I can’t even imagine having this type of thing happen… The shoot first thing has got way out of control
Police should be required to have a bachelor’s degree upon entering the police force. This total imbecile flunkies with guns experiment has failed
Police should not have lethal weapons at all. Traumatic pistols are well enough by stopping power. Not even shockers - they regularly misuse them for torture and murder.
Speaking of stopping power - for police use traumatic weapons are actually better than lethal ones.
When you think about it, carrying weapons in peacetime was a civilian thing for much of modernity in much of the world. Soldiers would be armed when posted, and in other situations it would depend on many things, often armed, but without ammunition. Gendarmes would be armed on service - and that’s not people doing usual police work. Policemen, like boring peelers, would not, batons and sticks are enough.
Civilians would carry weapons to defend against criminals and for other civilian things, like duels.
I’ve mixed, of course, different countries and traditions, but what good does it do to arm police with lethal weapons if it’s not their responsibility to go after really dangerous offenders and, say, mass riots, they have SWAT teams and national guard for that? Talking of USA. Anyway, I live in Russia, here it’ll soon be worse. Right now at least police doing what’s in the article is uncommon, but that can be explained by a system different from USA, static units instead of patrols.
The family says Hefti never mentioned that Chase was experiencing a mental health crisis when she called for backup or that she continued to pursue him despite his request otherwise.
Cory Ditter met his son when he arrived home, but Hefti didn’t leave the scene despite the father’s pleading, according to the family.
In 2024, following an investigation by the Nebraska State Patrol, a grand jury declined to bring charges against Hefti and Blunck.
The family initially submitted a tort claim to the city in early 2025, seeking $2 million, but withdrew the claim after the city failed to respond.
The defendants did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The fuck?! How in the fuck can you just walk into a home without a warrant like that after being asked to leave, hit both the son and the father with a taser, shoot the son 9 fucking times because he was holding a knife and then still face zero consequences?!?
I’ve read madlibs that make more sense than this.
A grand jury decided that there wasn’t enough evidence to convict.
Its almost like some cops join the force specficially for a license to kill
I would love to put all the blame on the police… but the frand jury refused to indite? Who the hell were those people? What is wrong with them. Ignore the judges “instructions”. Vote to indite. These things won’t stop until you stand up for what is right.
Grand juries are just a puppet of the prosecutor. The rules regarding evidence are much less strict for a grand jury, and the prosecutor has full control over what evidence the grand jury is allowed to see.
The district attorney is typically an elected position, so the job has to consider politics when deciding whether or not to press charges. And some cases are politically inconvenient. The public wants to see a corrupt cop charged… But the police union has privately told the DA that if they bring charges against the cop, the police will stop cooperating as witnesses or collecting any crime scene evidence until the charges are dropped. Making the DA’s job impossible in other cases.
Essentially, if it would be politically inconvenient for a prosecutor to press charges, they can simply refuse to bring any evidence before the grand jury. And then when the grand jury refuses to indict (because they had no evidence) then the DA can hop in front of a news camera and go “oh sorry people, I wanted to press charges on this cop, but the big mean grand jury refused. But remember I tried! I’m tough on crime and am constantly fighting to keep our streets safe. Vote for me!” The grand jury is a very convenient scapegoat. They’re a faceless blob that can’t defend themselves in the news headlines.
Or inversely, if the prosecutor wants to press charges, they could literally just scribble “lmao yeah I did it, signed {defendant}” on a fast food napkin and present it to the grand jury as “evidence”. There also isn’t any defense lawyer at the grand jury proceedings, because nobody has been charged with a crime yet. So there’s nobody to go “hey the DA literally just wrote that confession themselves. That evidence wouldn’t stand up in court.” The old joke among lawyers is that the grand jury would indict a ham sandwich for murder if the DA wanted them to.
Make no mistake. If the DA wanted to prosecute this, the grand jury would have voted to indict.
I know people who literally worship police. Like, the crying and reaching out to touch the sheriff during a parade type.
The cult is widespread and deeply entrenched.
From what I understand the Grand Jury reviews whether there is enough evidence to go forward with an indictment, not whether someone is guilty or not. I did a bit of digging and this event occurred Feb 6, 2024, and the Columbus Nebraska police did not start regularly wearing body cams until March 30, 2025. So that’s what, 3 officers word vs 2 parents of the deceased? At the end of the day there probably just wasn’t enough evidence. The Grand Jury trial was for prosecution by the State AG’s office against the Columbus Police officers. Government prosecutors typically won’t take a case to trial unless they are certain they will win, that’s why they have something like a 95% trial success rate, not because they are good prosecutors but because they drop any they aren’t certain of.
Shitty local police again.
Police officer follows child home, escalates situation, family asks police to leave, they instead forcibly enter the home and shoot the child.
Cops gonna cops
Yet another instance of people with guns and a badge BEING the threat by not knowing how they are the problem.
First entering a private citizens home without a warrant.
Second, using deadly force where none was warranted. ACAB They harrassed a person into a corner and killed them for no other reason than they thought they had the ‘authority’ to do so. Unacceptable under the united states constitution. Traitor and insurrectionist charges should be applied alongside everything else. An example must be made or no change will be affected.May another victim of police brutality and violence rest in peace. May the victims family see justice done upon the perpetrating criminals.
Exactly. Is this the ‘good guy with a gun’ that Conservatives want in our schools? I wish I could say that this story is unbelievable, despite the shock I felt reading it.
You said it: ACAB. Fuck them all.
It’s going to get worse until Congress, legislatures, and courts impose penalties on the police departments instead of the tax payers.
Not just the cop that fucked up, but the entire department. They either knew damn well that they had a dangerous asshat in their ranks and refused to get rid of him before something like this happened, or they’re dangerous asshats themselves. The only fix is to make them highly motivated to police themselves.
My suggestion (though I’m open to any idea that works) is fines/penalties/settlements for shit like this comes out of their retirement funds. And not just the police union’s pension fund, but private IRAs as well. Put it all on the table. Don’t leave any loop holes for them to skirt around taking responsibility for making sure every officer is qualified to do the job and not be a menace to society.
Another tact is to insure the police. There was an NPR journal on that a long time ago and it worked wonders where a police department was basically the gang that couldn’t shoot straight, running up all kinds of crazy legal fees for the city. Insurance compliance drove 100% of the needed departmental changes in a way that kept behavior, budget, and the city council in check. In exchange, the insurance policy was there for any mishaps or gross mistakes that would require a payout of any kind.
Foisting change politically by top-down policy was woefully ineffective in comparison. While this doesn’t fix the underlying problems with qualified immunity and how the cops can still fuck up anyone’s day on a whim, this does help.
so now you’re paying a private entity in this round about bullshit way for a service that isn’t actually the service you want but the service you want kinda is a side hustle for them in order to bring down their costs
insurance may be the way forward because the situation is so far beyond fucked it’s incredible
… but insurance shouldn’t be the answer
Oh, I agree. It’s perverse that the most effective way to govern is to outsource parts of it. It’s dangerous in other ways, but I will say that insurance companies can usually be relied upon to be greedy in ways that are advantageous in this particular scheme.
just take the litigation payouts out of their pension funds
Okay, that’s kind of brilliant.
My suggestion (though I’m open to any idea that works) is fines/penalties/settlements for shit like this comes out of their retirement funds.
My favorite reform approach is for law enforcement officers being required to carry professional insurance. Police are often referring to themselves as professionals. Let them carry insurance like doctors do for malpractice or professional engineers do.
To ease the transition, I propose that the department cover the base insurance premiums for each officer. If an officer has a judgment against them that raises their insurance premiums, the officer is now responsible for paying for the overage out of their own pocket. If the officer continues to exhibit behavior that results in judgments against them, their premiums will continue to rise eventually to the point where the bad officer cannot afford the overage premiums and will then have to stop working as police because they are not carrying the required insurance. So bad officers will self select out.
There’s also another angle where the base premiums will likely be calculated based upon the entire department. If there is a badly behaved officer, this will raise the base rate of all officers too, so the department has a financial incentive to get rid of bad officers because they are too expensive.
As long as that last paragraph is true, I could support this. There has to be enough motivation for them to get rid of bad cops before they become a problem, not after.
Edit; But I also imagine that the insurance companies themselves would be pretty focused on making sure each cop was attending good training on how to be effective instead of what they’re currently getting which seems to be, “Everyone wants to kill you! Kill them first!”
So, yeah, this could work.
There has to be enough motivation for them to get rid of bad cops before they become a problem, not after.
I’m understand where you’re going with this statement in spirit, but not in execution. An officer is only a problem after they have done harm to the public for which they serve. How then could a department get rid of a bad officer before this bad behavior presents itself?
How then could a department get rid of a bad officer before this bad behavior presents itself?
The public only becomes aware of the bad behavior when it goes too far and, for example, a cop unnecessarily kills somebody.
But that doesn’t just happen out of the blue. That cop’s coworkers and supervisors knew that he was reckless or emotionally unstable or whatever loooong before it got to that point. They need to step up before he kills somebody.
They could start by getting rid of things like IQ maximums.
The medical industry solved this a century ago. Just do that same thing again.
ACAB.
This is sad.
It’s not easy being a 17-year old male in our society, and this person clearly did not get the help or guidance that he needed.
May he rest in peace.
This is sad.
I think this is more. This is justified anger over a crying injustice.
Don’t call 911 for any problem that can’t be solved with a fire hose or a moron with a gun.
They didn’t call 911, the school “security” officer followed the kid home, escalated the situation, refused to leave after the kid and parents told her to, then just walked into this families home, escalating it even further before her backup decides to shoot the child 9 fucking times.
Meanwhile, the kid only ever picked up the knife because he felt threatened by the cops, which… he was. Stalking someone to their home and verbally accosting them while doing so, making vague threats; “you better not hit me,” is seriously fucked up. She goaded an emotionally distressed teenager into having a reaction, and then killed him for it in front of his parents.
Jodi Hefti and Kyle Blunck should be in prison.
Jodi Hefti and Kyle Blunck should be in prison.
Not an English native speaker, but a question, this spelling of names - is it indicative of anything in their family background? Like “redneck who can’t write his own name” kind of that?
No. Blunck is German, and Hefti is Swiss-German, meaning their great grand-parents or whatever immigrated here.
Thats what armed thugs do, they murder.
Shootings will continue until morale improves.
Pigs gonna be bastards apparently. Jesus fucking christ. At this point if I have a problem I’ll talk it over with a person myself if i can. Less likely to be killed doing so.
At this point if I have a problem I’ll talk it over with a person myself if i can. Less likely to be killed doing so.
Ah, yes, remembering that time when I walked to a Russian police station to report a missing person (my mom likes to just vanish without warning anyone, and I was too nervous that particular time, got worried), by the morning thought I’ll remain there, they clearly decided I killed her.
