By Carlos Miller
At the time, Erie Police officer James Cousins didn’t care who heard him mocking a murder victim and his grief-stricken mother.
The 40-year-old off-duty officer was loud and animated and most likely drunk as he also described how he punched and tasered a suspect.
And his drinking buddies, who might have been cops, could not get enough of his antic-filled, but profanity-laced monologue as they laughed in hysterics.
But just behind the group, in plain view of Cousins, sat a man who didn’t find it so funny.
Unknowingly to Cousins, Jeremy Orr was videotaping the monologue on his cell phone. He then uploaded the video to Youtube before departing back to Australia where he lives with his wife.
The video has since prompted police to suspend Cousins while an investigation takes place.
It has also prompted police to try and intimidate Orr’s family into convincing him to remove the video by threatening him with wiretapping charges.
Fortunately, Erie County District Attorney Brad Foulk has a little more legal sense than the Erie Police Department. According to the Erie Times-News:
“That is absolutely preposterous. I would never consider charging this person with a wiretap violation,” Foulk said Thursday. “The thought of charging the person who took the video for a wiretap violation is the furthest thing from my mind.”
If recent history is any indicator, wiretapping charges against people who film cops never go anywhere.
Last month, Palm Beach County prosecutors dropped all charges against Tasha Ford after police arrested her for felony wiretapping charges after she filmed them against their wishes.
And in recent years, at least three people who had been slapped with felony wiretapping charges after filming police against their wishes, had their cases thrown out of court, including one in Pennsylvania.
Although Pennsylvania is one of those states that require all persons to consent to having their conversation recorded, the law does not offer protection for people who do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy, as in this case.
But the actual law has never prevented cops from using intimidation tactics and false threats against people.
Orr’s brother told the Erie Times-News on Thursday that DeDionisio and Cousins visited him Tuesday at a construction site in Erie where he was working. He said DeDionisio told him the video could involve a federal wiretapping violation.
Cousins, near tears, implored him to take down the video because it could cost Cousins his job, the brother said. Cousins was in uniform and drove DeDionisio to the site in a marked squad car, he said.
Police have also asked Youtube to remove the video but they refused.
Orr said he posted the video because Cousin confirmed what he always suspected about some police officers.
“Good police officers have a really difficult job. What they’re entrusted to do is a tremendous burden,” he said. “But sometimes, with some officers, it’s really eroded into this ‘We’ll handle this how we want, and you will do what we say, and if you get in our way, we’ll roll over you.’ That’s what this guy felt like to me.”
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25 responses so far ↓
1 Voice of Reason // Apr 19, 2009 at 10:03 PM
Note to Carlos Miller: I’m familiar with some of the stories that your posting connects to. For example, the Michael Gannon case struck me as important at the time. I’d like to reiterate a related point that I’ve made elsewhere. If you personally are in for a dime, you might as well be in for a dollar. You should consider hosting video clips in cases where YouTube or other corporate sites might try to remove the clips or prevent their redistribution. In other words, you should be part of the Streisand Effect.
If you wait, in each case, until after the initial rush that follows the release of noteworthy video clips, I don’t believe that this will drive your hosting expenses up by much. Additionally, it’ll won’t increase the chances of a raid, though it will increase the chances of other steps that I’ve mentioned to you previously.
Finally, and this point is important, if you host video clips on your site, it’ll be much easier for people to download the video clips and to redistribute them. I don’t have any difficulty downloading YouTube video clips myself, but in the near future, it may not be possible for ordinary users to do this. If you host some of the clips, right-click and save should do the job.
2 Voice of Reason // Apr 19, 2009 at 10:25 PM
Note to Carlos Miller: On a separate note, I visited the Conservative Cave today out of curiosity. After all, your front page links to the site.
My reaction, after looking at the little creatures that scurry about the floor of the Conservative Cave, is that you’re to be commended for running the kind of site that tolerates opposing viewpoints. My points elsewhere regarding off-topic discussions don’t contradict this statement. That’s a separate issue.
The Conservative Cave people are the kind of people that I grew up with. It was difficult. These are the sub-Bonobos that I’ve referred to elsewhere, the animals, the automatons whose neurological makeup doesn’t permit compassion or tolerate dissent.
With luck, your site will continue to attract people on both “sides” who can rise above that kind of thing. That’s important. If you’re ever discouraged, remember that you’re serving a useful purpose and that you might eventually make a difference.
3 genewitch // Apr 19, 2009 at 10:57 PM
“Cousins, near tears, implored him to take down the video because it could cost Cousins his job, the brother said.”
That’s a sad story.
4 Voice of Reason // Apr 19, 2009 at 11:54 PM
Note to “genewitch”: For some reason, postings have stopped working for me on the previous thread. Possibly an anti-spam issue. Therefore, I’ll attempt to respond to you here.
I didn’t mean to imply that your post was redundant. In fact, I didn’t assume that you’d read my post. I’ve only seen a bit of evidence which supports the notion that people are reading my posts at all. I was expressing the opinion that you were being too polite. I do believe that the people in question are cowards. It is my personal feeling that they’re useless and that they serve no purpose. Look at what Nancy Pelosi said in 2007: We have many arrows in our quiver, and we are sharpening them. Rubbish. What did they ever do? However, when I addressed you, I should have worded things differently.
You’d have been entirely correct to post your thoughts whether or not you’d read my post at all. In fact, you made some points that I hadn’t addressed, though you might have missed what Mr. Kervic was trying to say.
Thanks for your response. I appreciated it.
5 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:00 AM
Note to Carlos Miller: WordPress says, Duplicate comment detected; it looks as though you’ve already said that! Looks as though something I’ve tried to post repeatedly is caught in the spam trap. Feel free to delete redundant versions of the message. However, I’d appreciate it if at least one of the copies that I’ve just attempted to leave for “genewitch” could be permitted to get through.
6 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:02 AM
Disregard this message.
7 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:06 AM
Disregard this message.
8 Carlos Miller // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:08 AM
VoR,
I just went into the spam folder and approved several comments from you and others.
I have it set where it is supposed to allow comments with two links but it still holds them, so I don’t know.
I’ve been a little busy this weekend so I haven’t been able to keep up with the comments caught by spam.
9 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:21 AM
Note to Carlos Miller: You said, I’ve been a little busy this weekend so I haven’t been able to keep up with the comments caught by spam.
Yes, of course. It’s generous of you to maintain this kind of system at all. If you ended up approving duplicate postings by me, feel free to delete the redundant copies.
10 the lone white boy // Apr 20, 2009 at 2:47 AM
cool beans! my tip got posted.
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VOR… when something like this hits youtube…. its snatched up by others. Who download it & use it in their own websites or post it to forums. Things like this tend to spread like a wildfire across the net. Across forums, blogs and then onto the mainstream media websites (I saw it on cnn’s website yesterday morning).
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Kudos to DA foulk for speaking out about how ridiculous it is to use FED wiretapping charges in this incident.
Sad that cops feel the need to use intimidation to protect one of their own (when they screw up)
11 Bad Apple // Apr 20, 2009 at 12:17 PM
There are no good cops.
Modern policing is the Lucifer Principle in practice.
Yes, good people become cops.
Yes, there may be a few good cops, especially in a lucky few small towns/rural areas where they still know their place as “peace officers” instead of “law enFORCEment officers.
It is inevitable that bullies and thugs become cops, and find an natural outlet for their thuggish behavior.
It is inevitable that good people who becomes cops turn bad because of the Lucifer Principle.
It’s not that there are “bad apples” its that the apple barrel is damp and moldy and there is no way a “good apple” can preserve its good character.
http://www.lucifereffect.org/about_reviews_chronicle.htm
12 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 3:25 PM
Note to Bad Apple: I was pleased and amused to see the words The Lucifer Principle near the start of your posting. However, I gather that you were actually referring to the Lucifer Effect there, as opposed to the Lucifer Principle.
The Lucifer Principle is a book by Howard Bloom. I recommend the book to anybody who’d like to understand exactly how the world works. However, you should be warned that the book isn’t completely correct. The author (Bloom) goes too far in places, but he talks frankly about unsettling truths that should receive greater attention.
The Lucifer Effect is actually part of the Lucifer Principle. As I understand it, The Lucifer Effect is essentially a test of the hypothesis that evil is a natural consequence of the Lucifer Principle.
13 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 5:25 PM
Note to “the lone white boy”: You said, when something like this hits youtube…. it’s snatched up by others. Who download it and use it in their own websites or post it to forums.
You’re correct. However, first of all, many websites and forums don’t download video clips. They simply embed the original YouTube content, which can (and sometimes does) disappear without notice.
Secondly, in the near future, it may be more difficult for third parties to “download it and use it”. YouTube isn’t there to fight for the First Amendment. It’s certainly not a charity. Google is trying to reposition YouTube as a money-making division. Related changes are likely to complicate downloads. In fact, they’ve already started to block third-party sites that facilitate this.
Websites and forums need to plan ahead to ensure that their video content isn’t going to exist solely at the whims of major corporations and other powerful entities.
If you read my postings about S.773, you’ll understand that this might be especially important after certain changes take place.
14 Grey BlackorWhite // Apr 20, 2009 at 10:55 PM
Jeremy is an Ass!!
He meets a guy in a bar, pretends to be his new friend, a guy who has had a difficult day at work (how would you deal with a dead body), who is just using black humour to cope with the situation. The officer is probably a typical male that won’t use councilling services available at his work to debrief about the emotionally challenging situations he comes across.
Jeremy the ass, posts his emotional unloading up on youtube!!
A good cop, who will probably lose his job, then his family along with his self respect….
While Jeremy the ass gets his 15 minutes of fame.
You should learn a big lesson from this situation. Keep your mouth shut!! Don’t mouth off about your boss with your work mates, they may tape you and send it around to everyone in an email ending up in your bosses inbox. He won’t sack you, but you won’t get that nice raise or the interesting opportunites.
We all have to unload the stresses of our daily lives and none of us looks like a saint when we do it.
Hopefully this sort of invasion of privacy will be outlawed and we can all go back to being human. Because lets face it, we all have a nasty side we let out now and then and we don’t want this shown to our firends, family, workmates, the world….
Hope you are happy Jeremy for ruining a mans life.
15 Carlos Miller // Apr 20, 2009 at 11:09 PM
VoR,
Me and those guys at Conservative Cave go back a long time.
I used to post on a site called Democratic Underground. Those guys would post on a site called Conservative Underground.
DU has a policy of banning people who are conservative.
One time when I was debating one of these people, they ended up getting banned from DU.
So they went back on CU and started taunting me from their site, daring me to join their site to continue the debate.
They promised they wouldn’t ban me.
I joined their site and took on several of them at the same time.
They ended up banning me in less than an hour because I was just tearing them apart.
That was in 2006. Ever since then, they’ve had an issue with me.
Now the only way they can deal with me is by insulting me because they are unable to hold a substantial debate of any kind.
They come on this site occasionally and insult me. And when I delete their comments, they brag about what a hypocrite I am for not allowing free speech.
But they’re welcome to post here if they can hold an intellectual debate.
I’m just not going to lower the intellect standards of this site for them.
But I have no problem with their “free speech” on their own site, which is why I link to it.
It’s ironic because they come on here and call this a second-rate blog, but if you look at traffic statistics, my blog is much more popular than their site.
And I’m just one guy.
I dedicated this post to them last year.
http://carlosmiller.com/2008/06/19/neocon-repugs-salute-state-while-trampling-constitution/
16 Voice of Reason // Apr 20, 2009 at 11:49 PM
Note to Carlos Miller: You said, look at traffic statistics, my blog is much more popular than their site.
It’s possible that you’re doing something right.
WRT the old posting about the Conservative Cave, the phrase “Kool-Aid” is overused these days, but sometimes it does seem to apply. Additionally, it’s good that your father was a fiscally conservative republican who was socially liberal. The possibility of common ground existed. FYI I was born and raised completely inside the Conservative Cave. I’m familiar with all the nooks and crannies. It was dark and unpleasant in there. There was no fun at all. Everything was a sin. However, if you went outside, the “secular humanists” would get you. They were lying in wait, hoping to catch you and burn your Bible. That was bad. I’d earned my Bible. They’d push their dinosaurs and other made-up liberal nonsense at you. If you wanted to be safe, you were supposed to stay inside the cave.
17 Voice of Reason // Apr 21, 2009 at 1:20 AM
Note to Grey BlackorWhite: First, I like your handle. I’d like to see more postings by somebody who uses that name. Second, you talked about an officer who was just using black humour to cope with the situation.
If you’re still out there, this is an important issue. You should talk about it further. No sarcasm is intended. However, understand that personally, I’d be pleased if the officer who joked about the murder of Tyisha Miller were to be harmed (the link is here). The police shot a sleeping girl to death. She was black. Her relatives came and cried over her corpse. They were black. So an officer said (over the radio, if I remember correctly), “It’s like Gorillas in the Mist here”. I don’t believe that it’s at all unreasonable for me to feel this way. It’s been a decade or longer, but my feelings haven’t changed.
Some people outside the profession are going to see insensitivity of the type demonstrated in the Tyisha Miller case and other cases as evidence that the moral sense of the officers involved has deteriorated to the point where they can no longer be thought of, or should be thought of, as human.
Obviously, you view this kind of thing differently. You should address the issue from a broader perspective, because it happens all the time. If the victim is Asian, the police will make Kung Fu jokes, and so on. There’s plenty of jokes about other races, physical characteristics, and so on. In my opinion, this kind of thing not only affects but utterly destroys sympathy for the LEO point of view.
18 Little Lebowski Urban Achiever // Apr 22, 2009 at 2:08 PM
Bad Apple makes a good point about the Lucifer Principle (and thanks for the book recommendation by the way, it’s currently on the way from Amazon).
I’ve always been a very laid back, extremely liberal and docile fella. At 6’6 and 300+ pounds, perhaps a gentle giant. Hell, I haven’t even been in an actual fight since elementary school.
I was employed for approximately two years as a correctional officer for the state of WV. In that short time period several people (mainly my wife) noticed a huge change in my personality and behavior.
In a mere 6 months I’d become an aggressive, assertive, well…um…asshole.
While not a valid defense, it was a high stress job, compounded by a shortage of staff and an overcrowding of inmates. At times we were 75-100 inmates above capacity and 10-15 officers short of full staff. Constant pressure from duties as well as administration would cause frequent (the frequency is almost shocking) abuses of power.
Without going into too much detail (I could write for days about all the fucked up stuff happening in that jail), the moral of the story is this:
It’s much easier than people realize to get sucked into a power-trip, us vs. them mentality.
It’s stunning how quickly a little bit of power can corrupt a person, and a lot of times (as in my case) the one being corrupted doesn’t realize it’s happening.
I look back on those days now, objectively, and am pretty ashamed of myself, but it can and does happen very easily.
Good people do go into law enforcement but they rarely remain that way for long.
And for the record, I’ve now been away from that hell hole for 4+ years and am back to my lovable old self.
19 Little Lebowski Urban Achiever // Apr 22, 2009 at 2:51 PM
A little follow up to my previous post:
First, I was trying to keep the post a reasonable size so I edited out certain portions of my original text and apologize if it is not exactly coherent.
Second, in no way was I trying to justify the behavior of myself, my fellow officers, or law enforcement personnel in general. If someone crosses the line, they should be reprimanded, period.
Finally, I was going to mention the Stanford prison experiment in my initial post as a way to reference how easy it is to lose perspective. I was reading a summary of The Lucifer Effect on Amazon and saw the author is actually the same guy who orchestrated the SPE, and had this to say:
“His troubling finding is that almost anyone, given the right “situational” influences, can be made to abandon moral scruples and cooperate in violence and oppression.”
Much more clear and succinct than my rambling…
20 Carlos Miller // Apr 22, 2009 at 3:00 PM
LLUA,
I think you make a good point about it being easy to fall into that trap of an “asshole cop.”
Humans do have a pack dog mentality.
That is why it is important to ensure proper leadership. It all starts from the top.
21 Voice of Reason // Apr 22, 2009 at 3:24 PM
Note to Little Lebowski Urban Achiever: You said, Bad Apple makes a good point about the Lucifer Principle (and thanks for the book recommendation by the way, it’s currently on the way from Amazon).
I gather that you actually ordered The Lucifer Effect, as opposed to The Lucifer Principle. There’s some ambiguity, because both Big Apple and you have mentioned both books.
For some remarks related to The Lucifer Principle, see post 12 on this thread. You might find it interesting to read the two books together.
22 Voice of Reason // Apr 22, 2009 at 3:32 PM
Note to Carlos Miller: You said, Humans do have a pack dog mentality.
This is consistent with things that I’ve said to you previously. You may, or may not, have meant this point literally. However, it’s a simple fact. It’s the most important factor in human interactions.
23 Voice of Reason // Apr 22, 2009 at 3:42 PM
Note to Little Lebowski Urban Achiever: You said, His troubling finding is that almost anyone, given the right “situational” influences, can be made to abandon moral scruples and cooperate in violence and oppression.
If you’re not already familiar with an experiment known as The Third Wave, you might find it of interest. The link is here.
24 Little Lebowski Urban Achiever // Apr 22, 2009 at 4:05 PM
Voice of Reason: I actually ordered both books from Amazon.
I also wasn’t aware of The Third Wave experiment. That was pretty interesting.
25 Voice of Reason // Apr 22, 2009 at 5:05 PM
Note to Little Lebowski Urban Achiever: Thanks for responding. Regarding The Lucifer Principle by Bloom (as opposed to The Lucifer Effect by Zimbardo, which I haven’t read), the first book is controversial and shouldn’t be taken as hard science, but it’s fascinating in places.
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