Know the Limits of Your First Amendment Rights

Law enforcement officers can be disciplined for speaking their minds. Here's a primer on how the First Amendment covers and doesn't cover you on the job.
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Law enforcement officers can be disciplined for speaking their minds. Here's a primer on how the First Amendment covers and doesn't cover you on the job.
The son of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., is asking the governor of Alabama to stop Thursday's execution of a man convicted in the 2004 killing of three police officers but who was not the trigger man.
An officer with the West Deer Township (PA) Police Department has filed suit against two private enterprises after he says he witnessed a man being electrocuted by downed power lines.
"This would be the first time in American history that a police officer or anybody was charged with the crime of murder for shooting at an active shooter," said Jason Smith, president of the Oklahoma Fraternal Order of Police.
A K-9 sniff of a suspect's car led to a drug conviction and a 7th Circuit ruling on traffic stop length.
"There's no crime called refusing to die while a mass murderer is in your school," said Eugene O'Donnell, a former New York City police officer and prosecutor.
An appeals court upheld the conviction of former Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca on Monday, clearing the way for the now ailing law enforcement figure to spend years in prison for obstructing justice and lying to federal authorities.
In past January issues, POLICE covered law enforcement officers’ fears as a Democrat was entering the White House, tools for rendering aid to heart attack victims, and tips for communicable disease protection.
The New York Patrolmen's Benevolent Association issued a press release stating that the autopsy report on the death of Eric Garner "demonstrates conclusively that Mr. Garner did not die of strangulation of the neck from a chokehold which would have caused a crushed larynx (windpipe) and a fractured hyoid bone."
In a lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Detroit, Michelle Reynolds says that police used excessive force and violated her 20-year-old son's civil rights in a confrontation outside the family's home in May.