Lawmakers aim to curb military surplus program for police after Ferguson

[White Horseradish]

"Ruggedized for police use?"  What, a regular $300 GoPro helmet mount kit can't handle the fumes in the bathroom?

GoPro media is a little too accessible and easy to tamper with.

Ideally, they should stream video to some cloud controlled by someone other than the PD.

[KD5NRH]

Ideally, they should stream video to some cloud controlled by someone other than the PD.

IIRC, lower res and/or frame rate streaming is an option on current GoPros.  Anything wearable is going to need a booster unit in the car to transmit more than a few yards, so secure that unit, and have it keep a copy as well as retransmitting to a central location.  A lower quality copy should still be plenty to check for doctored footage.  How many PDs could manage to composite in anything useful into 720p or better video in the time before the courts would insist on having a properly airgapped evidence copy anyway?  That's why footage just disappears instead of showing up altered.

[erictank]

All balaclavas required to be lavender with baby pink lace trim.  All other tactical clothing color schemes subject to approval by Richard Simmons.

Win.

It's just as protective as the tacticool stuff, right? So why not do it that way, for official use? And paint's cheap - slather those APCs and rifles in pink and lavender.

Pass on the Teletubbies, though - that level of detail is not necessary, IMO.

[agricola]

I was hoping to see some good come out of Ferguson with what looked like the beginnings of a national conversation on militarized police. After the goings on last night, thanks to the dumbass looters, I'm seeing, on the interwebz at least, a shift to "this is why we need military gear for LE".

I can't necessarily disagree, even being anti-militarized police. Last night's example (at least what has been portrayed on the MSM) was a good reason to have the stuff for specific situations (I still think the requirement should be for it all to be painted pink, possibly with teletubbies painted all over the outside), but that one example may very well shift the conversation to a race for every podunk LE agency to soldier up and escalate the misuse of the equipment. I really hate looters. About as much as I hate the "safety above all else" conservatives that applauded what cops did in Boston and what happens in our airports on a daily basis.

The odd thing from this side of the pond is how badly equipped the local and state Police seem to be, at least when facing a riot.  Take these images for example:





Why arent they wearing flame-retardant suits?  They would have to be cheaper than those APCs, scary rifles and whatnot, and would certainly make officers safer. 

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

The odd thing from this side of the pond is how badly equipped the local and state Police seem to be, at least when facing a riot.  Take these images for example:

Why arent they wearing flame-retardant suits?  They would have to be cheaper than those APCs, scary rifles and whatnot, and would certainly make officers safer.  

Cheaper for who?  Not for the local police department.  They get the military gear cheap or free from the Feds, who have a whole lot of it left over after Iraq.  Non-surplus military gear would have to be be produced and purchased, at a cost, but the military stuff is just lying around waiting to be used.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

What alarms me is the militarized police didn't bother anyone until it was deployed against a politically correct, media-favored target group.  Using this stuff against nondescript/normal/average folks didn't bother them, but somehow using it against poor black looters is cause for serious concern.  

Hell, if anything, a Ferguson-style mass looting and rioting scenario comes a lot closer to justifying military hardware than any ordinary police action.  And yet Ferguson is what torqued 'em off.  They've got their outrage ass-backwards, and it's all because they don't see all Americans as equal.

[Perd Hapley]

Hell, if anything, a Ferguson-style mass looting and rioting scenario comes a lot closer to justifying military hardware than any ordinary police action.  And yet Ferguson is what torqued 'em off.  

This thought keeps looping through my mind like a .gif

I think I'll just start reading the news backwards. Maybe the world will make sense that way.

[Battle Monkey of Zardoz]

What alarms me is the militarized police didn't bother anyone until it was deployed against a politically correct, media-favored target group.  Using this stuff against nondescript/normal/average folks didn't bother them, but somehow using it against poor black looters is cause for serious concern.  

Hell, if anything, a Ferguson-style mass looting and rioting scenario comes a lot closer to justifying military hardware than any ordinary police action.  And yet Ferguson is what torqued 'em off.  They've got their outrage ass-backwards, and it's all because they don't see all Americans as equal.

Yes. The militarized police bothered many. Many folks. It's been a hot topic for a decade on forums.

[Hawkmoon]

Personally, I think the Ferguson riots make a poor example of why the police should not be militarized. After all, if the police can't handle such situations, who comes in next? The National Guard, a.k.a. the military.

I think a much stronger argument can (and should) be found in all the incidents around the country of using SWAT teams to serve ordinary search warrants. There was one I read just the other day in which a SWAT team had a search warrant for a computer for the home of a 68-year old grandmother and her 18-year old granddaughter. Two women with no criminal history whatsoever. The police "served" the warrant by surrounding the house with at least a dozen tactical ninjas, smashing in the front door within a second or two of pounding on it (not allowing anyone a realistic time interval to, like, answer the door), proning out the two women, and taking them out in handcuffs.

For a search warrant -- for a computer. Not an arrest warrant.

And what did they find out after all this? The ladies weren't guilty of anything. Somebody else in the neighborhood had hacked their unsecured DSL router to use his cell phone to e-mail threats to the police department.

Compilation of links to the reports: http://www.dogpile.com/search/web?fcoid=417&fcop=topnav&fpid=27&q=SWAT+grandmother+computer+router&ql=

Direct link to SWAT video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ZXqbLzHd_oo

[Hawkmoon]

Cheaper for who?  Not for the local police department.  They get the military gear cheap or free from the Feds, who have a whole lot of it left over after Iraq.  Non-surplus military gear would have to be be produced and purchased, at a cost, but the military stuff is just lying around waiting to be used.

Why doesn't the military hang onto to it for the next time they need it?

Back in the 1960s, when I was in high school, I was fortunate enough to spend a summer touring Europe with a church group. I think it was in Italy (might have been Germany but I don't think so) that the tour bus drove by a U.S. Army installation. There were rows and rows of Jeeps, deuce-and-halfs, and other vehicles lined up on blocks, slathered in cosmoline. They were obviously in inert, long-term storage, but they were NOT shipped back to the U.S. and given to some podunk police department.

[fifth_column]

What alarms me is the militarized police didn't bother anyone until it was deployed against a politically correct, media-favored target group.  Using this stuff against nondescript/normal/average folks didn't bother them, but somehow using it against poor black looters is cause for serious concern.  

Hell, if anything, a Ferguson-style mass looting and rioting scenario comes a lot closer to justifying military hardware than any ordinary police action.  And yet Ferguson is what torqued 'em off.  They've got their outrage ass-backwards, and it's all because they don't see all Americans as equal.

Looking at reports from non-mainstream reporting sources it appears the looting occurs away from the peaceful protesters.  So while the police are busy with the non-criminals, the criminals have free reign. 

Police militarization has been a concern for many people for a long time.  It didn't just start bothering people because of the Ferguson debacle.  And the people being targeted by the Ferguson police are "nondescript/normal/average folks."  Ferguson is just the straw that broke the camel's back.

Fistful, if you want to make sense of the world, start looking at the police as a means of compulsory control, rather than a means of enforcing the law.  Police regularly disregard the law in favor of maintaining control of the populace, or even a single individual.  It's double-speak: the police have to break the law in order to enforce the law.  The modern police state is well advanced.

[Phantom Warrior]

Why doesn't the military hang onto to it for the next time they need it?

Back in the 1960s, when I was in high school, I was fortunate enough to spend a summer touring Europe with a church group. I think it was in Italy (might have been Germany but I don't think so) that the tour bus drove by a U.S. Army installation. There were rows and rows of Jeeps, deuce-and-halfs, and other vehicles lined up on blocks, slathered in cosmoline. They were obviously in inert, long-term storage, but they were NOT shipped back to the U.S. and given to some podunk police department.

Any kind of storage for vehicles is going to involve regular servicing if only to start them up and drive them around to circulate the floods, shift the part of the tire they are sitting on, etc.  Otherwise everything is just going to rot or wear out.  Things like weapons and body armor could probably be put in a more permanent storage.

Stuff like that is going to require outside agencies.  It isn't going to be parked in the corner of post and done by Soldiers.  It's going to probably be on off-site contracted or leased storage run by outside contractors.  Which is going to add up to a lot of money for something we may never need again due to age or quantity.

Also, some of that stuff like MRAPs is just straight surplus.  MRAPs were a temporary procurement for specific conflicts.  No light, Stryker, or heavy brigades are being converted to MRAP brigades.  Once Afghanistan is done there is no need for them anymore.  Ditto older M16s.  The DoD has enough M4s and newer M16s for everyone.  Keeping old M16s is just a waste of storage space and money.

[Sergeant Bob]

Why doesn't the military hang onto to it for the next time they need it?

Back in the 1960s, when I was in high school, I was fortunate enough to spend a summer touring Europe with a church group. I think it was in Italy (might have been Germany but I don't think so) that the tour bus drove by a U.S. Army installation. There were rows and rows of Jeeps, deuce-and-halfs, and other vehicles lined up on blocks, slathered in cosmoline. They were obviously in inert, long-term storage, but they were NOT shipped back to the U.S. and given to some podunk police department.

I suspect that was pre-positioned equipment due to the Red Scare.

[Marnoot]

Regarding having officer cameras streaming back to the police station, and cost of said cameras. The real financial killer here is the support hardware required (cam streams to car, car caches and re-streams to HQ, hardware like this), and the software back at HQ.

The commercial VMS softwares (and associated server hardware) that handle this scenario (record 10s to 100s of incoming streams and can verify whether a video was tampered with or not (required for chain of evidence)) are generally not cheap. Generally a $X/license kind of deal which can be quite a bit more than the per-camera hardware cost.

As mentioned the cheaper solutions (GoPro, etc.) are generally easily tampered with (gee, I don't know what happened to the SD card!).

All that said, on-body cameras with all the above associated stuff would be money well spent IMO.

[Ben]

The camera thing has been all over the business channels for the last week (stock took a nice pop too - I should have bought in for specualtion). I'll have to look up a link to the particulars, but the lead company making these for cops right now sells them for $700 a pop, and if I remember right, ~$50/mo per camera for data streaming. Several PDs in CA are using them, including Oakland.

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Looking at reports from non-mainstream reporting sources it appears the looting occurs away from the peaceful protesters.  So while the police are busy with the non-criminals, the criminals have free reign. 

Police militarization has been a concern for many people for a long time.  It didn't just start bothering people because of the Ferguson debacle.  And the people being targeted by the Ferguson police are "nondescript/normal/average folks."  Ferguson is just the straw that broke the camel's back.

Concern about militarization has non been mainstream until this month.  That it's been discussed on forums and blogs doesn't make it mainstream.  And the people throwing molotovs, looting, shooting at strangers, these are not people I would consider normal or nondescript, not by a long shot.

[fifth_column]

Concern about militarization has non been mainstream until this month.  That it's been discussed on forums and blogs doesn't make it mainstream.  And the people throwing molotovs, looting, shooting at strangers, these are not people I would consider normal or nondescript, not by a long shot.

I agree.  And that's my point, the people being targeted by the police are, by and large, peaceful protesters.  Thugs then take advantage of the diversion to loot, etc.  If the police were interested in stopping the looting, they would patrol for criminal activity where the protest is not occurring.

Since the police are more interested in keeping control of the populace, they are turned towards the protest, rather than away from it.

[Firethorn]

"Ruggedized for police use?"  What, a regular $300 GoPro helmet mount kit can't handle the fumes in the bathroom?

Besides the tampering resistance, another point I see is battery - from what I remember of the GoPro it wouldn't be able to last a whole shift. 

[Scout26]

Why doesn't the military hang onto to it for the next time they need it?

Back in the 1960s, when I was in high school, I was fortunate enough to spend a summer touring Europe with a church group. I think it was in Italy (might have been Germany but I don't think so) that the tour bus drove by a U.S. Army installation. There were rows and rows of Jeeps, deuce-and-halfs, and other vehicles lined up on blocks, slathered in cosmoline. They were obviously in inert, long-term storage, but they were NOT shipped back to the U.S. and given to some podunk police department.

Probably Germany.  What you saw was a POMCUS (Prepositioning of Material Configured to Unit Sets) site.  On the north side of the MTA in Baumholder was Nahbollenbach and Winterhauch.  There were a total of 3 divisions worth of equipment stored there.  The idea being that in order to do REFORGER (REturn of FORces to GERmany) It would be easier to fly the 10 divisions worth of troops to Germany and have them meet up with equipment there, rather they try to ship everything to Europe should the Commies get frisky.  There were some US, but mostly former DP's and local nationals that maintained and exercised the equipment on a schedule (We'd see them on the MTA at times.)  And during the annual REFORGER Exercise, whatever units came over from the states would marry up with their equipment and use it then.   After it was over, they cleaned them up, wrote up any gigs, and turned them in.

[Balog]

I bet the Army could pay for it's "new camo pattern every year" program if they sold all those MRAPS and etc to civilians at fair market value instead of giving it away to the popo.

[KD5NRH]

I bet the Army could pay for it's "new camo pattern every year" program if they sold all those MRAPS and etc to civilians at fair market value instead of giving it away to the popo.

Considering the reflector belt requirement for PT, obviously the PT gear is the best camo they have.