Waller County: 'Illegal' Lane Change leads to Death

He doesn't have to have a legal reason to ask her to get out. He has to have a legal reason for a pat down or a search.

 

You don't get it... as soon as he approaches a vehicle he can ask you to stay in the vehicle or get out. Courts have traditionally ruled an officer doesn't need a compelling reason. Perhaps this particular police department has a different set of procedures and they can fire him or punish him for violating the procedures but it won't be based on a larger state or federal violation of her rights.

I am not saying he handled the situation well or that he should even not be disciplined or fired. I am telling you that unless the law has drastically changed, asking her to get out of a vehicle is a lawful command and her failure to do so can lead to arrest. Whether this PD has a different internal policy is possible but he didn't violate her rights based on THAT point. The rest of it, it is possibly if not likely (Taser) and he clearly violated the PD protocol he worked for.

 

Yes.... Which is why they tell you to roll up your windows and close your car door behind you... Makes it harder to get provable cause to search.

 

Two idiots, one dead, the other on paid leave. One a professional the other was not.

Cop is really bad as his job but he'll probably get to keep it.

 

I seriously doubt he gets to keep his job... A few years ago he would have but not so much now... The media through video has exposed cops more so than in the past and the general trust of the police is lower... Departments are not in general as willing to stand behind their officers.

 

No not this time he'll lose his job he wasn't very professional after he asked her why was she upset he has once again put a bad taste in Texans mouth about a DPS officer they have been the best that Texas have now because of his actions DPS will be looked at as unprofessional officers when most people know that they are the best in the state.

 

She was not legally obligated to put out the cigarette unless he was placing her under arrest because at that point a lit cigarette could interfere with an officers ability to complete the arrest.

 

True but as he stated he was going to give her a warning so he had reason to ask her to get out of the car.

 

I hope you're both right. He did a terrible job with multiple shake your head moments.

 

He wont keep his job, not in todays environment, nor should he. He sucks at it.

 

She was legally obligated to get out of the car if commanded to do so. The cigarette really had nothing to do with it.... She was a disrespectful rude woman and as an officer he wasn't used to it and he was a fool and let it escalate. They both lost. She was going to be let go with a warning and he was going to be going about his work shift. Instead she was arrested for failing to follow a lawful police command and it appears he filed charges for assault of an officer... Now she either committed suicide or was killed... Either way she lost. Mr. Officer is now plastered all over the television and net, is facing at a minimum disciplinary reprecussions for lacking professional self control and is most likely never going to be an officer again and a defendant in a wrongful death suit. He lost.

They both lost because they couldn't act like empathetic, responsible adults. I don't find either one of them especially likable either.

 

Considering this cops past, first thing I would request is the demographics of everyone he pulled over for failure to use a ****ing turn signal in the middle of the afternoon.

 

Well dam Nook you just somewhat said it all even if he had no reason to ask her to exit the car they both lost and the tax payers of Texas have lost.

 

The only thing that matters is that he gave her a lawful order to exit the vehicle and she refused to comply. The cigarette is really irrelevant. It might have been the reason why he decided to conduct a further investigation, but none of that mattered after she refused to get out of the car.

If she complied with the order to get out of the vehicle, she could probably have gotten by with ignoring the order to put out the cigarette...but that doesn't really matter.

There's very little chance he loses his job over this, the video vindicates him.

 

You are insane if you think this vindicates him. Either that or you are some sort of eunuch that is so scared to question authority that it physically frightens you.

There is ZERO excuse for a Police Officer to act like that. He was not threatened in any manor, yet he threatened to taze a woman? He then made fun of her for having epilepsy.

He is 100% toast. And he should be. More tax dollars shouldnt be spent on someone like this turd.

 

He gave a lawful order, she ignored it and then kicked the cop and resisted arrest. All of those things are against the law.

He threatened to taze her because it was the least violent way of getting her out of the car. She was being a total moron and he would have been well within his rights to simply drag her ass out of there. Instead, he just threatened to use the tazer and she complied....what's wrong with that in your mind?

If she wasn't a total and complete potato, she'd have just gotten a warning for the 2 blatant traffic violations in front of the cop....most cops aren't that cool.

 

Why did he need her to get out of the car?

That is what escalated everything. Why do you bend over and accept tyranny from these assholes? Which is exactly what this guy is and has a history of being.

We pay his salary. Now we are gonna spend millions in tax dollars investigating this. because this dumbass wanted to be billy bad ass. Write the lady a ticket, tell her to shut up, and get on your way.

His job isn't to antagonize the citizens he is supposed to be protecting.

 

He needed her to get out of the car to further conduct an investigation....which is related to her acting strangely.

That's not tyranny.

The reason for the investigation is because a mentally unstable woman escalated what would have been a warning for multiple traffic violations into an arrest for assaulting a police officer....then she killed herself in jail. The investigation probably won't take very long because this is pretty straight forward.

There's really not much to see here other than an unfortunate case of a crazy person forcibly removing themselves from the gene pool.

 

Anyway, I'll just say that I certainly hope that everyone here is smart enough to not act that way when they get pulled over because it's just asking for trouble, and not every cop is as cool about it as this one was.

 

He needed to get her out to conduct an investigation? You are either crazier than her or just a complete tool, probably both.

Why you want criticize obvious ridiculous behavior of both of these people is just weird. If the cop writes a ticket hands it to her and goes on his way, you know his job. None of this happens. He doesn't waste millions of dollars of our money.