straight?
Unless of course this source does mean they cared somewhat that their bosses were there, but I am dubious about that interpretation.
Paul in KY
@beltane: You put it 100% true!
David in NY
@Steve in the ATL: I took that back as a generalization. Although it applied to a couple of cases I knew personally.
Paul in KY
@Bystander: If a motorcyclist makes me ‘fear for my life’, while I am driving a 2 ton car, that person will probably regret that action.
Paul in KY
@Betty Cracker: How about: If you really want to be a cop. You can’t be one.
Bystander
The family was swarmed by multiple motorcycles and they feared for their lives. There is nothing to indicate that the driver was doing anything except reacting to the mob around him. Sorry, but in my book dozens of people on motorbikes conspiring to prevent people access to the highway by blockading entrances for their private purpose and terrorizing innocent people lawfully using the public road are gangs. Not a “rally.” Well, maybe in Arizona, but not in NYC.
That said, my point was that despite there having been no police presence until things had devolved into the mess it was, no one asks why they failed to respond to 911 calls or why these guys could commandeer a vast swath of the WSH. If peabrains on bikes can do that, why isn’t the PD investigating its own failure?
Spandeffer
@Nicole: I’m sure you’re right; but anecdotally, the couple of workplaces I know of that are 80%+ women are living hells. Most workplaces are bad when there are a couple of psychopaths who ruin it for the rest. That is the case in these two places. Plenty of psychopathic men who ruin your various places of employment, too, I’m sure. I think the world is 27% psychopaths. So, hire half women, but keep the nutjobs out.
Mnemosyne
@Spandeffer:
Anecdotally, it seems that it’s not good to have too many of one gender or the other. I think there was a sexual discrimination lawsuit against Jenny Craig Inc. a few years ago because one of the few men who worked there was being constantly harassed. 50/50 sounds about right.
Nicole
@Bystander:
In defense of the cops (bleah!), pursuing someone on a motorcycle can get very dangerous very quickly. The sort of motorcyclist who thinks nothing of taking over a swath of highway also thinks nothing of riding up onto the sidewalks and going the wrong way on a one-way street. My neighborhood is a popular cruising spot for young men on illegal motor bikes and they think nothing of whizzing up on the sidewalk when it suits them. If the cops would pursue, pedestrians could easily be collateral damage. The cops do best busting motorcyclists and motorbikers when they set up in an area they aren’t expected to be and arrest them as they approach.
horatius
@Chet: Heh. Expected a racist scumbag. Found one. That blogs would be the pride of Ku Klux Klan.
horatius
@Chet: Heh. Expected a racist scumbag. Found one. That blogs would be the pride of Ku Klux Klan.
horatius
@Chet: Heh. Expected a racist scumbag. Found one. That blogs would be the pride of Ku Klux Klan.
horatius
@Chet: Heh. Expected a racist scumbag. Found one. That blogs would be the pride of Ku Klux Klan.
horatius
@Chet: Heh. Expected a racist scumbag. Found one. That blog would be the pride of Ku Klux Klan.