Cops Get Recorded Talking About Getting Vacation For Shooting Someone - Is This A Big Deal?

Officer David Miller of the LaSalle Police Department in LaSalle, CO pulled over Hells Angels member Anthony Mills on April 8, 2018 for speeding. Officer Miller then turned the traffic stop into an hour-long detention, calling a dozen other officers from five different police departments to also respond, because he - in his words - loves "getting to fuck with HA." The on-scene officers can be heard checking with one another, as they arrive, that everyone's "bodycam is off." The cops next began sharing stories with one another of violent things they had each done to bikers and members of motorcycle clubs. The topic then turned to various motorcyclists the officers had tased or attempted to tase. One officer described how he had "almost tased a guy off a motorcycle" while the motorcycle was in motion and had a passenger riding on it, to much laughter. Officer Miller then announced to the group that if Mr. Mills did anything he didn't like: "I'm shooting him! I need some paid vacation!" All of the officers laughed and laughed in response.

Unbeknownst to them, Officer Miller had failed to deactivate his bodycam at the beginning of the stop. All of this was recorded.

Mr. Mills retained Sarah Schielke of The Life & Liberty Law Office to sue the officers and their agencies in federal court for their violations of his civil rights on April 6, 2020. Just a few months later, on September 9, 2020, the case was settled following the agencies paying Mr. Mills $25,000 and Officer Miller writing Mr. Mills a letter of apology. Officer Miller has since resigned from the department.

Some might write off incidents like these as isolated instances of unprofessionalism. But they are not so innocuous. When police officers openly discuss with one another their disdain for one group of citizens that they are sworn to serve and protect, and make jokes about killing those citizens for "paid vacation leave," they normalize police misconduct and murder. Cop jokes about some lives not mattering inevitably fosters a culture of police officers who are much more willing to pull the trigger on those same lives later. "On this, you don't need to take my word for it," says Mills' attorney Sarah Schielke, "as we're living in that very world with those very police right this very second."

"Hearing what police say when they think they are NOT being recorded is the best insight we have into the state of policing and police culture today," says Ms. Schielke. "And this video reveals that our society's present worries and outrage at the ease with which police kill civilians are quite well-placed. One bad apple DOES spoil the whole bunch if the other apples continue to defend and conceal the bad apples within. Until police officers themselves have no tolerance for their fellow officers' misconduct and criminal attitudes, all Americans - particularly those in stigmatized groups - will continue to be unsafe in their presence."

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