Car Insurance Comparison – Home, Life, Business & Travel Insurance Quotes

Continued from Police Bashings – Part 2

THE MATTHEW BUTCHER INCIDENT

The plethora of incidents involving police beating suspects or criminals is undoubtedly a defining factor behind some members of the public retaliating in response to police thuggery. Many of the incidents are simply cases of self-defence, where members of the public only assault the police in an attempt to stop the police officers after they have already started assaulting members of the public.

One particular high profile case of self-defence occurred in Western Australia, where police thug Con. Matthew Butcher was attacked after he had shot Robert McLeod with a taser gun. Rushing to the defence of his father, Barry McLeod head-butted Butcher and he fell over and hit the pavement. The injuries were serious and even today, Butcher remains paralysed down the left side. The incident caused outrage in WA and led to the introduction on mandatory sentencing laws for anyone convicted of assaulting a public officer. It didn’t help matters that Barry McLeod was found not guilty of the assault incident, which prompted a number a highly verbal rallies calling for stricter punishments for those assaulting the police.

But the people at the rallies were only made up of the thug policemen and their families, as well as ill-informed members of the public. The story from the McLeod camp is entirely different from the police version, and even the video of the incident that was released to the public was edited to remove the police thuggery. Robert McLeod and his two sons were walking down the street when they saw a woman being assaulted. They went to her aid and later, Sgt. Blackwood rushed in without asking questions and grabbed Barry McLeod by the neck from behind. Con. Butcher then held his t-shirt over his head while Sgt. Blackwood beat him with his baton. When the other family members attempted to stop the assault, Butcher pulled out his taser gun. That’s when the situation turned ugly.

Con. Butcher was advised not to use his taser on Robert McLeod, since he had a heart condition and would almost certainly die from the shock. He refused to heed the warnings and fired at Robert McLeod, ultimately causing him to have a heart attack. This is when Barry McLeod rushed to his father’s aid to stop Con. Butcher. Fortunately only one of the two barbs hit Robert McLeod’s chest, but even this single barb caused a great deal of damage. He was dead for 12-14 minutes on the roadside while CPR was performed, and later had to be placed in an induced coma in hospital. He has now been left crippled and is unable to return to work. Police thuggery is unacceptable, as are the use of tasers and other assault weapons. When you consider that Con. Butcher was involved in the beatings, refused to listen to warnings about using the taser, and has almost killed a man and left him permanently injured, he certainly deserves what he got. Many may say that being left partially paralysed is not even enough.

It is fair to say that if Con. Butcher had not used his taser, he wouldn’t be paralysed today. The dangers of taser guns are well known, with thousands of deaths occurring from their use. How they were ever made available to police is a mystery, because they are clearly a lethal weapon. A google search for ‘taser deaths’ will reveals 1.75 million search results, which include examples of the murders police commit with the devices, as well as the ongoing campaigns calling for them to be banned.

SAY NO TO MANDATORY SENTENCING

The question at the moment is whether Victoria is going to follow Western Australia’s lead and introduce mandatory sentencing laws. If we examine all of the previously listed evidence, it is clear that a move like this is entirely unnecessary. Most of the incidents involving police being assaulted are incidents of self-defence, with the police receiving the beatings they deserve. There are always incidents such as the assault of Sen-Constable Sangston when he pulled over the vehicle with three occupants, for which he did not deserve to be assaulted. But the current laws are completely sufficient to punish the offenders for that occurrence.

Mandatory sentencing really means punishing people for petty assault incidences, such as when the fifteen year old girl was charged for kicking her shoe at the police officer. It was an extremely light contact, yet the girl would be facing a minimum six months jail if she was an adult and lived in WA. The punishment clearly does not fit the crime in this instance. When you consider that the police are well known for abusing their power and creating crimes that never occurred, many people will be jailed based on these laws for crimes they didn’t really commit. At present, only non-minor assaults result in a jail term, and this is the way it should stay.

Another issue is that police are becoming an untouchable species who are able to get away with any crime they desire. The police force are currently the beneficiaries of special immunity laws, making it impossible to charge them for the majority of the crimes they commit while working. As the above evidence shows, they are well known for lying, yet their evidence in court is believed in preference to evidence from regular folk. For example, if a person is charged with a crime and there is no other evidence apart from a single policeman being a witness, then the person can be found guilty. When it is word against word and the police are believed in preference, it always leads to corruption.

Bashing police is a serious crime and I agree that there should be tough penalties for those who commit the crime, but police bashing members of the public is just as serious, and the penalties for these crimes also need to be made tougher. The police are not punching bags for the public, and the public are not punching bags for police. A recent survey showed that 86% of Victorians want mandatory sentencing, but why don’t we have mandatory sentencing for police who beat up the public? The system currently favours crooked cops, such as the previous example of an officer who kicked a prisoner twice in the head and then tried to destroy the taped evidence. He was not even sent to jail.

OVERHAUL REQUIRED

The legal system needs a complete overhaul to bring more equality to the current laws. The penalties for crimes need to act as a deterrent for the public to stop them assaulting police officers and give them the respect they deserve. But respect needs to be earned, and suitable punishments also need to be put in place to deter police officers from acting outside the law and beating the public when they see fit. The following changes to the law should ensure that Australia becomes a more peaceful place.

• Tougher sentences for all assault charges, regardless of whether they involve police or they are between two members of the public.
• Tougher penalties for lying and perjury, such as when video evidence is later revealed showing that you have committed a crime you denied.
• Police officers should be forced to detail all incident reports with an affidavit under the penalty of perjury. At present they can lie about events and not be punished.
• All weapons of death should be removed from use, such as taser guns, capsicum spray and other chemicals. These have all caused deaths and are currently used as suspect punishment, instead of in life protection situations.
• All current immunity laws should be revoked. If a police officer commits a crime, they should be punished just the same as a normal member of the public.
• A regular citizen’s evidence should hold equal weight to that of a police officer. There should never be convictions in word against word cases, and some other evidence should always be required.
• Scrapping of police commissions and crime quotas. This will prevent police creating false crimes in order to make more money or reach performance quotas.
• Police officer resources should be diverted to give serious crimes preference over ‘ticket crimes’. They also need to be reminded that they are there to serve the people, not rape them with fines.
• There should be no punishments given before a court conviction. Currently arrests are being used excessively, when the majority of crimes could instead be charged through mail service.
• Police checks should only be performed when there are reasonable grounds that an offence is being committed. Public harassment through checking is unacceptable.
• Criminal intent must be evident in all crimes for a prosecution to be successful, especially in petty crimes. Currently someone could accidentally have something fall out of their pocket and be charged with littering.
• People found guilty of creating false stories to have someone charged with a crime they did not commit should receive the same penalty that the innocent party was facing. The present penalties for creating false charges are nothing more than a slap on the wrist, and these crimes need to be deterred with harsh penalties.

Continued from Police Bashings – Part 1

THE THUGS IN BLUE

Fines are one thing, but when innocent people are beaten by police, that’s another story. Even the criminals shouldn’t be subjected to this type of behaviour. Nobody deserves to be beaten in police custody. Unfortunately, police beatings in custody or even on the streets are a widespread occurrence, with very few cases making it into the news headlines. The problem is that the victims often have no way of proving their allegations, since they are generally alone and the police band together to refute their stories. The only cases that make the news are ones where someone dies or the police are filmed without their knowledge.

Most people would remember Rodney King and his beating being caught on camera. It brought the problem of police brutality into the public arena, but unfortunately hasn’t done much to stem the flow of police beatings. Instead, it has made police more aware of the prospect of being caught and forced them to conduct their beatings in more private areas and learn to cover up their tracks better.

To get a clear picture of just how bad the beatings given by police has become, we can do a simple search on the internet. A google search for ‘bashed by police’ reveals 540,000 results. Over half a million stories of people being beaten by police indicates it’s reaching epidemic proportions. When taking a look on YouTube, a search for ‘police brutality’ reveals 47,800 videos of incidences. Perusing through these videos for a short time will leave you both horrified and disgusted at what police have been caught doing.

There is one video which really sums up the brutal treatment the public are often receiving from police: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdAZERhmyxQ. This horrific video shows a fifteen year old girl being put in a jail cell, where she kicks off her shoe into a police officers leg. He then kicked her, punched her in the face, rammed her head into the wall and slammed her petite body into the ground. The officer claimed he beat her in order to prevent another attack. The worst part was that his actions were found to be justified. The same officer was previously investigated over two separate shootings, with one of the victims dying. Surprise, surprise – his actions were also found to be justified in both of those instances. In addition to the bashing she received, the young girl was also charged with assault for her little shoe kick.

AUSSIE POLICE BRUTALITY

For the police brutality deniers who may try and claim that the videos and google searches represent incidents overseas, they only need to add the word ‘Australian’ into their searches to bring up a comprehensive summary of Australian police brutality. Searching for ‘Australian police brutality’ on YouTube brought up 116 videos, with the first two featuring police beating a homeless man for no reason, and an officer kicking a handcuffed prisoner in the head twice and then trying to destroy the evidence. This officer was working with an honest cop, who are somewhat becoming a rarity, and was stopped as he was trying to rewind the tape and re-record over the evidence. For the beating and attempted disposal of evidence, he only received a nine month suspended sentence.

Besides the YouTube videos, there are thousands of articles detailing cases where police have been caught beating people. Considering the lengths that these officers go to in order to prevent being caught, you can only imagine in horror how many cases of police brutality go unmentioned or unpunished. Even if the cases referred to in the mainstream media are magically the only occurrences of police brutality, there are so many examples that it would take weeks on end to read them all.

When conducting a google search, even just the first few examples of people being beaten by police are enough to conclude that Australian police are indeed thugs. In NSW, a drunk driver was bashed by a large group of policemen, who used their fists, boots and batons. The police vehicles were filming the incident, but three officers decided to move and block the view of the camera when the beating took place. Unfortunately for them, there was another camera filming the incident.

There was also a case a while ago when two officers visited a 21 year old woman and tried to enforce a car-defect notice, but were told to leave because they did not have a warrant. Her punishment was a visit from eight policemen, who bashed both her and her partner. She was knocked unconscious, beaten while handcuffed and lying on the ground, and dragged bleeding into the police van. The incident left her with a broken nose and a swollen jaw, along with criminal charges for assault and escape. Fortunately the court saw through these lies and dismissed the charges.

Once again, I have seen police brutality with my own eyes. A few years ago I witnessed a potentially drunk person shouting loudly. He was told to shut up by police but he didn’t stop. Then a group of five to six police officers surrounded him and beat him to a pulp. He had gone completely quiet and wasn’t moving so I assume he was unconscious. As they were leaving and laughing, one of the officers saw me and realised that I had seen the entire incident. At this point he came right up to me and strongly said “You didn’t see anything, did you”, for which I naturally replied that I hadn’t seen a thing.

IT GETS WORSE

Airlie Beach Senior Constable Benjamin Price is a classic example of the modern day police thug. His conduct was so consistently obscene that a fellow police officer had to spill the beans on him after a particularly horrible incident. The beating in question occurred after Price arrested two men, Nigel Gluszek and Timothy Steele. The men got an inkling of what was to come later that night when Price performed the well known ramming of their heads into the window pillar of the police car when placing them inside after being arrested.

Mr. Gluzek escaped a further beating that night, but witnessed his friend being pounded by Sen-Constable Price. During the beating, Price jammed a fire-hose into Mr. Steele’s mouth and was heard shouting “You think you’re tough – this is my town”, which is a typical comment for arrogant police who believe they are above the law. Mr. Steele was beaten so badly that Mr. Gluzek didn’t even recognise him the next morning. Sen-Constable Price was also investigated over incidents such as repeatedly bashing a tourist until he blacked out, just for urinating in a park; and body-slamming a petite woman into the ground and splitting her chin open, during questioning over a stolen wallet.

One particular South Melbourne police station became notorious for its police bashings, with a particularly bad case involving the arrest of Shannon Ewart for spray-painting the station. One her first night she was stripped naked by six officers, handcuffed behind her back and repeatedly punched. The next day she was kicked in the kidney, punched in the stomach multiple times and beaten with a baton. Her five days of hell included the largest cop in the station standing on her stomach and saying “There are 38 muscles in the stomach. I can crush every one of them.” She eventually had to be taken to hospital. One the same night of Ms. Ewart’s arrest, another man was also receiving ‘police treatment’. Peter O’Callaghan was repeatedly punched and had his head bashed against a wall. He reported the incident, but an internal inquiry found that his injuries were caused by “falling over an unknown object in the dark”.

These incidents pale into insignificance when compared against the actions of the disbanded Victorian Armed Officers Squad. Stories of bashings and torture of suspects were becoming so common that secret video cameras were installed to record the interrogations. The officers involved naturally denied they tortured their suspects, but the hidden video cameras proved otherwise. During one beating, they shouted “Welcome to the armed robbery squad”, and another time when they were unhappy with the response they said “Don’t shake your head at me, cause when I get up you’re going to be in agony.” Once, a suspect asked if he could make a phone call, but when the questioning officer said “here it is”, he instead had the phone slammed into his head.

Also in Victoria, there was a horrific incident which occurred after Daniel Fox was arrested for being drunk outside his girlfriend’s house. Although he verbally abused police, he certainly didn’t deserve the treatment which was to follow. Mr. Fox was kicked and punched by police until he passed out, as well as having his leg broken. Ultimately, he was refused medical treatment and dumped outside the station late at night. Since his leg was broken, Mr. Fox had used a combination of crawling and hopping to get back to his house, before he could get assistance to travel to the hospital.

Continued at Police Bashings – Part 3

POLICE BASHINGS

A recent spate of police bashings in Victoria have led to calls for mandatory sentencing laws to be introduced, similar to the ones passed through the Western Australian parliament not so long ago. Adults in WA now face a minimum six month jail term if found guilty of assaulting or causing bodily harm to police officers or other public employees such as transit guards, prison guards, court officers or ambulance officers.

The Victorian public have seen a couple of major police bashing incidents in the last few months. Back in August, Sgt. Ward had his eye socket and nose broken after a confrontation with Glenn Pullar outside a city bar. Then just recently, Sen-Constable Sangston was bashed by three men and suffered head injuries when he attempted to arrest an unlicensed driver.

But both of these incidents were instigated by the actions that the policemen took. Sgt. Ward doused a group of people on a buck’s party night tour with capsicum spray, simply because they refused to move on when requested. The streets are public property and people have the right to be there. Sgt. Ward does not have the right to assault them for this ‘crime’. When he was hit in an attempt to stop the assault continuing, he only has himself to blame for being a thug.

In the instance of Sen-Constable Sangston, he decided to pull over a car for no reason at all, in what he calls a ‘routine traffic management check’ – In other words, a revenue raising exercise. I agree that the attack was brutal and uncalled for, and that the perpetrators should be severely punished. But people also have a basic human right to be allowed to travel without being stopped and interrogated, unless just cause is evident. Can anyone see that our society is now worse than Nazi Germany? Papers please!!!

WHAT IS CAUSING IT?

The police are now nothing more than well paid tax-collectors. Their actions have created a division between them and the general public, with most people now hating the men in blue. Rather than being known as police officers, they are instead commonly referred to as ‘pigs’ and ‘dogs’. Apart from the wealth of examples you can easily find on the internet, I have seen enough personal examples in my life to confirm this fact.

My friend had their front window smashed and house robbed a few years ago. After numerous calls, the police finally arrived three days later to inspect the scene and look for evidence. They were told that lack of staff was the reason for the lengthy delay. I personally had my car stolen about 9 years ago. The engine was later advertised for sale in a newspaper, with the matching engine number to prove it was mine. Even though the police have these details and know the person involved, I am still waiting for them to investigate the case. I call constantly and have been told that the case is not a priority for them. After nine years, I had already worked that out.

Where have all the policemen gone? They are stationed on the roads, hiding behind trees with radar guns. The simply fact is, the government makes a lot of money from traffic offences and nothing from investigating a break-and-enter or stolen car. Plus it’s not just the government making money; the individual police officers also receive commissions for each fine they issue. There are hundreds of reports of police insiders revealing the truth about fine commissions and quotas. Stories have been released of police failing to meet their quotas and having to pull over drivers and create false charges. Once again, I have personally fallen victim to this type of incidence.

I was travelling home about 9pm on a dark and rainy evening, driving under the speed limit of 100km/h on the freeway. I was pulled over by police and I asked what I did wrong. They told me they pulled me over to give me a yellow sticker for bald tyres. (In WA this is a car defect notice) First of all, how can you tell a car has bald tyres driving at maybe 95km/h in the dark and with rain? Unfortunately for the police, I didn’t even have bald tyres, so they changed the yellow sticker reason to an oil leak. Once again, how can they tell I had an oil leak in the dark and rain? Since the yellow sticker fees and bills came to more than the cars purchase price, I effectively lost my vehicle because of a commission-greedy cop.

RIDICULOUS OFFENCES

Quite frankly, the public is sick and tired of being fined for ridiculous offences or offences they didn’t commit, and many are fed up with the excessive ‘police checks and searches’ that clearly target certain segments of society. They are creating a society of hatred, where police officers are being used to collect money through fines, instead of being there to help the public. The governments and police forces of Australia need to take a serious look at the antagonistic tactics they are using to push some members of society over the edge.

Each state has different allowances for speeding offences. In Western Australia, the allowance is just 1km/h, meaning that you can be fined for travelling at 102km/h in a 100km/h zone. This is clearly unfair when you look at all of the factors that affect speed changes. In the old days, the police would let you off most of the time if caught speeding, especially for these miniscule amounts.

Considering that even if your speedometer shows you are travelling at the correct speed, it can easily be out by 10% due to factors such as cold or warm weather changing the tyre pressure, whether the air conditioner is used or not, tyre tread size changes and road quality. These factors are out of the drivers control and clearly demonstrate the need for a fair allowance in speed. Then there is the question why speeding drivers are being punished so much, when scientific studies prove that people driving faster concentrate more and are involved in far less accidents. That’s why they label speeding fines as revenue raising.

Speeding is just one example, but there are thousands of other fines being issued across Australia for ridiculous offences. There was an old lady fined for crossing the street too slowly, a driver fined for having a magic tree air freshener hanging from his rear vision mirror, and another driver who was fined for having three spotlights on his car. Apparently, having either two spotlights or four spotlights is fine, but having three is out of the question. Add to this the fines for made-up offences given either to people they don’t like or to receive bonus commissions. Once again I can relay a personal example. My glamorous girlfriend was pulled over by a policeman and asked out on a date. When she said no, he punished her by giving her a fine for not wearing a seat-belt.

Continued at Police Bashings – Part 2