Excuse me? Cops are giving out cards that let their friends and family ignore the laws and nothing is being done about this? The union is threatening anyone who dares to actually enforce laws...
Excuse me? Cops are giving out cards that let their friends and family ignore the laws and nothing is being done about this? The union is threatening anyone who dares to actually enforce laws against this, what a corrupt system. New York is a joke
This is actually fairly widespread, not just NYC. There's such a thing as a "policeman's benevolent association", which is basically an in-group of people who are related to or are friends with...
This is actually fairly widespread, not just NYC. There's such a thing as a "policeman's benevolent association", which is basically an in-group of people who are related to or are friends with cops. They make "contributions" of money and in turn are given cards saying they're friends or relatives of cops. This is not a new or localized thing. It's widespread corruption in the open.
I may be mistaken but I think this is what the "Get out of jail free" card in Monopoly was inspired by. It's a real thing.
How many people have these cards? It sounds like this one cop is running into them constantly. I wonder if cardholders are somehow psychologically encouraged to be more reckless than other drivers...
Staten Island, where Bianchi patrolled, is predominantly white. White drivers in the borough, the complaint said, “are significantly more likely to have courtesy cards than minority drivers”. As a result of a ticketing quota system, this means “police officers are forced to disproportionately ticket minority drivers”.
How many people have these cards? It sounds like this one cop is running into them constantly.
I wonder if cardholders are somehow psychologically encouraged to be more reckless than other drivers because of their perceived immunity.
Anecdotally, I know plenty of people IRL who carry PBA cards. Almost always because of a family member who’s a cop, which is a lot in my very white upper middle class NYC-adjacent suburb.
Anecdotally, I know plenty of people IRL who carry PBA cards. Almost always because of a family member who’s a cop, which is a lot in my very white upper middle class NYC-adjacent suburb.
I moved from NJ from Rhode Island a few years ago. I thought my boss was joking with me when he told me about the cards. I'm kind of used to good, old fashioned, under the table corruption. Not so...
I moved from NJ from Rhode Island a few years ago. I thought my boss was joking with me when he told me about the cards. I'm kind of used to good, old fashioned, under the table corruption. Not so much the formalized institutional kind... It seems like a huge thing in the tri-state area though.
There's 35k cops in NYC; if many of them have two living parents, a wife, a couple of siblings, a couple of kids, and a close friend, that's 8 people per cop, even setting aside the functional...
There's 35k cops in NYC; if many of them have two living parents, a wife, a couple of siblings, a couple of kids, and a close friend, that's 8 people per cop, even setting aside the functional sale of these cards if people give them "discounts", as claimed in the article. Even just friends and family numbers mean that there would be roughly 280,000 people who'd have these cards. With 1.4M car owners in the city, that's roughly 20% of the driving population. Even if traffic violations aren't more likely when the driver feels invulnerable to consequences it would be easy to see these cards all the time.
According to this Vice article, the PBA caps the number of cards per cop to 20, which means there may be around 500k out there, assuming each member of PBA has distributed all 20 of theirs.
According to this Vice article, the PBA caps the number of cards per cop to 20, which means there may be around 500k out there, assuming each member of PBA has distributed all 20 of theirs.
One cop would potentially have multiple cards it seems, but it does seem odd that he's hitting so many which would definitely suggest there's a high number of them.
One cop would potentially have multiple cards it seems, but it does seem odd that he's hitting so many which would definitely suggest there's a high number of them.
Looking at them on google there doesn't seem to be any sort of standard to them. They come in all sorts of styles and layouts. Some have the name of the card owner or the cop that gave it out, but...
Looking at them on google there doesn't seem to be any sort of standard to them. They come in all sorts of styles and layouts. Some have the name of the card owner or the cop that gave it out, but I'm not seeing anything like a serial number or a barcode to verify them.
I think forgery would be pretty easy, but I sure wouldn't want to get caught with a fake one.
I've incredible respect for Bianchi taking a stand knowing full well that he would be relatiated against. That's no easy thing to endure. May he be successful in the pursuit of justice. He called...
I've incredible respect for Bianchi taking a stand knowing full well that he would be relatiated against. That's no easy thing to endure. May he be successful in the pursuit of justice. He called this out for what it is--corruption and discrimination. Crossing all my fingers and toes that things change not just with his precinct, but elsewhere that this kind of abuse of justice takes place.
Seems to me this is effectively commodifying police solidarity. If someone has a card, their perceived proximity means they're more likely to be sympathetic to cops, and therefore deserving...
Seems to me this is effectively commodifying police solidarity. If someone has a card, their perceived proximity means they're more likely to be sympathetic to cops, and therefore deserving special treatment.
Excuse me? Cops are giving out cards that let their friends and family ignore the laws and nothing is being done about this? The union is threatening anyone who dares to actually enforce laws against this, what a corrupt system. New York is a joke
This is actually fairly widespread, not just NYC. There's such a thing as a "policeman's benevolent association", which is basically an in-group of people who are related to or are friends with cops. They make "contributions" of money and in turn are given cards saying they're friends or relatives of cops. This is not a new or localized thing. It's widespread corruption in the open.
I may be mistaken but I think this is what the "Get out of jail free" card in Monopoly was inspired by. It's a real thing.
Disgusting, this is the kind of thing I think everyone can agree is a problem. I hope more people become aware of this because I wasn't.
How many people have these cards? It sounds like this one cop is running into them constantly.
I wonder if cardholders are somehow psychologically encouraged to be more reckless than other drivers because of their perceived immunity.
Anecdotally, I know plenty of people IRL who carry PBA cards. Almost always because of a family member who’s a cop, which is a lot in my very white upper middle class NYC-adjacent suburb.
I moved from NJ from Rhode Island a few years ago. I thought my boss was joking with me when he told me about the cards. I'm kind of used to good, old fashioned, under the table corruption. Not so much the formalized institutional kind... It seems like a huge thing in the tri-state area though.
There's 35k cops in NYC; if many of them have two living parents, a wife, a couple of siblings, a couple of kids, and a close friend, that's 8 people per cop, even setting aside the functional sale of these cards if people give them "discounts", as claimed in the article. Even just friends and family numbers mean that there would be roughly 280,000 people who'd have these cards. With 1.4M car owners in the city, that's roughly 20% of the driving population. Even if traffic violations aren't more likely when the driver feels invulnerable to consequences it would be easy to see these cards all the time.
According to this Vice article, the PBA caps the number of cards per cop to 20, which means there may be around 500k out there, assuming each member of PBA has distributed all 20 of theirs.
Oh, wow, that's even worse than my estimate. That means fully a third of all car owners in the city could have one.
One cop would potentially have multiple cards it seems, but it does seem odd that he's hitting so many which would definitely suggest there's a high number of them.
Sounds like some people caught wind of this and might be copying the cards? Could be plausible.
Looking at them on google there doesn't seem to be any sort of standard to them. They come in all sorts of styles and layouts. Some have the name of the card owner or the cop that gave it out, but I'm not seeing anything like a serial number or a barcode to verify them.
I think forgery would be pretty easy, but I sure wouldn't want to get caught with a fake one.
I've incredible respect for Bianchi taking a stand knowing full well that he would be relatiated against. That's no easy thing to endure. May he be successful in the pursuit of justice. He called this out for what it is--corruption and discrimination. Crossing all my fingers and toes that things change not just with his precinct, but elsewhere that this kind of abuse of justice takes place.
Seems to me this is effectively commodifying police solidarity. If someone has a card, their perceived proximity means they're more likely to be sympathetic to cops, and therefore deserving special treatment.