We've been face-to-face, yeah."
Last night I attended a Toledo City Council meeting. The special meeting followed an incident where a TPD police officer jacked a teenage girl up against a police car, and then took her to the ground, twice. Toledo Police Chief Michael Troendle attended the special meeting to address the council’s and communities concerns.
Troendle began by noting Toledo’s crime statistics, which are down for violent felonies like homicide and robbery. But I wanted to know about the jaywalking statistics. Are jaywalking statistics down in North Toledo? I couldn’t find any jaywalking statistics on the TPD’s website’s official Crime Map.
The jaywalking statistics aren’t down in Toledo, but the TPD’s statistics for prowling Toledo’s neighborhoods and preying upon teens, are up. Troendle believes more training will improve policing in Toledo, but I disagree.
TPD police officers don’t need more training. Every police officer in Ohio must undergo extensive training and be certified. The TPD has a “Response to Resistance” policy that incorporates the law found in the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Graham v. O’Conner. That’s enough training right there.
TPD Special Ops Chase & Detain Teens
If any adult raced thru a Toledo neighborhood in a speeding car, past kids playing basketball in the street, jumped out of the car, threw a teen against a car, and then tackled the teen to the ground, twice, that person would be charged with felony child-abuse, reckless endangerment, and speeding.
Any TPD officer that uses unreasonable, excessive force, does not need to be reassigned to another neighborhood. What neighborhood is the rabid rookie being reassigned to? I don’t want a TPD officer like that in West Toledo.
We have Special Ops in West Toledo. They’re trained much better. They get on their PA and warn you not to walk in the street. And after they hunt, chase, and capture their prey, they release their prey back into the wild without injuring or tackling their prey to the ground.
After the video with the teenage girl aired, another incident involving the same rabid rookie surfaced. Troendle, however, wants to reassign the TPD officer and give him more training. Michael Haynes, President of the Toledo Police Patrolman’s Association, also spoke out on behalf of the rabid rookie. But not firing this TPD officer will only embolden him and other rogue officers like him.
What happens when the next teen runs because that teen doesn’t want to give their name, and doesn’t know why a TPD officer just jumped out of an unmarked police vehicle and started chasing them? If the rabid rookie thought the 15-year-old girl calling her mom on her cellphone was a threat, what are the TPD Special Ops gonna do when they believe a scared teen running away from them is a threat?
I’m not anti-police. I’m against bad policing. The above images are from an incident that occurred in West Toledo. I saw a group of teenagers being chased by TPD Special Ops. I don’t know how many of the teenagers got away, or what the cops were chasing them for. I do know that these were TPD Special Ops, and they chased and caught the people shown in the images. The TPD Special Ops searched them and ran their names. Why were they chased? Why were their names taken? Was any record of this incident made? Where are the bodycam and vehicle camera videos from this incident?
This post will be updated with additional photos and videos. Yes, a video of the TPD Special Ops in action in West Toledo.
About The Author
