Prime Time tonight

by Lone Gunman Thu Jan 08, 2004 14:01

I am expecting to see that one day as well.The Garda abused their prisoners?
Put that down for ANY police force on the planet.Whats new about this?

As for Prime Time,it will be the usual coy,skirt around the issues without going for the juglar and ripping it out.Musnt upset anyone too badly in twenty mins of "shock&awe" reporting.[Unless of course it is somthing to do with the evil USA of course.]
Hack reporting TV at its best.

by redflaremist Thu Jan 08, 2004 14:07

There's a street theatre action against police violence in Dublin on the 22nd.

by Janus Thu Jan 08, 2004 14:57

Prime Time has had some very good reports in the last couple of months.

by Mags Thu Jan 08, 2004 15:52

for a mainstream investigative programme on RTE to admit that police brutality takes place. People on here might know of such brutality, and the cover-up that is the Garda Complaints Board, etc. but nice government friendly RTE won't seriously address these issues. If it raises some debate and counters some of the unopposed jackbootism of McDowell over the past few months, then that is positive.

Can't comment on the programme as have not seen it yet. The Irish Examiner has a front page story today on it, with Dick Roche accusing the Guards of torturing prisoners. I suspect the news value of Prime Time is centred around the complaints from the TD and the ex-Judge. Personally I have been involved for a few years in trying to highlight a particular case of police persecution of an individual and no TD or media has shown any real interest, despite being contacted several times.

by Law abiding citizen Fri Jan 09, 2004 00:58

Having seen only the second half of the program, I'm shocked that this type of stuff is still going on. I thought that, other than one or two high profile cases such as the attack on the demonstrators in May 2002, that they had cleaned up their act after the Heavy Gang scandal in the seventies.
I'm also disgusted that they used a racial slur during an interrogation. (The program staged an re-enactment of the incident from a transcript of a garda tape.) I wonder is that just the tip of the iceberg? or is racism ingrained into the force?

by Anthony Fri Jan 09, 2004 06:00

The racial slur wasn't as disturbing as the overall context of their threats. They were basically threatening the suspect - in detail - with systematic rape. You don't get much sicker than that.

The program itself was a fine piece of journalism. I wasn't expecting it to be as hard-hitting (pun not originally intended) as it was. I thought that RTE would want to stay on the good side of the Garda press office so that they would continue to have access to breaking crime stories. They had carried out some reconstructions for TV but they had also obtained video footage of people being beaten while in garda custody.

The program did a good job of demonstrating the growing culture of violence among the police in this country. The fact that not one garda has ever had criminal proceedings brought against them while at the same time the state has paid out massive sums of money as compensation to the many victims. It questioned the wisdom of the vast powers given to the gardaí under the Public Order Act and it contrasted the weakness of McDowell's proposed inspectorate to replace the Garda Complaints Board with the powers of the Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland. The program highlighted a number of instances where the gardaí were shown to be either completely incompetent at investigating cases of garda brutality or else lacking the will to do so in any meaningful way. If you're assaulted by a guard, there's a good chance that they will threaten you with an assault charge. This has lead to a situation where gardaí feel that they can act with impunity so that problems such as forced confessions, tampering of evidence and the covering up of any such wrong-doing are becoming increasingly widespread.

Naturally, the documentary also contextualised well-known cases such as Mayday 2002, John Carthy's death, the McBrearty affair and Morris Tribunal, Paul Ward's trial, the Walsh sisters, etc. Former Circuit Court Judge, Anthony Murphy was particularly interesting in his accounts of suspect garda testimony in many court cases that he presided over. If I remember correctly, he admitted that his rule of thumb in the absence of evidence other than a confession was that the man walked free.

Nothing in that program really shocked me though much of it would have two to three years ago. Since then, I've experienced, been told of and read of many examples of garda heavy-handedness and brutality. (Talk to any of the people that you see drinking and hanging around the city centre.) For a while, I was actually a bit afraid when I saw large gatherings of gardaí but I have since gotten over that. You can't go living your life in fear of criminals - whether they wear a uniform or not. I pretty much take it for granted that were I ever unfortunate enough to be arrested for some reason that I wouldn't be treated with kid gloves.

That said, I realise that there are - as there are in all walks of life - decent people in the police force who do a very difficult job. The nature of the job and the power that goes with it is bound to corrupt. I can't imagine how you could work as a guard for too long in the city centre or areas such as Tallaght without the job affecting you psychologically. Being forced to deal with people in an authoritarian way and dealing with crime on a constant basis can't but have a negative affect on your personality and mental health.

After watching the program, I'd been thinking along similar lines to Lone Gunman's point: Are there any police forces in any country who don't act in such a manner? I can't think of any off-hand. Maybe Sweden or one of the other Scandinavian countries?

by city of god Fri Jan 09, 2004 09:50

Just thinking about the question are there any police forces who don't use brutality, and i rembered something.

If you've ever rented out the dvd "city of god" there's an excellent documentary in the extras about crime in the barrios of Brazil.

It interviews the Chief of police and he gives a frank an honest description of his situation. He basically says in so many words that his job is not to neutrally uphold the law but to enforce the will of his employers (the government) regardless the legaility of it. He describes his position as acting as a protective barrier between the small few who run the world and the great majority who would like to. He goes on to say that any police force that doesn't realize these truths and get on with their job is fooling themselves.

Interestingly enough it says at the end that he later retired from his position and became a politician!

by kokomero Fri Jan 09, 2004 09:56

We have a right to expect high standards in all aspects of public life and receive them, after all we PAY for this public service.

Obviously people like King Mob and Lone Gunman either do not pay taxes or are happy to have their money thrown away on sub-standard services or worse still on compensation claims against the state for those same sub-standard services.

We should have learned our lesson on non-interventionism after all of the scandals and claims regarding institutional abuse where the state preferred to allow the clergy police themselves!

The gardai obviously do not feel any sense of duty towards those they serve as they offer alliegance first and foremost to their colleagues by covering their backs in investigations such as RTS and Abbeylara.

This simply is not acceptable and nobody least of all the Gardai can be allowed to be above the law.

You need go no further than PJ Stones remarks this morning on Morning Ireland where he described the unprovoked attack by uniformed Gardai (without ID numbers) on RTS protestors as the "Dame St. riot" to understand how out of control (of the state) the Gardai are!

Wake up gentlemen, it is a right, not a priveledge to get a quality service for the money we pay.

The only way we can get a quality service is to have a fully independent ombudsman or equivalent, with its' own investigative personnel, with full powers of discovery and arrest if necessary!

If we don't the result will eventually be a flood of compensation claims against a crap service and we'll only have ourselves to blame!

by Steve Fri Jan 09, 2004 12:47 stevo_furball at esatclear dot ie

What these people are doing is disturbing but I think it's safe to say they're only a small minority. I'm frequently up and down the country, I talk to a lot of people, and I've never once heard about, let alone witnessed, Garda brutality of any kind before this programme. The footage from May Day 2000 was a bit of a surprise to me.

This Garda complaints centre thing is a heap of shite. As the programme said, out of about 2,000 complaints last year, only 2 were ever followed up, and neither of these resulted in any disciplinary action.

by Lone gunman Fri Jan 09, 2004 14:38

Re your previous comments.Yes i do pay taxes and I dont like seeing my money being wasted either
.However I grew up along time ago and realised that the world is a nasty place.All politicians of all hues are simply pigs trying to get their snouts into the public trough of our tax money.
If you give a force TOTAL power to run your life [IE police] you can EXPECT it to be abused.
If you expect "high standards" from public bodies because you" paid "for them. Then my friend,you are living in cloud cuckoo land. Especially in Ireland!This country would make Mexico and some third world juntas that I have had the [mis]fortune to visit,a exampleof honest govt.
so grow up and "demand" of your elected pig an independant Garda investigation body,that is civvie run.Best of luck.it will be an Irish solution to an Irish problem.

by Aileen Fri Jan 09, 2004 15:14 [email protected]

I visited a small Zapitista village in Mexico a couple of years ago. There the village community had elected their own policeman and a policewomen. Interestingly enough, at the time I was there, the policeman had been put in the prison for a day because he broke rules prohibiting alcohol and had got drunk.

by pat c Fri Jan 09, 2004 15:28

why was there a ban on alcohol?

by ec Fri Jan 09, 2004 16:31

more if you type zapatistas / alcohol into google

by pat c Fri Jan 09, 2004 16:42

its one thing to advise against alcohol abuse its another to ban it. gee, if i want to have restrictions on alcohol or have drugs banned i can get this under capitalism.

by Aileen Fri Jan 09, 2004 17:54 sovietpop at eircom dot net

As far as I know alcohol was banned because the combination of
guns and alcohol was leading to problems within the communiities (they have guns because of the war against the Mexican
state).

by kokomero Fri Jan 09, 2004 18:53

elected in many parts of the US also to the best of my knowledge but this doesn't prevent them from beating people to within an inch of their lives either as evidenced by the LAPDs beating of Rodney King.

by Old Mr. Gory Fri Jan 09, 2004 20:00

There is a Sheriff for Los Angeles County who is elected: currently Lee Baca is the holder of the office. He employs sworn deputies as officers in the LA County Sheriff's Dept.

The Los Angeles Police Department are a completely different organization that is administrated by officers appointed by the Los Angeles City Council. There are no direct elections to the posts.

by lone gunman Fri Jan 09, 2004 20:49

anything that a PD does.Thats one trouble with US law enforcement.Too many bodies and juristictions. IE the highways Cali being an example
California Highway Patrol, California State Troopers, California local police depts whose juristiction a highway runs thru,sherrifs dept. so who enforces the traffic laws?Alland none so you can see how easy it is to buck pass over there. BTW it was LAPD that beat up King.funnily enough the video NEVER showed King actually attacking the police.them trying to use mace,stun guns etc to try and bring the drugged up king under control.Hmm wonder why?

by Old Mr.Gory Fri Jan 09, 2004 21:17

If the tape doesn't exist that shows that King was doing what you allege then how do you know that he did that? The testimony of the officers? A divine revelation from the God of Reaction?

Anyway, there's yet another scandalous demonstration of police thuggery that people are concerned with now.

by lone gunman Sat Jan 10, 2004 22:20

It was used in the King trial.It is the SAME tape that has been slectively edited by the liberal media to show the good ol boy white cops beat up a poor innocent black man[who incidently was high on a illegal substance and driving in a reckless and dangerous manner.Of course it is racist to stop a black person doing such,and even more racist to arrest them for breaking the law].Funny that the tape is NEVER shown from start to finish.

by Old Mr. Gory Sat Jan 10, 2004 23:15

So when you said "funnily enough the video NEVER showed King actually attacking the police.them trying to use mace,stun guns etc to try and bring the drugged up king under control.Hmm wonder why?" in your previous posting you actually meant that you have only seen versions of the tape that don't include King being pepper-sprayed and stun-gunned?

The only versions that I've seen show him "resisting arrest" and I watch CNN and Fox, in fact the mainstream media that I watch made it quite clear that King was someone that deserved to have the crap beaten out of him because he wouldn't let the police assault him. The first showing of the tape on KTLA did have the first 13 seconds edited out, supposedly because it was "blurry", and that does appear to show King charging one of the officers. You should note that the second trial of officers Powell and Koon resulted in them receiving 30 month sentences for aggravated assault and a later civil suit award King millions of dollars in damages indicating that given some distance from the events two courts decided that he had not been treated fairly. This has all been mulled over extensively and it appears that the officers were indeed "over-reacting". I don't know if the KTLA-editing of the tape was inspired by the technical reasons they cite or by other considerations, but I do know that the other stations restored the first 13 seconds in subsequent showings.

Anyway, the only way to resolve this is for you to cite statistics to show that the tape is broadcast in its bowdlerized form more frequently. That would support your insinuations. I only have personal experience to refute your point and that may very well be non-convincing.