Cop goes overboard on kid

[Paladin]

I saw the video and was shocked and dismayed by what I saw, but after more information started coming out I found out that I am personally invested in this story. The Chief of Police is someone I know personally and have known for many years.
I don't know the cop that is in trouble over this, but I know Scott Uhrig and he is a decent stand up guy and is one of the people that I makes me believe that cops are real people and not power crazy sociopaths. There is a lot of information that is coming out that I think is unfair to him and police in general and I think that if you look at this situation in the context that a police officer is looking at it, this story is being blown way out of proportion.

Last month a St. Louis cop was executed by a who simply wanted to shoot a cop. The officer was alone at night and was ambushed. That is the worst case scenario, but when you look at the facts in this case, this kid baited the cop into a situation where the officer does what he should be doing. A car pulling into a dark parking lot at 2:00 AM deserves to be checked out. The cop asks the kid what he is doing, and the kid's response is that it is none of his business. If Officer Kuehnlein would have said, "Wow. You are right. Carry on then." what sort of cop would he be?

As a teen I did all sorts of things that could have landed me in trouble with the police, but I also knew that if you are stopped by a cop and you give them a hard time, they are going to give you a harder time.
It is my opinion that while Officer Kuehnlein stepped way over the line in his response, this kid is lucky it wasn't a cop who decided he was "resisting arrest"...

The media and general population is looking at this whole thing, and I don't think that it is fair to immediately judge the police. As the facts are coming out it is obvious that this kid has done this before, and honestly I don't have a problem with a cop cursing out a punk who is cruising around looking for trouble. The cops have to assume the worst about a person they are confronting, and I have a hard time thinking that it is a good idea to smart off to a cop.

Anyway, I don't respond to too many posts, especially when my post is going the opposite direction of the majority of the rest of the post, but I wanted to point out that as someone who knows that a good man and good officer is being dragged through the mud because of two people who made bad decisions.

I don't think you'll find many people disagreeing with you about a cop cursing out a punk, but the fact of the matter is the officer in question threatened to make up false charges against this kid. That's illegal no matter how you slice it, even if the kid was a punk.

 

[sherri79]

lets not forget he did not just yell or cuss at this kid. he made up charges and threatened to make up more.

 

[sherri79]

I don't think you'll find many people disagreeing with you about a cop cursing out a punk, but the fact of the matter is the officer in question threatened to make up false charges against this kid. That's illegal no matter how you slice it, even if the kid was a punk.

get out of my head... you posted while i was. :crazy:

 

[imthemom]

I saw the video and was shocked and dismayed by what I saw, but after more information started coming out I found out that I am personally invested in this story. The Chief of Police is someone I know personally and have known for many years.
I don't know the cop that is in trouble over this, but I know Scott Uhrig and he is a decent stand up guy and is one of the people that I makes me believe that cops are real people and not power crazy sociopaths. There is a lot of information that is coming out that I think is unfair to him and police in general and I think that if you look at this situation in the context that a police officer is looking at it, this story is being blown way out of proportion.

Last month a St. Louis cop was executed by a who simply wanted to shoot a cop. The officer was alone at night and was ambushed. That is the worst case scenario, but when you look at the facts in this case, this kid baited the cop into a situation where the officer does what he should be doing. A car pulling into a dark parking lot at 2:00 AM deserves to be checked out. The cop asks the kid what he is doing, and the kid's response is that it is none of his business. If Officer Kuehnlein would have said, "Wow. You are right. Carry on then." what sort of cop would he be?

As a teen I did all sorts of things that could have landed me in trouble with the police, but I also knew that if you are stopped by a cop and you give them a hard time, they are going to give you a harder time.
It is my opinion that while Officer Kuehnlein stepped way over the line in his response, this kid is lucky it wasn't a cop who decided he was "resisting arrest"...

The media and general population is looking at this whole thing, and I don't think that it is fair to immediately judge the police. As the facts are coming out it is obvious that this kid has done this before, and honestly I don't have a problem with a cop cursing out a punk who is cruising around looking for trouble. The cops have to assume the worst about a person they are confronting, and I have a hard time thinking that it is a good idea to smart off to a cop.

Anyway, I don't respond to too many posts, especially when my post is going the opposite direction of the majority of the rest of the post, but I wanted to point out that as someone who knows that a good man and good officer is being dragged through the mud because of two people who made bad decisions.

I see where you are coming from. I can see a cop getting angry at sarcastic remarks and yelling but he went way over the line when he started talking about making up charges. Who will the court believe, obviously the cop if it weren't for this video tape. The cop always wins and they know that. This was one of those egotistical cops that are power hungry and were probably beat up in school everyday so now he can be the big man and boss people around. Just my opinion.

 

[crypto6]

I am considering installing them in my kids cars. Honestly it is such a huge probelm around here, it would be a great investment.

My gf's son was pulling into a parking place. As he did he clipped a parked car. He went into the store directly in front of the parking place to get a pen and paper to write a note. He came out of the store a few minutes later with the pen and paper in hand. 2 officers that watched all this came over and began to write him up for misdemeanor hit and run! he told them he was inside the store getting what he needed to write a note and the storekeeper came out and corroborated his story. They said didn't matter, he left the scene. He tried to plead his case to the officers and they promptly arrested him for resisting arrest. Once they brought him into the station and the other cops saw that he was under arrest for hit and run and resisting arrest they promptly roughed him up.

Firstly, sorry about your PD. They need a major housecleaning; these malevolent attitudes come from the top down. This isn’t community policing, its community terrorism! I hope the judge had the sense to throw this whole thing out
On to the cameras: I’ve been thinking about a panoramic which would see the inside and somewhat through the windows. This can be hidden in the dome light area so it’s not so obvious. I saw one advertised as OEM on one brand of car, IIRC. I’ll try to find it. My concern is vandalism, rather than abuse of authority, but I’ve been mulling this over for about a year.

Crypto6

 

[GlitchWizard]

... but I wanted to point out that as someone who knows that a good man and good officer is being dragged through the mud because of two people who made bad decisions.

I hope you don't worry too much about speaking your mind in the future - if everyone just agreed with everyone else and had nothing to share, this place would get old fast!

I don't know your friend, so I'll take it on faith that he's upstanding - I have no reason to believe otherwise. This kid should have kissed up to the police - yes - that's what I'd advise my daughter to do - however, if the cop is generally supposed to be concerned that he is confronting a bad guy in a dark place, I think HE should use a bit of couth as well. If someone is going to shoot a cop, he's more likely to do it while the cop is mouthing off and being unreasonably nasty.

My opinion.

 

[dontpanic38]

One thing that I think is important to keep in mind is that being a cop IS about power. They are trained to never let the other guy have the upper hand.
This kid thought he was being smart, and obviously he is well read, but I think that he did the worst possible thing if he is trying to avoid police harassment. He challenged the officer's authority and it is up to the officer to assert his authority.
Something to remember is that the cop threatened the kid with trumped up charges, he didn't actually do it. I know that the response from most people is that he didn't do it because he saw the camera. Regardless, the kid baited the cop into checking out a suspicious situation and then challenged the officer with smart legal talk. He knew exactly what he was doing. He immediately posted the exchange on the internet and is now a cause-celeb.

To illustrate my point, I was pulled over as a teen late at night, we had been drinking and one of us had some pot on us. The cop pulled us over and told us that he smelled pot and pulled us all out of the car, searched us and put us all in cuffs.
First, he did not smell pot because we had not smoked any all day. Second, it was my friends Mom's car, so even if we did smoke it, it would not have been anywhere near her car...
Anyway, the cop knew that we were up to no good, made something up to pull us over, search us, put us all in cuffs and scare the crap out of us, but then what he did was he made my friend dump out all of the pot, scatter it and sent us on our way with the warning that he could have ruined all of our lives for stupid teen age shenanigans but he was a father himself and would rather not have otherwise good kids lives ruined and hoped that we would learn how lucky we were.
My point is that they will lie and make threats to prove their point or to get the upper hand.

Everyone seems to have crucified the police for this, but I don't think that everyone is seeing the whole picture.
Cops are people just like anyone else and they make mistakes the same as us, and mistakes were absolutely made in this case.

I don't envy this kid though. He put himself in a situation where he is lucky he only got verbally assaulted. He now gets to look forward to his name being fresh on every cop's mind nation wide....

 

[Jeana (DP)]

Yes, we know that police officers are trained to keep the upper hand. However, they're also trained to keep their cool and to not threaten anyone with things that are illegal. Obviously, this cop is a problem or this guy wouldn't have gone through the trouble of installing a camera. They are human and it takes all kinds. Unfortunately for this department, this kind ain't the right kind.

 

[SadieMae]

We have this problem in our area also. When my husband was younger he would get pulled over all the time, it is called dirving while being brown. He had a nice truck with shiny rims so that constantly searched him. I called the police station to complain and they said if he doesn't want to get pulled over tell him not to drive a truck like that. So basically because he was young and Mexican he can't drive a nice car without being a drug dealer. We see it all the time here, they will be searching a car and the person is always black or Hispanic. They are doing a census this year in Illinois on how many minorities get pulled over and hasseled. I am glad someone is finally doing something. This is a smart thing this kid did and I think it would be wise for anyone to keep a cell phone or something that can record handy for a reason like this.

I see the same thing here too. Rarely do I see young white males cuffed on the curb during traffic stops. It's always young blacks and hispanics. My oldest drove a fairly new Cadillac Eldorado when he was 17. He was outright asked "what do you do to drive a car like this? You must be selling drugs."

 

[crypto6]

I saw the video and was shocked and dismayed by what I saw, but after more information started coming out I found out that I am personally invested in this story. The Chief of Police is someone I know personally and have known for many years.
I don't know the cop that is in trouble over this, but I know Scott Uhrig and he is a decent stand up guy and is one of the people that I makes me believe that cops are real people and not power crazy sociopaths. There is a lot of information that is coming out that I think is unfair to him and police in general and I think that if you look at this situation in the context that a police officer is looking at it, this story is being blown way out of proportion.

Last month a St. Louis cop was executed by a who simply wanted to shoot a cop. The officer was alone at night and was ambushed. That is the worst case scenario, but when you look at the facts in this case, this kid baited the cop into a situation where the officer does what he should be doing. A car pulling into a dark parking lot at 2:00 AM deserves to be checked out. The cop asks the kid what he is doing, and the kid's response is that it is none of his business. If Officer Kuehnlein would have said, "Wow. You are right. Carry on then." what sort of cop would he be?

As a teen I did all sorts of things that could have landed me in trouble with the police, but I also knew that if you are stopped by a cop and you give them a hard time, they are going to give you a harder time.
It is my opinion that while Officer Kuehnlein stepped way over the line in his response, this kid is lucky it wasn't a cop who decided he was "resisting arrest"...

The media and general population is looking at this whole thing, and I don't think that it is fair to immediately judge the police. As the facts are coming out it is obvious that this kid has done this before, and honestly I don't have a problem with a cop cursing out a punk who is cruising around looking for trouble. The cops have to assume the worst about a person they are confronting, and I have a hard time thinking that it is a good idea to smart off to a cop.

Anyway, I don't respond to too many posts, especially when my post is going the opposite direction of the majority of the rest of the post, but I wanted to point out that as someone who knows that a good man and good officer is being dragged through the mud because of two people who made bad decisions.

In reality, some punks do need a dressing down; this kid has obviously played the game before and rigged it in his favor with the camera and his schtick of being just disrespectful enough to egg the LE on, but not appearing too insolent. The officer took the bait and this is the result. At first I also let the video take me down the "bad cop" road, but after reading some of you guys, I think the officer was set up and I feel sorry for him, alone in a dark lot with one kid being evasive and another lurking around in the passenger seat. But what the officer did wrong was to make up and threaten to make up more false charges. He sees it as trying to re-establish his authority with this smug punk; but because of the way it’s filmed and how the “director” has slanted it, we are supposed to see an out-of-control cop making credible threats against an innocent young man for no obvious reason. Not only does the LE need counseling on this kind of power control gamesmanship by suspects, he needs addressing of his deeper problem of breaking or threatening to break the law to achieve his ends. In this case I’m not sure getting the kid to quit being disrespectful was even worth the officer’s breath
BTW, He started off the recording sounding like a pretty good guy, and maybe he is. I hope the chief can stand by the officer, say some mistakes were made, but small ones, and it’s gonna be straightened out; next topic.

It’s great to have local perspective on matters like this; thanks ldontpanic38 and other ocal posters.

Crypto6

 

[calidreamin]

Yes, we know that police officers are trained to keep the upper hand. However, they're also trained to keep their cool and to not threaten anyone with things that are illegal. Obviously, this cop is a problem or this guy wouldn't have gone through the trouble of installing a camera. They are human and it takes all kinds. Unfortunately for this department, this kind ain't the right kind.

I agree with what you said Jenna. This officer threatend to write the kid up on made up charges. I think this cop needs profesional help to deal with his anger problem. He brought shame on his department by threatening to make up charges and he should lose his job sooner rather than later.

 

[dontpanic38]

Yes, we know that police officers are trained to keep the upper hand. However, they're also trained to keep their cool and to not threaten anyone with things that are illegal. Obviously, this cop is a problem or this guy wouldn't have gone through the trouble of installing a camera. They are human and it takes all kinds. Unfortunately for this department, this kind ain't the right kind.

You are right, they are trained to keep their cool. One thing to point out though, this was the first run in the kid had with that department. He had issues in the past with officers from other departments and installed the camera in response to that.
Everyone is looking for a payout, and I am convinced he knew exactly what he was doing, and the reaction from the officer is not excusable, the kid did something that amounts in my mind to entrapment, and he should not be held on a pedestal for asserting his rights. There are much better ways of doing it.
As a parent I want my child to be strong and to stand up for herself, but I would also want her to use some common sense when it comes to how you do that. Directly challenging a cops authority in a dark parking lot with no witnesses other than a camera that could be confiscated as "evidence" is not really bright, and downright dangerous.

 

[Jeana (DP)]

You are right, they are trained to keep their cool. One thing to point out though, this was the first run in the kid had with that department. He had issues in the past with officers from other departments and installed the camera in response to that.
Everyone is looking for a payout, and I am convinced he knew exactly what he was doing, and the reaction from the officer is not excusable, the kid did something that amounts in my mind to entrapment, and he should not be held on a pedestal for asserting his rights. There are much better ways of doing it.
As a parent I want my child to be strong and to stand up for herself, but I would also want her to use some common sense when it comes to how you do that. Directly challenging a cops authority in a dark parking lot with no witnesses other than a camera that could be confiscated as "evidence" is not really bright, and downright dangerous.

Entrapment???? You've got to be joking. We see criminals busted every day who are set up in police sting operations and everyone laughs hysterically when they cry "entrapment," yet when a cop gets busted suddenly this defense works? No one can "force" another to do something they weren't already going to do. I'm willing to go out on a limb and opine that this cop didn't just act this way this time. Its just the first time someone busted him.

 

[crypto6]

You are right, they are trained to keep their cool. One thing to point out though, this was the first run in the kid had with that department. He had issues in the past with officers from other departments and installed the camera in response to that.
Everyone is looking for a payout, and I am convinced he knew exactly what he was doing, and the reaction from the officer is not excusable, the kid did something that amounts in my mind to entrapment, and he should not be held on a pedestal for asserting his rights. There are much better ways of doing it.
As a parent I want my child to be strong and to stand up for herself, but I would also want her to use some common sense when it comes to how you do that. Directly challenging a cops authority in a dark parking lot with no witnesses other than a camera that could be confiscated as "evidence" is not really bright, and downright dangerous.

Does anyone else see a passenger in the rearview mirror when it's adjusted, or is that reflection the driver (the head in the mirror appears to not move when the driver does)?

Crypto6

 

[dontpanic38]

In reality, some punks do need a dressing down; this kid has obviously played the game before and rigged it in his favor with the camera and his schtick of being just disrespectful enough to egg the LE on, but not appearing too insolent. The officer took the bait and this is the result. At first I also let the video take me down the "bad cop" road, but after reading some of you guys, I think the officer was set up and I feel sorry for him, alone in a dark lot with one kid being evasive and another lurking around in the passenger seat. But what the officer did wrong was to make up and threaten to make up more false charges. He sees it as trying to re-establish his authority with this smug punk; but because of the way it’s filmed and how the “director” has slanted it, we are supposed to see an out-of-control cop making credible threats against an innocent young man for no obvious reason. Not only does the LE need counseling on this kind of power control gamesmanship by suspects, he needs addressing of his deeper problem of breaking or threatening to break the law to achieve his ends. In this case I’m not sure getting the kid to quit being disrespectful was even worth the officer’s breath
BTW, He started off the recording sounding like a pretty good guy, and maybe he is. I hope the chief can stand by the officer, say some mistakes were made, but small ones, and it’s gonna be straightened out; next topic.

It’s great to have local perspective on matters like this; thanks ldontpanic38 and other ocal posters.

Crypto6

Thanks Crypto. I think that you hit it right on the head.
As an ex punk, I am sort of surprised to hear myself being so defensive of the police, but having grown up, and having family in law enforcement has taught me a lot.
Having someone with issues and a lot of power and authority can be a bad mix, but I get upset when personal responsibility is not addressed. We had a situation here in St. Louis a few years ago where the police tried to pull someone over, and they ended up in a chase that concluded with the police shooting the car up with a shocking amount of bullets.
There was a huge outcry because the suspect had his wife and children in the car. Miraculously with all of the shots fired the guy was only wounded. Everyone started screaming about excessive force. I found myself in shock at that reaction. If every bullet that hit the car found its mark, it would have been tragic and the officers would have to live with it, but the man who decided to run and risk his family is the person who is to blame for the whole thing.
If I were the chief of police I would have fired every single cop that was involved, not for using excessive force, but for being such terrible shots.

Anyway, all I can say is that while there are bad people in authority in every walk of life, and I still hate when I see a police car in my rear view, I am glad that they are there doing what we as a civil society need them to do.

 

[crypto6]

Thanks Crypto. I think that you hit it right on the head.
As an ex punk, I am sort of surprised to hear myself being so defensive of the police, but having grown up, and having family in law enforcement has taught me a lot.
Having someone with issues and a lot of power and authority can be a bad mix, but I get upset when personal responsibility is not addressed. We had a situation here in St. Louis a few years ago where the police tried to pull someone over, and they ended up in a chase that concluded with the police shooting the car up with a shocking amount of bullets.
There was a huge outcry because the suspect had his wife and children in the car. Miraculously with all of the shots fired the guy was only wounded. Everyone started screaming about excessive force. I found myself in shock at that reaction. If every bullet that hit the car found its mark, it would have been tragic and the officers would have to live with it, but the man who decided to run and risk his family is the person who is to blame for the whole thing.
If I were the chief of police I would have fired every single cop that was involved, not for using excessive force, but for being such terrible shots.

Anyway, all I can say is that while there are bad people in authority in every walk of life, and I still hate when I see a police car in my rear view, I am glad that they are there doing what we as a civil society need them to do.

As an ex punk, I am sort of surprised to hear myself being so defensive of the police, but having grown up, and having family in law enforcement has taught me a lot

Me too. I figured I'd have to live at least two lifetimes to work out the teenage/early twenties angst.


Anyway, all I can say is that while there are bad people in authority in every walk of life

It can be constued as a compliment to the people themselves or as my respect for their positions, but I hold authority figures to a standard commensurate with their power. If they're going to accept the elevated respect then they should gladly shoulder the responsibility of being above reproach and earn that respect. And learn to eat the increased punishment that befalls if they lose that respect. I know rationally that there are bad people in positions of authority and maybe I should just let it go at that, but emotionally I want to make them pay extra for betraying us.

Crypto6

 

[OneLostGrl]

To this day I still have a hard time trusting in the police. They do not in any way make me feel "safe" nor do I feel many of them "protect and serve" the community. I have been let down too many times by several different officers and one sergent in more than one town including a state trooper in a major crimes unit.

This video does not surprise me- what surprises me is that there are not so many more of these types of videos being made public.

IMO!