Do Police Have An Obligation To Protect You?

There was an interesting discussion on Marc Stevens' website. They were asking "Do police have an obligation to protect you?" (I noticed that I'm getting some good subjects from reading that forum.)

The answer is "No. Police don't have a positive obligation to protect you." In most states, it's illegal to protect yourself by carrying a gun. Even worse, a policeman can injure you, and there's usually no penalty for the policeman. Only truly egregious police misconduct is punished.

Suppose there's a crime in progress. You call 911. If the police fail to respond, that's too bad for you. You can't sue the police for negligence.

If you're the victim of a crime, the police don't have a positive obligation to investigate. If the police say "We're too busy with other things." or "We couldn't find the criminal.", that's too bad.

Police don't have an obligation to reimburse you for your loss, if you're the victim of a crime. They might recover stolen property. If you're assaulted or killed, the police don't have to reimburse you. The police may punish the criminal by jailing him. There's no compensation for the victim. Stats justice is punishment-based and not compensation-based.

There is no contractual relationship, between slave/taxpayer and the State. If the State police monopoly does a lousy job, that's too bad. You can't hold State agents accountable for lousy performance.

Most police do the best they can. A policeman doesn't get up every day thinking "Who am I going to abuse today?" State crime occurs when people with good intentions follow orders without thinking.

The police operate within the framework of a corrupt system, but otherwise do the best they can. If you're the type of person who thinks "Is this law I'm enforcing really a good law?", then your policeman career is short. The police recruitment process weeds out independent thinkers. For example, if you score to high on an "intelligence test", you're excluded!

When there's a real crime (murder, theft, assault), police try to investigate. If real crime went totally unsolved, people would get disgusted with the State police monopoly. Some of my relatives were robbed, and the police didn't find the criminal.

The police that investigate real crime behave mostly honestly. The police that investigate "victimless" crime tend to be scumbags. For example, when a DEA agent is interviewed on TV, I can usually tell he's a parasite/psychopath. The IRS and tax collectors tend to be mostly dishonest.

The primary function of police is tax collection. Police are a standing army used to collect taxes. To preserve the illusion of legitimacy, some police investigate real crime. The police are on call, anytime a show of violence is needed to compel obedience.

For example, if you own a business and have unpaid sales taxes, then the police will shut down your business. Then, you can't even stay open to repay the alleged tax bill! The IRS dispatches no-knock raids against people who refuse to pay their tribute.

The police don't have a positive obligation to protect you. It's also illegal to protect yourself! Many states have strict laws, preventing non-policemen from carrying a gun. In some states, it's hard to get a gun permit or purchase a gun. Police don't have to protect you, and it may be illegal to protect yourself! Even if you legally own a gun, you may be charged with a crime if you defend yourself.

Police don't have an obligation to protect you. It's mostly illegal to protect yourself, either via gun ownership restrictions or by prosecuting people who use legally-owned guns. Can it get any worse? Yes.

Police don't have an obligation to protect you. In addition, police are nearly absolutely immune, if they hurt you.

If police arrest/kidnap you, and you resist, then the police may use excessive force and they'll charge you with "resisting arrest".

Suppose police conduct a no-knock raid of the wrong address. During the confusion of the raid, the policeman kills you. All the policeman has to do is say "I thought he had a gun!", and now it's legal murder.

Only truly egregious misconduct is punished. Most of the time, the policeman gets a paid vacation and a slap on the wrist. Even if charged with a crime, the policeman's sentence is light. It'll be "involuntary manslaughter" rather than murder.

Mental state is a key component of a crime ("mens rea"). No State-employed policeman would intentionally hurt someone. Therefore, policemen never commit crimes.

If police do inappropriately murder you, then your heirs might file a "wrongful death" lawsuit. However, you're suing the government and not the individual policeman. Police union contracts specify that the government reimburses them for all work-related civil lawsuits.

Suing the government is pointless. You aren't holding the police accountable. Any verdict is paid from the State's budget. If you win a $25M wrongful death lawsuit, then everyone else pays higher taxes to offset the lawsuit cost. The police and bureaucrats are not personally accountable.

To promote accountability, if there's a wrongful death verdict, each policeman should be required to pay his share, via a payroll deduction. For example, with a $25M wrongful death verdict and 50k policemen, then each policeman should be required to pay $500. That isn't politically feasible. That would promote accountability.

The police don't have a positive obligation to protect people. You can't sue them for negligence, if they do a lousy job. There is no contractual relationship between taxpayer/slave and the State. The police force you to pay taxes/tribute, under threat of violence. There is no requirement to provide a specific level of service.

The police don't have a positive obligation to protect you. Even worse, it's illegal to defend yourself. Not only is there no obligation to protect, police are nearly absolutely immune from liability, if they injure you.

Police behave more like a hostile occupying army, than protectors of freedom. The primary function of police is to collect taxes and prevent "forbidden" economic activity. In their spare time, police investigate real crime. This provides the illusion that State police are beneficial.

The State police have a monopoly. That makes it hard to tell if they're doing a good job, or if there's massive waste and inefficiency. The slaves are forced to pay police salaries under threat of police violence. There's no market competition. There's no incentive to do a good job, other than doing a good enough job so that people don't revolt or start forming vigilante (non-State-controlled) police.

Statists are very hostile to "vigilante" police groups, because they threaten the State's core monopoly, the police and violence monopoly. The police monopoly is a key component of State evil. Police use violence and threat of violence to force slaves to pay tribute.

Police collect taxes under threat of violence. Taxes pay the policeman's salary. Of course, the policeman will always agree with the tax collector. Almost no judge, prosecutor, tax collector, policeman, or bureaucrat will side with an individual in a tax dispute with the State. There's a conflict of interest.