My point about the complaint being about a black man in the Jane and Finch area is that who and where the person lives makes no difference. The police must react the same way. They can't make assumptions based on race and neighborhood.
Let's suppose you are the police officer and you got a complaint from the staff at an elementary schools that based on a drawing and statements made by a four year old girl, they suspect her father had a loaded gun which was accessible to a 4 year old.
Apparently everyone here would ignore the complaint. So after recording the call and dismissing the complaint as a little girl's imagination, the next call you get regarding this family is something along this lines:
February 27, 2012
A homeowner wasn’t home when two of his neighbor’s children apparently found a shotgun in his bathroom and accidentally fired it, killing one of them. It was unclear whether anyone would face charges after the 5-year-old girl’s death
Man wasn’t home when neighbor kids found gun | mercedes, neighbor, death - Death probe - Brownsville Herald
As the police officer who did nothing regarding the first report,
Where is your ass now? I bet Joe Public would complain about your lack common sense, only this time, common sense in hindsight, indicates that you should have investigated the little girls complaint.
Police have no way of knowing what is or isn't real based on a 4 year old's statement. But such statements must be followed up. In this case, the report was a false alarm about a toy gun. I would agree that the police reaction did far more harm than good. But the same complaint under different circumstances with the same police response could have saved lives.
BTW, I'm not saying that the police reacted properly. I'm only saying they had to react. I disagree with those of you who believe that the police should routinely ignore statements by 4 year olds. I'm saying they had to react, taking into account the statement was by a 4 year old and that they could have reacted better.
Since gun accidents kill about 500 children a year, the police doing nothing in response to this report from school staff would have been criminally negligent.
Gun Accidents Kill 500 Kids a Year
August 1, 2008
This week, a toddler fatally shot himself after finding a gun in his parent's car. According to Jackson, Miss., authorities, the 3-year-old was sitting in the car at a gas station when he found the gun in the front seat and shot himself in the face. Police questioned the boy's parents, but no charges have been filed. But these aren't freak accidents. More than 500 children die annually from accidental gunshots. Some shoot themselves, while others kill friends or siblings after discovering a gun.
Gun Accidents Kill 500 Kids a Year | momlogic.com
A police officer gets a report of a 4 year old child playing with a hand gun by the neighbor's 4 year old kid.
Should they:
a) enter the house without a search warrant
b) take a number at the court house and after a few hours, they get their warrant to search the house
c) do nothing, reports of 4 year olds playing with handguns by other children shouldn't be taken seriously