Page 2 - ARUBA TODAY

A2 UP FRONT
Thursday 6 June 2019

investigating tion status.'" ment" assignments while
Continued from Front Police departments often the department probes
In St. Louis, a police official have social media policies Facebook posts she called
shared a meme asserting that limit what officers may "embarrassing and disturb-
that "if the Confederate say online, and most of the ing." The database includ-
flag is racist, then so is Black departments included in ed nearly 180 posts tied to
History Month." the Plain View database current Phoenix police of-
"Obviously, some of the said this week they are ficers that disparage Mus-
posts are very disturbing," launching investigations lims, black people, trans-
said Emily Baker-White, a into their officers' Facebook gender people and other
lawyer who launched the feeds. St. Louis began an groups.
Plain View Project in 2017. internal affairs probe, and "They completely contra-
The work, she said, re- announced that officers will dict how the Phoenix Police
vealed a troubling online undergo sensitivity training, Department should speak
subculture that threatens after researchers flagged about the members of our
to undermine public confi- 166 posts by active-duty community or others," Wil- in this sept. 19, 2017 file photo st. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson
dence in law enforcement. police. The city prosecu- liams said in a statement. holds a news conference at city hall in st. Louis.
"It gets in the way of offi- tor's office said Wednesday York, a small city in south- associated Press
cers' ability to protect ev- it has launched a separate central Pennsylvania, is
erybody out there," she review. likewise investigating its of- The database includes a stuff is out there?" she said.
said. "My biggest fear is "These posts are disturb- ficers' posts, and the police 2014 Facebook post pur- Funded by Injustice Watch,
that there are people who ing and unacceptable," department will "take disci- portedly by Galen Det- a not-for-profit journal-
are seeing these posts on- Mayor Lyda Krewson said plinary action if any is war- weiler, a York officer who ism organization, Baker-
line, who are interacting in a statement. "We expect ranted," said Officer Derek worked for Baltimore po- White and her team pored
with these officers, who professionalism out of every Hartman, a police spokes- lice at the time. "Bucket through the Facebook ac-
think, 'The police might not city employee. No excep- man. York's social media list: Punch a guy so hard counts of more than 2,800
be there for me because I tions." policy prohibits online con- he poops himself," the post current officers and nearly
pray differently than they In Phoenix, Police Chief Jeri duct that "negatively im- said. The comment had a 700 former officers.
do, or I look differently, or Williams has moved some pacts" the police depart- checkmark next to it. They wound up flagging
I have a different immigra- officers to "non-enforce- ment and residents. Three years later, Detwei- posts by 556 of the current
ler was caught on video officers — about one in 5
repeatedly punching a fe- of those studied — and 299
male suspect in the face former officers. The data-
during a struggle outside a base includes more than
York bar. 5,000 posts, as well as com-
The woman's attorney, Le- ments on the posts. The re-
ticia Chavez-Freed, said sults were jointly published
Wednesday she plans to on Saturday by Injustice
use his 2014 post as an ex- Watch and BuzzFeed News.
hibit in a federal lawsuit al- The Lake County, Flori-
leging he used excessive da, Sheriff's Office said
force. Wednesday it is review-
"You just see how embed- ing posts by 16 deputies.
ded this culture is of pun- Though department policy
ishing instead of policing, bars employees from post-
a lack of compassion for ing material that is "unethi-
people who may not look cal, slanderous, derogatory
like you, and frankly a love ... or that tends to com-
of violence," she said. promise the integrity of the
York police declined to member," spokesman John
make Detweiler available Herrell said employees are
for comment. given a "great deal more
Baker-White, a former fed- latitude" if they don't iden-
eral public defender in tify themselves as members
Philadelphia, got the idea of the law enforcement
for Plain View after she was agency.
assigned to a police bru- And in Denison, Texas, City
tality case and found an Manager Judson Rex said
inflammatory social media that the city 80 miles (130
post by one of the officers kilometers) north of Dallas
involved. "does not condone racism
"That made me ask the or hate of any kind, on or
question, how prevalent is off the job" and will disci-
this stuff? How much of this pline officers "if needed."q