WEBVTT - Part Two: The Worst Police Union In History 0:00:02.120 --> 0:00:08.600 We're back and we're suing the cops. Uh talking. I 0:00:08.680 --> 0:00:11.920 just had a conversation in between episodes about the fact 0:00:11.960 --> 0:00:14.440 that both of us and everyone we know is suing 0:00:14.440 --> 0:00:18.759 the Portland police in some way. It's fun. Yeah, and 0:00:18.800 --> 0:00:20.360 how it's just so much a part of life that 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:22.040 I just forget about it, and every once in a 0:00:22.040 --> 0:00:25.200 while I remember that, Um, I am suing the City 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:31.440 of Portland. Good times. I I don't love lawsuits, but 0:00:31.600 --> 0:00:36.240 they happen. Um. Yeah, So Tuk, how are you his? 0:00:36.240 --> 0:00:39.320 His life changed radically for you in the last five minutes. Yeah, 0:00:39.400 --> 0:00:44.760 I got a kombucha Now everything's looking up. Is a 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:51.320 huge improvement. What flavor, grapefruit nice? It's exciting. I just 0:00:51.360 --> 0:00:55.320 want to information. You know, I haven't opened it yet, 0:00:55.360 --> 0:00:58.840 but I'll tell you. I'm sure. I'm sure it's great. 0:00:59.680 --> 0:01:03.600 A rinking. I have a diet orange crush um, and 0:01:03.720 --> 0:01:07.360 actually pretty recently I waterboarded a friend of mine with 0:01:07.440 --> 0:01:10.280 diet orange crush as an experiment, and it turns out 0:01:10.319 --> 0:01:15.920 it's terrible. Shocked that if you combine if you combine 0:01:16.000 --> 0:01:21.200 diet orange crush and waterboarding, it's bad. I know. Well, 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:24.880 I can update this kombucha is good, fantastic. What are 0:01:24.880 --> 0:01:30.520 you drinking, Sophie. It's a brambleberry hybiscus tea. Oh wow, 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:35.720 everyone's fancy today. It's very well. Orange crush is very fancy. Okay, 0:01:35.760 --> 0:01:38.440 there's several words involved in describing It's not like water, 0:01:38.720 --> 0:01:42.160 you know, it's like diet orange crush, bramble berry iced tea, 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:45.680 a lot of consonants. Now that you guys are just 0:01:46.800 --> 0:01:50.640 hooked on this conversation, this is the whole podcast. So 0:01:50.680 --> 0:01:52.640 I've decided that it's going to be too bleak to 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:54.800 keep going with this conversation, and so I'm going to 0:01:54.880 --> 0:01:57.480 talk about beverages for an hour. Welcome to Behind the 0:01:57.520 --> 0:02:04.360 Beverages about things that drink. Uh no, this is this 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:08.000 is a podcast about bad people, um the worst people. 0:02:08.440 --> 0:02:11.840 And today we're talking again about the Portland Police Association 0:02:12.080 --> 0:02:15.280 and kind of just about the Portland Police which is 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:18.920 shockingly one of the most influential police departments and unions 0:02:18.919 --> 0:02:21.200 in the entire country, maybe the most. You could make 0:02:21.200 --> 0:02:28.360 a case, although the NYPD isd um so after after 0:02:28.480 --> 0:02:31.360 single handedly doing more damage to Portland's economy than the 0:02:31.400 --> 0:02:34.360 decades of protests that would follow. The Portland Police Association 0:02:34.440 --> 0:02:37.600 was in a pretty good position as nineteen seventy dawned. 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:40.360 Their first big test of the modern era came in 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:43.240 May of that year, when students and faculty at Portland 0:02:43.240 --> 0:02:45.919 State University went on strike to protest the Kent State 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:49.360 shootings in the Vietnam War. After four days, the protesters 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:51.760 struck an agreement with the city to end the strike. 0:02:52.480 --> 0:02:55.119 So that's good, right, protesters go on strike and solidarity 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:57.360 over a shooting in another state. The city's like, we 0:02:57.400 --> 0:02:59.359 get what you're doing. Let's negotiate a way to bring 0:02:59.360 --> 0:03:01.480 this to an in then the negotiate a way to 0:03:01.520 --> 0:03:05.200 bring this to an end. Sounds ideal and very democratic. 0:03:05.440 --> 0:03:08.240 But before the protesters could start to disassemble the structures 0:03:08.240 --> 0:03:10.760 they'd set up for the occupation, the Portland Police Riot 0:03:10.800 --> 0:03:13.079 control team showed up to take down a hospital tent. 0:03:13.560 --> 0:03:16.160 Protesters felt betrayed by this, since they had already worked 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:17.760 out a plan to end the strike with the city. 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:20.560 They walled off the tent with their bodies. This piste 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:22.360 off the riot cops, who are more or less the 0:03:22.400 --> 0:03:24.720 same as the riot cops we have today. The riot 0:03:24.760 --> 0:03:27.480 squad tear gas the students and professors and then charged 0:03:27.520 --> 0:03:31.840 into the gas cloud to beat them with batons. Yeah 0:03:32.040 --> 0:03:37.480 sounds right, sounds like they do. Yeah. One officer noted 0:03:37.520 --> 0:03:41.000 that the violence was not pretty, but the streets were cleared, 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:45.400 which again would have happened if the cops hadn't shown up. Yeah. 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:49.800 An activist who was present, Lester Lamb, recalled his friend's 0:03:49.840 --> 0:03:52.560 head being split open like a pumpkin by a riot 0:03:52.600 --> 0:03:55.720 cops baton. Thirty one people went to the hospital for 0:03:55.760 --> 0:03:59.280 injuries sustained from police violence. Um. The whole mess set 0:03:59.280 --> 0:04:01.880 off an avalante of condemnation from local media, which had 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:04.200 either ignored or been critical of the protests before the 0:04:04.240 --> 0:04:07.520 cops beat everybody up. After what became called the park 0:04:07.560 --> 0:04:10.720 Block Riots, the PPB faced some of the first mass 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:13.960 criticism for violence to protesters in its history. This was 0:04:14.080 --> 0:04:16.080 largely due to the fact that its victims had been 0:04:16.120 --> 0:04:20.680 mostly white. Um. Go figure. The bad pr was enough 0:04:20.720 --> 0:04:23.080 that the Portland Police Bureau made a public statement where 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:26.480 they agreed to never use force against non violent protesters. Again. 0:04:27.120 --> 0:04:32.000 Oh cool, they well, it's so nice. How that paved 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:35.159 the way for them just being so chill and cool today. Yeah, 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:38.680 that's why. For example, when people sat in an intersection 0:04:39.000 --> 0:04:41.040 last May. They did not beat them in the face 0:04:41.040 --> 0:04:49.920 with sticks that would go against their promised. The controversy 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:52.320 over the park block riots faded soon enough, and the 0:04:52.320 --> 0:04:56.159 Portland Police Association succeeded in winning another contract in nineteen 0:04:56.279 --> 0:04:59.039 seventy two and yet more money. They withdrew from the 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:01.479 International Police Union they'd helped to start in March of 0:05:01.480 --> 0:05:04.120 that year after deciding that it lacked focus in direction. 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:08.640 The Portland Police Association was now an independent union because 0:05:08.680 --> 0:05:10.840 they also pulled out of AFTS MET with no ties 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:14.760 to any national organization. It remains that way to this day, 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:19.560 loyal to no one but itself. Yeah, they don't want 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:22.119 any influences that might give them like a conscience or something, 0:05:22.360 --> 0:05:26.880 you know, stay here to their ideology. Not even influences 0:05:26.880 --> 0:05:29.039 that would lead them to support other cops who weren't 0:05:29.080 --> 0:05:35.000 Portland cops. It's pretty good. So the p p A 0:05:35.120 --> 0:05:38.640 had ensured that its officers were highly paid and basically unaccountable. 0:05:38.680 --> 0:05:40.839 Now that the President had been said that Portland cops 0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:42.960 could go on strike if they were angry and created 0:05:43.000 --> 0:05:45.279 the local economy, there was very little that the city 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:48.279 government could hold over them. As you might expect this 0:05:48.320 --> 0:05:50.760 emboldened the worst officers in the department to carry out 0:05:50.800 --> 0:05:55.080 acts of horrifying racial violence. On March fourteenth, nineteen seventy five, 0:05:55.160 --> 0:05:58.600 Portland police officer Kenneth Sandford shot seventeen year old Ricky 0:05:58.720 --> 0:06:02.000 Johnson in the back him Johnson was the fourth person 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:04.600 of color shot and killed by Portland police in five months, 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:07.840 and his death ignited a city wide outrage. The details 0:06:07.839 --> 0:06:09.839 of the killing were just sketchy enough that even the 0:06:09.839 --> 0:06:12.360 city's white majority couldn't all sit by and pretend it 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:16.080 hadn't happened. In essence, two kids with an empty, broken 0:06:16.120 --> 0:06:18.640 gun had been ordering Chinese food and then robbing cab 0:06:18.720 --> 0:06:21.320 drivers who dropped it off. One of those drivers called 0:06:21.360 --> 0:06:23.599 the cops, and they set up a sting operation. Now, 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:26.320 despite the fact that everything in the PPBS by laws 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:28.800 said that this kind of operation should only be conducted 0:06:28.800 --> 0:06:32.279 by multiple officers, they sent one guy in. They dressed 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:33.840 him as a cab driver, and he had a gun 0:06:33.960 --> 0:06:36.839 hidden in an empty to go box of food. When 0:06:36.839 --> 0:06:38.560 he showed up at the house, the kids pulled a 0:06:38.560 --> 0:06:40.599 gun on him, so he pulled his own gun. What 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:44.200 happened next is debated. The cop claimed that Ricky knelt 0:06:44.240 --> 0:06:46.840 down and prepared to fire, so he shot the boy dead. 0:06:47.279 --> 0:06:50.080 Ricky's friend claimed that both boys ran like hell and 0:06:50.160 --> 0:06:52.960 dropped the gun immediately, and then the officers shot Ricky 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:56.240 in the back. The physical evidence supported the second version 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:59.440 of events. Investigators found the broken gun ten feet away 0:06:59.440 --> 0:07:01.640 from Ricky's body, and Ricky had been shot in the 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:04.599 back of the head, which probably wouldn't have happened if 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:08.720 he'd been facing the officer. Just physics and such, many 0:07:08.800 --> 0:07:11.640 white Portlanders were able to see that while armed robbery is, 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:13.720 you know, not good, shooting a fleeing robber in the 0:07:13.760 --> 0:07:16.200 back of the head is worse. The rage was augmented 0:07:16.240 --> 0:07:18.520 by the fact that the PPB had murdered again three 0:07:18.560 --> 0:07:21.040 other black men over the course of the last several months. 0:07:21.360 --> 0:07:23.480 All of the cases had been sketchy in some way. 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:27.160 Kenneth Allen, aged seven, was murdered in a prostitution sting. 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:30.120 His death was ruled a justifiable homicide because he had 0:07:30.120 --> 0:07:32.600 a gun, but the gun was never found and introduced 0:07:32.600 --> 0:07:34.680 into evidence. The cops just said that he had one, 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:36.880 and also he was shot multiple times in the back. 0:07:37.200 --> 0:07:43.200 Um hmmm, yeah, it's just sucking me up a little bit. 0:07:43.200 --> 0:07:45.080 How I guess this isn't pp A because it's right 0:07:45.120 --> 0:07:47.600 across the river or popleb. But like such a similar 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:50.080 thing is happening, like right now across the Rand Vancouver 0:07:50.160 --> 0:07:53.040 and cool. Just just how it goes forever, Just how 0:07:53.080 --> 0:07:56.720 it goes forever. This is the song that never ends. 0:07:58.160 --> 0:08:01.400 Charles Minifrey was killed after twenty mile car chase which 0:08:01.480 --> 0:08:04.800 started when Canby, Oregon cops pulled him over without probable cause. 0:08:04.920 --> 0:08:07.200 I witnessed his report that minife had his hands in 0:08:07.240 --> 0:08:09.480 the air and was standing outside his car when he 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:12.000 was shot to death. None of the witnesses to his death, 0:08:12.080 --> 0:08:13.840 or the witnesses to any of the other deaths of 0:08:13.840 --> 0:08:16.160 black men killed by Portland police during this period, were 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:19.240 called to testify in court. And again, all of these 0:08:19.240 --> 0:08:22.440 men were black men who lived in Albina. Uh. None 0:08:22.480 --> 0:08:25.440 of their deaths provoked any outcry until Officer Sanford shot 0:08:25.520 --> 0:08:28.000 Ricky Johnson in the back of the head. Everyone living 0:08:28.000 --> 0:08:30.000 in the year of the George Floyd Uprising knows how 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:32.199 this works. It's kind of impossible to predict when the 0:08:32.240 --> 0:08:33.960 violent death of a person of color at the hands 0:08:33.960 --> 0:08:36.560 of cops will provoke outraged and enough white people that 0:08:36.600 --> 0:08:39.440 the police actually have to address it. Um. But it 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:41.520 did here um. And I should note here that in 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:43.880 nineteen seventy two there were also plenty of back the 0:08:43.880 --> 0:08:47.000 blue types who defended the PPB from all of its murdering. 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:50.840 I'm gonna quote from Katherine Nelson again here. One citizen 0:08:50.840 --> 0:08:53.440 even sent officer Sandford, who shot the seventeen year old, 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:56.120 a twenty dollar check for his vacation fund and offered 0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:59.120 to provide him with a babysitter. The donor, Esther Nichols, 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:02.440 stated that a community cannot say or accept that black 0:09:02.559 --> 0:09:04.600 is bad, so it has to be the police that 0:09:04.640 --> 0:09:10.880 are wrong. What. Yeah, I'll read that again. Esther Nichols, 0:09:10.920 --> 0:09:12.640 who gave money to the cop that killed that guy, 0:09:12.679 --> 0:09:16.160 stated that the community cannot say or except that black 0:09:16.280 --> 0:09:18.400 is bad, so it has to be the police that 0:09:18.440 --> 0:09:27.480 are wrong. Cool esther, You see, rad Esther, Esther, thanks 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:30.600 for being really openly racist as opposed to just claiming 0:09:30.640 --> 0:09:35.600 you support cops. Uh, that's at least honest. She's like 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:37.680 the progenitor of all the cop go fund me is now. 0:09:37.720 --> 0:09:43.560 But it's just one person, master. Yeah, you seem cool. Yeah. 0:09:43.640 --> 0:09:46.520 Johnson's death revealed that a large portion of Portland's white 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:49.080 residents held racist views and respected the decision of the 0:09:49.080 --> 0:09:52.760 police to use extreme violence against black citizens. Uh Meanwhile, 0:09:52.840 --> 0:09:56.480 Johnson's death inspired black Portland's to create the Black Justice Committee. 0:09:56.640 --> 0:09:59.120 The b j C teamed up with several existing advocacy 0:09:59.240 --> 0:10:02.040 organizations to pushed the city to order an inquest into 0:10:02.160 --> 0:10:05.480 Johnson's death. A public inquest is essentially a trial that 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:07.640 occurs after a suspicious death, and it was hoped that 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:10.080 this would make it clear that criminal behavior had been, 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:13.439 you know, evident on behalf of the officer involved. The 0:10:13.480 --> 0:10:16.520 Portland Black Student Union was another group that pushed for 0:10:16.559 --> 0:10:19.560 the same cause. Now, when awful lot of Portland's were 0:10:19.559 --> 0:10:21.600 willing to support a public inquest, this was a very 0:10:21.640 --> 0:10:24.559 popular cause. It was, after all, a pretty basic thing 0:10:24.600 --> 0:10:27.160 to do and not exactly a revolutionary demand, like we 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:30.760 should investigate the suspicious killing. Is you can get most 0:10:30.840 --> 0:10:33.960 people on board that thing. There were, however, some boot 0:10:34.000 --> 0:10:36.360 liquers who thought this went too far. Opponents of the 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:39.319 inquest wrote into local papers complaining that Johnson's death was 0:10:39.360 --> 0:10:43.440 being turned into a race issue. Watford Read of Portland 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:45.280 wrote a letter to the police chief in which he 0:10:45.360 --> 0:10:48.240 complained that a public inquest would prove black people are 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:59.880 privileged in Portland. Pardons when they're murdered, they're privileged. Uh 0:11:00.080 --> 0:11:05.160 Uh fucking jelical catch ship where everyone's just like the Actually, 0:11:05.200 --> 0:11:07.040 the most privileged thing would just be to send to 0:11:07.080 --> 0:11:11.959 the heavens right now. Uh. It would be fun if 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:14.680 his argument was like, well, no, this planet is terrible 0:11:14.720 --> 0:11:21.000 and being to send out of life. Uh. Mayor Neil 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:23.280 gold Schmidt, who was basically the same as every other 0:11:23.320 --> 0:11:25.640 mayor of Portland as ever, had knew that outrage over 0:11:25.679 --> 0:11:28.160 the Johnson shooting was too popular for him to come 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:31.240 out against the inquest, but he was also terrified of 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:33.360 the p p A, who were clearly more powerful than 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:35.800 the city government. So gold Schmidt tried to thread the 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:38.599 needle by supporting the inquest in order to appease the 0:11:38.640 --> 0:11:42.080 liberals and stating publicly that he expected Officer Sanford to 0:11:42.080 --> 0:11:45.360 be totally vindicated. He actually announced that he thought the 0:11:45.360 --> 0:11:47.839 inquest would be a good opportunity for black Portlanders to 0:11:47.920 --> 0:11:50.240 learn why it was totally okay to shoot a seventeen 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:53.640 year old in the back of the head. Great Mayor 0:11:55.320 --> 0:12:00.000 solid marrying He does sound a bit like our current mayor. Yeah, 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:02.240 I was gonna totally about Portland is all the good mayor's, 0:12:03.400 --> 0:12:06.400 all the great mayors that we have here. So the 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.000 p P as president at this point was a total 0:12:09.080 --> 0:12:12.600 dick bag named Stan Peters, which is a dick bag name, 0:12:12.760 --> 0:12:16.320 like it's a name of a jerk. Uh so he was. 0:12:16.480 --> 0:12:19.440 Peters was enraged by even the mild support the mayor 0:12:19.440 --> 0:12:21.920 gave to the idea of an inquest. Um He was 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:23.640 just like, this is like the fact that you would 0:12:23.640 --> 0:12:26.320 even question one of my cops shooting somebody is offensive 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.000 to me. The police chief was a little bit more 0:12:29.040 --> 0:12:32.640 reasonable and decided the benefits of having an inquest outweighed 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:35.240 the risks. In the end, the inquest happened, and it 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:37.920 revealed some pretty damning stuff about the conduct of Portland 0:12:38.000 --> 0:12:43.080 police officers from Katherine Nelson. Witnesses who testified included Melva Thrower, 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:46.240 a neighbor on North Gandon Bean. She testified that the 0:12:46.280 --> 0:12:49.679 officers used profanity and handled Zachary roughly upon his arrest. 0:12:49.760 --> 0:12:51.160 That was the other kid who was with the kid 0:12:51.200 --> 0:12:53.480 who got shot to death. She stated that they threw 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:55.840 Zachary on top of the police car before tossing him 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:58.240 into the back seat. When Zachary asked about Johnson, they 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:01.040 said that bitch is dead and asked where does that 0:13:01.120 --> 0:13:04.319 motherfucker live? Instead of focusing on the treatment of Zachary, 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:07.600 More questioned the officers about throwers testimony and asked if 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:11.000 they used profanity. The officers admitted that profanity was used, 0:13:11.000 --> 0:13:13.920 but they couldn't remember what profanities. Another officer claimed that 0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:16.200 he heard loud language but could not determine that they 0:13:16.240 --> 0:13:19.880 were profanities. After the assistant district attorney question Stanford, the 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:22.199 six person jury voted as to whether Sanford should be 0:13:22.200 --> 0:13:25.080 held accountable. Vote returned five to one that Sanford's actions 0:13:25.080 --> 0:13:28.080 were justifiable. The only black jury member casted the soul 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:34.360 vote against Sanford's innocence. So lots going on there. One 0:13:34.440 --> 0:13:38.160 is that after hearing that they had referred to they 0:13:38.200 --> 0:13:41.240 had like said that bitch is dead and asked where 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:43.440 he lived and all that sort of stuff, and had 0:13:43.480 --> 0:13:47.680 abused an arrested person. The district attorney's concerned was that 0:13:47.720 --> 0:13:52.320 they'd used profanity, which is problem here. The real issue 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:55.560 cops are cursing. You can murder people, but you can't 0:13:55.600 --> 0:14:00.480 call them a bit afterwards, that's offensive. That's gonna make 0:14:00.520 --> 0:14:05.839 people angry. Yeah. Um, and yeah. Also that obviously all 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:07.680 of the white people and the jury voted that the 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:09.840 cop was right to shoot that kid, and uh, the 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:12.720 only black jury member was the only vote against his innocence. 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:15.520 I will state here that the story did not end 0:14:15.520 --> 0:14:18.880 happily for officers Sanford. Despite being described as a model 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:22.320 officer prior to the shooting, Sandford received increasing complaints about 0:14:22.320 --> 0:14:25.040 his performance after the inquest. He was suspended from duty 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:27.280 in nineteen seventy five for accepting a gift from a 0:14:27.320 --> 0:14:29.840 citizen in nineteen seventy seven for the use of illegal 0:14:29.920 --> 0:14:32.320 drugs while off duty. Later that year, he was put 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:36.360 on permanent disability for PTSD. And this next bit is interesting, 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:38.760 not that I expect people to have sympathy for this guy, 0:14:38.800 --> 0:14:40.960 but that it makes the point that the Portland Police 0:14:41.040 --> 0:14:43.600 Union is actually bad for officers in some ways to 0:14:44.360 --> 0:14:46.960 the p PBS. Culture of resistance supported by the p 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:50.680 p A negated Sanford's professional and moral accountability. P p 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:54.280 A president Stan Peters claimed Stanford would receive psychological help 0:14:54.320 --> 0:14:57.000 after Johnson's death, yet there is no evidence that he 0:14:57.080 --> 0:14:59.880 did to so easily brush aside. Johnson's death is just 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.760 afiable emphasized not only the inadequate services Portland police officers 0:15:03.920 --> 0:15:06.720 received from the Bureau, but also the unspoken norm that 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:10.360 black lives did not matter. This obviously and ultimately disrespected 0:15:10.400 --> 0:15:12.720 the sacred deus of black lives throughout Portland and question 0:15:12.760 --> 0:15:16.240 the worth of black people kind of like, it's bad 0:15:16.320 --> 0:15:22.040 for everyone for white supremacy to be enshrined by institutions. Arguably, 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:27.400 but does that stop it? No, not at all. This 0:15:27.480 --> 0:15:29.080 is bad for everyone. Should we stop it in the 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:32.880 next fifty years? No, absolutely not. Let's keep having the 0:15:33.000 --> 0:15:36.520 same fight went on. We don't have anything else to 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:40.040 do in society. Everything else is good, Yeah, everything else 0:15:40.120 --> 0:15:43.920 is smooth. Them just chugging right along, like that train 0:15:44.040 --> 0:15:49.880 the police used to shoot Longshore from. So the rest 0:15:49.880 --> 0:15:52.840 of the early seventies continued the by now well worn 0:15:52.880 --> 0:15:56.160 pattern of Portland police only suffering consequences when they offended 0:15:56.200 --> 0:15:59.360 the white majority with their actions. In nineteen, the Bureau 0:15:59.440 --> 0:16:02.120 was rocked by a series of scandals in the Narcotics Division, 0:16:02.280 --> 0:16:04.280 most of which revolved around the fact that the entire 0:16:04.360 --> 0:16:08.320 Narcotics Division was addicted to illegal drugs one PPB detective 0:16:08.400 --> 0:16:12.000 testified that narcotics officers frequently did huge amounts of cocaine 0:16:12.000 --> 0:16:17.280 before going out on drug rates. Mean, I'm gonna be honest, 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:19.360 I've seen them riding along on their Riot vans and 0:16:19.480 --> 0:16:21.400 thought it would be fun to do a funckload of 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:23.200 blow and then like hang off the side of a 0:16:23.240 --> 0:16:27.160 four D F three fifty rolling around the streets. That 0:16:27.280 --> 0:16:31.560 does seem rad is It's just like how not subtle 0:16:31.640 --> 0:16:34.800 it is? That just like makes my brain explode, where 0:16:34.800 --> 0:16:37.360 it's like, let us do drugs before busting people for 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:42.160 drugs for drugs good, because that way we'll have more drugs, Yeah, exactly, 0:16:42.600 --> 0:16:47.440 which is actually getting ready to oh my god, it's 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:50.240 a perfect cycle. There is at least one clear case 0:16:50.280 --> 0:16:52.960 of the PPB murdering and then faking the suicide of 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:56.960 a drug dealer in order to get his heroine. Um good, 0:16:57.200 --> 0:17:01.680 good guys Portland' narcotics cops. Uh. And in fact, when 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:04.760 that dead kid's mom pressed for an investigation into his death, 0:17:04.840 --> 0:17:06.960 she received a phone call from a white dude who 0:17:07.000 --> 0:17:10.040 was probably a Portland narcotics officer. He told her to 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:13.240 back off on the investigation unless she wanted more family 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:22.080 members dead. Yeah, that's good. Um, good police good, fine, 0:17:22.359 --> 0:17:25.520 that's fine police work. So the detective Dupay who was 0:17:25.560 --> 0:17:27.800 the uh, I guess the best Portland copper're going to 0:17:27.840 --> 0:17:29.520 talk about in this he's the one who reported that 0:17:29.560 --> 0:17:32.320 Portland narcotics officers were doing a shipload a blow before 0:17:32.400 --> 0:17:35.399 going out on drug raids. He investigated the murder of 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:37.439 this drug dealer and he submitted a report to the 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:40.359 police chief with his findings, which were pretty damning to 0:17:40.520 --> 0:17:43.480 the Portland Police Bureau. Years later, when he attempted to 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:45.200 get a copy of the report, I think to give 0:17:45.240 --> 0:17:47.320 to a reporter, but I'm not sure, a clerk told 0:17:47.359 --> 0:17:48.919 him that it had been shredded as soon as he 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:56.159 filed it, like almost immediately. That's good stuff, good stuff. 0:17:57.000 --> 0:18:00.000 If you're wondering why didn't anyone do anything about these 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:02.480 drug adduled out of control cops, the answer is p 0:18:02.480 --> 0:18:04.920 p A. President Stan Peters one of the worst people 0:18:04.960 --> 0:18:06.879 to ever live in the city of Portland. He was 0:18:06.920 --> 0:18:09.960 a potent negotiator, though, and when the city negotiators angered 0:18:10.040 --> 0:18:12.520 him during a contract dispute like this is the story 0:18:12.560 --> 0:18:14.879 that everyone tells about Stan Peters. He was negotiating with 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:17.600 the city for more money, and when they wouldn't play 0:18:17.640 --> 0:18:19.840 ball with him, he drew his gun and slammed it 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:30.119 on the table and told them these are my ground rules. Sorry, 0:18:30.119 --> 0:18:32.000 I just sat here. They can see I just sat 0:18:32.000 --> 0:18:33.919 here with my mom and went for like thirty straight seconds. 0:18:33.920 --> 0:18:38.680 And they just they just keep out doing themselves. It's 0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:42.399 of themselves, and they keep doing ship. That is again 0:18:42.680 --> 0:18:48.119 literal criminal stuff, right, It's a thing. No, it's just 0:18:48.160 --> 0:18:49.960 a thing where like I feel like we get desensitized 0:18:50.000 --> 0:18:52.080 to it, Like I get desensitized at anything that they 0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:53.840 do because I'm just like, yeah, of course they're doing that. 0:18:53.920 --> 0:18:55.760 And then you know, you know what the protests that 0:18:55.800 --> 0:18:58.160 we were at, Like someone outside would be like, wait, 0:18:58.200 --> 0:19:00.320 they're you know, snatching people up in on my fans 0:19:00.320 --> 0:19:02.440 and I'm like, oh, is that not normal? And They're 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:05.560 like that's not They're not supposed to do that. I'm like, oh, interesting, 0:19:05.720 --> 0:19:07.520 So like when they do that, I'm just like, oh, yeah, 0:19:07.520 --> 0:19:10.520 I guess technically or not supposed to do that just 0:19:10.560 --> 0:19:13.719 seems like something they would do. There's a there's a 0:19:13.720 --> 0:19:16.280 local cop that we all know, Brett Taylor, who is 0:19:16.359 --> 0:19:18.199 most famous in the city of Portland for kind of 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:22.440 randomly stabbing car tires during riots, um, for no real 0:19:22.520 --> 0:19:24.959 purpose that I can see most of the time. I 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:28.159 originally knew him as cop who won't stop pointing his 0:19:28.160 --> 0:19:30.399 gun at people's heads. That's when call him. It was 0:19:30.400 --> 0:19:32.600 a long moniker, but he just let everyone else would 0:19:32.600 --> 0:19:34.080 like point out the ground. He would just be still 0:19:34.080 --> 0:19:36.159 having at your head. But yeah, then he switched to 0:19:36.240 --> 0:19:41.480 just like really just hating car tires. Yeah he's he's 0:19:41.680 --> 0:19:43.680 really fucking loves to stab car time. Does he have 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:49.040 the joy in his body language? Yeah? Um. He Among 0:19:49.119 --> 0:19:53.000 other things, we had like a recent like city like 0:19:53.119 --> 0:19:56.520 in testimony or whatever on police violence, and somebody came 0:19:56.520 --> 0:19:58.879 on who he had shot in the groin and Brett 0:19:58.880 --> 0:20:01.280 had to testify that he had never knowingly targeted the 0:20:01.280 --> 0:20:04.240 growing area. And in another point, he was talking about 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:07.000 having addressed protesters and like he was stopped by the 0:20:07.000 --> 0:20:14.800 modern said, by addressed, you mean you threw grenades at them? Uh, 0:20:14.960 --> 0:20:18.960 fucking love the Portland police. They're cool. Then they're cool. 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:25.080 Now start a conversation with a grenade. I love dialogue. 0:20:25.520 --> 0:20:30.320 So stan uh, the guy who negotiates with a handgun 0:20:30.560 --> 0:20:33.280 wound up having an influence that extended far, far beyond 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:36.440 the bounds of the Rose City from pickets, pistols, and politics. 0:20:37.000 --> 0:20:40.159 Shortly after Peters became the union president, he introduced a 0:20:40.200 --> 0:20:44.000 concept that was relatively new to police officers, political involvement. 0:20:44.320 --> 0:20:48.240 Peter's predecessor, David Callison, had dabbled lightly, even inviting controversy 0:20:48.280 --> 0:20:51.040 by offering a PPA endorsement and a few local races, 0:20:51.320 --> 0:20:53.879 but Peter's scope was broader than that. He wanted the 0:20:53.960 --> 0:20:56.320 Union to be a political force to be reckoned with. 0:20:56.520 --> 0:20:58.760 He was tired of the city and state officials writing 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:01.360 rough shot over police with seemingly little interest in its 0:21:01.400 --> 0:21:04.320 rank and file concerns or causes. He wanted the police 0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:07.439 to be listened to better. Yet, he wanted politicians to 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:12.000 quake in their boots if the police were not happy. Huh, 0:21:12.600 --> 0:21:16.720 And so he pulled his handgun out. Yeah, I mean, yes, 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:19.240 he did do that. Um. He's also the start in 0:21:19.280 --> 0:21:22.440 a lot of ways of police nationwide getting directly involved 0:21:22.440 --> 0:21:25.720 in political races and having police unions directly endorsed candidates 0:21:25.720 --> 0:21:28.200 and taking partisan stances. We can also thank the p 0:21:28.280 --> 0:21:34.720 p A for a lot of that. Yeah no, I yeah, 0:21:34.760 --> 0:21:39.680 And that showed up last month, this month. Gosh, every 0:21:39.720 --> 0:21:44.240 month is a years long. Yeah, I mean this month. Yeah, 0:21:44.280 --> 0:21:46.920 every month of this year has lasted longer than all 0:21:46.960 --> 0:21:49.720 of the history we're covering in this podcast. Yeah, this 0:21:49.800 --> 0:21:53.240 is true. But you know what doesn't take long tuck 0:21:54.200 --> 0:21:57.000 goods and services. Yeah, it doesn't take long to develop 0:21:57.000 --> 0:21:59.520