The only proper purpose of a government is to protect man’s rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence. A proper government is only a policeman, acting as an agent of man’s self-defense, and, as such, may resort to force only against those who start the use of force. The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law. But a government that initiates the employment of force against men who had forced no one, the employment of armed compulsion against disarmed victims, is a nightmare infernal machine designed to annihilate morality: such a government reverses its only moral purpose and switches from the role of protector to the role of man’s deadliest enemy, from the role of policeman to the role of a criminal vested with the right to the wielding of violence against victims deprived of the right of self-defense. Such a government substitutes for morality the following rule of social conduct: you may do whatever you please to your neighbor, provided your gang is bigger than his.

New York, New York – NYPD Detective Sekou Bourne is being accused of tackling and assaulting a woman because he thought that she had drugs. However, what the detective believed to be drugs was just a lollipop.

Jarnale Henry claims that the officer assaulted her in her Brooklyn apartment after he mistook her for a drug dealer.

Last April, Bourne was reportedly snooping around Jarnale’s apartment complex in search of drug dealers. At one point, Bourne was hanging around Jarnale’s apartment, so she asked him, “What do you want?” according to court documents.

According to Jarnale, the officer then became violent with her.

“He pushed me down … They knocked my lollipop to the ground. I fell on my leg, onto my whole right side,” Jarnale said.

In Court, Bourne said that the lollipop looked like it could be marijuana, and he also claimed that the way she said “what do you want” indicated that she was selling drugs.

“I thought it was a drug-related question. I thought she was asking me if I needed any drugs. That’s when I identified myself as a police officer,” Bourne said in court.

Bourne denies tackling her, but he says that she tripped on her own.

“She tripped and fell on her own. Then I got on top of her and began frisking her for my safety,” he said.

Bourne has a history of wrongly suspecting people of having drugs and assaulting them without any probable cause.

In addition to the accusations from Jarnale, Bourne is also being investigated for the assault of 17-year-old Marcel Hamer. In the case of Hamer, Bourne attacked him because he believed that the teenager was smoking marijuana, but it was just a cigarette.

So far, just one organization has opposed it–the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers (SHOPO), the all-powerful police union that not only succeeded in getting the special exemption passed by the Legislature back in 1996, but has lobbied hard to defeat repeal and reform measures ever since.

“Finally, release of officers’ names that have been suspended may have a chilling effect on the extent of action taken by officers who often have to make split second decisions,” SHOPO President Tenari Maafala said in his Feb. 5 written testimony on the bill to the Senate Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental & Military Affairs. “It impacts not only the officers but their families, too. Though other employees are subject to release of their names for suspensions, rarely, if ever, does that happen because of the level of news worthiness.”

Given SHOPO’s past success in getting meaningful reforms like this squashed, we’re holding our breath.

In a complaint filed in federal court, Kenya Harris explained that she went to the Albany Police Department in May 2011 to pick up her minor son after he was arrested, according to Courthouse News.

Harris said she waited five hours for her son before informing Officers Ryan Jenkins that she needed to return home to take care of her other children.

“Defendant Officer Jenkins stated that he did not appreciate the tone in which she was communicating with him, and further stated that if she continued he would take her head and ‘put it to the floor,’” the lawsuit stated.

The mother once again insisted that she needed to leave, and that’s when Jenkins decided to use force.

“Defendant Officer Jenkins, without provocation, grabbed plaintiff, who weighs less than one hundred twenty (120) pounds, by her neck and slammed her to the ground,” the lawsuit said. “Plaintiff momentarily blacked out and came to with defendant Officer Jenkins sitting on her back, and with his knee on her arm. Plaintiff was pregnant at the time.”

“Defendant Officer Jenkins put handcuffs on plaintiff and slammed her against the wall. Plaintiff was placed into an interrogation room after she was beaten and handcuffed.”

Harris asked for medical attention, but officers denied the request. Instead, she was charged with obstruction, and spent one night in the Dougherty County Jail.

In the lawsuit, Harris asserted that excessive force caused her miscarriage. She also suffered injuries to her knee, neck and other areas.

Driving down the highway when we notice the police have a car pulled over in the far right of the shoulder(the shoulders in our state and this highway in particular are very large.. say 20+ feet) . In the state of Texas the law is either move over to the far left lane at normal speed or slow down 20 mph under the speed limit if you're in any of the other lanes. The speed limit on this highway is 75 mph. I'd say we were moving close to 2-10 mph. Then officer Travis Alewine Badge #12523 runs over 15 feet to get to the edge of our lane and demands we get over. Well there was a giant truck in the way but as we were making our way to the next lane the officer reaches out hitting the car putting a dent in the hood. Then he proceeds to pull us over and accuse us of trying to run him over and issues a citation. This is whats wrong with the police in this state. You're obeying the law and they can just run out into traffic and start writing tickets because they are on some power trip and think they are above the law.

A federal judge’s order to allow a jury to hear the excessive-force claim of a man who survived being shot 16 times by a state corrections officer and a King County sheriff’s deputy is raising a new question: whether Officer Kristopher Rongen and Deputy Aaron Thompson gave truthful accounts of what occurred when they shot Dustin Theoharis in his bed on Feb. 11, 2012.

U.S. District Judge Richard Jones, in a 31-page order issued Friday, denied the state’s request to dismiss Theoharis’ claim, citing conflicting versions of what occurred.

“Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Mr. Theoharis,” Jones wrote, referring to the standard of review, “the shooting constituted excessive force in violation of clearly established Fourth Amendment law.”

King County already has settled with Theoharis, agreeing in 2013 to pay him $3 million. A onetime refrigeration mechanic, Theoharis, 31, is no longer able to work, according to his attorney.

A Lakeside Walmart customer pulled out his cell phone in front of the store on Monday evening to capture video of Lakeside Police arresting a man suspected of shoplifting. The man shooting the video, Chris Hoover, didn't expect he'd end up in handcuffs, too.

The video shows two police officers wrestling a man on the ground. When they get the man in cuffs one officer realizes there is a camera. During the commotion the officer points at the camera and says "that phone is evidence. I want it." Hoover then says "it's mine."

"So he snatched it out of my hand... I wasn't going to resist. He grabbed my wrist, and then he put me in cuffs," Hoover said.

Lakeside police would not go on camera, citing an ongoing investigation. However, they did say they stand by their officers. They say police have a right to detain someone if they have video of a crime.

"He said, 'look, you have two choices,'" Hoover explained. "He said, 'either I will arrest you right here, right now for obstructing justice, and then we will get a search warrant, and we will get your phone, and we will get that piece of video as police evidence.'"

The ACLU of Colorado says police can get a search warrant but that the phone typically should remain with the owner until that warrant is obtained.

"Police officers can ask for a copy or ask for the video, but in the absence of a warrant, to actually seize somebody's personal property, I don't think police officers can seize it or threaten to seize it except in the most extreme emergency circumstances," ACLU Colorado Director Mark Silverstein said.

Hoover eventually gave in. He sent the officer a copy of the recording via email.

"It made me want to be angry, but honestly I was scared," Hoover said.

Silverstein says more regulations may need to be put in place.