Defunding police. What does that actually mean? Replace cops with social workers? It’s a mantra often shouted by so-called police reformers with little specificity to gain public support.
From Dan Tepfer, CT Post:
A clash between police and protesters outside the city council president’s house was averted Friday afternoon when a half-dozen officers ignored the taunts and walked away.
But it came close.
More than two dozen protesters had gathered outside Aidee Nieves’ Park Street house carrying an assortment of placards supporting Black Lives Matter and denouncing the police. Getting no response from Nieves, who didn’t appear to be home, the protesters hung their signs on her fence.
Jazmarie Melendez, whose 15-year-old brother Jayson Negron was shot to death by a Bridgeport police officer in 2017, took to a bullhorn demanding justice for her brother and others who she claimed were brutalized by city officers.
Full story here.
This is perfect, exactly what I expected after the national elections. I hope that major cities nationwide, all the major cities, have these kind of actions and if the extreme left does not get whatever it wants that they cause anarchy because I want to see how the Democrats will handle that. I do not want right wing people out there doing anything. I really want to see how Democrats handle the extreme left. Will they give them everything that they want, will they put them in their place, will they fund all their demands? Lets see , it will be very interesting if this occurs. I am absolutely not one to want to see social unrest but in this scenario , with what’s been going on over the last four years I really want to see what this test of liberalism will do.
Maybe this country needs a good dose of this to straighten everything out one way or another. I don’t know what the answer is. But something needs to change.
Hoping for the best.
Cheers !!!!!
I respect her as an activist. She has stood in for the long hall. She’s not in this fight for justice for her name only. She is actually fighting now for the rights of others. As you can see, the BLM crowd has grown weaker and weaker. People now days do not have the tenacity that protesters had in the past. Our war heroes such as Martin Luther King Jr. made real effectual changes within our society. He did not just talk the talk, he walked the walk and died for his strong beliefs of equality. Groups such as the NAACP and “other” groups are lack luster. They do not make any progress. They do not align with the original goals of their groups existence. The leaders of most activist groups within our state are paid off in one way or another to look the other way. Every activist in CT should be supporting her no matter what!. What happened to her brother was horrible! Many others have suffered at the hands of many within the corrupt walls of the political machine. It’s time for voices to be heard and swift changes to be made.
First, let’s make sure that we are talking about why there was a protest of two dozen protesters who had gathered outside Aidee Nieves’ Park Street house carrying an assortment of placards supporting Black Lives Matter and denouncing the police of the killing of Jayson Negron. Getting no response from Nieves, who didn’t appear to be home, the protesters hung their signs on her fence. Jayson Negron’s body was left in the street uncovered for over four hours, plus no one called for medical help. Are these acceptable policies and procedures for the Bridgeport Police Department with no changes? Look at the video of the police chase in the parking lot of Walgreens and watch how busy the area is with people walking and cars parking, more people could had killed by three police cruisers, is that acceptable policies and procedures for the BPD? Now I’m not even talking about the shooting of the 15 year old Jayson Negron. What has City Council President Aidee Nieves done, has she made any comments concerning an investiagtion in the policies and procedures for the BPD. How about last spring when Connecticut Post reporter Tara O’Neill was taken into custody, then later released, as Bridgeport police controlled a demonstration on the second anniversary of an officer-involved shooting that killed 15-year-old Jason Negron. O’Neill said, “Immediately it just took me back to last year, my heart was racing, my breathing sped up, I couldn’t help but feel the helplessness that you can hear and you can see in the video of the CNN team being arrested. It’s the same thing that happened to me last year,” she says.
Is that acceptable policies and procedures for the BPD? Council President Nieves has been silent so that means the BPD should continue to get funded the same way without looking into the BPD that is in court right now on who should be the “Acting” Police Chief never mind hiring a permanent police chief after the arrest of Police Chief AJ Perez by the FBI by the FBI.
FOX NEWS 61 Matt Mahoney
Published: 9:20 PM EST January 26, 20
BRIDGEPORT — The State’s Attorney’s Office released new surveillance video of the fatal incident between Jayson Negron and a Bridgeport officer.
Bridgeport police were reportedly patroling the city’s West End on May 9, 2017, when they say they spotted a suspicious vehicle around 5 p.m. They attempted to intiate a traffic stop after learning the vehicle was stolen earlier that day.
As they ordered the driver and his passenger out of the vehicle, the responding officers reported that Negron, 15, refused their request to get out of the stolen car. Bridgeport Police chief A.J. Perez claims Negron threw the car into drive and hit the gas, “trying to knock off the officer.”
“He put it in reverse, at a high rate of speed, pinning the officer almost underneath the vehicle,” said Perez.
“At that point, the officer feared for his life, drew his weapon and shot the passenger and shot the operator of the vehicle,” said Perez.
Negron was pronounced dead at the scene.
New video of fatal confrontation between Jayson Negron and Bridgeport officer released
Hearst Connecticut reporter reflects on arrest while covering Jason Negron … reporter reflected on her arrest one year ago by Bridgeport police
https://fox61.com/embeds/video/520-be7d6dcc-cf9a-4991-b240-fbefa5bf9401/iframe?jwsource=cl
Lol you literally blatantly just lied on this forum. If that’s the case you should go to the state pd with that information because even they don’t have that video lol .
From witnesses, the cars were going at a very slow rate of speed because of tracking of vehicles leaving the parking lot. Lol genius
Defunding the police is not the answer. More pressure needs to be put on the Union to stop protecting their corrupt officers & get them off the streets.
If my business is being robbed, an armed officer is going to have a greater impact than a social worker.
Now if they want to follow NYPDs pilot program to send social workers for certain 911/mental health calls vs officers, thats a different story. Maybe this will have good results or maybe this will be yet another nightmare once an unarmed social worker is shot by someone they’re trying to help.
Shannon, is giving the police all the funding that they asked for the answer?
Far from it, every person on the Unions executive board knows who their corrupt officers are. They need to stop protecting them & simply take their badges.
Keep the peaceful protests going but don’t put all police officers in the same bucket.
Shannon Shelley, it’s a common misconception that “defunding the police” means completely stripping law enforcement of all of their funding. “Defunding the police” simply means reducing police department budgets and redistributing those funds towards essential social services that are often underfunded, such as housing, education, employment, mental health care, and youth services. Police shouldn’t respond to calls where the person is experiencing a mental breakdown because they are ill equipped to handle these calls.
Don, it’s still about color, in the 1960’s in California they were a open carry state with firearms so the Black Panther Party started carrying weapons openly and followed the police because of the police abuse in their community and whites got scare so they changed the law to ban open carry. But you notice that the law was not changed in Michigan when white racist groups protest at the state capital carrying weapons inside the capital threatening the governor and nothing was said.
Donald Thanks for the Merriam Webster version, I’m well aware of what defunding the police means. Why not send a social worker with an officer for a mental health call? Many times the person having a breakdown is armed.
Shannon, and where is that funding for sending a social worker with an officer for a mental health call coming from?
Ron, I don’t think social workers should be used. NY makes it sound appealing but It’s just a bandaid until that too blows up.
My brother is a police officer (thankfully not in Bridgeport) there are men in his dept with rap sheets so long they can compete with the best career criminals. Guys like that should not have the privilege of wearing a badge but the Union continues to protect them. That’s unacceptable, they need to go.
I feel Shannon is correct. Not sure you can always send a social worker on those calls but maybe the police department need to add how to deal with the mentally disabled at the academy and also continue training yearly.
Social workers don’t want to deal with people having a violent mental breakdown. That’s not their job. They don’t know how to handle violent mental patients. They need them sedated first or brought down to a calmer level to try and reason with them.
Even social workers said they don’t want to do it. Firefighters are too scared to do it. So that leaves one other person to do it, your cops. Btw I’m pretty sure BPD has a social worker on stand by on most nights. A person wielding a knife out of their mind is not up for negotiation especially if they’re a danger to anyone else. Take care of the threat first and then get them help. Dead social workers can’t help anyone
Shannon, and where is that funding for sending a social worker with an officer for a mental health call coming from?
Defund the Fig Newtons!
I believe Aidee Nieves was in full support of defunding the police when it first started. And then ….. nothing. She has done nothing. Said nothing. I am sure she doesn’t know what she wants.
Normally Dan Tepfer is a good reporter but he seems to have dropped the ball on this one.
Why doesn’t Dan contact Aidee and find out what she wants to do and how she plans on doing it? Does she think that all of the problems stopped with AJ?
I am pleased to see that the police backed off and let the protesters have their space.
But as I said to when this started if the Council does not act and doesn’t act quickly then it will boil over.
Bob, you make some good points, as for defunding the police most people have different views of what defunding the police means and the right wing conservative are doing great job with the media in falsely saying that Democrats want to do away with police then take your guns. As for AJ Perez, a number of council members had AJ on speed dial just like they have Joe and Mario on speed dial to bail tem out of any situation they get into.
Defunding the police means…No EXTRA federal funding. The Police Departments nationwide receive EXTRA stipends from the Federal Government. Municipalities are supposed to operate on a budget. Bridgeport does not. Bridgeport relies on Federal Grants to uphold the massive overtime and other corrupt spending. Defunding the police means cutting overtime and not rewarding Bad officers with EXTRA purks. People need to understand what the protesters mean when they say “DEFUND THE POLICE”. It means, holding Illegal/Criminally minded Officers accountable for their actions. Everybody runs off on a tangent in the WRONG direction as soon as they hear the words “DEFUND THE POLICE”.
I remember once a group of protesters marched on a former council presidents home.
That time it was Lisa Parziale and the protesters were from ACORN. And what did Lisa do?
She invited some of them in for coffee. They had a dialogue about the matter and discussed some ways to address it.
Aidee seems to think you can just ignore it and it will go away. That is not the way to deal with it.
Maybe Aidee can learn from past leaders of the council.
But a word of caution Aidee. Do not promise anything just to make them go away. With out concrete action it will come back at you ten fold.
Here’s one great reason for for defunding police departments. Here is a news story from TMZ. Just read and watch the video.
https://www.tmz.com/2020/11/27/agt-kid-magicians-kadan-brooklyn-rockett-arrested-custody-battle-refused-return-mother/
In the video, the teens say they’re afraid of their mother and don’t want to go back to her, but cops say they have no choice. The kids refuse to comply, so the cop begins reading them their Miranda rights and slaps the cuffs on 15-year-old Kadan. 13-year-old Brooklyn — who’s sobbing during the arrest — was also cuffed.
Our sources say the siblings were in Louisiana for their grandmother’s funeral, so that is how the mother knew where they would be in order to send the police to pick them up.
Law enforcement sources tell us the children were held at the Green Oaks Detention Center in Monroe overnight to await a court hearing the next morning.
Defund the fire department too, they sleep 70% of the time while on duty 🤷🏼♂️.
Defund the fire department, great idea genius, Jo when was the last social protest and civil unrest towards firefighters? Where are the videos of firefighters killing someone black in their line of duty work? Those 343 firefighters who lost their life trying to save others at the 911 incident were fools to risk their life to others, right Jo?
I hear they have too much time on their hands over on the BFD….they have to create “games” to play to keep themselves occupied.
I hear they have too much time on their hands over on the BFD….they have to create “games” to play to keep themselves occupied.
A lot of time on their hands. Don forgets the men in blue went into the same twin towers as the FD on 9/11.
He’s a firefighter that couldn’t make it as a cop trying to tell people what police should do lol. It’s okay Don, there is no shame playing for JV.
Jo Salling, what the hell are you talking about?
Jo Salling, they can give teachers guns and after a two weeks of training they can come to school with them! We want when cops are dispatched they are there for the relief of suffering. When someone calls the authorities on someone with a mental condition don’t send the cops with their batons & tasers send a productive therapist or somebody that’s trained to relieve the hurt & pain that they might experience so that they won’t be killed. We don’t want cops to see us as the criminals and begin to hurt us in many ways that many White brothers and sisters can scarcely imagine.
Having a mental condition isn’t or shouldn’t be a death sentence and doing nothing is what America does best.
People with untreated mental illness are 16 times more likely to be killed during a police encounter than other civilians approached or stopped by law enforcement. A person shouldn’t lose their life because they’re experiencing symptoms of a mental health condition. Jo Salling, Empathy, look it up because you sure as hell don’t have any.
Here’s one great reason for for defunding police departments. Here is a news story from TMZ. Just read and watch the video.
https://www.tmz.com/2020/11/27/agt-kid-magicians-kadan-brooklyn-rockett-arrested-custody-battle-refused-return-mother/
There are some good points made above and some STUPID ones. Can we please have an educated discussion on this.??
Lennie……or someone,……. can somebody list 5 or even 10 absolutely exact points in what’s being looked at for “defunding the police”? And how they mean it???? No u tube , no click on opinions etc. Maybe we could have an interesting debate on what would and could work etc and how to make things better. (In Bridgeport). I would be very interested in that. As a former cop with a wide range of experience and education I would like to engage in a positive catharthis on that subject. There’s just too much “defund” bullshit out there without knowing what anyone really means about it.
Cheers!!!!
Do they actually think that this is a good idea when shooting deaths in the Park City are on the rise? Who will protect the citizens? Drug Lords and gangs ????
And where is the reciprocity? Citizens want police to have respect for the citizenry, yet it’s perfectly all right for citizens to spit in the face of police, call them pigs and try to kill them by turning motor vehicle’s into assault weapons? Is that where we are at these days?