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One in three recent Atlanta Police Academy graduates have criminal records
- Text size
TIM EBERLY
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
October 14, 2008
Keovongsa Siharath was arrested in Henry County on charges he punched his stepfather.
Jeffrey Churchill was charged with assault in an altercation with a woman in a mall parking lot.
- A d v e r t i s e m e n t
Calvin Thomas was taken into custody in DeKalb County on a concealed weapons charge.
All three are now officers with the Atlanta Police Department.
More than one-third of recent Atlanta Police Academy graduates have been arrested or cited for a crime, according to a review of their job applications. The arrests ranged from minor offenses such as shoplifting to violent charges including assault. More than one-third of the officers had been rejected by other law enforcement agencies, and more than half of the recruits admitted using marijuana.
“On its face, it’s troubling and disturbing,” said Vincent Fort, a state senator from Atlanta. “It would be very troubling that people might be hitting the streets to serve and protect and they have histories that have made them unqualified to serve on other departments.”
But Atlanta police say it’s not so simple. Officials have been trying without success for more than a decade to grow the department
to 2,000 officers, an effort hurt by this year’s budget crisis. With competition for recruits intense among law enforcement agencies, Atlanta has had to make concessions.
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October 14th, 2008 at 10:07 am
It makes perfect sense, thugs leaving one gang (not legal) that doesn’t have health benefits, and joining another one (”legal”) that does…
I know, not all cops are bad, but the ratio is really starting to swing the wrong way.
Pray for the best, prepare for the worst.
Blessings to us all.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:20 am
Only one in three? That seems low for the way Atlanta is trending. Again you have the hypocrisy of weed smokers arresting other marijuana users and getting them sentenced to jail. Heh, it is good for the outsourced Corrections Industry. New motto for the Atlanta Police Department: “Anyone Will Do”.
They can plead and cry about the fact that they need to make concessions. Some of it I will accept if they can prove beyond any reasonable doubt that these officers are clean. Short of that, increase the the salary and benefits, men and women with character need jobs and will serve as excellent police officers. CNN isn’t the only big budget employer in town. Start outstanding police academies right in high schools in you have to. Not fascist style, just solid police academies and then see how fast you get excellent young people who will have a career they can be proud of. All of Atlanta is not “Beauty Shop”.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Who do you expect to attract at 27k to start?
October 14th, 2008 at 10:32 am
You can’t find anyone without a record now days because the law charges you for every thing. You cant do anything now days without worrying about a charge. So what if you got into a fight once or twice, so what if you smoked pot. Not only that but they don’t have to pay someone nearly as much if they have a record. Just because you screwed up one time doese not make you a bad person, oh yea cops are perfect.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:40 am
I guess the days of community policing with the officer walking through your neighborhood and waving to the children is over. Now when the come into the neighborhood it will be to pacify and the officers will be wearing black ski masks and black boots. I hope you guys have you vinegar ready, becuase when you smell that smoke again it won’t be barbeque, it will be tear gas.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:47 am
#4 is basically right…this is coming from a pro-police person
October 14th, 2008 at 10:48 am
Police work has always attracted the stupid, the brutal, and the insecure… Not that all cops are this way, just about 20%…. Departments have to change their cultures, and let their officers know that they are just public servants, and civilians like the rest of us. Unfortunately with a starting salary of around 31k, and a top salary of 50k, the smartest people usually aren’t attracted to police work.
October 14th, 2008 at 10:54 am
The RCMP is doing the exact same thing. But the RCMP gives preferential hiring to someone that has killed someone with a taser.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:22 am
I’m from atlanta – and this article is referring to downtown atlanta (not the suburbs, and atlanta is one big suburb) which is a racist anti-white gov’t as seen in deep parts of cities like philly, pre-katrina NO, etc. and no one with a brain, regardless of race, really wants to be subjected to such insanity – but especially if you’re european-american. While #4 makes an excellent point, it’s only part of the story. If there was a real inventory of the actual crimes committed by these officers, I’ll bet you’ll find some real abusive low lifes among them who will now be policing the ‘community’.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:25 am
There are people who have no record. Me. A few speeding tickets covers it. I don’t understand it when people say everyone has a record. The majority of young people do not. I can guarantee that if I were black, the chances of me having a record would exponentially increase. Just a fact of life.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:32 am
Well, it’s a disturbing trend for sure, and only reiterates what Alex and others have been saying for some time. I live in Atlanta and I’ve been here for 4 years now. I’m a musician and I spend a lot of time running around the city late at night. I can honestly say that I have never been treated unfairly by the Atlanta Police. I’ve only been stopped once, for expired tags, and the officer was as friendly as you could hope for. I can’t say as much for some of the other cities I’ve lived in however, i.e. Detroit & Nashville. I’m not making excuses for what I see as questionable hiring practices within the Atlanta Police Dept., however. I think there should be a higher employment standard for law enforcement jobs. Higher pay is one solution for attracting more qualified applicants. I believe the starting pay for new officers here is 27K per year. Would you be willing to do that job for that pay? I don’t believe I would, and that’s part of the problem. Consider this, how many professional athletes have criminal records? How many Attorneys? How many teachers? How many doctors? How many of you? Our legal system only adds to this problem. With all the rules and laws choking us, we’re all just one mistake away from being criminals ourselves. Can Atlanta do better? I think so. But it will reqiure more money from the tax payers to raise police salaries, and most people here in the city are already feeling the economic squeeze. I think it’s safe to say there are no easy answers.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:34 am
#4 born change:
The big problem is not that they’ve smoked some pot or been in some minor scuffle but that they
go on an persecute others for the same.It means something is wrong with their morals making them
unsuitable for police work.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:40 am
This is a good FYI until he states, and half of them admit smoking Pot. Leave that out. That is meaningless.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:48 am
omg! they smoked pot? omg omg omg
October 14th, 2008 at 11:51 am
How would they be ableto enforce martial law, send us off the FEMA camps. get rid of the constitution with honest people in these positions? Come on now. If good people like me became a police officer they know I would not do the above statement
October 14th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
I’ve seen police in Atlanta play craps b4 on the street.
October 14th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
maybe if they smoked more pot they would stop tazering us
October 14th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Wayne #11: Exactly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! “All ‘HAIL’ Thermal Expansion!!!”
October 14th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
I know of a police dispatcher who used to smoke methamphetamine 4 to 5 times a day for about 5 months strait and she does the dispatching for the police department now.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Born Change:
You would think they wouldn’t want to bother aiming a taser and yelling at the same time while high, (too much trouble) but I guess a few do. They ought to just legalize it. It is sure better than the pharmacy pills. I guess I wouldn’t move fast enough if they came after me for a camp if I was high.
They should let prisoners smoke all the pot they want and all that fighting and inmate/gaurd attacks would go waaaayyyy down.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
Look Folks! Just because someone has a criminal record, especially for minor offenses like marijuana possession, doesn’t necessarily mean that they haven’t changed their lives around for the better.
Sure, we’d like to have police with flawless lives, but it’s simply impossible. Everyone makes mistakes, and to be honest, I would actually rather have police with some viceral experiences, than those who condemn weed smokers, and equate them with murderers, because we would then have some cops who can understand the plight of some people, and put themselves in regular folks shoes, and see things from their perspectives.
What do you think?
October 14th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
This happens to a greater degree (nation-wide) than you would EVER imagine. The greatest offenders are the Sheriff departments, as they’ll routinely hire on the candidates rejected by Police Dept.’s….as their qualifications are usually not as strict. I know of a guy here in my home state that failed 2 local P.D.’s psychological exams, but was then hired on by a local Sheriff’s Dept., that by the way does not even administer pre-employment psych exams. Scary stuff to think that there’s nut cases out there patrolling our streets and pulling us over…but we all know that is definitely the case.
October 14th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Who the fuck cares Georgia is a shitty state anyway filled with shitty people. Im sure some fuck is going to attack me instead of saying how they feel on the article. So this is for (that guy) your fucking dumb.
October 14th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
http://www.aniboom.com/video/2.....own-kenny/
October 14th, 2008 at 5:25 pm
I think for people with non-violent felonies shouldn’t have to be punished the rest of their lives, which is what happens. You do your time, have paid your debt, and it shouldn’t follow you the rest of your lives to keep you from every job almost, especially something like nurse, a corornor which will not allow licensing. I think at the least if you’ve been out of trouble for 5 years, it should be where everyone can’t find out and then at least maybe someone could get a degree, a good job, and quit the cycle. A lot of people end right back up in jail, after more crime because no one will hire them. Even if the guy was just 19 or so, the rest of his life carries that black mark when it was non-violent and he had some drug charge or something, and that is all anyone sees even when he is 45 trying to get a job.
October 14th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
Takes one to know one I guess. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPS7ksrKk8Y
October 14th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
Maybe they should hire ex-murders, drug addicts, robbers, burglars…. At least we could see some empathy from them and they’d stop the brutality and tazering. Besides, atlanta is a toilet. I don’t know how or why people even live there. Bunch of fucking crackheads anyway.
October 14th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
Maybe if I would have smoked crack and stole a couple of cars I would have been a cop by now go figure.
October 14th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
violent retards are prime raw material from which to fashion Brown Shirt functionaries.
October 14th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
http://www.salon.com/news/feat.....index.html
October 14th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
only one in three??? that means the other two were not caught at it.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Imagine that! -Al Koppel.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Hey they finally found jobs for real criminals. As police.
How about using them a judges and politicians as well. Oops they already are.
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HOO HOO HOO HOO HOO HOO HOO HOO HOO
HOO HOO HOO HOO HOO HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE
HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE.
just kidding, got ya.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
Did You know, that in the complete history of the DOW eight out of ten top peaks occured during the early years of the Great Depression?
#3 was the day after the great kickoff crash of 1929. What? the majority of the best DOW peaks occured during the great depression? What?
The DOW is not exactly the best indicator of where we are. We know where we are, and once the bailout money hits the banker boyz, game gets tough.
Best Days of the Dow (% Gain)
1 15.3% March 15, 1933
2 14.9% October 6, 1931
3 12.3% October 30, 1929
4 11.1% October 13, 2008
5 10.1% October 21, 1987
6 9.5% August 3, 1932
7 9.5% February 11, 1932
8 9.4% November 14, 1929
9 9.4% December 18, 1931
10 9.2% February 13, 1932
October 14th, 2008 at 11:13 pm
I live right in Atlanta. When martial law comes and the police are helping the military round us up, me and my rifle will remember this article from the AJC.
October 14th, 2008 at 11:29 pm
Just today, 2 Atlanta police assaulted up a patron for arguing with a skycap about his luggage.
Police said he pushed them when they tried to talk to him, But according to the mans wife,
He is handicapped with restricted movement of his arms..
These could be some of the hired Thugs by ATL Police Dept..
October 15th, 2008 at 12:09 am
Having a criminal record may be a good resume highlight because they (the police-men/women) have to know thoroughly their subject. It is shameful that the USA has come to this level of lowliness.
October 15th, 2008 at 2:08 am
Sorry but “WOW” some of you guys are just figuring out that law enforcement jobs attract SOCIOPATHS,people with DOMINATION AND CONTROL ISSUE’S and INADAQUACIE ISSUE’S.Think what reasoable human goes”hummmm with all the jobs in the world I think ill pick the one where ill have to carry a gun and possibly HAVE TO KILL SOMEONE OR BE KILLED hummmm” at least people in the military are guided by a sense of (misguided) patriotism and are usally very young and lacking real world experience when they join.I used to work with a 20’s sumthen year old guy who was going into the police academy and already had a local police job but couldnt join for a few months.He was the biggest authority worshiping bully I ever knew,he was openly racist and used to DEBATE me on why it was OK for his department to wear black military BDU’s with no name tags.
Not all police are bad people but at this point it’s like saying not everyone in a brutal group of racist murder’s are bad people.Oh yeah he used to laugh when we’d talk about someone I knew in his department who shot a friend of mines brother in the back……
October 15th, 2008 at 8:48 am
if they study psychology, they will find that the criminal and cop are not much different, just on opposite ends of a magnet baiscly. One uses deception to swindle money or property, the other uses deception to swindle time and property. One uses violence as force, so does the other. In fact both criminal and cop are essentially..the same. Unthinking obedient slave drones of a reality invented by the microcosm of rich men who have more fear of loss than faith in the universe to provide what they need, so both again, are inherently flawed thinkers.
October 15th, 2008 at 9:48 am
Great, I go into Atlanta quite a bit. Good thing they are trying everything up to and including hiring criminals to “grow their department.” If they can’t find decent cops to take their oath to the constitution seriously then they don’t need to hire them. They just want a bunch of moronic thugs running things so when martial law goes down they have their lackeys follow orders without question.
Google “The Black Pope” and check out all the links(about pretty much everything discussed on ajc show and this site) to Rome and the papacy. There’s too much evidence to ignore.
Btw, good one #31. haha.
October 15th, 2008 at 10:38 am
The good news is that ONLY 36% have criminal records!!!
I wonder what the figure is for cities like Filthydelphia.
October 16th, 2008 at 3:31 am
It’s been like this since the times when people were weilding swords and it’s not surprising when your own government polices the world around with your troops, going to steal other people’s lands and resources under the banner of such corny names as “operation freedom”. They need people like this because they know that it’s these assholes that would bring more money for the cops by abusing their power, finding reasons to charge you if there aren’t any. I don’t know what to say, just be careful on the street, don’t be eager to light someone’s fuse knowing what jackasses with a gun and authority are walking around.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:24 am
This is business as usual for Atlanta. This is very similar with all the counties that make up the Metro Atlanta area. This is the same area where a few years ago where the newly elected Sheriff was murdered by the elected defeated old Sheriff in DeKalb County.
October 16th, 2008 at 11:46 am
Who’s surprised at this?
Look at any county state or country that has a black majority “gubmint” and you’ll see similar trends.
It’s not racism,it’s reality,it’s seeing clearly WITHOUT prejudice.
The multi-culti,politically correct news outlets are the ones who have become prejudicial against stating obvious racial realities.
December 12th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
Straits Times Headlines Town councils’ exposure: $16m Traffic cameras to watch for flooding Inside Averting the next economic crisis View Points Minister assures MPs: Mis-selling probe is independent PSLE results out on Thursday