Nauseating police detention in Aurora CO

OMG those poor kids! They must have been so terrified! 

Those poor children! JFC!

But hey, the plate number was right, THOUGH IT WAS A CAR & THEY WERE LOOKING FOR A MOTORCYCLE!

But if the passengers are POC, it must be stolen, right? /s


There needs to be serious repercussions for wrong actions like this.

I feel sick.

Forty plus years ago, my date and I were pulled over by A cop as we were driving through a bad part of town en route to somewhere else. Cop said car was stolen, although my date had the paperwork. Cuffed him and laid him out in the road, not sidewalk, just like that photo above.
Eventually put him in the cop car. Leaving me alone on a bad street in a bad part of town, pre cell phone, no pay phone anywhere in sight. Date freaks out about my safety. Cop takes car keys and gives them to me so I can wait in the car for a taxi he calls for me.

Wait. Car is "stolen" and Cop. Gives. Me. The. Keys? Oh hell no. Something is rotten.

On the way to the cop shop, Cop confessed he pulled my date over because he had long hair and the cops have a bet going about how many "long hairs" they can bring into the station. Winner gets a case of beer.

Nothing has changed. Small dicks with too much power.

I think the Aurora PD needs to be cleaned out and started over. Clearly something has gone very wrong in their hiring and training practices.

@dallie wow! That is a crazy story. From some of the stories and podcasts that I have listened to, it seems that the whole justice system is messed up in a lot of ways, including lawyers, judges, police officers having lost the perspective to see how situations like this can harm people. From trauma to not being able to get housing, financial problems, work issues, etc. What members of the legal system seem to think are "minor" and inconsequential interactions with the law can really cause serious consequences for people.

I guess I would've gone to jail because I wouldn't have been able to stand there silently while those children were on the ground crying and screaming. What the fuck is wrong with people??? WHY were any of them on the ground but most of all, A SIX YEAR OLD???

I have a very good friend who is an Aurora Policeman.. he is the nicest guy ever. He once got behind a car that was sitting on an off ramp that seemed to be having problems, went up to help them out, guy got out of the car with a hatchet and proceed to try to hit him over the head (with the blade). It was horrible. My friend after getting stitched up was okay but it sure took a toll on the kids and his wife. You never want to get that call on the 'special phone' in the middle of the night. Aurora has some not so good areas. (NOT that they have any right to pull those girls over at all). Aurora is just one of those funky towns that go from high end to low end within a few blocks. The town gets a bad rap. But I do agree, something needs to be done...

Just cops being cops...but they're not all bad. *sarcasm*

I'm right there with you! How can you mistake an SUV for a motorcycle? I hope that there is some discipline for these morons. SUV . . . motorcycle . . .

That's awful! I live in VT and while we may be seen as liberal Bernie lovers, this is a pretty racist (and white) state. I don't think I met a POC until I was in high school and it was at camp and he wasn't from VT. Things I hear my students say sometimes almost knock me over. Trying to explain to them why it isn't okay is so difficult because they are raised to believe such awful things. Having a president that condones these behaviors just makes it that much more difficult.

All kinds of things went wrong in the situation... Including BAD info in the PD system/computers!!

**
"I (police chief) have called (Gilliam's) family to apologize and to offer any help we can provide, especially for the children who may have been traumatized by yesterday's events," Interim Chief of Police Vanessa Wilson said late Monday. "I have reached out to our victim advocates so we can offer age-appropriate therapy that the city will cover."
**
when Aurora police pulled up behind her vehicle with guns drawn and yelled for them to put their hands out of the window and to get out of the car.

Gilliam and the girls got out of the vehicle and were told to lay face down on the ground, she said. At that time, police handcuffed Gilliam, her sister and niece. Gilliam said the police wouldn't tell her why she was pulled over until she was handcuffed.

Aurora police told Gilliam her vehicle was stolen, she said. Gilliam said she told them her vehicle has been stolen in February, but that it was cleared up. She said she offered to show them the vehicle registration and insurance paperwork.

Gilliam's attorney emphasized to CNN that when the vehicle was stolen in February, it was returned to her the next day by the Aurora Police.
Gilliam said she asked why the kids were being handcuffed and she was told officers handcuff kids when they get hostile.

"If you wanted to place me in handcuffs at that point, I would have gladly agreed to that because you had a job to do and you did it under the right protocol, but you pointed a gun at four kids and then you proceeded to start handcuffing the kids," Gilliam said.

Gilliam said police later told her about the mix-up.
**
Officers were alerted to a possible stolen vehicle just before 11 a.m. Sunday, according to a statement from the department. They stopped a vehicle matching the license plate and description, ordered the people inside onto the ground and placed some in handcuffs, police said.

After the stop, officers realized the car Gilliam was driving was not stolen, but that another vehicle with the same plate information but from a different state had been, police said in the statement.

"The confusion may have been due, in part, to the fact that the stopped car was reported stolen earlier in the year," the statement said. "After realizing the mistake, officers immediately unhandcuffed everyone involved, explained what happened and apologized."
**
www.cnn.com/2020/08/04/us/aurora-police-draw-guns-girls/index.html

And this is the result of the training that began in the 90's to teach police to look at everyone as a potential criminal.  They lose the ability to read a situation and behave like normal human beings.  Those poor kids - I can't even imagine how traumatizing that must have been.  More and more I think the police unions, all police training and the entire thing needs to be flushed to start over.  

I wasn't trying to defend the town or whatever.. just explaining to those who are not familiar with Aurora as best as I could.  It could happen in any town any day. My friend wasn't there, he works a different division (I don't know how all that works... he is a traffic police so usually he isn't involved in any of these type cases).. And in any other town, there are the good cops and bad.  We all know that.