Lawsuit Seeks To Bar Police From “Shaming” Suspects On Social Media
I love a good story about stupid people doing stupid things. I love the fact that my job is to talk about those things and it is someone else's job to actually have to deal with these jackwagons. The jackwagon herders are the members of our law enforcement community. They have to be at their best when we are usually at our worst. They also have to be nice to us while we are not being nice to them.
Many police departments are now using social media to demonstrate the kind of issues their officers face every day. Sometimes those issues are tense and quite terse. Other times the absurdity of the situation is so far out there that if they didn't have the pictures you wouldn't believe it.
Some people have taken offense to the idea that police are posting stories about arrests and incidents and adding commentary as an aside. So offended are some that they have decided the issue needs to be decided in court. The incident that has spurred a lawsuit happened just south of Boston Massachusetts in the town of Taunton.
A female driver may or may not have had too much to drink and was behind the wheel. She mowed down several mailboxes by the time the police were able to get her out of the car. She also disclosed that she had a lizard in her bra. That my friends is comedy gold and to be honest this law abiding citizen acting in an unlawful manner has probably earned a little public shaming.
That's my opinion. It's not the opinion of attorneys that are representing her. They feel that the Taunton Police Department's depiction of the events as they took place and the side commentary that was added to the story damaged their client. They probably hurt her feelings too.
What do you think? Should police only report "the facts" on their social media or should they be just as flabbergasted as the rest of us are when we read stories such as this?
When I was in school if you screwed up you had to sit in a corner and wear a stupid hat or stand in front of the class with chewing gum stuck to your nose. It only took a few minutes of "shame" to suppress thoughts of bad behavior. That small dose of humiliation probably prevented me from doing a lot of other really stupid things.
I understand innocent until proven guilty. I understand the right to a fair trial. I also understand if you don't break the law then the police are really cool about almost everything. Granted I wouldn't want my faux pas shared on social media. In fact, I want that so badly that I try not to faux pas at all. So far my strategy has been flawless but the day is still young right?