LSP Col. Lamar Davis, just after being pulled over by an LSP Trooper for allegedly going 91 MPH in a specifically-designated dangerous section of I-10 along the Atchafalaya Basin, thus justifying the 60 MPH speed limit for personal vehicles and 55 MPH for 18-wheelers.
We made it clear earlier this week entailing our thoughts on LSP Col. Lamar Davis being quoted as stating that LSP Troopers can, “use their discretion to turn off body cameras when they assess the situation as non-confrontational.” From that feature:
For the record, we EMPHATICALLY DISAGREE with LSP Col. Lamar Davis when he says, “a trooper has discretion to turn off his body camera when he assesses that the situation won’t be combative.”
That statement is perhaps the most bone-headed, idiotic, asinine statement we’ve ever heard ANY public official make; furthermore, given the circumstances under which Davis made that statement, the public has every right to be outraged (and they clearly are) by Davis’ recent irresponsible conduct.
In our opinion, what needs to happen is that “LA-ONE” (i.e. Gov. John Bel Edwards) needs to mandate Davis be assessed with the first $350 fine which technically don’t take effect until August against Davis to set an example. Furthermore, Edwards (as “LA-ONE”) should mandate a 24-hour suspension of Davis to demonstrate that LSP Troopers are NOT going to be permitted to be “above the law.” Davis can, of course, appeal that suspension to the Louisiana State Police Commission (LSPC) if he so chooses, and we’d love to film that!
At the Louisiana State Police Commission (LSPC) meeting of Thursday, July 14, 2022, Sound Off Louisiana founder Robert Burns took it a step further and stated that, if Davis is unwilling to publicly retract his statement regarding the body cameras, he “needs to be removed as LSP Colonel.” Here’s Burns making that statement to the LSPC:
7/14/22 LSPC Meeting: Burns calls upon LSP Col. Davis to make a public retraction of his statement entailing discretion to turn off body camera in non-confrontational situations or else be removed from his position as LSP Colonel.
The feature in London publication which Burns references covering Davis’ outlandish and flagrant flaunting of his apparent perceived lack of need to adhere to public safety measures is available for viewing here. At the time of publication of this feature, it had a whopping 681 comments!
With all of the problems LSP has experienced in body cameras being turned off, it is completely inexcusable for the Colonel of LSP to give a public green light to even more such deactivations, and that’s particularly the case given that his guidance in that regard is a flat-out violation of LSP’s body-worn camera policy!
Anybody is prone to place his foot in his mouth on occasion as Davis clearly did in this instance. It’s certainly understandable. What is not acceptable, however, is when a person has too much pride and/or arrogance to fix the problem of having placed his foot in his mouth by publicly retracting the erroneous and ill-advised statement. We’ll see if Davis fits the category of having too much pride and/or arrogance and, if so, we firmly believe he needs to be removed from his position as LSP Colonel.
If you would like to be added to our Sound Off Louisiana email list to be notified of future posts, simply go to our home page and scroll to the bottom (mobile devices) or to the top of the right-hand column (desktops). Supply your email address within the subscribe box. You’ll then receive an automated email from Word Press, and all you have to do is click on the blue “confirm follow” bar contained within that email, and you’ll begin receiving great posts such as the preceding one above.
Nice article Robert! Keep the sound on!! LSP need to be accountable!
this whole mess is infantile and all these commissions that have jurisdiction over departments like the state police are just as ignorant and moronic and here this blog is showing the absurdity of the state police and how does a person get to be a colonel of the state police as it looks to me and many more of us that it takes a sub intellect to become a captain, a major, a colonel….as these people are so stupid that it is embarrassing to the tax payers that are paying for these mental midgets to make decisions concerning people’s lives…..and then throw in the so called commissions that are at the same level and all these commissions have a deep smell of a rotten above ground landfill…..and i am sure after seeing all these blogs on sound off louisiana that there are a lot more with the same smell and yet nobody in louisiana will stop all this foolishness of paying idiots to be who they are.