House is currently surrounded by Nashville police. They keep announcing they have a K-9 and to "come out with your hands up, and you won't be bitten." But it's not at all clear who they're talking to.

(I'm fairly sure it isn't me.)
Now helicopters swirling overhead. Weird thing is, they didn't close the roads. So when I step out on the porch people keep driving by the cop cars, then slowing down to ask me what's going on. Pretty surreal.
Let me just add, it isn't *just* our house. But there are cop cars surrounding a group of about 10 or so houses, including ours.
Hey @MNPDNashville, could we get a briefing on what's going on? My dogs are going nuts.
All the cop cars have now left but one. I no longer hear helicopters. So I guess they got their guy. But that was quite an interlude. I was right in the middle of a tweet about Ted Cruz.

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More from @radleybalko

11 Nov
Here now, a thread of decrees I would issue if I were made king of the criminal justice system.

Feel free to reply and add your own.
-- If police say an informant is reliable and trustworthy in an affidavit (despite drug use, a criminal record, etc.), the courts will assume that same informant is reliable and trustworthy should he or she later accuse the police of lying or misconduct.
-- All else being equal, jailhouse informants cited by prosecutors to convict someone ("he confessed to me") should be given the same weight as jailhouse informants cited by defense attorneys to exonerate someone ("the real killer confessed to me")
Read 11 tweets
5 Nov
So the anti-car people have just been relentless in my mentions over the last 24 hours.

The odd thing is, I actually *agree* that we are a far too car-dependent country. I think Robert Moses is one of the great under-recognized villains of the 20th Century.

But …
… it’s precisely *because* we’re so car dependent that I’m wary of mass automated enforcement that would catch every violation every time. We have …

— cities that now rely on revenue from violations, meaning they need people to *keep* committing infractions to balance budgets
— roads often designed for speeds far higher than posted speed limits, essentially tempting drivers to break the law
— laws that impose DL suspensions and issue arrest warrants for people unable to pay fines
— numerous cities caught manipulating stoplights and shortening …
Read 10 tweets
1 Nov
So I guess I need to do some record-correcting.

In this Manhattan Institute piece, @RAVerBruggen says I tweeted, “murders are surging because an
entire profession would rather let people die than hold their colleagues accountable . . .

media4.manhattan-institute.org/sites/default/…
. . . when they needlessly hurt and kill people."

This is true! However, I was summarizing this article, which claimed cops have been quitting and de-policing because of the Chauvin fallout. That article was published by . . . the Manhattan Institute!

city-journal.org/why-cops-are-q…
I actually *don't* think de-policing caused the murder surge.

(To be fair, I mistakenly failed to thread the quoted tweet to my previous tweet, which linked to the article. So it's entirely understandable why VerBruggen would mistakenly assume I was expressing my own opinion.)
Read 5 tweets
18 Oct
This @saletan piece indirectly hits on a big misunderstanding in how we interpret polling data about black attitudes toward police. It's true that when asked generically, black people express . . .

slate.com/news-and-polit…
. . . more concern about crime, and say they want more police, and more funding to fight it.

However. The tradeoff in the "more cops, less crime" argument is that the approach to policing proponents claim reduces crime is the same type of policing that brings more ...
... encounters and low-level arrests -- and that black people specifically tell pollsters they *don't* want.

You can say, "But this time we'll hold them accountable!" You can say, "But they'll practice community-oriented policing, not stop & frisk!"
Read 5 tweets
8 Oct
New from me: Michael West has now helped send at least five innocent people to prison, including three to death row.

Incredibly, West didn’t actually testify at Sherwood Brown’s trial. Another “expert” did, but used West’s notes and examination.

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/…
Why didn’t West testify? Turns out he was in another part of the state, giving the testimony that sent Kennedy Brewer to death row.

Brewer was also innocent.

When they later caught the real killer for that crime, the killer confessed to a similar murder in the same area . . .
. . . a couple years earlier.

Levon Brooks was wrongly convicted for that murder.

At this point, you can probably guess who gave the clincher expert testimony that also convicted Brooks.

But yes. It was Michael West.
Read 4 tweets

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