Common sense would dictate that after the Philadephia police department paid out $25,000 last year in a pre-trial settlement for violating a gun owner’s civil rights, that members of the department would have gotten the proverbial memo not to do such silliness.
Apparently a few of them follow the lead of their rabidly anti-gun police chief Charles Ramsey.
And the story from the Philadelphia Daily News:
PHILADELPHIA police officers are supposed to be educated about civilian gun laws – especially since an expletive-laden altercation with a licensed gun owner ended up on YouTube last year and led to a $25,000 court settlement.
For the record: It’s perfectly legal to openly carry a handgun in the city – with a valid permit. Everywhere else in the state, a permit is needed only if the gun is concealed.
But apparently not everyone in the Police Department got the memo.
New video shows cops harassing man legally carrying gun
Philadelphia (Daily News) – A new YouTube video shows two Philly cops antagonizing a man last week who was legally carrying a .40-caliber Glock on his hip as he headed to a Manayunk barbershop.
One officer wrongly tells Joshua Rodriguez, 22, that his ammunition is illegal. Another officer later tells the barber that Rodriguez has a gun.
“You have all these laws, man. You go to law school? You’re not supposed to have 13 bullets of hollow points in your gun right now,” an officer says. The bullets are, in fact, legal.
He asks Rodriguez, who took the video, a series of questions and later says, “Shut your mouth” and “Don’t call me ‘officer.’ ” The other cop, who repeatedly tells Rodriguez that his gun should be concealed, says, “I should’ve pulled my gun out on you, technically.”
“I don’t want to argue,” an exasperated Rodriguez says. “I want to get a haircut.”
The officer tells him he’s free to go, then walks into the barbershop and revives the debate. “You want this guy in here with his gun open?” the cop asks the barber. “This guy here, right here.”
Capt. Francis Healy, a police lawyer and special adviser to Commissioner Charles Ramsey, said officers should be “respectful and courteous, and also be safe” in such situations. He said the first officer might have misstated the law about the ammo, and the other might have been “a little overzealous” in the barbershop.
The department increased training on open-carry stops after a February 2011 incident involving Mark Fiorino, an information-technology worker with a firearms permit who was harassed and handcuffed for carrying a gun in Northeast Philly.
Would is surprise you to learn Ramsey started his career violating people’s civil rights in Chicago of all places. Who would have guessed it, right?
He became the Washington D.C. Police Chief in 1998, and instituted traffic stops of motorists without reason and entered data into computers. Cops called it a violation of privacy; we call it violation of civil rights.
Ramsey also got himself into hot water with the arrest of some protesters that ultimately cost D.C. as they paid $1 million to over 120 protesters.
Crazy Philly Mayor Nutter hired Ramsey after he was forced out at D.C. to be Philadephia’s top crimefighter.
Just as Mayor Nutter is a incendiary leftist, so is Charles Ramsey.
(FoxNews) – With a shocking altercation between Philadelphia police and a 25-year-old IT worker putting the spotlight back on open-carry gun laws, local authorities are warning gun owners that they will be “inconvenienced” if they carry unconcealed handguns in the city.
Lt. Raymond Evers, a spokesman for the city police, told FoxNews.com that gun owners who open carry, which is legal in the city, may be asked to lay on the ground until officers feel safe while they check permits.
“Philadelphia, in certain areas, is very dangerous,” he said. “There’s a lot of gun violence.” Several officers have been killed in the line of duty in the past three years, local authorities say.
The warning comes after Mark Fiorino, a suburban Philadelphia IT worker, posted an audiotape to YouTube of his tense, 45-minute encounter with police in February over his exposed handgun. The video went viral and captured national attention.
After Fiorino released the audiotape, he was charged with disorderly conduct and reckless endangerment. He now faces up to two years in prison.
“The police department and assistant district attorney are coming after me, in my opinion, to make an example of me because I stood up to them and exposed them for their lack of knowledge,” Fiorino said, who called the trial “absolutely inappropriate and a waste of taxpayer money.”
Can you imagine the outrage if police officials said black folks would be “inconvenienced” if they set foot in that city?
Fiorino’s tape can be seen here at YouTube:
Ironically, Charles Ramsey, the chief of police in Philadephia, struts around with a firearm, open carrying, but he lacks both a carry permit and a state certification as a police officer.
Don’t forget Chief Ramsey is the one who dictated what the police were looking for in the DC sniper case:
http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2002-11-04/news/0211040064_1_muhammad-white-van-white-people
Yet though police questioned Mr. Muhammad on more than one occasion, they sent him on his way each time. “We were looking for a white van with white people,” admitted D.C. police Chief Charles Ramsey.
we are nearing the time when all law and order will fail, following the economic collapse of the US adn even the world. When that happens many of your local police will turn into out and out tyrannts. Be prapered to take up arms against them to ensure your region is free—many areas will fall into utter despotism, though.
Remember the Second Amendment simply protects a pre-existing right–the porpose of which is t combat tyranny. Remember the founders’ writing:
“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.-”
We are inching daily toward the “Necessity For Taking Up Arms”
I pray it is avoidable—but I am not counting on it.
sorry for the type-o’e
adn = and
Porpose is purpose
is to combat tyranny.
fat fingered–oh well!
“Element uh surprise, element uh surprise…das all I’m sayin”
Who gave this moron a badge? That is his reason why this respectful citizen can’t open carry! Why would he be any less susceptible to being disarmed by the element of surprise? I notice he is open carrying. He and his partner are both ignorant of the law they are paid to enforce
Disgraceful!
For a prior 8 year Marine, officer fatty failed to take the importance of PT with him upon discharge. By his comments about being tactical, I’m willing to bet he was a POG.
Sounds like some Philly police officers need to be publically horse-whipped.
I used to want to be a law enforcement officer as a kid, but the older I get the more I realize the majority of the police are just using their power to oppress people. Now I am afraid to live in major cities because of the risk of police brutality.
what do high school bullies do when they graduate…..become cops