Alesia Thomas: Woman Dies in LAPD Custody Amid 'Questionable Tactics,' Police Say

Another north American pavement ape bites the dust and does society a favor. It's too bad she spawned a couple of mud monkeys before checking out.

Screw her! With all the public assistance she has received over the years I applaud the police for finally removing this parasite from the welfare rolls. They should be commended, not condemned. 

If one citizen killed another citizen, that person would be thrown in the slammer while the investigation continued.  There is no reason why this should not apply to the police.  It's utterly ridiculous that these pigs who kill only get transferred to do desk work and still get paid, while if it were one of us, we would be thrown in jail. 

If i were a cop also, I wouldn't hesitate to kill a citizen since i know i would still be getting paid and rarely are these officers punished as harsh as citizens.  Until these laws change, I'm not shocked that these incidents still occur.

A mother brings two children and places them outside a police station. Without notification or notice of any kind, the mother leaves and returns alone to her home.

The police evaluate the situation, they take an understanding of their mission, they access the resources within the department to develop a strategy for contacting the mother and select a team possessing the skills and training best suited to match the potentials of the situation.

Rarely does police work afford all these opportunities for a succesful response.

Most of the time, the police set out in response informed only by the dispatcher code - which is in itself the trained dispatchers hasty translation of a panicked caller to 911. They arrive at a scene and must engage immedeately.  They are simultaneously trying to learn what is really going on, who is who, and what is the underlying objective of each persons manipulations. They are also attempting to effectively anticipate in real-time how the incident is developing and whether to call for extra resources and which resources are needed.

In the case of Alexia Thomas, the station which responded was in effect the caller and the dispatcher. A golden opportunity to set out with an extremely accurate and well informed understanding of the problems they could encounter and the resources needed.

According to code, Alexia Thomas was wanted on suspicion of child abandonment. But a thoughtful non-expert doing an intake of the situation will come up with:

mother is undergoing some sort of crisis, Emotional, psychological, physiological. she is very likely suicidal. She has undergone sustained stress and her reaction will reflect extreme anxiety and fragility.

In human terms. she has made a desperate last-ditch effort to endure incredible shame and deprecation in order to insure the survival and safety of her children.

The resonse is grounded in that understanding.

 Or just saddle up, open the corral gates and fire a shot in the air to start the horses galloping. a response comfortably oblivious to where its going, who it will find and what purpose it has at all.

more cops does not equal more safety.

more rowers does not equal the rowboat moving any faster.

repeating these simplifications leads to creating generally accepted falsehoods.

toxic delusional logic.

I had the opportunity of conversation two nights past with a patrol officer assigned to LAPD's Northeast station. I was impressed with her knowledge, even-tempered manner and communication skills.

LAPD gets officers with a variety of personal aptitudes and motivations. Different paths to developing personal effectiveness  leads to maximizing the individuals intrinsic job satisfaction.

And creates an organization able to respond succesfully to the variety of potential situations. Success through personal development opportunities and identifying specialized skill sets. then allocating the specialized skills when and where most needed.

Alexia Thomas was confronted by a female officer and the outcome was undesirable. I still believe that female officers in general possess the aptitudes best suited in taking the lead in approaching and communicating with Ms. Thomas.

 I believe the officer I met earlier this week is well suited to specialized training in this category of domestic police call.  The organization benefits to develop her skills and designating her as the lead when responding to specific situations. I am not implying this officer is a softie either. i wouldn't challenge her direction I have no doubt that once she determines compliance must be exacted by physical intervention - she can get it done quite swiftly and efficiently.

LAPD can wait for SWAT to arrive. They can wait for a Drug Recognition Expert to drive the length of the city from another station if needed. But nothing for Alexia Thomas.

LAPD may be on target with numbers of female officers. What i am seeing is an organizational failure to value and develop their inherent skills and allocate effectively to the incidents where they are needed. Which is a big chunk of the calls received. I also can see frustration in deriving the job satisfaction which comes from effective placement in the team.

female officers is only one area where LAPD treads water.

You can add a rower and cause everyone to row harder and the rowboat to move slower.

We are paying top dollar for our police officers. We don't need more. Lets invest that in developing and innovating all of the individual potential and then using it where its most valuable.

If the death of alexia thomas is any indication - the LAPD is failing at that. That does no good for the citizens or the police

The death of Alexia Tthomas:

is a case study where the organization(LAPD) was given an opportunity to fully maximize all of its human talent and resources, properly match those to the incident, carry out their mission and result in the best possible outcome available.

instead, their efforts achieved an outcome which almost couldn't have been any worse and is hard to get even if they had been denied all of the luxuries this situation provided to get it right.

We are also left with a narrative indicating the trajectory of the response was oblivious or impervious to making any readjustment, reevaluation or calling any of the free time-outs which they had left on the clock.

This is what we have been rewarding at LAPD.

 We have obviously succeeded in transforming some components of the LAPD culture and organization into the same malignancy identified with the decision to halt improvement efforts at County MLK Medical Center and shut it down completely. 

Preface: I haven't seen all the details that may be available to read about this incident, nor do i have access to primary sources which the police dept can study and measure in their investigation of the incident. Therefore, my comment is reactive. It is open to correction and revision as more information about the incident becomes available.

I could wait for that information before commenting, but i will offer my reaction now with a sense of urgency. Take away from my comment any portions which may be useful and relevant. Leave untouched any portion which your own understanding finds not applicable, or contribute a correction based on your own body of understanding or experience.

I bear responsibility for the death of Alesia Thomas. If you live in Los Angeles, if you pay taxes in Los Angeles, if you are eligible to vote in Los Angeles - then you are also responsible for the death of Alesia Thomas. Not only are we responsible for the death of Alesia Thomas, but we should have seen it coming for a long time. We could have intervened years ago, we could have stepped up to try and prevent it only the day before it happened. Instead, not only have we ignored the signs telling us that we were getting closer and closer to the moment of her death, but we chose to engage in group activities of delusion as our contribution to local policing in a democratic society.

Do the LAPD officer's have any responsibility for the death? Some. Not as much as i do or as you do.

What about Chief Beck?  We pay his salary. Doesn't that mean we get to blame him?

Sure, go ahead and blame Beck. Blame Beck and insure that it will happen again if we insist on our own innocence and continuing our comfortable delusions.

Here is my Heirarchy of Responsibility for the Death of Alesia Thomas listed from least responsible to greatest responsible:

the police officers who made the arrest

LAPD Chief Charlie Beck

the LAPD Board of Commissioners -

Andrea Sheridan Ordin, Robert Salzman Richard Drooyan John Mack -current members

Alan Skobin, Debra Wong Yang, et al former members in recent past

You and I

It requires a sustained effort from the responsible hierarchy to produce the effort which was the departments response to the actions of Alexia Thomas.

An established, well funded, professional big city law enforcement agency response that indicates that officers, supervisors, department mangers and planners have become critically confused in understanding their mission.

Have become hostile to or remain ignorant of the human resources and talent within their own organization.

Have reached a point where the organization has no incentive or negative incentive to develop, innovate, efficiently allocate and deploy the valuable human resources within the department.

Is now wasting, fettering and stunting the development of their own human resources.

is preventing implementation of operational policies allowing them to properly identify situational needs of an incident and match the skills required.

The bully will always just keep beating you down until you stand up one day and beat the fuck out of him. Who's gonna do something about it?????? Like today.... not tomorrow, not waiting for your neighbor. TODAY!!! The only conclusion I can come up with is the higher ups are LOOKING for people like this to patrol the streets.

just curious, have any of you tried sitting inside a police car? if yes, good. if no, try it. 

How about testing the officers for "intoxicants"?  

Let's see what kinds of drugs or other illegal substances they may be using.

You know whats theve been beating the shit out of inmmates in county since the early eighties but since theyve taken to the streets everyones outraged and ill tell its not a racial thing its a lower class citizen when you start letting them stop and search people without probable cause and to generally rough up the homeless of course their gonna get a taste for it

You know whats theve been beating the shit out of inmmates in county since the early eighties but since theyve taken to the streets everyones outraged and ill tell its not a racial thing its a lower class citizen when you start letting them stop and search people without probable cause and to generally rough up the homeless of course their gonna get a taste for it

wow.

wow.

Where is the DONT like button?

I hate these power hungry pigs, we need to do something to stop this from happening to out citizens!!! The police have become more dangerous than the bad guys!!!

They probably used excess force because she was breathing. Very life-threatening to the pigs of course.

Horrible, I feel for the children..Is anything being done to help them?

it wont stop till we revolt against them

They gangster!

Clearly the female cop needs to be charged with assault. I pity the kids and maybe it's a good thing the mother died. 

: O

what is there to investigate? they should be taken to court for murder..