TexasCHLforum.com

speedsix wrote:...that kind of behavior makes the news, like the fat pig punching a handcuffed suspect, and a lot of harm is done to the image of our law enforcement officers...it's hard to wear the badge and know that people like this are part of what society thinks we are...the greater majority of law enforcement pukes to see this kind of "representation"...hug a cop today, please...

Reasonable people understand that, despite the best efforts of the police management system, a few bad apples are going to get into the ranks of LE. Respect for LE is probably not based on those few who are responsible for these acts or show their human frailty in other ways.

But this was not the first time that Officer Harless was involved in such an event. The Internal Affairs units should help to deal with officers like this and it would have been far better for all concerned if Harless's PTSD had been diagnosed with those original incidents. I believe the town in which Harless operated condones such behavior, especially toward concealed handgun licensees and it took an egregious example of his conduct caught on tape and widely distributed to make them deal with it. For that, I have no sympathy at all. Earlier in this thread, there was discussion of the lack of action by the chief regarding Officer Harless in those previous matters.

By contrast, the last two police chiefs in Dallas appear to be working hard to clean up the ranks of officers there. Before that, the public understood that there were some rotten apples in the barrel but that little was being done to deal with them. I think that is much more of indictment than the conduct of the errant officers.

“Obviously, it’s an unfortunate set of circumstances that transpired,” Adams said. “We feel that due to the fact that (Harless) has PTSD, that nobody realized it for eight-plus years, for it to come to light the way it did ... this is not a way we wanted this to play out. PTSD is obviously a disease.

One of the articles is interesting. In the above quote, it says that noone realized Harless had PTSD for eight years. It another point, it says that he was diagnosed with PTSD multiple times. I'm sure that the truth lies somewhere between those alternatives.

While I understand that PTSD, like many other mental illnesses, is difficult to diagnose and treat, someone who has it bad enough to have created the video taped situation needs to be in a different line of work. I"m glad that is the way that it worked out.

Blindref757 wrote:I would be willing to bet that this officer talks to people like this every night he works. He needs to find a new line of work.

I'd be willing to bet that he isn't alone on this conduct either. His partner's willingness to tolerate the outbursts indicates that the opinion of the City Councilman is understood within the department. Like just about everywhere else, I'm sure that the department has a lot of good, dedicated officers. There will always be a few officers like this one who need to be kept in line. If the proper steps to do that are not taken in a timely manner, those with aberrant behavior are emboldened and just get worse.

There is another thread running now where the police department in Quartzite, AZ has become a pawn of a very public political catfight. I believe that departments often taken on the tone of their leadership. If the chief in Canton had shown that leadership, the officer in this OP would have been excused from duty from the previous the incidents that he had and this incident never would have happened. While I blame the officer, he is not singularly responsible for what happened.

Wow, just wow

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBfpBxY2J00

Canton, Ohio: City Council Alan Schulman President Railing Against Concealed Carry

wgoforth wrote:Good video on refusing police search " onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

My guess is that the approach in this video would not have worked for the situation in the OP. The LEOs in that video apparently felt that they had PC for a vehicle search or weren't worried about PC at all. The LEO in this video is staying within the boundaries of the law as I'm sure most officers do. When you get someone as out of control as in the OP, all bets are off.

cctcaden wrote:Foxnews.com has this on their home page today

They've had a tease running for the last 10 minutes about taking the matter up on their "Is it legal?" panel, on air.

kyreb wrote:Lived in Ohio for 5 years. I am not anti- LEO at all but cops up there tend to be a different breed...especially the state troopers. I had one who lived a couple doors down from that refused to talk to me...even wave for that matter, despite the fact he would bring his kid by the house regularly to sell items to fund the little guy's various sports teams. (Which I did. The kid was a neat little guy).
Anyway, the Ohio cops fought the state's "new" CHL law with a vengence. They lobbied to disallow a CHL to carry unsecured in your own car. ( since repealed I believe). Your CHL was tied to the tags on your car and the cops would pull over CHLs regularly just to harass them. Needless to say, the wife and I did not bother to apply for a CHL while we lived there.
Oh, one more thing, in Ohio if you have an AR15 and a mag that holds over 30 rounds, state law classified your semi auto AR as an "illegal machine gun".
Ohio is definately not a gun friendly state unless said gun is a skeet shotgun, unloaded, locked up and completely inaccessable at all times.

God bless Texas ( and KY too).

I, too, am not anti-LEO. We have a number of good friends here in Texas who are or were LEOs.

I believe that a general LEO mindset is different in much in the Northeast and that the approach from these Ohio LEOs is not much different than that of LEOs in NJ and MD. I worked in Wilmington, DE for a number of years and had part of MD as my territory where I supervised service personnel. We lived in Northern NJ for a number of years and saw LEO interaction with the public. I consider neither of those States to be as gun friendly as Ohio. The interesting paradox for Ohio is neighboring PA. Outside of Philadelphia, PA is generally gun friendly, perhaps even more so than Texas. LEOs there (again outside of Phila.) have neither the same overall attitude nor are gun unfriendly as those in Ohio. What magic happens on the Ohio/PA border, I have no idea but it does seem to be a remarkable transformation.