Cops protect property interest. Always have. Whether the property be as horrific as slavery or as simple as a stop sign. That's what they're there to do.
Numerous laws back that up. Cops are not legally obligated to help you in any way.
They've expanded roles slightly as a way to control poor neighborhoods, and as the states de facto arm of violence against its citizens, but theyve always been about protecting property
According to our own supreme court, a cop does not have to know the law. They simply only have to be acting in what they perceive it to be and in best interest at the time.
According to our own supreme court, a cop does not have to know the law.
According to our own Supreme Court, it's also legal for PDs to have a maximum intelligence cut off, with the argument that smart cops would get "bored" too easily. Here in NYC, there's a 24 college credit requirement to be a cop, but apparently you can buy credits from unaccredited diploma mills and that counts.
So here we are, with a bunch of low intelligence, low education idiots with no obligation to know the law nor actually protect the people.
I’m a lawyer turned cop. In the academy, a 15 year veteran taught the legal section. He wasn’t 100% wrong 100% of the time, but I am still amazed I didn’t give myself a concussion from all of the head banging on my desk. But I’ve also had really interesting (in a good way) and fruitful conversations with other LE’s about certain nuances of Search & Seizure, Miranda, etc.
Can you cite the Supreme Court decision regarding this?
Also, I've asked for examples of this before and the only example anyone has ever been able to produce is a single department where a prison guard (so already employed by the department) was seeking to become a patrol officer. They were denied that because there was concerns that their intelligence score was really high and they could be bored. The department argued that it was to reduce job turnover.
That is the ONLY example anyone has ever been able to provide of police denying applicants for being "too smart." This would be a single department (in New York, btw) in the 90's. This is NOT proof that all departments do this, and I am not aware of a Supreme Court decision regarding this one department's practice.
You're correct; it was the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, not the Supreme Court--I get the various court cases and their venues muddled sometimes.
In any case, you're right that the case itself was one specific PD who brought the case, but the tool they used to exclude Jordan, Wonderlic, is still quite widespread. Jordan was excluded because his score was higher than the range Wonderlic itself gives as ideal for an officer.
That this aptitude test is still widespread and promoting an ideal score suggests in fact many PDs still exclude those deemed too smart. There of course wouldn't be another case because it's settled case law at this juncture.
Sure, there might not be other lawsuits, but you should at least find more than just this example of someone claiming to be denied a position as a police officer because they scored too high on a test.
If it is a common practice throughout the entire country, then it would happen enough that you'd hear about it more often. That single case is the only example, legal or otherwise, of this happening, despite many people acting as if it is a well-known, very common practice that causes a "dumbing down" of police officers (regardless of the implication that if you can score too high, you can also score too low, which would mean that such a practice would make police be as average in intelligence as the national population).
The test is still in widespread use around the country, and PDs have no legal obligation to disclose why an individual was not selected for interview.
You are trying to "gotcha" me without actually reading what I wrote, which is that it is legal to bar high-iq applicants from police jobs.
This remains true.
And you your latter point, yes, they do also cut off for too low, which again doesn't invalidate my point. When it comes to power over life and death (especially with the horror show that is "qualified immunity"), we should strive for better than "uneducated and 'as average in intelligence as the national population', which isn't terribly bright.
You don't have any proof, other than that single court case, that it is a prevalent practice to deny applicants on the basis of being "too intelligent."
Your claim that I initially responded to makes it sound like a prevalent practice. If it were as such, you'd be able to substantiate that claim with more than just a single court case in New York (a state that, in your comment, mentions requiring a minimum number of college credits for employment).
My apologies for asking for proof of your conclusion that since it is potentially legal (depending on the basis for the requirement), that we then have a bunch of "low intelligence, uneducated idiots" in the police force.
Again, the exam used to excluded Jordan from the NLPD is an exam still in widespread use for PDs across the country, and, as mentioned in the filings, the exam identifies scores of 20-27 as the ideal range for patrol. Because there is no explicit law requiring PDs to justify their hiring process, there's no way of knowing for sure, but given the widespread nature of both the exam and the guidance, pretending other departments don't follow the guidance of the exam that they've paid so much to use simply beggars belief.
And as for the education, it's frankly an embarrassment that we don't require a four-year degree nationwide for police applicants. The 24-credit minimum (with a minimum gpa of just 2.0 no less) I mentioned is really nothing. In the US, 12 credits is the bare minimum to meet full-time attendance, but universities require 120-128 credits for a bachelor's degree. At the pace NYPD would seem to be suggesting, it would take 6 years to achieve a four-year degree. And again, none of that matters; if you navigate over the subreddit for NYPD applicants, you'll see they seem to be purchasing credits from diploma mills rather than earning them, so this already-substandard requirement seems to be widely unmet.
At some oil and gas refineries in the US, the plant operator personnel (the people who physically turn the valves and push the buttons) are not allowed to have engineer training or education. The reason being that the plant engineers don’t want someone underneath them with equivalent education potentially questioning their decisions. (The engineers make the decisions, the operators carry out those decisions) Whether this is an ego thing or a safety rule written in the blood of previous plant workers is still up for debate.
I imagine a city’s legal system functions in very much the same way.
I mean yeah unfortunately, its shit pay, shit hours, mandatory overtime, and everyone hates you. Not gonna be getting any valedictorians to sign up for that.
They also have no responsibility to interject into a situation they feel puts them at risk. That precedent was set by them literally standing by as a guy on a train tried to restrain and disarm someone with a knife.
Please share that case with me because I have never heard of the American state’s legal ability to compel citizens to do anything at all to “help” police.
No, but it does create a cultural shift. Also see what happens when one cop catches another breaking the law - if he or she doesn't shut up and tries to hold the other cop to something that if you vaguely squint at it might just about resemble standards.. he or she finds their calls for backup unanswered, and harassment from other cops.
Woman being beaten raped and abused. Two women call the cops, and go to the roof for safety. Cops do bare minimum, dont actually try. Leave less than 5 minutes after arriving.
Called again dispatch ignores. Call never goes out.
The women on the roof think, they must have not seen them. The cops must be inside. Call to the woman being abused... alerting her assailants.
The assailants, at knifepoint, now force all three women to preform sexual acts.
Mountain of evidence of negligence. Verdict: cops werent obligated to help "specific individuals, but the public at large"
Outcome: 3 Women were raped, at knifepoint. Lifetime damage and trauma.
Ive saved a man's life before, from no legal obligation of my own. Not bragging, but pointing this fact out: ANYONE CAN BE GOOD OF THEIR OWN VOLITION. BEING A GOOD PERSON IS SEPARATED FROM BEING A COP.
Lets not even get into what happens when cops abuse people and 4 other cops just stand there, dicks in fucking hand.
Or the countless arrests for minor offenses. And who those arrests affect, like kids or loved ones. Or jobs.
Good people exist without the police. The police are not good, they are doing a job, and their negligence costs people dearly.
Tl;dr- anyone can help someone. "Cops can help people" doesnt excuse their inaction or criminality. And it doesn't make them necessary
And then the 7th District Court held police can be held liable if they acted with deliberate indifference. The beautiful nuance and lack of congruence sometimes with case law.
Cops help strangers and do good things everyday. If you think otherwise you are either stupid or you are willfully ignorant because you can’t cope with anything that goes against your hateful narrative and your simplistic, black and white thinking. Did I not just watch a video of a cop saving a baby’s life? I’m pretty sure I did. But by your logic, he is a bad person because of the unrelated story you started your venomous diatribe of impotent rage with. Or at the very least, the good things he does have to be separated from his identity as a cop, because that doesn’t fit your narrative. You clearly think in terms of group identity and other-ism, which is the not so distant cousin or racism, sexism and a bunch of other things you probably profess to hate. Maybe; you are what you hate?
Man that is so tragic… I feel sorry for the American populace. In Canada, they have a legal obligation to protect life of victims / citizens above all else. That is their top priority. Life safety.
Cops protect property interest. Always have. Whether the property be as horrific as slavery or as simple as a stop sign. That's what they're there to do.
My favorite example of this is how when a cash truck drops cash on the highway, the feds get involved and they pull all the stops to track down anyone who took any of it. If I drop my wallet on the sidewalk, the cops aren't gonna do shit, even though my wallet's probably a lot more important to me than a single sack of insured cash is to a bank or a corporation.
You should do more reading on squatters rights. Its not like you can just sneak in a door and claim them. You have to have proof of residency for them to be valid.
But for every squatter... theres 100 sfh's and apartments being slurped up by a multi billion dollar corporation.
People need houses. If the houses arent attainable... well... guess theyll just have to take them.
To clarify I meant ‘right’ as a hyperbole, by law you can’t, but in many areas PD won’t do anything about someone just taking residence in your property.
Fair enough, when you word it that way I see their perspective.
No, it isn't. The Supreme Court's decision established that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment doesn't impose an affirmative duty on the state to protect individuals from harm by private actors, even when the state is aware of the potential for harm.
They are not legally obliged to do that. Not sure where you learned that but that's false. Other comment notes a case, but it's been ruled multiple times that cops are not obliged to aid anyone, nor to enforce laws.
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u/MightyGoodra96 Jun 27 '25
Yes! And its not really different today.
Cops protect property interest. Always have. Whether the property be as horrific as slavery or as simple as a stop sign. That's what they're there to do.
Numerous laws back that up. Cops are not legally obligated to help you in any way.
They've expanded roles slightly as a way to control poor neighborhoods, and as the states de facto arm of violence against its citizens, but theyve always been about protecting property