When I've been pulled over in the past I've asked the cop if I could light a cig if the stop was going to take a few minutes and I've never been told no. His request was after the fact and was used as pretense for his eventually arresting her.
This stop was over and he jacked it up because he didn't want it to be over.
To claim that she didn't disobey his requests is absolutely vile.
Oh, you want to get all pedantic on me for using the word ignore. Fine...enjoy.
In a traffic stop, is it legal for an officer to order a driver to put out a cigarette and exit the car?
Ms. Bland has a right to smoke in her car, but Trooper Encinia could argue that the cigarette was interfering with legitimate police business. Since he had already processed the papers, however, I dont see a good reason, said Robert Weisberg, a criminal procedure expert and law professor at Stanford University.
ooops. lawsuits incoming bigtime.
At this point she is combative and uncooperative.Im in my car, why do I have to put out my cigarette. He then says, well you can step out of the car now,
pauldun170 seems to believe that cops exist to police the attitudes and respectfulness of people.
There is proof, she had been arrested for it twice before.
Ridiculous. Their job is to ensure public safety. They are not state appointed mommies and daddies.
Cop was a dick. Never should have even been a stop. Somehow a meaningless traffic infraction turns into a stop, arrest, fight, arrest, jail then a dead woman.
They failed their #1 mission in every way possible.
Sue their asses. If they were a business, they would be all fired and the doors closed.
Another COP apologist!!He did not order her.
He asked her politely. -- no the cop was not polite!!
When she replied to her the way she did. He then ordered out of the car. -- no, when she did not put out her cigarette the cop felt that his perceived authority was being questioned so the COP escalated matters!!His intentions on that first order to get out of the car are unknown. -- no his intentions are not unknown!1 The COP intended to be a jerk and lay some smackdown on her....
Quote:
Im in my car, why do I have to put out my cigarette. He then says, well you can step out of the car now,
At this point she is combative and uncooperative. -- No the COP escalated the matter.....he was a dick!!
Legally, she has a right to smoke but on the other side of the coin the officer is allowed to ask her out of the car to finish conducting the business of the stop. Probably to explain that she is not getting a ticket and that she should calm down. Probably also to be a dick to her.
Legally that's allowed.
The courtesy policy that the officers fell foul of is at play right here.
That violation does not excuse Bland's behavior that drove this entire interaction.
Bland responds "I dont have to step out."
There is a grey area there where it can be argued that the wording of his initial request is unclear. -- not true at all....When he clearly says to get out of the car the second time, she is legally obligated to get the hell out of the car at that point.
I like how this was put on Yahoo --
Sandra Bland's Arrest Wasn't Racism; It Was Something Even Worse
It's easy to assume racism when watching the video footage of Sandra Bland's arrest. Admittedly, the first question that entered this writer's mind when watching it was, "Would a white woman have been treated this way during a routine traffic stop?"
I believe the answer is "yes," if the white woman committed the cardinal sin Sandra Bland committed. It wasn't her being black that started the tragic chain of events. It was refusing to follow a police officer's orders.
At some point between ratification of the Fourth Amendment and the death of Sandra Bland, the entire principle underpinning that constitutional protection has been lost. The Fourth Amendment assumes armed agents of the state can't be trusted to issue their own orders. That's why we have warrants in the first place. They are permitted only to enforce the orders of an impartial judge, who authorizes them to apprehend suspects upon the judge's determination of probable cause.
That's not to say many or most officers aren't well-intentioned or trustworthy. But their job is to use force. That role must be separated from the issuance of orders.
Had Sandra Bland been a murder suspect and arresting officer Brian Encinia serving a warrant for her arrest, no one would have questioned Encinia's conduct in ordering her out of her car. One might even find room to excuse his order to stop smoking, if she were assumed to be someone who had already killed another human being.
But Bland wasn't a murder suspect. As she quite rationally protested, she was ordered out of her car over a "failure to signal." She had complied with the traffic stop. I seriously doubt there is a law or ordinance requiring her to stop smoking while being issued a citation for a traffic violation.
Encinia didn't even phrase his initial request as an order. His exact words were, "You mind putting out your cigarette, please, if you don't mind?" It was Bland's refusal to comply with this non-order that incited Encinia's indignation and subsequent order to exit her car.
Ultimately, we have to look at what we are asking police officers to do and how we are training them to do it. Encinia may have treated Bland differently because she was black. We can't read his mind. But it's much more likely he treated her the way he did because she didn't exhibit blind obedience to his every whim, something he was trained not to tolerate and Americans of all political persuasions seem to have acquiesced to without question.
Life and property have to be protected. When a real crime is committed, men or women with guns are often needed to bring in the suspect to answer the charges. That only occurs after an adversarial process during which a judge assumes an arrest is unjustified until the officer presents enough evidence to persuade him otherwise. Until then, police officers aren't authorized to give orders to anyone.
We need to get back to that relationship between citizen and law enforcement officer.
This wouldn't hamper police officers from protecting innocent people from violent crimes on those rare occasions when they are present while they are occurring. All individuals have a right to defend victims with force under those circumstances, whether employed by the government or not. But private individuals don't have the authority to walk around giving people orders, even if they suspect them of having broken the law.
In a free society, neither do cops.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-m...asnt_b_7849052.html?ncid=txtlnkusaolp00000592
And you're making comments based on what, something you heard? It's obvious you have not even watched the video. She got out of the car on her own. No 'yanking' occurred.What the fuck does that have to do with her specifically being yanked from her car over having an attitude and a cigarette.
I swear, you guys go straight to work on the smear campaigns.
He did not order her.
He asked her politely.
When she replied to her the way she did. He then ordered out of the car.
His intentions on that first order to get out of the car are unknown.
At this point she is combative and uncooperative.
Legally, she has a right to smoke but on the other side of the coin the officer is allowed to ask her out of the car to finish conducting the business of the stop. Probably to explain that she is not getting a ticket and that she should calm down. Probably also to be a dick to her.
Legally that's allowed.
The courtesy policy that the officers fell foul of is at play right here.
That violation does not excuse Bland's behavior that drove this entire interaction.
Bland responds "I dont have to step out."
There is a grey area there where it can be argued that the wording of his initial request is unclear.
When he clearly says to get out of the car the second time, she is legally obligated to get the hell out of the car at that point.
Count me on the cop's side.
Bland's behavior was atrocious.
I just don't follow your logic here. Maybe this will help. What law did she break that he asked her to step out of the car and place her under arrest?
Saw the clip on the local news station tonight and two analysts (one was former FBI agent and one is a lawyer for ACLU). They said:
1. She would NOT have to put out the cigarette.
What the fuck does that have to do with her specifically being yanked from her car over having an attitude and a cigarette.
I swear, you guys go straight to work on the smear campaigns.
Aside from the citation she was already getting, she failed to obey the cop's request.
He didn't order her to put out the cigarette, he politely asked, twice. So when she refused, she technically wasn't refusing a lawful order. The cop probably should have said something like "first I was asking, now I am ordering you to extinguish the cigarette." Then she would have definitely been not following a lawful order.
The officer asks Bland to put out her cigarette.
She refuses.
Legally, she's within her rights to continue smoking, Callan and others experts said.
In a recording of the Bland traffic stop, the officer can be heard telling Bland to get off her phone. She tells him she is not on the phone, but is recording and says she has every right to record.
During Bland's traffic stop, a bystander is filming from a distance.
An order is heard, "You need to leave!"
The bystander can be heard responding by asking if they are on public property, and the bystander continues to film.
Retired New York police detective Harry Houck said an officer should never tell a person not to record.
The only reason we are even talking about the video and arrest is because conspiracy theorist want some airtime.
Sandra Bland was not being arrested for refusing to put out the cigarette she was arrested for resisting the lawful order to get out of the vehicle. She made things worse by striking the trooper and the arrest became Assault of a Public Servant.
Here's a good article on the subject.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slat...s_legal_but_encinia_used_excessive_force.html
Further evidence may mitigate the apparent illegality of Encinias violent tactics. But the evidence so far is extremely damning.
Ridiculous. Their job is to ensure public safety. They are not state appointed mommies and daddies.
Cop was a dick. Never should have even been a stop. Somehow a meaningless traffic infraction turns into a stop, arrest, fight, arrest, jail then a dead woman.
They failed their #1 mission in every way possible.
Sue their asses. If they were a business, they would be all fired and the doors closed.
And here's how that very article you linked to ends: