Update: Gate Crashing - Secret Service...

[EJSG19]

Well, the story below is what it is. But this leads me to a question that I don't have the answer to. Apparently the same holds true from local law enforcement clear on up to the Secret Service. If you (a LE individual) screw up, everyone thinks you screwed up, and you are being investigated, you are put on paid leave. Meaning, you don't go to work, and you get paid for it, no? So you screw up and you are rewarded.

Why then if I screw up, and everyone thinks I screwed up, I get put in jail, and I am not paid for it. In fact, I likely would lose my job, and couldn't get another one. I'm not concerned with the end result of investigations. I think with all the news stories we've seen that sometimes LE gets a better shake in the court system than non-LE's do, but thats a whole other issue.

Double standard seems like doesn't it? Is this the way we really want it, for some reason not apparent to me? How do we fix it? Go to the people who can fix it, which are the politicians, law enforcement high-ups, and court system... oh yeah they are the problem, and would have incentive to leave things the way they are...

http://www.reuters.com/article/joeBiden/idUSTRE5B164E20091203

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Three U.S. Secret Service officers were put on paid leave for their role in letting an uninvited couple breeze into President Barack Obama's debut state dinner last week, where they shook hands with the president and had smiling photos taken with various officials.

Secret Service director Mark Sullivan, who spent the morning being grilled over the security breach by lawmakers at a hearing on Capitol Hill, said the agency had identified the agents who had worked the security checkpoint.

"Established procedures related to entering the White House were not followed at the initial checkpoint," Sullivan told a House of Representatives committee. "A mistake was made. In our line of work we cannot afford even one mistake."

Sullivan took responsibility for the security breach that cleared Michaele Salahi, an aspiring reality TV contestant, and her husband Tareq in to the dinner without an invitation, calling it "unacceptable and indefensible."

Even though the Salahis had not received a coveted invitation to the elaborate dinner party in honor of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, they managed to talk their way through the Secret Service checkpoint.

The officers failed to follow procedures that require them to call a member of the White House staff if they are approached by people seeking entry who are not on the guest list, Sullivan said.

But he said Obama and Singh were never in danger.

The Salahis shot to fame after news organizations picked up on pictures plastered on their Facebook page showing the couple at the state dinner posing with Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Marines guarding the White House.

The Salahis have claimed they did not crash the party but were invited guests. They refused to testify at the hearing and the House Homeland Security committee is preparing to subpoena them to force them to testify.

Obama told USA Today that he "could not have more confidence in the Secret Service" despite the security breach.

(Reporting by Deborah Charles, editing by Vicki Allen)

[Paul]

Well first off... It's partially a result of the unions.

Second, it's a result of the job and nature of the allegations.

Letting a person in a position of authority to continue work IF they did something wrong is a huge liability. If a person is in a position to take away another person's freedom, or their life, you need to make sure they are of sound judgement and are of good morale character. The only viable option in most cases is to remove the person from duty.

Also, complaints against LEO's happen ALL the time... And contrary to what many may believe, most of them are unfounded. Complaints are usually in three forms.

1) The complaint is valid, and the officer acted inappropriately/outside of the law/department policy & procedure.

2) The complaint is valid, but the officer acted appropriately/within the law/department policy & procedure.

3) The complaint is untrue and/or completely fabricated.

Number 2 is probably the most common, where someone is pissed off that they received a ticket, went to jail, did not get what they wanted from the officer and file a complaint. The officer may have done everything that the complainant alleges, but that does not mean they did anything wrong.

Number 3, unfortunately, is also all too common. I have received several complaints, none of them that fell into the first category, many that fell into the second category, and one that fell into the third category. Fortunately for me, there was evidence that proved I did absolutely nothing wrong. I.E., audio/video recording that completely proved the allegation to be false and fabricated.

The fact is that law enforcement officers deal with people in their worst moments, not their best... So people are pissed off and often times don't want to take responsibility for their own actions and problems. Complaints happen, all the time... If you removed the officer from the job without pay anytime a complaint came in, that would result in a huge and unfair punitive punishment to the officer. People would make complaints knowing it would screw with the officer's livelihood regardless of the validity of the complaint.

There are bad cops out there, and many incidences that fall into the first category, and they ultimately get removed from the job.

I realize this is a different aspect than the Secret Service scenario... But the OP seemed to include all LEO's under the umbrella.

Just my .02, FWIW.

[EJSG19]

All right, first off, sorry if my post sounded like I included all LEO's everywhere. We've stated before that "hopefully" any time a complaint arises around here about LE, that it only refers to the less than savory individuals. Good LEO's are not to be included simply by association, however difficult that line is to draw.

I meant of course, only the ones who have done something bad/wrong/negligent etc. This scenario in the OP for example, the proof is slapping us in the face, at least from what the people in the article are saying. They seem to know who was responsible, they know what they did, and they get put on paid vacation. Un-invited guests made it close enough to the Pres* to do whatever it was they wanted at the time. This, we all would assume is a bad thing, to have ANY president vulnerable like that. (all obama rhetoric aside) (lets also set aside the "well lets see how it pans out" stuff, just for the sake of argument)

As with my failing at making a disclaimer that I don't mean all LEO's, just the bad ones, its hard to eloquently address every aspect of a situation when caught up in the moment. The intent wasn't to include all LEO's everywhere.

So, anyway, under the assumption (yep, I know what they say about assumptions, but let me play devil's advocate for a second.) that we know what the article says we know. Why does the guy get a soft-assed reprimand, paid vacation until it blows over, and then apparently back to work no harm no foul? Isn't risk of harm to the President worth more than that? Maybe not evidently.

[DeanC]

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[Widge]

Because of the high number of malicious complaints, and the egregiousness of treating one officer differently to another, everyone gets put on administrative leave until the investigation is complete. if they didn't do that you'd have this scenario:

Officer A: subject of a complaint from Mr. White (a notorious complainer) - Admin leave because it's 99% certain the complaint is BS.

Officer B: subject of a similar complaint from Mr. Black (who has never complained before) - Suspended w/o pay because it could be justified.

Can you say 'Lawsuit'?


Compare to:

Employee 'A' given written warning for tardiness over 6 times in one month

Employee 'B' fired for tardiness over 6 times in one month

Same offense > > different punishment = $$$