Talk:Kevin Gaines (police officer)

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On 11 January 2025, it was proposed that this article be moved to Killing of Kevin Gaines. The result of the discussion was not moved.

Fair use rationale for Image:Gainesdot.gif

Image:Gainesdot.gif is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot (talk) 22:51, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the last section of this article, titled Skepticism

Its improper to include the book written by Brian S. Bentley. Bentley himself says in plain English that "This book is fictional and all incidents are pure invention" in the book's disclaimer, as described on the very page linked to justify its inclusion in the article.

What you have here is a work of fiction, together with a blog post, being passed off as a legitimate counter-point to the facts described in court documents. All of which is fairly beneath the standards one would expect from an encyclopedia.

External links modified

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Added archive https://web.archive.org/20090123123626/http://www.rollingstone.com:80/artists/notoriousbig/articles/story/5933156/the_murder_of_the_notorious_big to http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/notoriousbig/articles/story/5933156/the_murder_of_the_notorious_big

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Neutrality Dispute

Per Wikipedia's Neutral point of view policy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view) I've added the POV tags at the top of the page.

This policy states: All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.

I believe there are too many editorial words and suggestions in this article which violates the policy. For example in one section of the article it states there was "widespread corruption" in the Rampart CRASH team which implies lots of people and activities. However there are some sources which suggest that it was roughly three out of dozens of cops that acted improperly and a well-sourced statement on Wikipedia's own entry about the Rampart scandal says the following:

"The Rampart investigation, based mainly on statements of admitted corrupt CRASH officer Rafael Pérez, initially implicated over 70 officers of wrongdoing. Of those officers, enough evidence was found to bring 58 before an internal administrative board. However, only 24 were actually found to have committed any wrongdoing, with twelve given suspensions of various lengths, seven forced into resignation or retirement, and five terminated" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Construct21 (talk • contribs) 14:47, 19 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion:

Kevin Gaines.png

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 12:52, 24 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 11 January 2025

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. Per consensus, the subject's notability extended beyond that of his untimely death. – robertsky (talk) 18:39, 21 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Kevin Gaines (police officer) → Killing of Kevin Gaines – Per WP:VICTIM and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (violence and deaths) this article should be about the event of Gaines's death and not a biography page. 4meter4 (talk) 09:57, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose – Per WP:VICTIM and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (violence and deaths), this article is about Kevin Gaines as a person, not just the event of his death. Changing the title to "Killing of Kevin Gaines" puts too much focus on how he died instead of his life. The current title fits better. Footballnerd2007 • talk ⚽ 15:31, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Footballnerd2007I disagree with that categorically. The sourcing isn't there to overcome WP:BLP1E as applied at WP:VICTIM to killings/deaths. Gaines is not independently notable outside of his death and if it remains at this title it fails our notability guidelines.4meter4 (talk) 16:40, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Whether it meets WP:Notability is a separate matter entirely. Footballnerd2007 • talk ⚽ 16:42, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No, it really isn't. Talkpages are the perfect place to decide the level of content and focus of the article. Violating BLP standards is a severe and urgent problem. Forcing a title to match content that should not exist is a nonsense argument. Support move. DMacks (talk) 19:06, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Support per nom, notability is on the event. This kind of matter is not an AfD situation, it's an editorial matter. PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:44, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: If I understand correctly, Gaines was a significant figure in a highly notable scandal. He wasn't just some random non-notable person who happened to get killed. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 22:24, 11 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I therefore oppose the move. As I understand it (see also the Rampart scandal article), he is notable for being a corrupt Rampart cop who threatened various people with a gun in several road rage incidents, was affiliated with a highly notable (now defunct) record company and its highly notable felonious owner-founder and one of the most notorious Los Angeles crime gangs, dated the record company owner's ex-wife, and was ultimately killed by another cop who defended himself when attacked by Gaines. We may not have known all that if he was the victor in that shoot-out, but he is notable for more than just being killed. I am not fond of "killing of" article titles in many cases. Even if Gaines wasn't otherwise notable, I think "Killing of X" would not be a good title for an article about a death that resulted from split-second on-the-spot self-defense in an incident where X was the attacker. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 20:30, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. Seems to be notable outside his killing. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:51, 15 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per the scandal that predated his killing. Had he not been killed he would have still likely met GNG, and the killing basically makes GNG absolute. As such, their notability exceeds this one event. TiggerJay (talk) 16:37, 17 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.