A new web service that lets users rate and comment on the uniformed police officers in their community is scrambling to restore service Tuesday, after hosting company GoDaddy unceremonious pulled-the-plug on the site in the wake of outrage from criticism-leery cops.
RateMyCop founder Gino Sesto says he was given no notice of the suspension. When he called GoDaddy, the company told him that he'd been shut down for "suspicious activity."
When Sesto got a supervisor on the phone, the company changed its story and claimed the site had surpassed its 3 terabyte bandwidth limit, a claim that Sesto says is nonsense. "How can it be overloaded when it only had 80,00 page views today, and 400,000 yesterday?"
"Having a website like that puts a lot of law enforcement, in my eyes, in danger because it exposes us out there," Officer Hector Basurto, vice president of the Latino Police Officers Association, told ABC television affiliate KGO.
Since undercover officers aren't in the database, and the site has no personal information like home addresses, that fear seems unfounded. Chief Jerry Dyer, president of the California Police Chiefs Association, voices what sounds like a more honest concern: that officers will face "unfair maligning" by the citizens they serve.
While I support transparency in any organization funded by tax payer dollars, overzealous local law enforcement bashing is to the detriment of the community they patrol. When cops are screamed at for doing their job (which they often are), they stop.
Look at LAPD.
3 comments:
If only they would "stop doing their job".
Where is this "overzealous local law enforcement bashing" that you speak of?
I just checked SDPD and SD Sheriffs and saw nothing but positive reviews.
However, I'd like to think that if there were someone out there stomping kittens and harassing citizens, it would be reflected somewhere in the public sphere, not just on sealed court transcripts. I'd love to see citizen reviews of some asshole who's quick on the Taser and slow on common sense.
Every community acts differently to the liberty of anonymous postings. Hopefully this on-line community will show restraint is recording their dealings with local law enforcement.
But there are groups out there who make sport, and some who make a living off of cop bashing.
Those folks could ruin a good idea really fast.
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