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Thread: TX-Austin declares itself "Freedom City" will direct cops to avoid arrests for petty theft

  1. #1

    Exclamation TX-Austin declares itself "Freedom City" will direct cops to avoid arrests for petty theft

    I wish this would lead to more people becoming aware of just how useless cops are, but I fear it will do nothing but lead to a crime wave and even more cops after the backlash.


    'Freedom city'? Going beyond 'sanctuary,' Austin, Texas, vows to curtail arrests

    http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-...018-story.html

    By JAWEED KALEEM
    JUN 19, 2018 | 11:15 AM

    'Freedom city'? Going beyond 'sanctuary,' Austin, Texas, vows to curtail arrests

    Ever since the Texas legislature last year passed one of the country’s most aggressive “anti-sanctuary city” laws, some enclaves have fought officials over the extent to which police can ignore federal immigration law.

    The state regulation known as Senate Bill 4 has been described by opponents as the “show your papers” law for allowing officers to ask about the immigration status of anybody arrested or detained.

    Republican Gov. Greg Abbott signed the law in May 2017, and Austin was among the first cities to challenge it in federal court. The law is currently in effect while a case against it proceeds.

    The Trump administration, in the midst of legal battles against some states and cities for their sanctuary policies, has cheered Texas even as officers in cities such as Houston and Austin have rarely used the law to ask immigration questions. Some cities have indeed followed a part of the Texas law that calls for police to hold detainees believed to be in the country illegally.

    The White House has said dozens of sanctuary cities and counties in the country are breaking federal law for not fully cooperating with immigration authorities and has threatened to withhold public safety grants from them. The Texas governor has shared a similar argument, and echoed Atty. Gen. Jeff Sessions in his belief that sanctuary cities promote crime.

    Amid the controversy over sanctuary cities, Austin this month took its fight against strict immigration law enforcement a step further by declaring itself to be the first “freedom city” in Texas. City Council members unanimously passed two resolutions last week that will restrict police attempts to question immigrants about their status and curtail arrests for nonviolent crimes.

    One of the new city resolutions requires officers who question immigrants about status to also say that their questions about immigration need not be answered. The other resolution directs police to avoid arrests for misdemeanors, including those for smoking marijuana, having drug paraphernalia, and taking part in petty theft — crimes that city data shows frequently end in arrests of black and Latino residents.

    While Austin is among the country’s first so-called freedom cities, it’s part of a wider movement around decriminalizing low-level offenses and decreasing arrests. According to Local Progress, a national network of progressive city officials, some council members in El Paso and Dallas are also considering “freedom city” proposals.

    “Poor people of color in our city are over-punished and over-incarcerated,” said Greg Casar, an Austin City Councilman who pushed for the resolutions. “If people are being arrested less, we can also prevent people from being put in the deportation pipeline.”

    “We found that black and Latino residents comprised 75% of discretionary arrests for driving with licenses invalid in the city even though they are 45% of the population of the city,” Casar said. “Black residents are seven times more likely to be arrested for low-level marijuana violations despite having comparable rates of usage of marijuana to white residents.”

    Casar said the new rules could prevent up to 1,000 low-level arrests each year. Austin police arrest around 30,000 people a year.
    Austin’s new rules passed Friday after more than 100 residents spoke about them at a City Council meeting. While support was wide, groups differed on the need for the “freedom city” title, and what effect it will have.

    Ken Casady, the Austin Police Assn. president, said that although the police union supported reducing arrests, misleading data were cited to garner support for the resolutions.

    “We do arrest more blacks and Hispanics but the problem we have is that people do not want to look at the reasons why,” said Casady.
    He said he thought marijuana usage in public was higher among among black and Latino residents. That, he believed, leads to disproportionate arrests even if overall usage by white residents was comparable.

    “We will not tolerate being called racists,” Casady said. He added that officers do not regularly ask for immigration information when making arrests or writing tickets. “To us, this is a symbolic move,” he said of the freedom city vote.

    Nelson Linder, president of the Austin chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People, said the new moniker largely amounted to city branding.

    “We appreciate the gesture and the idea,” said Linder. “This city has a history of symbolic overtures, but has been inconsistent in providing the kind of leadership that will implement its own resolutions.”

    “While the vote has been applauded, the Austin NAACP will continue to work toward more meaningful and substantial changes,” he said.

    The group has focused on combating segregation and gentrification in the city, as well as boosting education and employment for African Americans in the city and Travis County. The region is still also recovering from a series of mail bombings this year that seemed to target black families. In March, a suspect in the bombings blew himself up as he was being chased by police.

    Many city activists celebrated the council’s decision.

    “These policies will protect the constitutional rights of immigrants and make sure that Austin is a safe place to live for everyone regardless of race or immigration status,” José Garza, director of the local nonprofit Workers Defense Project, said in a statement.

    Grassroots Leadership, an Austin nonprofit that pushed the initiative, said in a statement that the council’s move was an “important first step.”

    “This is a long-term struggle and we are in part one of what is actually a decathlon,” said Rebecca Sanchez, a representative of Grassroots Leadership.

    “We’re committed to fighting for a city where we redefine safety for ourselves and not through badges, and where we determine how our communities thrive.”
    Another mark of a tyrant is that he likes foreigners better than citizens, and lives with them and invites them to his table; for the one are enemies, but the Others enter into no rivalry with him. - Aristotle's Politics Book 5 Part 11



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  3. #2
    Pretty much just a high rent $#@!hole over ran with dirty hippies .
    Do something Danke

  4. #3
    It gets expensive when places are made up of large percentages of people who do not contribute anything .
    Do something Danke

  5. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by oyarde View Post
    It gets expensive when places are made up of large percentages of people who do not contribute anything .
    Well, that is sure to happen if they keep going to prison for relatively minor infractions. Maybe they're trying to find another way.

  6. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by VIDEODROME View Post
    Well, that is sure to happen if they keep going to prison for relatively minor infractions. Maybe they're trying to find another way.
    I think they should issue letters, with apologetic undertones. "I'm sorry, but you really must stop stealing stuff", should do the trick.
    Quote Originally Posted by timosman View Post
    This is getting silly.
    Quote Originally Posted by Swordsmyth View Post
    It started silly.
    T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men

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    I part ways with "libertarianism" when it transitions from ideology grounded in logic into self-defeating autism for the sake of ideological purity.

  7. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by nobody's_hero View Post
    I think they should issue letters, with apologetic undertones. "I'm sorry, but you really must stop stealing stuff", should do the trick.

    Or pay them monthly...
    Pfizer Macht Frei!

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  8. #7
    Imagine having $400 of property stolen from you but the criminal isn't arrested because MUH RACISM!

  9. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Danke View Post
    Or pay them monthly...
    We already do.



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  11. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by spudea View Post
    Imagine having $400 of property stolen from you but the criminal isn't arrested because MUH RACISM!
    The only way you had $400 is because you oppressed a person of color to get it, white devil.

  12. #10
    San Francisco has already tried this. The result is a massive increase in crime "under the limit". Criminals even track how much they steal to make sure they stay under the limit for prosecution.
    "Foreign aid is taking money from the poor people of a rich country, and giving it to the rich people of a poor country." - Ron Paul
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  13. #11
    Without rule of law, there is just anarchy.

    May God have mercy on their souls.
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  14. #12
    Common Sense Crime Fix Killed by State Legislators

    If you had any doubts that many elected state leadership in Sacramento could care less about victims and adamantly oppose even the most common sense solutions to crime, proof was again provided via SB 916 which died in the Senate Appropriations Committee.

    This bill was proposed by San Francisco area Senator Scott Weiner to help address the car burglary problem plaguing that city. The problem is horrendous: in 2017 there were 31,122 car burglaries reported in San Francisco, a crime rate that was at least four times higher than in Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose, or Sacramento.
    "Foreign aid is taking money from the poor people of a rich country, and giving it to the rich people of a poor country." - Ron Paul
    "Beware the Military-Industrial-Financial-Pharma-Corporate-Internet-Media-Government Complex." - B4L update of General Dwight D. Eisenhower
    "Debt is the drug, Wall St. Banksters are the dealers, and politicians are the addicts." - B4L
    "Totally free immigration? I've never taken that position. I believe in national sovereignty." - Ron Paul

    Proponent of real science.
    The views and opinions expressed here are solely my own, and do not represent this forum or any other entities or persons.

  15. #13
    So unless you can afford a bike that retains at least a $400 plus valuation even after you start using it , people are now allowed to steal your bike at will within the city limits. Way to look out for the little guy who can't afford a car. Bike crime is a huge problem even in cities where it is against the law.

  16. #14
    At some point marshal law will be required to seize control of the cities and lock up the criminals and their enablers.
    Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

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  17. #15
    Quote Originally Posted by Anti Federalist View Post
    The group has focused on combating segregation and gentrification
    Well, which one?
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  18. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by nobody's_hero View Post
    I think they should issue letters, with apologetic undertones. "I'm sorry, but you really must stop stealing stuff", should do the trick.
    Dumb idea. They need "theft free zone" signs.
    Amash>Trump

    ΟΥ ΓΑΡ ЄCΤΙΝ ЄξΟΥCΙΑ ЄΙ ΜΗ ΥΠΟ ΘЄΟΥ

    "Patriotism should come from loving thy neighbor, not from worshiping graven images" - Ironman77

    "ideas have the potential of being more powerful than any army....The concept of personal sovereignty was pulled screaming from the ether into this reality by the force of men believing in a self evident truth, that men are meant to be free." - The Northbreather

    "Trump is the security blanket of aggrieved white men aged 18-60." - Pinoy



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  20. #17

  21. #18
    The problem is , yes while they do not belong in jail , they belong at work earning money to buy things ..... the avg person has no idea how really unlikely that is to happen . Avg rent in a $#@!hole like that is 1300.00 per month You can take it to the bank they are living off someone else while they steal your $#@! . Ya , no thanks .
    Do something Danke

  22. #19
    More self responsibility, more guns, more ARMED SIGNS in homes and stores.
    THE SQUAD of RPF
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    @Ehanced_Deficit's real agenda on RPF =troll:

    Who spends this much time copy/pasting the same recycled links, photos/talking points.

    7 yrs/25k posts later RPF'ers still respond to this troll

  23. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by eleganz View Post
    More self responsibility, more guns, more ARMED SIGNS in homes and stores.
    More prosecutions of those who defend themselves and their property.
    Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

    Robert Heinlein

    Give a man an inch and right away he thinks he's a ruler

    Groucho Marx

    I love mankind…it’s people I can’t stand.

    Linus, from the Peanuts comic

    You cannot have liberty without morality and morality without faith

    Alexis de Torqueville

    Those who fail to learn from the past are condemned to repeat it.
    Those who learn from the past are condemned to watch everybody else repeat it

    A Zero Hedge comment

  24. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by The Rebel Poet View Post
    Dumb idea. They need "theft free zone" signs.
    Won't work. Someone might steal the sign.
    Quote Originally Posted by timosman View Post
    This is getting silly.
    Quote Originally Posted by Swordsmyth View Post
    It started silly.
    T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men

    "One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors." - Plato

    We Are Running Out of Time - Mini Me

    Quote Originally Posted by Philhelm
    I part ways with "libertarianism" when it transitions from ideology grounded in logic into self-defeating autism for the sake of ideological purity.

  25. #22
    It's all doublespeak, Winston.
    “The spirits of darkness are now among us. We have to be on guard so that we may realize what is happening when we encounter them and gain a real idea of where they are to be found. The most dangerous thing you can do in the immediate future will be to give yourself up unconsciously to the influences which are definitely present.” ~ Rudolf Steiner

  26. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by Brian4Liberty View Post
    San Francisco has already tried this. The result is a massive increase in crime "under the limit". Criminals even track how much they steal to make sure they stay under the limit for prosecution.
    They are just learning....

  27. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by Brian4Liberty View Post
    San Francisco has already tried this. The result is a massive increase in crime "under the limit". Criminals even track how much they steal to make sure they stay under the limit for prosecution.
    Talk about underground funding.

    All those people trying to wash your windshield at stoplights in Austin will be trading in their clothes.
    FJB



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  29. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by nobody's_hero View Post
    I think they should issue letters, with apologetic undertones. "I'm sorry, but you really must stop stealing stuff", should do the trick.
    ...Or strongly painted pictures, because those always work!



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