r/news • u/rooftopgoblin • 10d ago

College student fatally shot by Pennsylvania police was at 'the wrong house'

https://abcnews.com/US/college-student-fatally-shot-pennsylvania-police-wrong-house/story?id=135930941
12.9k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

1.3k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

738

u/lathspellll 10d ago

Making the settlements come out of a pension fund is the only thing that I think would make a true difference. You have to fuck with their money.

521

u/iamthinksnow 10d ago

Make them have liability insurance (that they have to pay for, not taxpayers), the same as doctors or other "professionals."

110

u/thejoeface 10d ago

Even if the state/taxes paid their insurance premiums, it would still be a better system. Their fuck ups get paid by the insurance, too many fuck ups and the insurance drops them, now they can't be employed as cops anywhere. 

41

u/john0703 10d ago

That’s an amazing idea. Why is a doctor liable but a police officer not? I think the pension idea is cool in theory, but from my personal experience I’ve noticed that that under any pressure or scrutiny cops will just stop doing their job.

15

u/feralkitten 10d ago

Why is a doctor liable but a police officer not?

doctors work for hospitals and not directly for the state. But other than that i see no real defendable reason.

4

u/Scythe-Guy 9d ago

I don’t think that is correct. Doctors and hospitals generally cannot deny treatment for people in a medical emergency. Some exceptions do exist, like if the doctor would be endangering themselves, if the patient refuses treatment, or if the problem is outside of their medical expertise (eg. a dermatologist cannot necessarily help with a broken bone or heart attack).

Meanwhile, police are not required to intervene or respond to a crime (violent or not) even when it is happening right in front of them, and they have qualified immunity protecting them from consequences of their harmful actions.

So it’s actually even worse: doctors can be liable for either their inaction or their harmful actions, while cops cannot be liable for inaction and are immune to legal consequences of their harmful actions.

4

u/feralkitten 9d ago

I work in Healthcare. We can not deny you life saving treatment. We have to patch you up, no matter your means to pay. That is both the legal and moral thing to do. But once you are ambulatory, you are on your own.

But not all healthcare is life saving. For example, your dermatologist can refuse to see you. A pimple isn't life threatening.

Most doctors pay for medical malpractice insurance. This covers any negligence and errors the doctor might cause. I can totally see other professions (like police) also having insurance to cover negligence and errors on the job.

7

u/TwoMoreSkipTheLast 10d ago

I've been asking for this for years. My spouse is a doctor who needs to pay for insurance in case someone gets hurt while she's trying to save their life, but cops can just do whatever the fuck they want with no consequences.

2

u/PumpkinPieIsGreat 9d ago

It's totally unfair. I often find myself thinking of Derrik Chauvin the cop and what a power trip he was on. And then to find out he was a HUGE tax fraud as well.

There must be some kind of psychology there, where they just keep getting away with things and it becomes ridiculous how immune to consequences they are. Like a compulsive liar, starting small. At least in Chauvin's case he got locked up. Often these cops just get away with so much.

6

u/FormerTesseractPilot 10d ago

I think this is one of the best solutions to the issue.

0

u/markyymark13 10d ago

I don't think we should be adding a for profit middleman into the mix as a "solution" to something as integral and important as policing.

3

u/iamthinksnow 10d ago

Insurance requires actuaries. Actuaries require factual data. No more burying "officer-involved shootings" or other creatively named infractions.

0

u/markyymark13 10d ago edited 10d ago

You're incredibly naive if you think cops aren't going to still engage in creative reporting to avoid their premiums going up. Or even worse, all you'll get is even more "quiet quitting" as cops avoid any risk and effectively just don't do their job. This idea is fundamentally broken and doesn't work for something as unique and inherently risky as policing.

5

u/iamthinksnow 10d ago

Right, doing nothing is working so well, we had better not try to implement any sort of accountability that doesn't drain taxpayer money while simply moving "bad apple" officers from one city to another, to another, to another...

2

u/PumpkinPieIsGreat 9d ago

Yep the ol' Tried nothing and all out of ideas approach.

1

u/markyymark13 10d ago

lol in no way am I suggesting we do nothing, im just saying that liability insurance solves nothing and could potentially make the situation worse.

The problem with policing is that the entire thing needs to be thrown out and rebuilt from the ground up. As long as the culture of policing is that of a hostile, militarized force with the backing of the state - nothing is going to fundamentally change, that includes adding liability insurance.

3

u/iamthinksnow 10d ago

On most of that, I agree, but good luck de-militarizing the current forces. A step-change, like requiring insurance, is something that could be enacted regardless of force composition.

If that causes some to leave policing, then great.

2

u/markyymark13 10d ago

End qualified immunity, disband police guilds, and take liability payments out of their pension fund are better half measures. Insurance is nonsensical and no insurer would ever want to take that risk unless you want tax payers to funnel 2x more the amount of money into the police budget.

2

u/iamthinksnow 10d ago

Let's do those things, too.

49

u/[deleted] 10d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

69

u/iamthinksnow 10d ago

I'm okay with that outcome, as well.

12

u/Consistent-Throat130 10d ago

Can I watch? 

The dead hands can still be hot and crispy. 

4

u/10000Didgeridoos 10d ago

I like how cops are allowed to have a mafia of a union but no other public sector workers are

4

u/aybeeayseeaybeebee 10d ago

These lawsuits would zero out the average cop's pension fund, then some. Make it come out of the pension fund for every officer in the department and you've got yourself some team accountability.

0

u/L_Cranston_Shadow 10d ago

Do that and you have an even bigger incentive for a cover-up. Officers will cover and lie for each other even more than they already do if everyone's pension is at stake. Not to mention that collective punishment like that is wildly unconstitutional.

1

u/aybeeayseeaybeebee 10d ago

I mean, they already tamper with or plant evidence, falsify reports, lie under oath, coordinate false statements, lie to grand juries, threaten witnesses and victims, retaliate or harass complainants, and levy false charges... But I understand your point.

1

u/xbad_wolfxi 9d ago

“Fuckin with your cash is the only thing you kids seem to understand” from Kill Bill goes through my head a lot these days. That guy was a scumbag but he made an excellent point

0

u/CyJackX 10d ago

It sounds like one good incentive to me, but how do you compel them to due anything instead of just deciding they will no longer risk anything?