YES, Obeying the Police in America is ABSOLUTELY Mandatory...

Michael Brown

August 15^th, 2014

Starting with the unfortunate death of Eric Garner (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/cops-involved-eric-garner-confrontation-asked-target-illegal-cigarette-sales-bratton-article-1.1901612) on my own borough of Staten Island, in New York City, there has been an even more unfortunate and maliciously misguided sympathy for “street people,” who tend to often have unfortunate encounters with the police.

Along with that misplaced sympathy has come quite a bit of antipathy for the police.

Eric Garner was a sympathetic figure primarily because his crime (selling loose cigarettes) was so petty and the result (his death) was so disproportionate with that crime, his plight garnered some sympathy. The fact that he was, despite his resisting a lawful arrest, nonaggressive, never swinging at Officers during the struggle made him even more sympathetic.

However the basic facts remain, Mr. Garner broke the law, and when cops moved in to effect an arrest he told them that “this stops today,” and he began actively resisting arrest. Moreover, Mr. Garner’s litany of health problems made such an early death far more likely for the 6’5”, 350+ pound man.

Of course, Mr. Garner COULD HAVE made his own plight far easier by merely complying with police in that very LAWFUL arrest.

A civilian has NO RIGHT to EVER resist arrest, confront the police, or refuse police orders or directions…the courts have upheld all of that and it is, in the eyes of most of us, “just common sense.”

In the end, Eric Garner had absolutely NO RIGHT to resist arrest, because citizens DO NOT have any right to a “fair hearing” on the streets with police. You get your “fair hearing” in court. That’s what courts are for and the police are for bringing offenders before the courts.

Just how dangerous and tenuous police work is was highlighted just days before the Eric Garner confrontation, when 23 y/o Jersey City police officer, Melvin Santiago was gunned down while responding to a robbery call by career thug Lawrence Campbell, who was thankfully put down in a hail of bullets by other incoming police (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/jersey-city-police-officer-killed-line-duty-reports-article-1.1864902).

A week ago another “unarmed teen” (Michael Brown) was shot by police in a town called Jefferson, MO. (http://www.connectmidmissouri.com/news/story.aspx?id=1083924)

All week protesters AND many in the media demanded the Jefferson Police release the officer’s name and their version of the events.

TODAY, the Jefferson Police Department did just that and the howls of outrage only increased!

The Jefferson, MO. Police Dept. released the officer’s name (Darren Wilson) and relayed that the police officer was treated for unspecified injuries after that incident.

They also released surveillance video that appears to implicate the “unarmed teen” in a “strong-arm robbery” at a local Convenience Store. The video surveillance shows a man dressed and looking like Michael Brown in that robbery (NOT a shoplifting, after the assailant assaulted a store worker), so it seems highly unlikely that, as Brown’s accomplice Dorian Johnson attested, Officer Wilson told them to “Get the F*** off the street,” as they walked down the center of a road. If that part of Johnson’s story is untrue, how much of the rest of his account can be trusted...and can the account of an accomplice in a felony earlier that night be used at all?

A number of local “witnesses” claim that Brown was shot with his hands up, but that too, seems inconsistent with injuries to a police officer. In NYC, there’ve been numerous cases of local “witnesses” not only lying, but hiding weapons after such encounters. In a police shooting at a Brooklyn Housing Project last year, numerous residents testified that the male shot by police was unarmed, which countered police accounts that he was shot after leveling his weapon at police. The wounded suspect’s weapon was recovered inside a resident’s apartment. That resident was subsequently arrested for evidence tampering and obstruction of justice.

IF Brown did confront the officer before he got out of his car and then ran...the Supreme Court has ruled that “police CAN use deadly force upon a fleeing suspect.” Witnesses attest that the confrontation began at the police car. Given that police reports have both Michael Brown’s AND

At this point (Friday, August 15^th, 2014) Michael Brown DOES NOT appear to be at all the sympathetic character that Eric Garner was.

While it’s no more surprising that the likes of Al Sharpton would defend a black thug confronting the police, than it is the likes of Tom Metzger defending skin heads targeting and killing an African immigrant in Seattle. Birds of a feather.

Here are the basic facts that we ALL must abide by;

A citizen NEVER has the right to refuse to comply with police orders and directions.

A citizen NEVER has the right to confront police officers in the street. Compliance with police orders is mandatory. The idea that “Citizens do not have to comply with unlawful police orders,” is absolutely in error. ONLY a court of law can determine whether a given order is lawful, or not. Because of that, civilians MUST comply with ALL police orders, cooperate with arrests, even if they believe such an arrest is unlawful. Only a court can determine whether a given police action was just and warranted and unlawful orders CAN BE grounds for a Civil lawsuit.

Police CANNOT ever back away from a civilian who refuses to comply with their directives. Police ARE authorized to use force to effect arrests on those who are non-compliant.

ALL of that is right and necessary and there is no reason to believe that ANY court will ever abridge or modify those police powers.

On the street, obeying/complying with police orders is mandated by law.

Cameras should be installed on every police cruiser and police should use wearable cameras, BUT the public must embrace, even if they find it hard to accept that in ALL cases once police begin to effect a stop, or arrest, they are authorized to use overwhelming force to effect such an action. A civilian confronting police has no “right” to a “fair fight.” In fact, a civilian has NO RIGHT to confront police officers in the street...ever.

In every one of the above cases, it appears that there would’ve been no violence had those civilians involved simply complied with the lawful orders of the police.