A Maryland police officer was convicted on Friday of charges that he joined a mob’s Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and hurled a smoke bomb and other objects at police officers guarding a tunnel entrance.
U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden heard two days of trial testimony without a jury this week before he found Montgomery County Police Officer Justin Lee guilty of two felonies and three misdemeanors. The judge, who also acquitted Lee of two other misdemeanors, is scheduled to sentence him on Nov. 22.
Lee, 26, ignited and threw a smoke bomb into the tunnel entrance on the Capitol’s Lower West Terrace, where a mob of rioters attacked a group of outnumbered police officers. The device struck a police officer’s riot shield and filled the mouth of the tunnel with a large plume of smoke, prosecutors said.
As I said, I wrote my dissertation on policing in minority ethnic communities. I specifically went out of my way to understand the sensitivities before I started the career. I also have a master’s degree in human rights law, and continue to work in the legal field dealing with these topics every day. I am far better placed than most to understand both sides of the situation (though I’d argue against the assumption that there are ‘sides’).
How can you say there are all these videos all the time when I haven’t even said where I’m from? Because in my country, incidents like what I see often from America are extremely rare.
I dismiss the ACAB movement because it is by definition reductionist. When you say ALL of something is anything in society then I will immediately raise my eyebrows to that claim. Society is not that simple.
I knew you weren’t American simply because you were WAY over-educated for law enforcement. At best you were in a Federal Agency but that was highly unlikely.
ACAB is admittedly more of an American phenomenon. Policing in other Western nations is generally far better, but imperfect, and this stark difference in education standards is a significant (but not the only) reason why. In the US high intelligence is considered an indicator the individual will find police work dull drudgery and greatly reduces the likelihood of, if not overtly disqualifies them from being approved to become a police officer.
Appealing for nuance where the problem literally is they are too uneducated to appreciate nuance is unreasonable. The solution requires bold and blunt ‘enough is enough’ statements that clearly declare society is done with the concept of law enforcement as it stands and wants the return of classic peace officers.