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Posted on 07/19/2009 2:49:03 PM PDT by AAABEST
The American Civil Liberties Union has sent a letter to the Loveland Police Department alleging that officers illegally searched and briefly detained a man carrying a gun at South Shore Parkway.
On Thursday, the ACLU sent a formal complaint to Loveland Police Chief Luke Hecker and 8th Judicial District Attorney’s Office chief investigator Elliot Phelps.
The organization is questioning the way police dealt with Loveland resident Bill Miller at South Shore Parkway on Oct. 7, 2008.
The ACLU has not sued the city but asked in its letter that the Police Department turn over all records connected to the incident, including internal review documents and discipline or training records of the officers involved.
A spokesman for the ACLU said the organization would wait for a formal response from both Hecker and Phelps before commenting.
The Loveland Police Department did not return several messages from the Reporter-Herald requesting comment Thursday.
Miller, 71, said Thursday that he isn’t looking for anything for himself, such as an apology, but rather he wants to teach a lesson.
“I would like to see police officers change the way they approach people with guns,” Miller said in an interview.
“I hope that (police departments) know they need to operate within the law and respect all of the constitutional rights of all the people.”
Miller was carrying an unconcealed handgun in a holster attached to his waistband, he said, when he was approached by Loveland police officers who had received a report of a man with a weapon in the park.
Miller wasn’t carrying the gun to protest or make a point, he said; he was trying out a new holster he had made.
The police officers, according to the ACLU’s letter, seized Miller’s pistol “without consent, and emptied it of ammunition.”
The officers then ordered Miller to give them his driver’s license, over his objections.
After checking with dispatchers, the officers found that both the gun and Miller were clear of any issues, and they returned Miller’s gun and license.
They also “explained our and citizens’ initial concern over the weapon,” the police incident report says.
Miller also said, the ACLU’s letter says, that the officers told him he could expect similar treatment should “similar encounters occur in the future.”
From the time officers first contacted Miller to the time they left was about 16 minutes, according to a police incident report. No charges were filed.
Miller sent a formal complaint to 8th Judicial District Attorney Larry Abrahamson, according to a letter Phelps sent to Miller.
In that letter, Phelps told Miller the office considered the incident an internal matter for the Police Department.
Phelps said residents have a right to possess and carry firearms, but that “there is a fine line between the protection of an individual’s rights and the protection of a law enforcement officer.”
What permit? Permits are not required in Colorado to purchase, possess, or openly carry a firearm.
A permit is required only for concealed carry.
Hence the stop.
I agree, though, that people ought to be able to carry openly. Concealed carry, maybe license that. Or not.
Call me dense, but I don't follow your logic.
The ACLU took this case in order to try to muff it and muddy up the contactee's right to open carry, by creating "reasonable" exceptions by argument, by "backing in" to exceptions to his right?
So where's the clue? Or do we have to follow links to get the rest of the story?
For whatever reason, this thread has become FR's version of deciphering the Dead Sea scrolls. We even sent one archaeologist into a non-existent town in Texas.
The posted article is from Loveland, Colorado. The law itself on open carry in Colorado is not bad (except for Denver), but some of the people from states like California and New York would like to disarm ranchers and other rural residents in isolated and very sparsely populated areas (sparsely, except for large and sometimes dangerous predators). It appears that many of those folks from heavily populated neighborhoods of other states are wanting more services near their houses—examples being more police than people in remote counties and snow removal everywhere. It is practically impossible to fulfill their desires (revenues, strange intrusions, etc.).
Here’s a link for interested Coloradans.
Rocky Mountain Gun Owners
Colorado’s No-Compromise Gun Rights Organization
http://www.rmgo.org/
The “Mob” experience was in another state, BTW. There’s corruption in CO, as is the case everywhere. ...not physically rough in CO, for the most part, though, and due mostly to ignorance, indoctrination and demands from liberal constituents.
“I guess pigs do fly every now and again.”
A lie succeeds best when she baits her hook with a little truth.
“It appears that many of those folks from heavily populated neighborhoods of other states are wanting”
Liberals must be shorn of all power and influence, and their “wants” assiduously ignored.
“He was technically under arrest, and the invasions were unreasonable. It’s not always about how a sensitive, socialist, civilian official ‘feels.’”
Absolutely. We recently had a libtard couple call the cops because my son was standing on **our own** balcony spraying oil on a bolt-action deer rifle.
The cops came out, talked to the commie filth, and left without bothering us, but what in the world made those morons think they had any standing to call the police?
Did they really think that possession of a firearm was illegal? In Idaho?
You get partial credit, that the cops involved need to determine that the man with a gun is not a threat. But it is lazy procedure to do so by direct confrontation *immediately*, and that confrontation does not have to take the form of treating the man as a criminal.
There is such a thing as observed behavior, and police are supposedly trained to take “probable cause” from how a perpetrator is behaving prior to the stop. Is the man with a gun skulking about, acting suspiciously, or accosting persons belligerently? Or, as he says he was doing in this case, sitting on a bench, eating an apple quietly? The former calls for a more direct approach. The latter, less so.
The attitude displayed is one frequently seen — that the presence of the gun itself, displayed openly is in and of itself an overt threat, regardless of the behavior of the person carrying it. WE know this premise to be smelly, nitrogen-rich, and suitable for enriching lawns and farmland. THEY, on the other hand, are convinced that ALL guns not possessed by police are tainted, and when seen must be pounced upon as an immediate threat.
The idea that no criminal is going to walk around with a gun openly displayed, and behave as though nothing is wrong among law-abiding citizens (like sitting around eating an apple) does not seem to penetrate. This is not so much a procedural problem as a perceptual one that is *causing* a procedural one.
I am reminded of a member of my family, who was subjected to guns in her ear and a felony-level stop and arrest when her license and plates were suspended — because of a missing emissions test on a car she no longer owned. There was no reason to treat her in that fashion over a suspended plate. They could have simply said “did you know your plates are suspended?” If they had to arrest her, they could have done it politely. But they dragged her from the car at gunpoint, then took away her shoes and her belt and shackled her to a bench in a holding cell like a drug dealer. Their defense? “Sometimes suspended plates are on the cars of violent criminals.”
Cops do need to do their jobs. That’s understood. But there would be less anger about it if they didn’t mistreat the innocent as they went about it.
Hello, Mr. Miller. Nice of you to sign up today, to tell us this.
Ping~
I thought texas at first too.
“If the police are so concerned about their own safety then maybe they shouldn’t have approached him in the first place.”
With some of the previous negative reports about cops trying to cover up their mistakes (outted by dispatch recordings etc)..I’d like to say that I’d like us to be protected from them..since we can’t tell the good guys from the bad. This is crazy.
I stand to be corrected but I believe the USSC has previously ruled that detaining a person such as on a traffic stop does not signify that the person is technically under arrest BUT the person being detained is not free to leave until the LEO says s/he can. Odd ruling IMO.
it's not in the title, excerpt, or key words. would be nice to know.
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