Police Violence and a conversation with the Police Department

As I mentioned in anther comment, here are some also true anecdotes about the BPD:

  • A friend of mine and I left the bar at last call. A ways down the street - we were walking home - he realized he needed to go to the bathroom but not one bar would let him in. He ducked in an alley to take a leak, when a DPB cruiser pulled up. The spotted him and gave him a public urination ticket, for which he had to take time off from work to go to court and plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge - because there was nowhere to use the restroom.

  • A friend of mine had his car broken into. He realized this as he was driving and pulled over into a nearby school parking lot to call the police. When the police arrived, they asked him if he had been vandalizing the school, much to his astonishment. He explained the situation and the DPB said there is nothing they can do and he will need to go to the police station the next day to report the crime. When he went to the police station they said there was no way they would catch the person who broke into his car and stole a bunch of stuff, but he could file a report if he wanted to.

  • Another friend of mine was pulled over because he allegedly "took a turn too fast" on a residential street. The BPD said they'd like to search his car because there was a report of a Mexican, in the same car, driving recklessly around Boulder. My friend was not Mexican, and had just left the house to go to 711.

  • An acquaintance of mine, back in college, got in an altercation at a party, and wound up punching someone in the face as self defense, after which the altercation ended and he went home to sleep. Turns out the other person was stoned - he was a drug dealer also - and called the police to report my acquaintance. The BPD went to the drug dealer's house, who was illegally - at the time - growing marijuana at his house, asked him if he wanted to press charges and after he said no, the BPD then went to my acquaintance's house and woke him up at 4am to question him about the incident, even though no charges were filed.

These are just four of many examples, I don't really care to write the rest out.

/r/boulder Thread Parent