Hiring Practices (UPDATED)

JCPD Station (JCHeights.com)

The Jersey City Police Department hired a man by the name of Kevin Freibott as a police officer. As an officer of the law, one is expected to obey it, as well as enforce it. Mr. Freibott failed in his duties.

He got drunk Tuesday night when he was off-duty and slammed into a car carrying a young mother and her son, sending the woman to ICU and the son into critical condition. It is bad enough when a civilian does something as stupid and selfish as driving drunk and hurt somebody else, but to have a police officer do it makes it even worse. You would wonder how someone who has the ability to do something like this even gets hired to serve and to protect the public in the first place.

However, Kevin Freibott is not one of those people. He was a police officer in Middletown Township, New Jersey until 2001, when he was fired after being involved in a minor accident and holding an invalid driver's license. Big deal, right? Well according to the New Jersey DMV, Freibott lost his license because he neglected to show up to a program for drunk drivers that was court-ordered. So this is not the first time Officer Freibott has taken his chances drinking and driving.

My question is this: if it is so hard to get a job with a criminal record, how could the Jersey City Police Department possibly hire someone who a) broke a justified law, and b) refused to follow a judge's orders that came in response to him breaking that law? Is the JCPD that desperate for officers that they will hire just anybody? I certainly hope not.

UPDATE (1/28/07): The 2 year old boy who was hit by Officer Freibott passed away last night at University Hospital. The mother's condition has improved from critical to stable at Jersey City Medical Center. It has been determined that Freibott's blood alcohol content (BAC) was three times the legal limit, which in New Jersey is 0.08%, just recently reduced from 0.10%. As if the situation could not get worse for Freibott, 1010wins.com reports that the day that the accident occurred he was scheduled to work, but called in sick. Let's hope justice is served.

Garbage is Political?

Big Belly compactor (Boston.com)

Boston, Massachusetts. A city where black and white don't really mix and home to a stark racial history. Where the money is old, and apparently the trash cans should be, too.

The members of the Back Bay Architectural Commission, a group designed to keep the historic aspects of the neighborhood intact, have been up in arms over a trash can. Not just any old trash can, though, a cleaner, more efficient one. The trash can is solar powered and compacts trash into neat 40 pound trash bricks, according the to Globe article. It requires fewer pick-ups from city workers and ensures that trash cannot blow out of it on windy days.

But its aesthetics are lacking, according to the Commission. It does not match the neighborhood and they want it redesigned in order to match the aura of Back Bay. Unfortunately, they cannot make a trash can into a rich white man, but the Commission will settle for wrought-iron ornamental casing.

Others in the neighborhood have either shown indifference to the trash cans, or have welcomed them, but the Commission is unfazed. Of course, people who live in glass houses (all up to code with the Commission, of course) should not throw stones. The Back Bay area used to be a mud basin for the previous industrial waste flow known as the Charles River until it was filled in by the city.

Here comes the kicker: the Back Bay does not want them, but neighborhoods with lower incomes such as Hyde Park, Jamaica Plain, and South Boston have been asking for them for a few months now. Well, wouldn't it make sense for the city, who paid about $3,600 per compacter, to just take them to the neighborhoods asking for them and out of the neighborhoods that are shunning them?

Instead, the City of Boston will come back with a new design for the trash bins in the hope that the Commission will approve. So the city will outright ignore these poorer neighborhoods in hopes that the rich, high tax-base Back Bay area will grant them permission to place trash cans on their sidewalks. Ridiculous.

 If I lived or had a business in Hyde Park, JP, or Southie I would be furious right now, knowing that the city is pandering to an upper class neighborhood that does not even want the barrels rather than bringing the machines to a part of the city that will actually appreciate them. This just further proves that everything - everything - is political, even something that seems as trivial as trash receptacles.

Airport Security

EWR (Travel and Leisure)

In a New York Times op-ed today, Kathryn Harrison writes that she was able to board a plane at JFK to look for her wallet. While not breaking news in any way, shape, or form, the way she was able to do it is highly disturbing.

She had gotten off the plane with her daughters from a Puerto Rican getaway, gets to the baggage carousel and realizes she left her wallet on the plane. She begs and pleads her way through security, gets to the gate and no one is there. She can see her plane through the window, so she knocks on the door of the gate leading to the plane. Nothing. 

She opens the unlocked gate door, and an alarm goes off. She waits for someone to show up and yell at her, but nothing. The passengers in the airport don't seem to care, either. So she props the door open with one of her shoes, all the while the shrill alarm is going off, and goes onto the plane. She looks around her seat for the wallet, but it is gone because the plane has already been cleaned and prepped for its next departure.

So she leaves the plane, closes the gate door and the alarm goes off. She walks back to the terminal and explains what happened to someone at the customer service desk, who is shocked, tells her she cannot do that, then lets her go.

So essentially someone was able to gain access to an airplane in one of the largest airports in the United States and was able to freely move within the aircraft and could have had enough time to alter the plane how she could have wanted to, which could include planting a bomb. This begs the question: how safe are our airports? If Mrs. Harrison was able to go through security sans boarding pass and also able to gain access to an empty airliner prepped for takeoff, all the while setting off alarms and giving authorities every chance to act, what would happen if a terrorist were able to do this?

I am certain of one thing: had Kathryn Harrison been Middle Eastern or had darker skin, then this would be a very different story. Remember, if there is the slightest miscommunication between a port employee and a Middle Easterner, you can expect to spend a night or two locked up, even if your paperwork and everything is in order. We are out in Iraq fighting terrorism there, when it seems that our airport security (or lack thereof) might be a larger threat to national security than some Sunnis and Shi'ites (if you know the difference) in Iraq fighting for control of their homeland.

New York's Finest?

101 Precinct (Forgotten NY)

A disturbing story coming out of the 101st NYPD precinct in Queens.

Two officers responded to a laundromat on the report that someone had posed as a police officer and had told a girl to wait at said laundromat. When the (real) police officers arrived, they talked to the fake cop (later identified as Eric McCoy), who told them that he had investigated a fight between two girls. The officers, taking McCoy's word, talked to the 15 year-old girl through the window of their squad car (to be fair, it was a chilly 46 degrees that day in Queens), then gave the girl a ride to the train station and ordered her to go to school.

Well, so what, so some guys posed as a cop and didn't really do anything. But this is where the story gets bad. Mr. Eric McCoy actually has a thing for having non-consensual relations with women. On December 4, 2006 he raped a woman in a motel room after posing as a cop. On January 2, 2007, he did the same thing, only hours after posing as a police officer and ordering a young girl to wait in a laundromat. Therefore, had the two officers in question done their job, which would have included one or all of the following: checking McCoy's credentials as a cop (which, if he had any, were bogus), talking to witnesses at the scene, interviewing the complainant (15 year-old girl), or getting out of their car to do anything, they could have possibly prevented a rape that occurred hours later. Seemingly harmless laziness led to very serious consequences.

Fine Police Work

Pinellas County Sheriff (Patch.com)

On August 17, 2006 two men were arrested in Florida who were the subject of a drug sting - or were they? Pinellas County Sheriff's Narcotics Division officers were following two black men in a white Chevy Lumina with tinted windows who were seen leaving a house known to be a spot to buy the most awful drug known to man: marijuana. Well, the police lost track of the car so they did the next best thing which was to find a white Lumina with tinted windows being driven by two black guys. The undercover officers followed the new duo into an Enterprise rent-a-car store in St. Petersburg, pointed their guns at the men that they had failed to identify correctly, made them get on the ground, kicked and shoved them a little bit, put them in handcuffs, and then high-fived each other for a job well done.

Well, as most places are, the store was equipped with security cameras which caught all the action on tape. The men just received a settlement worth $100,000 paid for by the taxpayers of Pinellas County, Florida. But there is a question that might be on your mind: this happened back in August, why is it being reported on now? Well, because the officers just started serving their suspensions - a whole 12 days without pay - now. In addition to the 12 days, the men will be assigned to desk duty for a year, then are allowed to go back on the street to arrest any pair of black men who dare drive a white Lumina with tinted windows in Pinellas County.

By the way, this is not just some mistaken arrest, the two innocent men were roughed up enough that Enterprise had to throw out the rug that the men were handcuffed on due to the large amount of blood spilled on it from the men's various cuts, split lips, etc. suffered from the narcs. I do not remember this story being reported on a national scale when it happened, only when it turns out that the police were punished for their wrongdoing. That begs the question - how often do things like this happen and do not get reported on, or how often does it happen and the officers get away with it? It's something to think about, especially if you drive a car and happen to be black.

Miami Port Scare

Port of Miami (Ship Technology)

Just as quickly as it came, the news story of the Miami Port scare on Sunday has been swept under the rug with no more reporting.

How did the Miami piece have racial overtones? Well, just the fact that it made the news in the first place. The media was very careful to mention that the three men under suspicion were Middle Eastern (Iraqi and Lebanese). Essentially, the problem was rooted in a language barrier and there was some miscommunication between the driver and the inspector. However, once the details were ironed out (i.e., the cargo matched the manifest to a T), the men were hauled into the police station and charged with resisting arrest and trespassing (charges which were later dropped completely.)

My question to you is this: do you think that this is the first time that there was a miscommunication issue at the Port of Miami? With the place being one of the busiest ports in the nation, one must believe that mistakes happen. How many breaking news stories have occurred when a white person or non-Middle Easterner has made a mistake with the inspector? I have yet to hear of one. Never mind the cost that this single security scare must have been to the taxpayers of Miami, Florida, and the United States. The FBI, Department of Homeland Security, federal and local law enforcement got involved in what the Miami-Dade police spokesman dubbed "an abundance of caution." Along with an abundance of money and resources.

Of course, profiling Arabs and Middle Easterners is nothing new to America, even before 9/11 occurred. Some of us must be able to remember the rush to judgement of the Oklahoma City Bombing, in which major news sources pointed to the Middle East and their people as the culprits. Alas, come to find out it was Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, two white men avenging the government's bungling of the Waco siege.


Terrorism comes in all shapes and sizes, unfortunately. The idea that terrorism is a tactic cornered by those of Middle Eastern descent is simply wrong, and to assume that an attack is done by someone from the Middle East can hamper investigations (as in OKC) or can waste resources when a simple misunderstanding turns into a federal investigation (as in Miami.)

Tommy Fin

Thoma Finneran (The Boston Globe)

Massachusetts' latest man of authority turned convicted felon is the one, and only, Thomas Finneran, the former Speaker of the House on Beacon Hill. Once dubbed the most powerful man in the State House, he is now a criminal - or so one would think. It has yet to be determined if he will lose his state pension (a no-brainer for someone who lied under oath in a federal case) and it appears that he will lose his half-million dollar a year job as the head of the Massachusetts Biotech Council. So it seems that he will get what is coming to him, right? Well, thanks to the much-respected AM talk radio station WRKO (it's hard to type that with a straight face), it seems that Finneran will be able to hold a steady, well-paying job, something that most convicted felons in this country are deprived of due to their involvement with the justice system.

This, of course, begs the question: how many other convicted felons have the ability to be hired at WRKO? Many companies refuse to hire felons because of that title; it has such a stigma attached to it that many companies want nothing to do with anyone who has been convicted of a felony.

Young felons I've taught in the past were highly concerned that when they got out, they would not be able to find gainful employment due to their past indiscretions. Unfortunately, this is a legitimate concern and the cycle of crime is perpetuated by this unwillingness to hire felons. So back to the original question: would WRKO hire a felon to be a sound guy, or a security guard, or even a janitor? But because Finneran is a wealthy, powerful, white male his felony status is not a factor in his employment. In the unlikely event that WRKO is setting a precedent to hire people that other people won't (i.e. convicted felons), kudos to them. In the more likely event that they are looking to boost ratings with a "controversial" host, any iota of credibility that they may have had has been blown to hell - along with Finneran's reputation.

New Orleans Cops

Suspects in the Danziger Bridge shooting on their way
to turning themselves (NOLA.com)

Today New Orleans suffered another setback. The police officers accused of killing 2 men on a bridge in the days after Katrina will be able to post bail. While the article did not mention the amount of the bail, the fact that the indicted suspects will even be allowed to post bail on such serious charges is ridiculous.

Four of the seven officers are facing the death sentence through first-degree murder charges. How many black cop-killers have been offered bail in a murder case? Yet these police officers are given the benefit of the doubt because of one thing: a shiny badge.

The mentally-challenged man they killed was shot 7 times - 5 times in the back, and no gun was found on his person or near him. This brings flashbacks of Amadou Diallo in New York and the trigger-happy police behind the crime. Let's not forget that those cops walked from their charges.

With the availability of bail for these officers, the judge is sending the future jury of this case a message that they are not violent and should not be held in jail like their civilian counterparts. At the end of the day, cops are people too and are susceptible to the same evils that we are, and should be subject to the same treatment as regular people in the justice system.

While the officers should be commended for staying in the city following Katrina when many of their brethren cut and run, that does not give them the right to murder at will. These officers need to be treated just as everyone else in the justice system. A badge does not exempt you from wrongdoing and it's time that we held the police in this country to the same standard we do everyone else.