Comments

1
Goddamn police state raises its ugly head yet again.
This kind of thing is happening every day around this country.
And none of our 'leaders' says a damn thing about it either.
2
Letsis was out of line in the manner of this encounter, and possibly his justification as well. If he had reasonable suspicion to believe that the phone had evidence of a crime, he was within his rights to seize the phone to prevent destruction of that evidence, if Medina refused to show it to him voluntarily. Medina bears at least a small portion of responsibility for escalating the situation.

However, the fact that they had taken the suspect into custody when they noticed Medina's action indicates that they had **already** developed probable cause of a crime. So any video, while possibly helpful, would not have been needed for prosecution.

Another example of the continuing mistrust between the public and the police, going both ways. However, being public employees, the responsibility to improve that relationship really does fall upon the police. And the Gresham chief has it right. Do your job properly, and you have nothing to fear from video. It's called integrity, and the public has the right to expect it from the police.
3
Although Letsis can't be faulted for not believing everything Medina told him. Officers face people being untruthful every day, and becoming less than trusting of what people say is an occupational hazard. It's something that officers need to be aware of and constantly guard against. Nobody said the job was easy.

Please wait...

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