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Comment by n8cpdx | Hacker News Reader

Why is police choosing not to make arrests (at high physical risk to all involved) in cases where the DA has announced intent to not prosecute “not doing their job”?

The public demands that police only focus on the worst offenders, everyone demands that use of force is eliminated, and the DA announced intent not to press charges for victimless crimes like property theft.

How would it be appropriate for police to take action in that scenario? If that chase ends in a tackle and the thief is harmed, and the government would have just let the dude go, how is that in any way consistent with the government’s interest?

Responding to clear direction from political leadership and the public is not “protest”, if anything failing to do so would be.

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> Why is police choosing not to make arrests (at high physical risk to all involved) in cases where the DA has announced intent to not prosecute “not doing their job”

The specific claim made upthread was that this was justified by DAs pursuing alternative/restorative justice. Not arresting because they don’t like DAs doing that instead of seeking prison is very much not doing their job.

Similarly, not arresting because they don’t like DAs charging misdemeanors rather than felonies.

Not arresting in specific circumstances where DA has indicated no action of any kind will be taken, if done consistently, is reasonable; but even here, police are very inconsistent, and will frequently arrest nonviolent protestors (and engage in viewpoint discrimination as to which protestors get this treatment) – for possibly legitimate offenses, sure – in circumstances that they know will not be prosecuted, while using the lack of prosecution as an excuse not to arrest for equally legitimate offensea of other kinds. This is, itself, a form of political lobbying while on th4 clock as civil servants.

I don't know as much about SF, but the police statement in NYC is illuminating:

https://www.nyc.gov/site/nypd/news/p00055/career-violent-cri...

The worst of the worst list is especially interesting, though the numbers for at least three arrests are more indicative.

Whatever it is we're doing, it's not working. The people who lose in this case are the victims.

As for differential treatment, it's not too hard to see arrests of protesters who start becoming aggressive with officers as a means of nipping something worse in the bud.

Compare that with the upthread example where a guy was running after having stolen something. The threat of violence was over, there wasn't a risk of escalation unless the officer ran after him.

One of the many facets of the defund/2020 movement was trying to get cops to stop enforcing misdemeanor crime: https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-protests-for-racia...

I think the real challenge you’re running into is that the line between enforcement-worthy and not enforcement-worthy crime is in the eye of the beholder. But the DA saying _x_ is no longer a felony would seemingly be a clear signal about how police should be prioritizing their work.

The DA is a political actor too and could be pressuring cops to funnel people to their restorative Justice programs if they wanted to.

Police don't get to choose the method of justice. That's up to the judge, and depends on what the DA's orders are regarding what charges are actually filed (i.e. felonies won't qualify, so drop charges to a misdemeanor).

Arrest gives them legal authority to search the person of the accused and find evidence of other crime. Perhaps they will find something that leads to a felony and authorization to hold. For instance, you probably wouldn't want to release someone who was heavily intoxicated in public while in possession of a deadly weapon.

To be clear, I'm not saying I'm thrilled about prosecuting people for many of the crimes for which the contraband would constitute, but the advantages of arresting the perp even if they'll immediately be released is obvious.

All that you’ve said is clear Abe obvious and the logic of the post-90s sustained reduction in crime we saw for decades.

The challenge is that holding people accountable for misdemeanor crime, using stops as pretexts for deeper investigation, and aggressive enforcement of nuisance laws all contribute to disproportionately bad outcomes for underprivileged people. That consequence is more directly obvious than the consequences of not going effective police work, which is why our society collectively made the choices it did over the last few years.

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