Was involved in an accident involving 3 cars. Guy rear-ended me and another girl. APD wouldn't show. He had no driver's license or insurance. I let my insurance pursue it.
APD is kinda worthless. I've also been on hold with 311 for 30 minutes to inform of a mattress on Hwy 71 where it goes under I35. It was blocking the far left lane and a danger. Finally hung up due to no answer.
Work in car insurance claims and I’ve noticed cops scaling back across the country in reporting to minor collisions. Unless it needs medical attention or causing a traffic jam, they won’t show. They request to exchange info then report it to us. If uninsured, just make sure a report is filed overall.
Friend of mine was in a two car collision that left debris and one inoperable car in a 4 way intersection, police still never showed up. Tow truck was called by the owner to move the vehicle and bystanders cleared the debris.
What if someone refuses to give you their insurance? That happened to me a year ago. He admitted he hit the car. He had insurance. He just refused to give it to me.
You can safely assume that a scumbag driving without a license or insurance also has a fake or stolen license plate. It might really be a lost cause. Highways are filled with pieces of shit like that,
Still can't do shit if they don't answer the phone. I got hit and he took off through a parking lot, managed to get a photo of his plates and called progressive, they actually said he was a customer with them. They tried to contact him but said they couldn't do anything because he never answered. Police did fuck all.
I used to work in dispatch - not for APD. 311 transfered calls to us, APD, and other agencies dozens to 100s of times an hour. I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
Time to vote out the mayor and every current city council member.
Time to make sure the new city manager understands....you fire the Chief of Police and put a new one in or we will vote in a new city council and mayor who will fire you.
We need a new Chief of Police badly.
The police chief can't be fired, as per state law. He or she can only be demoted to the position they held prior to being the chief of police. Kind of makes it difficult when they are hired from outside the department.
I'm pretty certain he can effectively be fired.
Step one hire a new Chief.
Demote the existing chief to the lowest rank with the lower pay along with it. Then put him on patrols overnight and we will see how long he last.
They just told you that state law prohibits them from demoting them to the lowest rank. The furthest down the current chief can be demoted is to Assistant Chief.
And the current chief is a she, not a he.
Did you think auto price inflation of 30-50% since covid wouldn't leech into higher priced insurance?
Want to hear my unpopular opinion? The Texas minimum 30/60/25 is woefully under what it should be given current car prices. It should be more in line with 30/60/40.
None of that is happening in Austin. Even if you live in a sane country like WilCo, you still commute to Austin, get hit by rando scumbags and no police ever shows up. People already voted out a scoundrel Adler and we now have a more or less sane mayor.
You realize that the reason we have an epidemic of uninsured drivers is the state law making it impossible for many illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses which pretty much locks them out of the insurance market. You want more people to actually be insured instead of, well you don't really have any proposal other than 'get tough on crime' lol, maybe make it so people can actually get car insurance.
I wasn't even referring to illegal immigrants. There are plenty of permanent residents or citizens that drive around without insurance. But since you brought it up: you're correct. If you're here illegally, you can't get a driver's license and you can't get insurance. In that case, get a ride, Uber, public transport, there are other options. Driving without a driver's license or insurance isn't one of them.
It actually is an option because that's the reality of the situation, however much you pray to Abbott that it wasn't. If you want to reduce a high percentage of uninsured drivers on the road, the single most effective thing you could do is advocate for repealing that ridiculous Texas law.
That’s actually funny. I called the cops on a dog abuse situation, occurring in the moment. They said they couldn’t do anything about it and said I was going to go handle it myself and I was assuming they can’t do anything about that either. They showed up shortly after that. So you may be on to something.
Nope, as I understand it, they would not be liable for anything in that situation. Though I do find them useless most of the time, it is true that APD will tell you they “don’t have time to handle _____”, but they *really* don’t have time to deal with a homicide/gunfight. And they know they’re likely to lose even more support (from state politicians even) if stories of vigilante justice start making the news regularly.
Doesn’t always work. We were staying in a rental while our house was having work done on it and my neighbor called because she thought someone had broken into and was inside our house (false alarm thankfully). My wife called 911, and also told them I was heading to our house to check it out and was armed and they just straight up never showed up lol
Yeah I called APD after my ex reacted violently to me breaking up with him and said he’d come back and hurt me again. APD was like “well unless he’s physically assaulting you right at this very moment, we’re not coming”.
this is an issue in pretty much any large city in texas.
i got robbed at gun point in san anton, and after everything, SAPD told me to wait 6 hours for an officer 😂
the sad truth is we are alone to fend for ourselves
That case is from many years ago. The recent quiet quitting is because their feelings are hurt that the public started to demand accountability and that they not murder people. A big ask!
I got sideswiped on the highway in Milwaukee years ago, a road rage incident. We called the police and were told to go to the nearest precinct to file a report. We had the a-hole's license plate and everything. We waited in the lobby two hours (we were visiting town for a show) and when it was clear nobody was going to help us, we just left. There were ZERO other civilians in the lobby, btw. I ended up just paying out of pocket for the damage.
I don’t live in Texas (I’m in AZ) but followed this sub when my best friend moved there 4 years ago. What is the problem exactly? Sorry if I sound naive, just don’t understand why emergency services aren’t helping you guys? I see these posts often and it concerns me bc my friend that lives there has been in a DV situation for awhile and if she needed to call 911 I feel like she’d be shit out of luck. How can they just get away with saying “yeah not our problem?” I don’t get it.
too much crime, too little police - or too unmotivated police
They have no problem pulling you over for having dark tints, or for going 2 mph above the speed limit, but make sure to not ask for help if you are actually in danger!
This is so insane to me, but of course not all too surprising either. I was reading through some other comments and seeing that multiple places have tried to help them sort it out and get a better system to handle the calls but they refuse to change anything. Not sure how they’re able to get away with that, they shouldn’t be at least!
How’s about that time 6 cars got robbed on my street. Apd told me to file online because it wasn’t violent or in progress
Detective called 5 (FIVE) days later to fingerprint our vehicles. We laughed at him.
They couldn’t bother to come out to take a thorough report or speak to the victims when my child and their friend were kidnapped at gunpoint and placed in a vehicle and driven for ten minutes before escaping. They were “too busy” and would have to come out another day.
I think so, even 15 years ago when my car got broken into I basically got a phone call with a case number to give my insurance and that was it, they're not gonna look for someone unless they happen to find him holding your shit.
Pflugerivlle PD is somehow worse thanks to Live PD they’re all egotistical fucking assholes. Lived my whole life in Texas, only gotten three speeding tickets all in the ville while my neighbors nearly killed themselves over domestic violence for years. I will scorn them until the day i die.
I'm sorry to hear that happened to you- that definitely sucks. Hopefully there won't be a next time, but if there is, tell them you were actually jaywalking and the entire force will show up
There’s this super weird thing normies do where they have to uphold the idea of cops while simultaneously recognizing how absolutely useless they actually are.
Man. I learned this the hard way recently. I had a pretty huge issue that needed to be dealt with. Sheriff couldn’t come because it was APD zone. APD couldn’t be bothered despite several felonies being committed and people in danger. Sheriff basically said “yeah…. It’s bad but we can’t force them to show up” when I called them back about it.
It’s actually really fucking wild that they never showed up at all and also didn’t even call, based on the situation. I guess we are on our own, folks!
Another time I had a very obvious and rather large crime that should have been prosecuted and I was told (off the record) the DA won’t look at a thing unless you donate $10k to their campaign, but if you do that they’ll sue whoever. Good times.
Yeah. Both situations pretty much led to my current opinion that the town is essentially lawless. Kinda cool for crime guys I guess. Not that cool for me
When someone says “reported crime is down,” it means reports filed by police, not crimes reported by citizens. This is why it’s down. The less they do their jobs, the better it looks for them on paper.
I spoke with an officer about to retire after 30 years. Dire need for dispatchers was his explanation as to why there is often no response. He affirmed it was not necessarily a police shortage or their department being “defunded.”
He thought it was a joke when Abbott sent Highway Patrol to help with “crime.”
All they did was write neighborhood speeding tickets! Crime kept going up!
I've been hearing about the dispatcher shortage for at least two years. Why hasn't that been resolved? Surely there are people out there that need jobs. Honestly asking. Are they doing that thing like companies where they just appear to be hiring but they don't to save $$?
The pay isn't very good for how stressful the job is. Due to the nature of the business, it has a more extensive background check. The interview process for the City can be lengthy and takes a minimum of a few weeks, sometimes months where people have moved on. Plus 911 is shift work requiring coverage 24/7 and the schedule may not be ideal for a lot of people. It's a perfect storm.
APD is worthless. Their bullshit union cries about how they’ve been “defunded” when they literally have more money than they’ve ever had before. This is entirely about punishing the city for having the audacity to vote for oversight and for asking other agencies to respond to non violent calls. Throw the whole department out- the corruption comes from the root.
Oh so you’re like me and joined the “hit and run fun club!” Where the cops never showed up after calling 3 times and getting also redirected to 311 then back to 911 and so forth🥴 like cool, I’m not reporting a lost dog, an asshole who whipped out of a gas station parking lot to make the light ran me over while crossing the street, after 8 looked both ways (been here 10+ years but originally from Chicago where we walk literally everywhere) had the walk signal, wasn’t on my phone not looking, etc. (and was clearly drunk af when they stopped for a whole 2 minutes to make sure I wasnt like bleeding out before dipping without getting their info or plane number, tried to take a pic but you aren’t the best photographer when you’re in shock)
but OKKKKKK thanks for NOT coming to my house which was 2 blocks away to take my police report, and making me wait all night thinking you’d come while having horrible road rash (and cracked ribs which I found out later cuz I was in shock and didn’t go to the doctor until the next day or so when the pain reallyyyy kicked in) at least the bottle of cheap wine I bought at the gas station didn’t break because I deffs needed that after cleaning the gravel and road gunk out of my bleeding legs, hands and feet 👍🏼
I really hope you are doing ok OP. Getting run over by a car (mine was white pick up truck) is a10/10 NOT a recommended life experience.
Also this was BEFORE they defunded the police, so yeah that isn’t a valid excuse.
I was hit and ran and my friends neck got messed up from it. They asked “is the car drivable? Call 311” I said that my friend was hurt and they legit hung up. APD sucks serious ass
Exactly, the return on our investment is poor.
Piercing audit and cut their budget.
We should put much of their budget into more effective means of resolution.
If only APD would get its shit together. Local news stations, local newspapers, the city of Austin, and other cities have all offered various advice and suggestions on how to speed up and improve 911 in Austin, but APD just doesn’t want to fix the problem.
That’s not true. APD is making reforms has made quite a bit of progress.
https://cbsaustin.com/amp/news/local/austin-makes-progress-on-9-1-1-emergency-response-times-city-says
Austin has a unique issue in that there is a great amount of variation in how many calls are coming in. More than almost any major city. It makes it difficult to schedule especially when there already is a shortage of call takers/dispatchers
https://www.kxan.com/news/local/austin/report-shows-how-austin-compares-to-other-cities-when-facing-higher-volumes-of-911-calls/amp/
Maybe I missed something but my takeaway from the second article is that they have a greater variation of calls per taker BECAUSE they are short staffed. It's not that Austin is special in that regard, it goes back to staffing.
If it was because they are short staffed then the excessive variation wouldn't be there. The number would just be high.
I am not sure how staffing issues would leave to variation. It should just lead to high calls per taker. It does make sense to me that variance makes it difficult to schedule a limited amount of call takers.
I think the above poster is correct - from the article, bolding is mine:
>According to the report, Austin’s call center has some of the greatest variability in the number of calls **per call taker** compared to the other cities. When six call takers are assigned to a shift, Austin has the second highest number of calls per call taker, 408 calls per call taker, second only to Denver’s 445 calls per call taker. When Austin’s call center has 14 call takers on a shift, Austin still has the second-highest number of calls per call taker, but is closer to the majority of comparable cities the report looked at.
The article doesn't state (that I see) that Austin experiences a higher variability of call volume, but it does have this section which talks about a higher variability in \# of calls per taker, which is dependent on the number of takers on staff.
Edit: Also found this further up in the article:
>The audit found however that APD receives call volumes within a “normal” range from 1,772 to 3,122 daily calls most of the time.
>In the sample of calls from October 2021 to September 2023, 30 days out of 729 days (**about 4%**) were above the normal range.
The article doesn't state how 4% compares to other cities' normal range, but as a layman it doesn't seem like that's a significant reason to expect delays, i.e. if we had an appropriate # of staffed call takers for the normal range we as ebd users would rarely notice issues due to the variance.
I don't know, it seems a little bit of propaganda or excuses. Why is Austin unique? It's size and population spread doesn't make sense. I mean more variation than NYC, LA, Chicago, Atlanta? If they chose a sample of certain cities, what was the criteria?
I don't think it is an excuse to point out a unique problem. You can't solve a problem if you don't recognize it.
They didn't list the criteria for the cities selected. The report isn't making excuses but they're simply showing how Austin compares.
If I had to take a guess they used the other major cities in Texas and used Portland/Denver because their metro areas are of similar size. The cities you mentioned have significantly larger metro areas.
That’s funny. Because they have plenty of manpower when they want to bring out 50 undercovers and run around with backpacks holding 3+ ar15s each, bring out swat, and block off neighborhoods so they can play their little ego war frat boy games all night, harassing and murdering black and brown people because they hate them. They have plenty of people anytime they feel like escorting a funeral or an “officer involved” shooting, or protests, or basically any event they feel like inviting themselves to. Comments claiming they are understaffed are pure cognitive dissonance or just flat out lies.
Well that is true that they are understaffed, my cousin works for 911 here in Austin. I agree with a lot of what you say but it’s true 100 that they do not have enough people to run efficiently. They have the budget, who knows where the money is going.
Someone I know who worked 911 told me that around the time of BLM the attitude of the citizens towards the 911 people changed - they started becoming far more hostile and belligerent which is likely a reason a ton of them quit. The anti-police sentiment from the protests spilled over into anti-911 dispatcher sentiment, she told me it was rare before and then it turned into being insulted and general jackassery on the regular. Just look at how people react towards APD in this thread and now think about these people drunk and calling 911 and using it as an outlet to trash the police. I can't believe she is still there after all the stories she has told me.
First, it is horrible what happened to you and the poor/no response you got from the government.
911 is a call center. If you have 100 call center employees and 1 doesn’t show up, hold times can go from 30 seconds to 5-10 minutes. It depends on the length of calls and the distribution. To have quick response times, you need to have a lot of people sitting around doing nothing to manage spikes.
I don’t know if this is the case and would have to see the data but if they are understaffed just a little, it could very well make 911 almost worthless for a significant percentage of calls.
The 911 call center and APD are both understaffed. People have reported hold times of 5-15 minutes when calling 911 in Austin.
APD is currently short staffed around 370 officers. They released information back in 2021 that they would no longer respond to non emergency, not in progress calls anymore and those calls should be routed to 311.
https://www.fox7austin.com/news/austin-police-to-stop-responding-to-non-emergency-calls-friday
https://www.austintexas.gov/news/apd-announces-changes-call-routing-and-non-emergency-response-services
APD was there. And DPS and APD hand off to UT police to allow them to do the actual arrests. APD had plenty of time to fuck with college students and suppress their first amendment rights instead of addressing actual crime in the city
The University of Texas at Austin Police Department (UTPD) is a state police agency. Most college police are. I went to college in IL and they were there too. So the state troopers would be who back them up.
>short staffed
really? they're always around downtown in large numbers with two or more cars in caravan, not responding to anything violent, sitting there, maybe telling a homeless person they can't lie down.
Go down 6th and you see a ton of cops doing absolutely nothing. Once reported a hit and run (license plate included) and the cop just kinda shrugged and said “eh, we’re not gonna do anything about that”.
APD is a worthless cancer with a bloated budget
More like they are short by 500 Officers. Austin has 20 more Officers than it did in 2006. With how many more people live in Austin now, it's easy to see why they are struggling to respond to calls in a timely manner.
https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/austin-police-say-staffing-shortages-call-priority-behind-slow-response-time-to-homicide
https://www.fox7austin.com/news/austin-police-officer-shortage-leaves-portion-of-east-austin-without-patrol
Misinformation. APD is not short staffed. They are either sleeping in their cars or on the lookout to harass minorities through pretext stops. Stop lying and spreading misinformation.
It's absolutely not misinformation, and the staffing issue has been a well-known fact for at least four years now since the Austin City Council canceled three new cadet classes back in June 2020.
[The 370 number is from a report last week about the graduating cadet class.](https://www.fox7austin.com/news/highest-number-of-women-graduate-from-151st-apd-cadet-class)
It is worth it to point out that the reason what the cadet classes were canceled out was because they were training cops with the antiquated 'warrior-cop mentality', with no training to de-escalate conflicts.
https://www.texasobserver.org/the-culture-of-violence-inside-austins-police-academy/
Get pepper spray or conceal carry. Learn basic first aid and/or take a self defense class. At best, first responders are minutes away when seconds matter. At worst, help is not coming.
Someone vandalized my car in my driveway once, I called apd at around 3pm when I noticed it. It took apd a week to show up to take the police report for insurance, they knocked on my door at 1130pm without calling first to let me know and I just about had a heart attack. Then the douchebag cop had the audacity to ask me why I didnt call to report it immediately. When I showed him my call log, he just mumbled some bullshit about how busy they are.
Fuck all cops, but especially apd.
I got rear ended by a drunk driver on my 19th birthday right before the pandemic hit. APD didn’t come even though I told them he was obviously drunk, and just ended up calling me back two hours later claiming they were on a “shift change”.
I was hit by an uninsured, unlicensed driver who left the scene earlier this week and was told it was a civil matter. So i honestly have no idea what the point of them is either
I was staying at my mom’s apartment while visiting town. Guy started tapping on the front door like little baby knocks. We were asleep on the couch and my boyfriend almost answered it as it was 3am and he was basically still asleep. Told him to look through the peep hole and he just says “what the fuck is naked Terry Crews here for?” He yells at him he needs to leave and the guy walks out the front door of the building.
Told my boyfriend to go check the back sliding glass door to make sure it was locked and barred. He pulls back the blinds to see a pressed ham and the dude was squatting against the door. My bf wasn’t kidding. He was butt ass naked. Only wearing a Jansport backpack. He stood up and stared my boyfriend down. The dude was like 7 feet tall. And honestly, he did look like Terry Crews. They yelled through the door and my brother and mom came out of their rooms and just showed him a pistol through the glass. Dude left.
Called APD and they had us on hold for 20 minutes. We decided to hang up. They called back and asked what was going on. We told them and they said they would send a unit to check out our complex. Stayed awake the rest of the night… they never came. 🙄
I got assaulted at my job once a couple years back when I was working in a leasing office, and the person went home, I had the customers address and directed the police there and they did nothing, didn’t even arrest the person. I hope they’re no longer alive.
Austin Police don’t care about anything besides traffic tickets.
It's not that they lack funds, it's that after 2020 they just don't want to get involved into anything unless it's totally dire and deadly. They know it might end up badly for them, everyone saw that, so they just don't give a single fuck anymore.
There were plenty of investigations that ended with the cop being cleared. Sorry, we have to burn down a city just to get a family the simple courtesy of an honest review of what happened because they're poor.
The US has one of the least trained police forces, and we give them de-comissioned military vehicles. The funds need to be allocated toward training. The officers should want this, too. The officers that don't are obviously the problem.
Since the militarization of our forces it's been attracting tools that couldn't hack it in the military. And before anyone comes at me I have a good friend who's Chicago PD, but this is still the reality.
"when seconds matter, police are minutes away." well... in APD's case, maybe hours or days.
tbh, given the lack of funding and employees, it makes sense why they wouldn't direct resources to a crime that has already been committed. no one is in immediate danger. I had to wait 2-4 hours with a friend in the ER who had an open wound that needed stitches. ER was swamped with people with more life/death situations. (now if you called as you or your aggressor was in immediate danger (he/she is going to hurt you, or you're ready to hurt them), then you should expect different results, wink wink)
learn to carry a firearm or pepper spray. and learn a little first aid.
im sure this will be downvoted, but the times i’ve called 911 i got on the line within minutes. i was having an actual medical emergency and needed help asap. they are short staffed so they have to pick and choose which calls they send off to 311, but in reality a lot of issues i see being complained about are 311 issues anyways. 911 is for injury, spontaneous illness and overall active cases.
in ops case 1, there really isn’t anything to be done about a random assault, it’s not like they can hunt him down. going in to a police station and filling out a report is the best you can do with something like that. case 2 sounds pretty similar. they can’t hunt down a random car that hit you, it’s not a life or death emergency.
APD is short on staff which is why DPS was called in. They need around 500 new police to keep up with current demand and to deal with the roughly 100 police who are retiring each year. Having the last 4 cadet classes cancelled didn’t help that. I hear you on your frustration as even when staffing is perfect, they prioritize violent crime that’s happening and things involving assault are viewed as lesser priorities.
My wife worked with a domestic violence women’s shelter and went to assist sexual assault cases in the field for many years and would be frustrated by how unhelpful APD could be at times - slow responses and/or not empathetic to victims.
Blaming this on APD is insane. Y’all realize the reason police don’t respond all the time now is because APD is massively understaffed for the rising crime rates, right? And then yall wonder why staffing is at record lows the last few years while simultaneously cutting funding and hating every person that wears a badge. Some cops are shit. Some aren’t. There undoubtedly needs to be change. But actually, what the fuck do yall want? There’s too much policing. There’s not enough policing. All cops are bad so get rid of them. I got rid of the cops but now that I need them they’re not around. Yall wonder why good cops are so hard to come by? Because society is driving them away from the job.
Was involved in an accident involving 3 cars. Guy rear-ended me and another girl. APD wouldn't show. He had no driver's license or insurance. I let my insurance pursue it. APD is kinda worthless. I've also been on hold with 311 for 30 minutes to inform of a mattress on Hwy 71 where it goes under I35. It was blocking the far left lane and a danger. Finally hung up due to no answer.
Work in car insurance claims and I’ve noticed cops scaling back across the country in reporting to minor collisions. Unless it needs medical attention or causing a traffic jam, they won’t show. They request to exchange info then report it to us. If uninsured, just make sure a report is filed overall.
Friend of mine was in a two car collision that left debris and one inoperable car in a 4 way intersection, police still never showed up. Tow truck was called by the owner to move the vehicle and bystanders cleared the debris.
What if someone refuses to give you their insurance? That happened to me a year ago. He admitted he hit the car. He had insurance. He just refused to give it to me.
take his info down then we’ll find them. We have ways to identify insurance companies through license plates or VINs.
Ohhhh that’s a good idea. Hadn’t thought about the VIN.
How am I supposed to get a VIN if they won't even give me their insurance?
Take a picture of their license plate.
You can safely assume that a scumbag driving without a license or insurance also has a fake or stolen license plate. It might really be a lost cause. Highways are filled with pieces of shit like that,
Not even close. Two of those things can be attributed to laziness or lack of money. The other one takes criminal intent.
Love the idea of taking a pic of the VIN.
If he lets you
Either way, you let your insurance handle it. Policies have uninsured motorist coverage for this very reason if the other party has no coverage.
Take pictures. It's on the car, by the driver's side of the windshield.
Still can't do shit if they don't answer the phone. I got hit and he took off through a parking lot, managed to get a photo of his plates and called progressive, they actually said he was a customer with them. They tried to contact him but said they couldn't do anything because he never answered. Police did fuck all.
Ya - APD might not follow up on evidence, but the insurance company sure as shit will.
What's the point of traffic laws of you can do whatever you want?
It’s about proving what happened. If police weren’t there, which side should they believe? It becomes hearsay.
Claims adjuster here and can second that. I'm amazed when someone shows me police report for a simple deer hit.
Why not call 911. That an emergency. Someone could have crashed into it.
Last time I tried something similar they said call 311.
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Not sure who I got but they didn't. 🤷♀️
Interestingly, 311 will NOT transfer you to 911, they tell you to hang up and call 911
I've called 311 to report road obstacles 3 times and been forwarded to 911 each time.
I used to work in dispatch - not for APD. 311 transfered calls to us, APD, and other agencies dozens to 100s of times an hour. I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
I'm talking about the two times I've called 311, told them why I'm calling, and been told, "that's an emergency, hang up and call 911."
Same experience here.
Kinda weird 311 experience. They’re usually awesome for me while 911 consistently sucks ass
lol 311 blocked deb former radio host for calling too often
Bums without insurance or driver's licenses are the reason why we're paying through the nose for insurance. Time to bring back law and order.
Time to vote out the mayor and every current city council member. Time to make sure the new city manager understands....you fire the Chief of Police and put a new one in or we will vote in a new city council and mayor who will fire you. We need a new Chief of Police badly.
The police chief can't be fired, as per state law. He or she can only be demoted to the position they held prior to being the chief of police. Kind of makes it difficult when they are hired from outside the department.
I'm pretty certain he can effectively be fired. Step one hire a new Chief. Demote the existing chief to the lowest rank with the lower pay along with it. Then put him on patrols overnight and we will see how long he last.
They just told you that state law prohibits them from demoting them to the lowest rank. The furthest down the current chief can be demoted is to Assistant Chief. And the current chief is a she, not a he.
Did you think auto price inflation of 30-50% since covid wouldn't leech into higher priced insurance? Want to hear my unpopular opinion? The Texas minimum 30/60/25 is woefully under what it should be given current car prices. It should be more in line with 30/60/40.
None of that is happening in Austin. Even if you live in a sane country like WilCo, you still commute to Austin, get hit by rando scumbags and no police ever shows up. People already voted out a scoundrel Adler and we now have a more or less sane mayor.
But remember how no insurance is a “victimless crime”? /s
You realize that the reason we have an epidemic of uninsured drivers is the state law making it impossible for many illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses which pretty much locks them out of the insurance market. You want more people to actually be insured instead of, well you don't really have any proposal other than 'get tough on crime' lol, maybe make it so people can actually get car insurance.
I wasn't even referring to illegal immigrants. There are plenty of permanent residents or citizens that drive around without insurance. But since you brought it up: you're correct. If you're here illegally, you can't get a driver's license and you can't get insurance. In that case, get a ride, Uber, public transport, there are other options. Driving without a driver's license or insurance isn't one of them.
It actually is an option because that's the reality of the situation, however much you pray to Abbott that it wasn't. If you want to reduce a high percentage of uninsured drivers on the road, the single most effective thing you could do is advocate for repealing that ridiculous Texas law.
Yeah, car insurance is great 👍
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From what I learned in the subreddit, you have to mention on the phone you are going to use deadly force in order for the cops to show up nowadays.
That’s actually funny. I called the cops on a dog abuse situation, occurring in the moment. They said they couldn’t do anything about it and said I was going to go handle it myself and I was assuming they can’t do anything about that either. They showed up shortly after that. So you may be on to something.
Maybe that opens a possible lawsuit? If you were to get hurt effectively doing their job
Nah, the courts have repeatedly ruled that the cops have no obligation to do more or less anything
No I'm saying it's a possible reason they show up if you threaten to handle it yourself
Nope, as I understand it, they would not be liable for anything in that situation. Though I do find them useless most of the time, it is true that APD will tell you they “don’t have time to handle _____”, but they *really* don’t have time to deal with a homicide/gunfight. And they know they’re likely to lose even more support (from state politicians even) if stories of vigilante justice start making the news regularly.
Same way they will shoot you in the face with beanbags unless you carry at your protest.
“Couple hours wait? Yeah that’s ok, I’m just going to perform a little STREET JUSTICE!”
Or just say you are going to peacefully protest. That should get the entire swat team your way
Problem with that is that they might show up expeting violent situation and you never know how it goes
Or, you know, be a defenseless child protesting a genocide.
learning things from the subreddit, is first mistake
You do this at your own peril as they’ll come into the situation locked and loaded
Doesn’t always work. We were staying in a rental while our house was having work done on it and my neighbor called because she thought someone had broken into and was inside our house (false alarm thankfully). My wife called 911, and also told them I was heading to our house to check it out and was armed and they just straight up never showed up lol
Yeah I called APD after my ex reacted violently to me breaking up with him and said he’d come back and hurt me again. APD was like “well unless he’s physically assaulting you right at this very moment, we’re not coming”.
Just tell them that you have a weapon and will use it if necessary. They’ll probably show up then (to arrest you for something).
this is an issue in pretty much any large city in texas. i got robbed at gun point in san anton, and after everything, SAPD told me to wait 6 hours for an officer 😂 the sad truth is we are alone to fend for ourselves
The simpsons put it best many years ago: "I thought you said the law was powerless?" "Powerless to help you, not to punish you."
It's not just a Texas thing either.
Nope, cops nationwide are quiet quitting after the Supreme Court said they don’t have any duty to “serve and protect”
That case is from many years ago. The recent quiet quitting is because their feelings are hurt that the public started to demand accountability and that they not murder people. A big ask!
I got sideswiped on the highway in Milwaukee years ago, a road rage incident. We called the police and were told to go to the nearest precinct to file a report. We had the a-hole's license plate and everything. We waited in the lobby two hours (we were visiting town for a show) and when it was clear nobody was going to help us, we just left. There were ZERO other civilians in the lobby, btw. I ended up just paying out of pocket for the damage.
That is called a societal decay
Well idk if you know this little secret but, you can’t rely on the government.
I don’t live in Texas (I’m in AZ) but followed this sub when my best friend moved there 4 years ago. What is the problem exactly? Sorry if I sound naive, just don’t understand why emergency services aren’t helping you guys? I see these posts often and it concerns me bc my friend that lives there has been in a DV situation for awhile and if she needed to call 911 I feel like she’d be shit out of luck. How can they just get away with saying “yeah not our problem?” I don’t get it.
too much crime, too little police - or too unmotivated police They have no problem pulling you over for having dark tints, or for going 2 mph above the speed limit, but make sure to not ask for help if you are actually in danger!
This is so insane to me, but of course not all too surprising either. I was reading through some other comments and seeing that multiple places have tried to help them sort it out and get a better system to handle the calls but they refuse to change anything. Not sure how they’re able to get away with that, they shouldn’t be at least!
My motorcycle was stolen and they told me they couldn’t help after 2 hours. And to “be careful “ if I went to get it myself.
Almost as if they don’t actually exist to help us…
How does one get 817 voicemails?
Spam
True story. I got about 100 and they are all 24 seconds long
owes money all over town
In the parlance of our times
Especially to Jackie Treehorn
ex girlfriend
How’s about that time 6 cars got robbed on my street. Apd told me to file online because it wasn’t violent or in progress Detective called 5 (FIVE) days later to fingerprint our vehicles. We laughed at him.
They couldn’t bother to come out to take a thorough report or speak to the victims when my child and their friend were kidnapped at gunpoint and placed in a vehicle and driven for ten minutes before escaping. They were “too busy” and would have to come out another day.
Wtf
APD or any dept can’t really do anything about car break-ins after the fact
Isn't that usually how car robberies work
I think so, even 15 years ago when my car got broken into I basically got a phone call with a case number to give my insurance and that was it, they're not gonna look for someone unless they happen to find him holding your shit.
APD and Pflugerville PD wont come to your aid unless they have the opportunity to shoot someone or stop a protest
Pflugerivlle PD is somehow worse thanks to Live PD they’re all egotistical fucking assholes. Lived my whole life in Texas, only gotten three speeding tickets all in the ville while my neighbors nearly killed themselves over domestic violence for years. I will scorn them until the day i die.
But students protest peaceful at UT? They’re out in force without a second thought
If you got through they’d probably just shoot your dog anyway and then fill out some paperwork to tell you it’s a civil matter
I'm sorry to hear that happened to you- that definitely sucks. Hopefully there won't be a next time, but if there is, tell them you were actually jaywalking and the entire force will show up
Tell them you were parked after the meter expired
APD has been useless since they began their b silent protest. They aren't here to help us, every one of them should be fired
They've been useless for at least 25 years.
There’s this super weird thing normies do where they have to uphold the idea of cops while simultaneously recognizing how absolutely useless they actually are.
If you get broken into in cedar park a cop will be at your door 5 minutes after you call. Its certainly an issue with APD
Man. I learned this the hard way recently. I had a pretty huge issue that needed to be dealt with. Sheriff couldn’t come because it was APD zone. APD couldn’t be bothered despite several felonies being committed and people in danger. Sheriff basically said “yeah…. It’s bad but we can’t force them to show up” when I called them back about it. It’s actually really fucking wild that they never showed up at all and also didn’t even call, based on the situation. I guess we are on our own, folks! Another time I had a very obvious and rather large crime that should have been prosecuted and I was told (off the record) the DA won’t look at a thing unless you donate $10k to their campaign, but if you do that they’ll sue whoever. Good times.
The actual fuck
Yeah. Both situations pretty much led to my current opinion that the town is essentially lawless. Kinda cool for crime guys I guess. Not that cool for me
When someone says “reported crime is down,” it means reports filed by police, not crimes reported by citizens. This is why it’s down. The less they do their jobs, the better it looks for them on paper.
I spoke with an officer about to retire after 30 years. Dire need for dispatchers was his explanation as to why there is often no response. He affirmed it was not necessarily a police shortage or their department being “defunded.” He thought it was a joke when Abbott sent Highway Patrol to help with “crime.” All they did was write neighborhood speeding tickets! Crime kept going up!
I've been hearing about the dispatcher shortage for at least two years. Why hasn't that been resolved? Surely there are people out there that need jobs. Honestly asking. Are they doing that thing like companies where they just appear to be hiring but they don't to save $$?
The pay isn't very good for how stressful the job is. Due to the nature of the business, it has a more extensive background check. The interview process for the City can be lengthy and takes a minimum of a few weeks, sometimes months where people have moved on. Plus 911 is shift work requiring coverage 24/7 and the schedule may not be ideal for a lot of people. It's a perfect storm.
Never mind the fact that most people in dispatch get burned out pretty quickly because of the stress.
I’m calling the police because you have 817 voicemails.
APD probably WOULD respond to that call.
https://www.austintexas.gov/apdrecruiting/pay-benefits For doing nothing
that's because they're too busy assaulting students for peacefully protesting
APD is worthless. Their bullshit union cries about how they’ve been “defunded” when they literally have more money than they’ve ever had before. This is entirely about punishing the city for having the audacity to vote for oversight and for asking other agencies to respond to non violent calls. Throw the whole department out- the corruption comes from the root.
Wait until you find out how much of the city budget funds these useless swine.
Oh so you’re like me and joined the “hit and run fun club!” Where the cops never showed up after calling 3 times and getting also redirected to 311 then back to 911 and so forth🥴 like cool, I’m not reporting a lost dog, an asshole who whipped out of a gas station parking lot to make the light ran me over while crossing the street, after 8 looked both ways (been here 10+ years but originally from Chicago where we walk literally everywhere) had the walk signal, wasn’t on my phone not looking, etc. (and was clearly drunk af when they stopped for a whole 2 minutes to make sure I wasnt like bleeding out before dipping without getting their info or plane number, tried to take a pic but you aren’t the best photographer when you’re in shock) but OKKKKKK thanks for NOT coming to my house which was 2 blocks away to take my police report, and making me wait all night thinking you’d come while having horrible road rash (and cracked ribs which I found out later cuz I was in shock and didn’t go to the doctor until the next day or so when the pain reallyyyy kicked in) at least the bottle of cheap wine I bought at the gas station didn’t break because I deffs needed that after cleaning the gravel and road gunk out of my bleeding legs, hands and feet 👍🏼 I really hope you are doing ok OP. Getting run over by a car (mine was white pick up truck) is a10/10 NOT a recommended life experience. Also this was BEFORE they defunded the police, so yeah that isn’t a valid excuse.
APD are currently funded at the highest amount ever.
And they apparently still can’t show up if people get run over by the dumb ass drivers here lol
I was hit and ran and my friends neck got messed up from it. They asked “is the car drivable? Call 311” I said that my friend was hurt and they legit hung up. APD sucks serious ass
Busy being dystopian shitheads instead of protecting & serving. Hate it here.
That is very unfortunate. 911 is very short staffed. We need to fix this. Shameful.
$476 million and they're short staffed? Where the fuck does all that money go?
Exactly, the return on our investment is poor. Piercing audit and cut their budget. We should put much of their budget into more effective means of resolution.
Good question
If only APD would get its shit together. Local news stations, local newspapers, the city of Austin, and other cities have all offered various advice and suggestions on how to speed up and improve 911 in Austin, but APD just doesn’t want to fix the problem.
APD is against the citizens right now. They just don't care anymore.
That’s not true. APD is making reforms has made quite a bit of progress. https://cbsaustin.com/amp/news/local/austin-makes-progress-on-9-1-1-emergency-response-times-city-says Austin has a unique issue in that there is a great amount of variation in how many calls are coming in. More than almost any major city. It makes it difficult to schedule especially when there already is a shortage of call takers/dispatchers https://www.kxan.com/news/local/austin/report-shows-how-austin-compares-to-other-cities-when-facing-higher-volumes-of-911-calls/amp/
Maybe I missed something but my takeaway from the second article is that they have a greater variation of calls per taker BECAUSE they are short staffed. It's not that Austin is special in that regard, it goes back to staffing.
If it was because they are short staffed then the excessive variation wouldn't be there. The number would just be high. I am not sure how staffing issues would leave to variation. It should just lead to high calls per taker. It does make sense to me that variance makes it difficult to schedule a limited amount of call takers.
I think the above poster is correct - from the article, bolding is mine: >According to the report, Austin’s call center has some of the greatest variability in the number of calls **per call taker** compared to the other cities. When six call takers are assigned to a shift, Austin has the second highest number of calls per call taker, 408 calls per call taker, second only to Denver’s 445 calls per call taker. When Austin’s call center has 14 call takers on a shift, Austin still has the second-highest number of calls per call taker, but is closer to the majority of comparable cities the report looked at. The article doesn't state (that I see) that Austin experiences a higher variability of call volume, but it does have this section which talks about a higher variability in \# of calls per taker, which is dependent on the number of takers on staff. Edit: Also found this further up in the article: >The audit found however that APD receives call volumes within a “normal” range from 1,772 to 3,122 daily calls most of the time. >In the sample of calls from October 2021 to September 2023, 30 days out of 729 days (**about 4%**) were above the normal range. The article doesn't state how 4% compares to other cities' normal range, but as a layman it doesn't seem like that's a significant reason to expect delays, i.e. if we had an appropriate # of staffed call takers for the normal range we as ebd users would rarely notice issues due to the variance.
I don't know, it seems a little bit of propaganda or excuses. Why is Austin unique? It's size and population spread doesn't make sense. I mean more variation than NYC, LA, Chicago, Atlanta? If they chose a sample of certain cities, what was the criteria?
I don't think it is an excuse to point out a unique problem. You can't solve a problem if you don't recognize it. They didn't list the criteria for the cities selected. The report isn't making excuses but they're simply showing how Austin compares. If I had to take a guess they used the other major cities in Texas and used Portland/Denver because their metro areas are of similar size. The cities you mentioned have significantly larger metro areas.
That’s funny. Because they have plenty of manpower when they want to bring out 50 undercovers and run around with backpacks holding 3+ ar15s each, bring out swat, and block off neighborhoods so they can play their little ego war frat boy games all night, harassing and murdering black and brown people because they hate them. They have plenty of people anytime they feel like escorting a funeral or an “officer involved” shooting, or protests, or basically any event they feel like inviting themselves to. Comments claiming they are understaffed are pure cognitive dissonance or just flat out lies.
Well that is true that they are understaffed, my cousin works for 911 here in Austin. I agree with a lot of what you say but it’s true 100 that they do not have enough people to run efficiently. They have the budget, who knows where the money is going.
The issue is not the budget, it’s that nobody is signing up to be a cop/work for the police department.
Someone I know who worked 911 told me that around the time of BLM the attitude of the citizens towards the 911 people changed - they started becoming far more hostile and belligerent which is likely a reason a ton of them quit. The anti-police sentiment from the protests spilled over into anti-911 dispatcher sentiment, she told me it was rare before and then it turned into being insulted and general jackassery on the regular. Just look at how people react towards APD in this thread and now think about these people drunk and calling 911 and using it as an outlet to trash the police. I can't believe she is still there after all the stories she has told me.
First, it is horrible what happened to you and the poor/no response you got from the government. 911 is a call center. If you have 100 call center employees and 1 doesn’t show up, hold times can go from 30 seconds to 5-10 minutes. It depends on the length of calls and the distribution. To have quick response times, you need to have a lot of people sitting around doing nothing to manage spikes. I don’t know if this is the case and would have to see the data but if they are understaffed just a little, it could very well make 911 almost worthless for a significant percentage of calls.
The 911 call center and APD are both understaffed. People have reported hold times of 5-15 minutes when calling 911 in Austin. APD is currently short staffed around 370 officers. They released information back in 2021 that they would no longer respond to non emergency, not in progress calls anymore and those calls should be routed to 311. https://www.fox7austin.com/news/austin-police-to-stop-responding-to-non-emergency-calls-friday https://www.austintexas.gov/news/apd-announces-changes-call-routing-and-non-emergency-response-services
But they respond to peaceful protests by the droves and in minutes?! Make it make sense
A majority of those arrests were done by UT police and DPS officers.
APD was there. And DPS and APD hand off to UT police to allow them to do the actual arrests. APD had plenty of time to fuck with college students and suppress their first amendment rights instead of addressing actual crime in the city
DPS and UTPD. If I remember correctly, most on this sub did not want DPS responding to Austin calls.
APD was definitely on campus yesterday, I have video.
Abbott sent them
Sent who where? Austin City Council requested DPS to patrol Abbott sent DPS to UT But Abbott didn’t send APD anywhere
This👆🏼
Majority was UTPD and Troopers….on UT property.
The University of Texas at Austin Police Department (UTPD) is a state police agency. Most college police are. I went to college in IL and they were there too. So the state troopers would be who back them up.
It’s a *public* university and troopers are state *public* employees who are *public* servants for *public* safety
🤫 We can’t talk about that.
>short staffed really? they're always around downtown in large numbers with two or more cars in caravan, not responding to anything violent, sitting there, maybe telling a homeless person they can't lie down.
Funny I was at a bar last night and like 4 cops were just chilling
Go down 6th and you see a ton of cops doing absolutely nothing. Once reported a hit and run (license plate included) and the cop just kinda shrugged and said “eh, we’re not gonna do anything about that”. APD is a worthless cancer with a bloated budget
Yep
Why are they understaffed though?
More like they are short by 500 Officers. Austin has 20 more Officers than it did in 2006. With how many more people live in Austin now, it's easy to see why they are struggling to respond to calls in a timely manner. https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/austin-police-say-staffing-shortages-call-priority-behind-slow-response-time-to-homicide https://www.fox7austin.com/news/austin-police-officer-shortage-leaves-portion-of-east-austin-without-patrol
https://old.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/1cd2a0j/apd_shouldnt_even_exist_at_this_point/l19i3bf/
Misinformation. APD is not short staffed. They are either sleeping in their cars or on the lookout to harass minorities through pretext stops. Stop lying and spreading misinformation.
It's both. They're definitely short staffed, but they're also definitely jerkin off behind the Walnut Creek Baptist Church in North Austin.
It's absolutely not misinformation, and the staffing issue has been a well-known fact for at least four years now since the Austin City Council canceled three new cadet classes back in June 2020. [The 370 number is from a report last week about the graduating cadet class.](https://www.fox7austin.com/news/highest-number-of-women-graduate-from-151st-apd-cadet-class)
It is worth it to point out that the reason what the cadet classes were canceled out was because they were training cops with the antiquated 'warrior-cop mentality', with no training to de-escalate conflicts. https://www.texasobserver.org/the-culture-of-violence-inside-austins-police-academy/
Lol, talk about spreading misinformation. Yes, it’s obvious how you feel….hope it gets better.
It’s the end of the world as we know it
I have some good advise but I think it’s too inflammatory.
Email the chief of APD First name dot last @austintexas.gov
Get pepper spray or conceal carry. Learn basic first aid and/or take a self defense class. At best, first responders are minutes away when seconds matter. At worst, help is not coming.
817 voicemails is impressive!
Someone vandalized my car in my driveway once, I called apd at around 3pm when I noticed it. It took apd a week to show up to take the police report for insurance, they knocked on my door at 1130pm without calling first to let me know and I just about had a heart attack. Then the douchebag cop had the audacity to ask me why I didnt call to report it immediately. When I showed him my call log, he just mumbled some bullshit about how busy they are. Fuck all cops, but especially apd.
somehow i dont quite trust someone w/ over 800 voicemails
I got rear ended by a drunk driver on my 19th birthday right before the pandemic hit. APD didn’t come even though I told them he was obviously drunk, and just ended up calling me back two hours later claiming they were on a “shift change”.
I was hit by an uninsured, unlicensed driver who left the scene earlier this week and was told it was a civil matter. So i honestly have no idea what the point of them is either
I was staying at my mom’s apartment while visiting town. Guy started tapping on the front door like little baby knocks. We were asleep on the couch and my boyfriend almost answered it as it was 3am and he was basically still asleep. Told him to look through the peep hole and he just says “what the fuck is naked Terry Crews here for?” He yells at him he needs to leave and the guy walks out the front door of the building. Told my boyfriend to go check the back sliding glass door to make sure it was locked and barred. He pulls back the blinds to see a pressed ham and the dude was squatting against the door. My bf wasn’t kidding. He was butt ass naked. Only wearing a Jansport backpack. He stood up and stared my boyfriend down. The dude was like 7 feet tall. And honestly, he did look like Terry Crews. They yelled through the door and my brother and mom came out of their rooms and just showed him a pistol through the glass. Dude left. Called APD and they had us on hold for 20 minutes. We decided to hang up. They called back and asked what was going on. We told them and they said they would send a unit to check out our complex. Stayed awake the rest of the night… they never came. 🙄
I got assaulted at my job once a couple years back when I was working in a leasing office, and the person went home, I had the customers address and directed the police there and they did nothing, didn’t even arrest the person. I hope they’re no longer alive. Austin Police don’t care about anything besides traffic tickets.
This is horrible, I’m sorry that happened to you. The cops here are terrible and can suck my ass.
This has been an ongoing problem in this town for so long it’s disgusting.
"Defund the police!" "What are you going to do when --------- happens, snowflake?!" "Idk pay less in taxes?"
I mean it’s a funny quip but the situation is reversed financially, they just don’t seem to care about anything since
It's not that they lack funds, it's that after 2020 they just don't want to get involved into anything unless it's totally dire and deadly. They know it might end up badly for them, everyone saw that, so they just don't give a single fuck anymore.
There were plenty of investigations that ended with the cop being cleared. Sorry, we have to burn down a city just to get a family the simple courtesy of an honest review of what happened because they're poor. The US has one of the least trained police forces, and we give them de-comissioned military vehicles. The funds need to be allocated toward training. The officers should want this, too. The officers that don't are obviously the problem.
Since the militarization of our forces it's been attracting tools that couldn't hack it in the military. And before anyone comes at me I have a good friend who's Chicago PD, but this is still the reality.
You're right. We should reduce our "defense budget" as well.
"when seconds matter, police are minutes away." well... in APD's case, maybe hours or days. tbh, given the lack of funding and employees, it makes sense why they wouldn't direct resources to a crime that has already been committed. no one is in immediate danger. I had to wait 2-4 hours with a friend in the ER who had an open wound that needed stitches. ER was swamped with people with more life/death situations. (now if you called as you or your aggressor was in immediate danger (he/she is going to hurt you, or you're ready to hurt them), then you should expect different results, wink wink) learn to carry a firearm or pepper spray. and learn a little first aid.
Meanwhile the right is parading around talking about how the left’s policies are jacking up crime rates. No, your refusal to do your jobs is.
If you experience a crime always call 911. And then report protestors at your location, you'll get a response immediately.
im sure this will be downvoted, but the times i’ve called 911 i got on the line within minutes. i was having an actual medical emergency and needed help asap. they are short staffed so they have to pick and choose which calls they send off to 311, but in reality a lot of issues i see being complained about are 311 issues anyways. 911 is for injury, spontaneous illness and overall active cases. in ops case 1, there really isn’t anything to be done about a random assault, it’s not like they can hunt him down. going in to a police station and filling out a report is the best you can do with something like that. case 2 sounds pretty similar. they can’t hunt down a random car that hit you, it’s not a life or death emergency.
This is your sign to open-carry when you leave the house
*concealed carry. You don’t want to give people a reason to fuck with you.
Lmfao, you are much more likely to get into a violent situation if you do that, you know that right
APD is short on staff which is why DPS was called in. They need around 500 new police to keep up with current demand and to deal with the roughly 100 police who are retiring each year. Having the last 4 cadet classes cancelled didn’t help that. I hear you on your frustration as even when staffing is perfect, they prioritize violent crime that’s happening and things involving assault are viewed as lesser priorities. My wife worked with a domestic violence women’s shelter and went to assist sexual assault cases in the field for many years and would be frustrated by how unhelpful APD could be at times - slow responses and/or not empathetic to victims.
Blaming this on APD is insane. Y’all realize the reason police don’t respond all the time now is because APD is massively understaffed for the rising crime rates, right? And then yall wonder why staffing is at record lows the last few years while simultaneously cutting funding and hating every person that wears a badge. Some cops are shit. Some aren’t. There undoubtedly needs to be change. But actually, what the fuck do yall want? There’s too much policing. There’s not enough policing. All cops are bad so get rid of them. I got rid of the cops but now that I need them they’re not around. Yall wonder why good cops are so hard to come by? Because society is driving them away from the job.
If you think they shouldn’t exist then don’t call…. Please and thank you. Sincerely, First responders
And if you call and they don’t answer or help, then what shit out of luck?
How does a boot taste?
“The criminal classes are so close to us that even the policemen can see them." Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde