Receiving a complaint about your service is always awkward, people rarely like to admit when they’ve done wrong. However, it seems that for some South Florida police departments filing a complaint is next to impossible. As this undercover video shows, you better have a damn good reason for your complaint because entering a police station without one can be scary, risky and even downright dangerous.Investigators went to visit several police departments around the state, with the simple task of obtaining a complaint form. Nothing more than that. They were met with intimidation, threats and even arrest by these insecure cops, who abused their positions in quite a shocking way. All this despite having a policy of not only allowing citizens to legally obtain a form, but fill it out and return it anonymously.Suspicion among police officers was high. The right to anonymity usually went straight out of the window as they went on the defensive and wanted to know the investigator’s identity, and reason for complaint.From anti-social behavior to threats and downright aggressiveness, you begin to wonder exactly why these cops are so self-conscious. What’s going on down there in south Florida? A polite request was often met with flat out refusal to cooperate, followed by a line of questioning that casts suspicion on the complainant. It turns out that police officers in the United States often share a “blue code of silence“, which means that they do not turn each other in for misconduct. While some officers have called this code a myth, a 2005 survey found evidence that it does indeed exist. Perhaps this goes some way to explain the hostility.
This case went even further and descended into violence, as the officer realized that he was being filmed. The complainant here asked to see the policy about filming in the police station before he was violently grabbed in an armlock and slammed against a wall.
When evasive cops wouldn’t cooperate with a request for a complaint form, some investigators were persistent in demanding that their rights be recognized. In response, this officer threatened to make up a fictional scenario so he could throw the investigator in jail.
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