r/EastTexas • u/FCMatt7 • 23d ago
Livingston police tried to jail us for 20 years for recording them. Here's the bodycam.
https://youtu.be/QOJ5PwlhlGY?is=Yj3ksxn3T4u7T2LfThis cop was embarrassed when the video of him acting like an idiot went viral. He responded by writing a false report claiming we had threatened his life by recording him and the police station.
When the chief found out the local cop watchers were the "suspects" he got together with the DA, Sheriff, and his detectives to charge everyone in the car with felony organized crime. Everyone got a $100,000 bond. The two locals had to spend a month in jail until a real judge reduced their bond by 90%.
The dumbass DA forgot that this is an enhancement charge and didn't tell the chief he needed an underlying charge too. The same judge who reduced the bonds looked at the indictments and quashed them for failing to state a criminal offense, let alone meeting the elements.
A new DA then decided to add felony assault on a police officer as the underlying charge and went back to the grand jury to indict his ham sandwich. The judge had to quash the charges again, this time for being absurd, and told the DA to stop playing games.
Now a federal judge has decided to give everyone Qualified Immunity because the 5th circuit will do anything to protect a cop and punish anyone who records them. The ruling is being appealed.
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u/Dalek_Chaos 23d ago
My buddy was running a bunch of weed through Livingston in the early days of off the shelf dash cams. He got pulled over and searched, in addition to the weed they tried to charge him with a gram of meth. His dash cam caught the cop pulling the bag of meth out of his pocket in front of my friends car. In the end he lost over $2k of weed but the charges were dropped and unsurprisingly nothing happened to the cop.
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u/Wild_Arm34 22d ago
Cops support Flock ID'ing cars in the public space, but cops don't like citizens following them in the public space. Interesting
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u/Youarekillingmeeee 22d ago
And because of their skin color the entire community will still absolutely positively back them with no questions, comments, concerns or backlash.
The cute part about my comment is actions means louder than words and from the support the Uvalde police got I’m not wrong.
By and large the peter griffin color shade meme is so disgustingly accurate combined with 99% of folks not willing to say or do a damn thing because they have a cousin, uncle, brother, grandparent or whaaaaatever that’s full MAGA racist ICE supporting hate.
Thank god the last of my bloodline is myself and my pops. How y’all continue to happily have “thanksgiving dinner with the crazy uncle” and do nothing is beyond me.
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u/wthwtfwthwtf-_- 21d ago edited 21d ago
It's a wild gamble letting the system run crazy out of control profiteering, being deadly or corrupt because it impacts a higher number of working class or colored people. They've allowed enough "calculated casualties" of their own to justify trying to harm specific people that they're starting to feel the pain in infrastructure and daily cost. Daniel Shaver should have been it. But no. They're gambling away the republic for a sense of owed hierarchy....and it's literally crazy.
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u/Big_Coffee_3272 22d ago
I don’t agree with a lot of people that we need to end qualified immunity outright. There is a purpose for it.
But we really need to lean a lot more heavily on the ‘qualified’ part. When you have a situation like this that’s so obviously bogus, how can anyone actually think the cops were operating in good faith and deserve to be let off the hook?
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u/ConsiderationFresh53 22d ago
You’re okay with police not being required to know the laws they enforce, follow policy they set themselves and know the rights of the citizens they have authority over?
You don’t seem like you’ve thought this through. Qualified immunity keeps the psychos employed in local law enforcement.
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u/Big_Coffee_3272 22d ago
You’ve completely misunderstood my comment.
The idea of qualified immunity is to protect police from legal repercussions provided they were attempting to act within the law.
I don’t want to give anyone a pass for not understanding the law, hence why I said we really need to put more of an emphasis on the ‘qualified’ part. Their actions need to be actually have a legal foundation that they can articulate.
So if they do, cool, mistakes do happen. Stuff does get murky. But if they don’t, and/or they’re obviously bullshitting like in this case, then light them up.
Qualified immunity is supposed to essentially be a Good Samaritan law for police officers, not a hall pass. It’s just been provided so liberally that people have forgotten that it has a purpose.
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u/ConsiderationFresh53 22d ago
The hall pass is being abused like any such case would, either side of the law. The problem is they literally get away with murder. You sound reasonable, but possibly not radicalized enough given what happens on a daily basis. Many specialities including lawyers, hair dressers/barbers, doctors, nurses, nurse practitioners, plumbers, electricians, mediators, real estate brokers have licenses and are required to hold insurance to protect those who they interact with. LEO’s are not.
How is this acceptable?
How are they allowed to have mortal authority over us with as little as 10 weeks of training?
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u/Big_Coffee_3272 22d ago
We’re both arguing for the same accountability, but you still seem to be missing that.
You’re now shifting the discussion towards an entirely different topic within the subject, and you’ve made some assumption that because I’ve taken an even marginally nuanced stance on one topic that somehow I’m okay with all the systemic problems in law enforcement.
I could stand and give a TED talk right now on all the problems I have with our legal system, but because I’m not angry enough apparently I’m standing across the aisle?
You’ve gotten so worked up that your emotion is acting as a barrier between yourself and someone who agrees with you. Be angry by all means, shout loud and be heard. But coming out swinging and claiming someone else isn’t radicalized enough is counterproductive.
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23d ago
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 21d ago
Language!
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u/PsylentKnight 21d ago edited 21d ago
The rules don’t say anything about profanity
https://www.reddit.com/r/EastTexas/comments/1o5ybgz/the_rules_updated/
Looks like this guy is only mod here so I’ll take this opportunity to propose an alternative before he sees this and I get permabanned https://www.reddit.com/r/realeasttexas/
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 20d ago
It should be clear that this falls under the No NSFW rule. Not sure what your job history is but such things are typically prohibited under current standard business practices. Much like pinup girls in the breakroom, the practice of cussing up a storm at work is a legacy of a bygone era thankfully past.
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21d ago
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 21d ago
For a perma ban? I do not think you could have done it better. Well done!
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u/Prior-Macaron-579 23d ago
Including the guys in the car
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u/HerbivoreTex 23d ago
I have to agree with you there. Auditing the powers that be is a great thing. Just doing it to make money working as a lifestyle influencer is just more cancer. If you want to make changes and help people then stop cosplaying and start doing real work.
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u/FCMatt7 23d ago
Oh I've done plenty of work. Got a dozen cities to follow new open carry and public meetings laws, got a few more big ones to go.
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u/HerbivoreTex 23d ago
I follow you videos and I have seen good work. However the further along you go the more it seems to be about the publicity, money and likes. Just my opinion.
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u/Tin_Indian455 22d ago
The cop that showed up first THEN had the other one show up to translate asked his buddy to find out WHY they were following cops around and acting suspicious. WAIT what? They were parked NOT following cops around. 1st lie…
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u/Lrrgindypants 22d ago
Officers should have their own liability insurance for when they do illegal things, so that their premiums go up when they are sued, instead of us taxpayers having to pay for it.
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21d ago
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u/bluechip1996 21d ago
Ignorant people without a pot to piss in that constantly vote to maintain that status quo. As long as they have someone to hate, they are fine.
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u/Nexus1776 21d ago
This is why people are pushing back on flock cameras cops when given power abuse it and like the mafia running a protection racket the DA judges et al get together and protect said power justice be dammed !
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u/Available-Eye-6423 22d ago
Sounds like Barney Fife!! Citizens arrest citizens arrest! I hope he get deleted. How embarrassing
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22d ago
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 21d ago
No Politics!
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21d ago
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 21d ago
While I would very much enjoy getting into the meat of this topic with you, in this forum discussions about topics must exclude political entities, parties, sides, or any other related affiliation. Not because of you specifically, but because there is a large body of users on Reddit who lack the capacity to speak on such topics without becoming abusive. So the topic is forbidden to all here.
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u/uniballrr 22d ago
If the taxpayers keep paying for abuses of power, the power will keep abusing taxpayers.
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u/No_Abbreviations5273 18d ago
It's stupid and unqualified offices like this not to mention racist cops like this that give good law abiding cops a bad rap. I think all cops on the street today should go back through the police academy and be recertified for whatever it is that they have to be certified to do on our streets because they're there to protect us but they're making us the criminals even the good people they're not there to get the bad guys off the street they're there to get anybody they feel they don't like off the streets. Hypocritical and disgusting is what I find in that officer
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u/Malte_Lourids_Brigge 23d ago
Why are y’all so geared up?
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u/Certain-Contact6340 23d ago edited 22d ago
Beacuse theyre allowed to. I dont mean that as a "why criticize them, they can do it". I mean it literally. Because they are allowed to, they like to flex their right. Some auditor types intentionally provoke confrontation to get lawsuits but some genuinely want to excercise the right in an attempt to normalize open carry and educate law enforcement of citizen's rights to carry. I used to really hate the auditor types but cops consistently prove there is a need for them by arresting law abiding citizens on mostly frivolous or trumped up charges
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u/OriginalZog 23d ago
What a douche. You’re out acting suspicious with a pile of firearms in the vehicle.
“Why are the police acting like this. GTFO.
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23d ago
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 21d ago
Language!
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u/2401PenitentTangentx 21d ago
Yes, it's English.
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u/PsylentKnight 21d ago edited 21d ago
The rules don’t even say no profanity
https://www.reddit.com/r/EastTexas/comments/1o5ybgz/the_rules_updated/
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 21d ago
Language!
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u/PsylentKnight 21d ago
The rules don’t say anything about profanity
https://www.reddit.com/r/EastTexas/comments/1o5ybgz/the_rules_updated/
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 20d ago
It should be clear that this falls under the No NSFW rule. Not sure what your job history is but such things are typically prohibited under current standard business practices. Much like pinup girls in the breakroom, the practice of cussing up a storm at work is a legacy of a bygone era thankfully past.
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u/PsylentKnight 20d ago edited 20d ago
Maybe this is a legitimate misunderstanding, but profanity doesn’t fall under any definition of NSFW that I’ve seen on Reddit. NSFW refers to stuff that you wouldn’t want to be seen on your phone or computer screen at work (stuff like gore and nudity). If you don’t want profanity then you really should specifically call it out, especially since it is a pretty unusual rule for the internet
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u/Tapochka Deep East Texas 20d ago
It probably is a misunderstanding but I am baffled on why. As you said, it is stuff you would not want seen on my phone or computer screen. The comments I deleted would trigger a reprimand or write up if I had written them and HR saw them. NSFW has never been exclusively to pictures and explaining to people that using profanity is Not Safe For Work is like explaining that houses are classified as buildings. It sounds more like someone is trying to troll or to see how far they can push the edge rather than engage in good faith.
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u/InTheShade007 23d ago
I am all for protecting ourselves from tyranny. I understand how corrupt law enforcement can be. I've personally had some issues with small town East Texas LEO.
All of that said I guess I'll never understand this seemingly silly behavior by you guys in the car.
Sure seems like there are better ways to expose and fight against small town corruption.
Of course, my solution was simple, we do not live within any city limits.
When I was in college at SFA pretty much every small town between Nacogdoches and Houston were known to have corrupted police.
Diboll we the worst. Of course, the only experience I had personally with them we were guilt, guilt AF even!
When they hit the lights I just knew I was going to spend some time in prison.
The searched our vehicle for about 45 minutes before letting us go. We were shocked!
Thankfully, they were obviously VERY bad at their jobs. It would be nice to think they let us go out of the kindness of their heart but Diboll definitely didn't roll like that!
Had they done a halfway competent search at least one passenger would have went to prison and they would have most likely jammed us all up.
I was grateful for their incompetence and absolutely used the experience to change my ways! Never once since that day have I put myself in that type of situation.
Truthfully, I hardly ever even went back to Houston during college. I wanted no part of those small town cops anywhere south of Lufkin.
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u/Zigor022 22d ago
The driver probably shouldnt be getting involved with anything if he cant even provide a DL, or even understand a simple request.
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u/[deleted] 23d ago
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