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Youtube Video Prompts FBI Probe of LAPD
PachecoJ writes "The AP has a story of a Youtube video showing police brutality that has sparked an FBI probe of the LAPD. A group called 'Cop Watch LA' placed the video online to draw attention to the actions by officers. The officers pictured in the video are now being defended by police defense attorney John Barnett, who defended the officers in the 'Rodney King' trial of 1991." From the article: "A search on YouTube for the terms 'police brutality' found more than 500 videos, including ones that claim to show police violence in the U.S. and as far away as Egypt and Hungary. A search of Google's video site also yielded hundreds of videos. In response to the surge in amateur videos, some law enforcement agencies have installed cameras in squad cars to protect officers against false allegations."
We are all human, and there are days where people get out of control. This is a tough job, with a lot of high stress. I'm not surprised at all that there are hundreds of instances where an officer may have overstepped justified force. But, again, I would also easily believe that there are lots of cases where it was justified. We are not just robots that can 'reset' ourselves after a highly dangerous situation, so some people might overreact when in another siutation so soon after a stressful one.
:)
Anyway, that's my two cents
Yeah, I tend to have a hard time breathing when I'm yelling & struggling with the police too.
Come on, I think cops are a pain in the ass as much as the next guy, but they don't just beat you for no reason.
What did the guy do to get himself into that position ?
I'm willing to bet it wasn't jaywalking.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
In response to the surge in amateur videos, some law enforcement agencies have installed cameras in squad cars to protect officers against false allegations.
Why exactly would amateur videos help create the false allegations? Are people doing a little post-production work on them before they go up online to show a closed fist hitting not once, but twice? If anything, I'd think that video in squad cars would reduce the possibility of police brutality, since the cops know that they are being recorded on video, and an allegedly beaten person can get that video.
Qualitas edurus commercium, nullus penitus net rimor, nullus deus beneficium
In Egypt, a muslim country, police brutality is government policy, not some idiot running out of line, like it is in the US.
x ual-assault-in-downtown-cairo.html
i _Arabia
And Egypt is the second most moderate muslim country there is.
Read how the police responds in a moderate muslim country :
http://forsoothsayer.blogspot.com/2006/10/mass-se
Read how the police responds in a reasonably muslim country :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Saud
Do I really need to provide a link to what happens in a really muslim country, like palestine or afghanistan or pakistan ? Do you want to see ?
Why does this happen ? Here's one opinion :
http://www.faithfreedom.org/challenge.htm
In Soviet USA, you watch Big Brother!
....
In democratic UK, Big Brother... err... wait... hang on
We have it pretty good in the USA, you should see the other places in the world
Agreed, and as COPS has shown. The video camera in the cop car is nothing new. I just hope the video tape is write-once.
Stop resisting arrest and I bet he'd stop punching you in the face. Roll over and get cuffed like he wants, he's not interested in your asthma, he's worried about you pulling a concealed weapon.
Here in the home of Kerry and Kennedy, a couple of people tried to record their interaction with police. They were prosecuted under the state's privacy laws. And the police were full of righteous indignation about the "invasion of their privacy." As were we all ...
I've witnessed police brutality first hand before. An officer handcuffed a college kid when he tried to walk away from a speeding ticket, then the officer pushed him agaisnt the hood of the cop car (burning the kids cheek) and then pepper sprayed the kid right to the eyes (after handcuffing him and inflicting 2nd degree burns to the kids face). That was the third incident in a year for that officer and he didn't even get suspended. I was a witness in the civil case against the station, the kid's family won $150,000. I thought that was an exorbinant amount for a pinched nerve, burnt cheek, and stinging eyes but whatever.
/. who have ever dealt with the police for more than a speeding ticket. I think most people who don't deal with the police very much have a negative view towards them (as brutal or power tripping or whatever) and that is messed up because you are the people the police are protecting. Sooo, support the boys in blue!
Anyway, the video on youtube is a little brutal but I don't think either officer should be fired. Maybe a short suspension for the guy punching the perp in the face, because that is not a move that helps get the suspect into custody. We also have no idea what that guy did before the video starts. He might have just shot a little girl, spit in the cop's face, or jay walked. We have no idea what the context was, so it's hard to pass judgement. Either way, that wasn't all that brutal, at least he wasn't hitting the dude with his mag-light.
I have had a few bad experiences with the police (like the one mentioned above) and believe that it is always better not to get them involved. However, I have also had police save me from a machete weilding maniac that had me pinned in my bedroom (adn believe me, I wanted them to kick the crap outta him). They are necessary, and I think we should all try to keep open minds. Besides, I'm a rarity, a nerd who parties and gets involved with shady people. THeir probably aren't very many people on
I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. -Confucius
Ice-T did Cop Killer with Body Count. It was NWA that did Fuck Tha Police.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
it's all in how you look at it. If you watch the video in reverse it looks like the officers are helping him up.
This was in the Norwegian news several days ago. I immediatly logged on Slashdot to check for more info here when I saw it, but was disappointed not to find any. As the event happened in August though, I figured slashdot had news on it weeks ago, if not more.
Apparently, I was wrong.
Wow, that's really slow.
1) Cops who are corrupt
2) Cops who are not corrupt, but ignore the corruption of others
3) Cops too stupid to know what's going on around them
I know plenty of cops that fit into varying categories above. Personally, I don't give a shit if some guy dealing drugs to kids (note to kids) or some guy abusing his wife gets an extra knock to the skull. At the same time, cops are typically dicks to people for no reason. They spend 90% of their time raising taxes (writing tickets) or playing cleanup after some dumbass.
Check out my lame java blog at www.javachopshop.com
Some points...
1: The guy clearly was breathing. It can be seen and heard.
2: Scum will lie through their teeth in order to gain an advantage. You can't believe a word they utter. e.g. "Got the time mate", "Excuse me miss I'm lost could you help", "Do what I say and you won't get hurt".
3: Where's the rest of the video? Why was it cut off? Could it be that the suspect wouldn't be seen in quite the same light? Not an innocent victim but a violent attacker?
I'm not a big fan of the police but this is a bullshit video. It's propaganda designed to manipulate me. Show me the whole video and let me make my own decision.
Deleted
In My Humble Opinion:
1. It was obvious to me that the guy was resisting arrest. It was clearly obvious to me, even in that short clip, that the officers were trying to control the man's hands so they could cuff him, and he was struggling against being cuffed.
2. It was obvious to me that the video was edited to only show the officers actions, and not those of the person being arrested. This furthers the cause of Cop Watch LA through the use of a dramatic impression on the watcher's emotions, but not on a substantive argument of right versus wrong.
In other words, if the guy did not deserve to be punched, they would have shown everything that happened for five minutes before and five minutes after he was punched in order to emphasize his innocence. On the other-hand, if the guy reasonably deserved to be hit, they would edit out whatever he did to deserve it in order to make the cops look all the worse.
Did I really need to say all this? Is that not obvious to everyone else?
The guy was resisting arrest. He would not let them handcuff him. They may have already pepper sprayed him, but we don't know because we don't see the entire incident. You're not gonna be gentle and polite to someone who could potentially hurt you. This is nothing like the Rodney King incident, where you see him getting pulled out of the vehicle and beaten. I can't believe this garbage is gathering so much attention. All we need are violent criminals getting away or cops getting killed because they are scared of someone portraying them as brutal when they are trying to do a very difficult and dangerous job.
Similes are like metaphors
The word 'muslim' does not mean what you think it means. You cannot be more muslim or less muslim, any more than you can be more jewish or less christian. You are, or are not. Also, being muslim does not influence your level of sophistication.
By equating the oppressiveness of a country with its being islamic, you're wrongfully stigmatizing the muslim faith, where you should be criticizing the regimes in those countries.
As for that site you quoted, it is the work of a deranged mind. Both asking or demanding to remove the site is the sign of psychological illness peculiar to those following the faith he opposes? Please. The fewer people like that we have on this planet, the fewer problems we'll have.
How am I supposed to determine anything with 30 seconds of footage? Why am I only being shown what somebody else wants me to see?
One officer has his knee on the guys neck, they both have his arms. While the officer on the left is calling it in, the officer on the right begins punching the guy while he is saying he can't breathe, It does not look to me like the guy is continuing to struggle at that point. They should be completing the handcuffing, but instead the other officer punches him several times in the face. I think you are just trolling. Go look at it again if you aren't.
Is there heaven? Is there Hell? Is that a Tuna Melt I smell?-Primus
If there was he wouldn't have been capable of speaking. He wouldn't have been breathing and he would have blacked out within 10 - 15 seconds. He was clearly speaking, breathing and still struggling.
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He was unable to prevent being punched in the face, that is a pretty clear sign that he was well restrained.
As a teenager I worked at an electronics company that built, among other things, circuit boards for in-car cameras for police cars. When I first got the job, the cameras were on if the flashing lights were on. That was it. Easy-peasy. A week into the job, we changed the design per the requests of the customers--the police departments wanted a way to leave the flashing lights on, but turn the camera off. Even at that tender age, I thought "Why would they want to turn off the camera?" Why, indeed. I still have never heard a remotely convincing argument why a police officer would not want to film his or her interaction with the public. Since they're so frequently accused of impropriety or even brutality, wouldn't a tape help them? Well, it would, unless they weren't innocent. The only time a cop would want the option of turning off the camera would be if they wanted the option of doing something they don't want a record of. I'm just amazed that more people aren't skeptical.
He should not have run away from the police or put up a fight to begin with. Police officers are only human, and they don't want to get hurt any more than anyone else does. You run away and try to fight them, and you are asking for trouble.
Clever signature text goes here.
That is where we see the stuntmen dress up as cops and robbers and, plan the scene - Because there is no other situation that whould exuse what we see in the video.
FRA: STFU GTFO
He should promptly ask the police for a complaint form (and pen).
How could he speak if he couldn't breathe? Watch the video. He's both breathing and speaking. Not only that, before the officer punches him he tries to get a grip on the officers upper thigh or groin with his right hand. Watch the video. 15 seconds in. Given the proximity to the officer's groin I'm not surprised he got hit.
There are a number of "vital points" on the human body which will end a fight damned near instantly. The big three are eyes, throat and groin, if you let someone anywhere near any of them you're in big trouble. Perhaps the officer was more cognizant of the potential danger than you are.
Deleted
You only get to see what somebody else wants you to see because you were not there. Just like -ahem- Katrina.
News is not -sold- for facts.. its sold for entertainment.
Isn't Ice-T playing a cop on Law & Order now?
But, again, I would also easily believe that there are lots of cases where it was justified.
Sorry, it is never justified when the police do it.
Police officers are also civilians and have to abide by the laws. Having a badge doesn't exempt the carrier of the badge from obeying the law regardless how pissed off they are what whomever. It would be damn hypocritical for those who uphold the law to not follow the same law.
Sure, they are humans and they make mistakes, and that's what we see in this video...
How could he speak if he couldn't breathe? Watch the video. He's both breathing and speaking.
Answered elsewhere, by myself and others.
Not only that, before the officer punches him he tries to get a grip on the officers upper thigh or groin with his right hand. Watch the video. 15 seconds in. Given the proximity to the officer's groin I'm not surprised he got hit.
You left out the fact that the officer WAS KNEELING ON THE GUYS NECK. I'd be 'trying to get a grip' on the leg that was kneeling on my neck, too.
I'm regularly in situations where I can't breathe or speak. If he could speak he could breathe. It's why wrestlers, ju jitsu and karate practitioners "tap out". If you can speak, your windpipe isn't closed and unless there's pressure on your chest/diaphragm, you can breathe. He was in discomfort but could both breathe and speak.
If the pressure was significant on the side of his neck his carotid would have been closed, starving his brain of blood and he would have blacked out within seconds.
Deleted
When you have to find the worst possible to compare yourselt to, in order to seem good?
FRA: STFU GTFO
First a blatant display of ignorance, then you try to lecture us about unarmed combat.
*taps out, since the irony is killing me*
(IANAL)
violence only begets more violence
wake up and smell the police state
If police officers recorded their actions for full public view, it would give every situation oversight and the potential for review. Yes people reviewing tense crazy situations after the fact are more likely on a witch hunt, but if the officer themselves would know that their actions are being recorded they would be less likely to do anything outside of limits, and it would also make the subject of any potential incident have less chance of trying to waste everyones time on things. Police are public servants, they serve the people, people should have oversight of what they do.
"without seeing the part where that person drew a gun and threatened the cop"
In reality a persons weapon does NOT magically disappear the moment they are shot. Only if the person being shot already has lost hin gun; when he is shot, will it seem that the officer is doing something shady.. And in that case he actually is!
FRA: STFU GTFO
I'm sorry, but you're simply wrong. As I've said elsewhere, If his head was to the side and the pressure was that severe he'd have been unconscious, the carotid is even easier to close than the windpipe, it has little structural rigidity of it's own.
No, that's self evident. He was still struggling against restraint and the officer was prudent to keep hitting him. If I was in a fight, had someone just about restrained and then felt them going after my groin, I'd do exactly the same thing. Actually I'd probably be far more vicious about it and go for his eyes.
I suspect, fredklein that you are a victim waiting to happen.
Deleted
Another social issue wrapped up as a technology issue...
then you shouldn't have gone outside being black.
If you cant breathe then you usually have great difficulty talking too.
The police werent going to suffocate him.
I disagree. He is still squirming around with the two police on him.
Also his arms are above his sholders which means cuffing him would be difficult.
He was trying to avoid being punched in the face, by grabbing the offending officers arm. That is why it looks like the other cop was trying to restrain his partner. He was really trying to get the perps hand off the cop that was throwing the punches. I don't think it was OK, but I want to see the rest of the footage. If that guy put other innocent peoples' lives in danger, I have no problem with the cops getting in a few cheap shots. I don't care what a bunch of /.er's think "the law says this..." or "the law say that...", our court system doens't work and I support a little vigialnte justice.
Of course we have no idea what the context was because the person who put up this clip up obviously has an agenda. We know they have an agenda because they are doing everything possible to avoid explaining the circumstances. The clip is very short, nobody is interviewed after the incident (cops or suspect), and their is a bunch of text introduscing the clip as police brutality before the footage and explainging that the perp was saying "I can't breathe...I can't breathe...". The cutting, editing, and presentation of this clip does nothing but take away from the validity of the presenters argument. I always have a tendency to resist when presented with spin like this.
I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. -Confucius
I'm just wondering what you'll say when one of those cops goes ape-shit on you. Oh, I forgot - stuff like that only happens to other people, because you're a good, patriotic American.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
True, but I think the chorus to Copkilla was 'Fuck the police!'.
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
I'm not interested in defending the law, you, or in fact anyone else but my friends, family and myself. I'll do that with the utmost ferocity with every tool at my disposal.
It's very clear to me that the video being shown is propaganda given the way it's edited. Even with that, it's not clear that the officer used excessive force and if I was on a jury with just that video as evidence, I'd happily clear him. Which btw, makes it well within the law.
Deleted
After the entire rodney king video was put out there, it was clear that he earned his beating. he struck first, twice, .... finally the cops stopped taking it, and they forced him to submit. He got what he deserved, and should have been beaten again for suing. They had to put on the show since ignorant blacks riotted. It was crowd control, not justice, when he got the court settlement. Real justice would have been to lock his dumb ass up, and then take on the rioters with bullets.
,"stop in the name of the law or I'll shoot" and they were allowed to shoot a person in the back if they ran. Obviously there was a problem with that much authority being abused so it is no longer allowed. Getting punched a couple times after getting caught doing something wrong is hardly national news. I am pretty sure the FBI is there to put on the show to prevent idiots from rioting again. Too bad since the national guard has enough ammo to put down the worst of American riots. A couple of shots and a few dog bites and the people would scatter. And we wouldn't need to raise up the small discomfort suffered by this criminal and vilify the cops who appear to be doing their jobs with personal emotion. If I were a cop, I would probably shoot someone my first day, then I wouldn't be a cop anymore. I lack the patience for shithead criminals.
Tazers are making that job much more humane. A quick jolt to burn off all the energy in the violent suspect saves beating like this.
It is sad to see or hear about abuses of power, say like killing 500,000 folks in Iraq. If Americans ever grow brains they might put small things like this in perspective. Our national guard could be at home defending our country from the idiots who live here, rather than shooting up families of idiots over there.
If you know your rights and don't break laws, cops will not treat you badly. If you treat a cop like you treat a service clerk at any business, expect a beat down. As a service clerk, I am pretty glad to see some jerk getting punched a few times. The complete lack of respect displayed by most individuals has opened my eyes to the job of the police. I don't like getting tickets, but I am always polite to the cop writting them. I don't like police since their job is to get people convicted of stupid laws. But they are doing their job. It wasn't too long ago that police in this country would order
Watch the video, 15 seconds in, the suspect goes for the officer's upper thigh or groin. Or at the very least it's entirely possible to interpret it that way. It's only after that point that the officer punches him.
How would you interpret such an act from someone you've just had a fight with and who you're still holding down? Would you wait and see what he was doing with his hand?
btw, if you answered yes to that last question, you're a walking victim, it's just a matter of time before something nasty happens to you completely unexpectedly.
Deleted
I thought by now pretty much all police cars had them, they are invaluable in court.
And while i dont condone unwarranted violence, try walking in their shoes for a night: Being attacked, perhaps killed at any turn. Everyone you meet is trying to get away with something. Can things get out of hand unintentionally in that environment? Sure.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
How would you interpret such an act from someone you've just had a fight with and who you're still holding down? Would you wait and see what he was doing with his hand?
Maybe if the cop wasn't busy pounding the guy in the face, he might have had a hand free to grab the guy's hand before he did anything with it.
Being a Black man who as a youth(16 yrs. old)was taken into custody and brutalized by police for the simple fact that I looked like the criminal they were after. It's hard for me to justify using this type of force. For those of us who have take any type of basic self defense course we know that there are way too many ways to subdue a person without punching them in the face. Especially if there are two of you doing the subduing. (I think that's a word LOL). Peace, DREi2Deuce
You didn't watch the video. He only pounds the guy's face after he grabs hold.
Deleted
So someone who signed up to serve their country and got hurt (whether mentally or physically) in the line of duty is deserving of a beating? Those vets that you speak of were normal Americans tryin to do their duty before they saw something that changed them for life. Get a clue, dude - your current attitude is hatefull and disgusting.
-b.
The guy was clearly struggling. For all you know, they were just desperately to finally get him cuffed and under control, because as long as he's struggling he's a threat. The police doesn't want to die any more than anyone else.
Clever signature text goes here.
I'd prefer not to give them a reason to go apeshit on me. If the police was coming for me I would try to cooperate fully to avoid getting into even more trouble.
Clever signature text goes here.
Do they ever do it? Almost never, and if they did they would lose their job as the absolutely best-case scenario. More likely, they get fired, get sued, never work again, and have to spend the rest of their life giving handjobs to support their crack addiction. What makes cops think they're above that? Firing cops who abuse their power is the very least that should happen to them.
It's arguably closer to treason, since they're abusing a sacred trust that has been placed in them. The power to use violence is a very serious one, and it is not casually that we've waived the right to claim our own justice with vigilanteism and lynch-mobs. The whole point is for police officers to be better than vigilantes and mobs -- otherwise, how are they worth the tremedous price? Why entrusting them with anything if we can't actually trust them?
Your ideas intrigue me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Several years ago, I was a volunteer for an organisation called The Legal Defence and Monitoring Group here in the UK. We were often invited to monitor the police during public demonstrations (marches and the like). Most of us had legal training of some sort, and an interest in public order legislation and its reform following a string of draconian laws passed under the Thatcher government during the 1980s.
Our aim was to observe the actions of the police and record what they did during the demonstration, be that behaviour good, bad or indifferent. We used written notes and (later) dictaphones for this. We did not use cameras (still or video) because we knew that photographic evidence was very problematic in court. It was too easy to challenge on points of detail. It was instead far easier to secure a conviction of police brutality by having detailed (and consistent) written observations of three or four individuals given as evidence by the prosecution. Having evidence that nothing happened at a specific time was useful if the police said that there was an incident, so we used to take notes at 5-minute intervals whether or not there was anything to observe.
When riots happend (and they usually did), I remember you needed a bottle of water to stop your mouth running dry as you had to constantly describe the events around you.
"And the meaning of words; when they cease to function; when will it start worrying you?"
Is this new technology? If so, where did they get all that footage for the cop video shows I watch on FX when I'm bored before now?
I guess surveillance goes both ways.
I can well understand why corrupt police would dislike it when they are caught behaving like the jackbooted thugs that many of them are. It is well known how corrupt police tend to have an attitude of exceptionalism; they think that the law does not or should not apply to them, and that they should be able to get away with doing whatever they like.
I also don't know how that demoniac Barnett is able to sleep at night...I saw the footage of what they did to Rodney King myself. Makes me think that there must be some substance to some of the negative stereotypes about lawyers as well, after all.
Enjoy a taste of your own medicine, guys. Suddenly surveillance cameras watching anything and everything doesn't seem like such an attractive idea when you're the target of them, does it?
If the cop has the guys hand, then why the hell is he pounding the guys face? Sounds like retribution, not self defense at that point.
yeah that's what I was refering to. Don't know why I got modded to -1 redundant, especially since in the CopKilla, the lyrics run:
Fuck the police, for Darryl Gates.
Fuck the police, for Rodney King.
Fuck the police, for my dead homies.
Fuck the police, for your freedom.
so it seemed to me to be quite relevant to the debate. ah well, such is slashdot.
Fuck the moderators, for AC
Fuck the moderators, for CowboyNeal
Fuck the moderators, for Unregistered Guests
Fuck the moderators, for your Karma
(i will be sooo screwed if I forget to tick "Post Anonymously"...)
This guy is innocent until a court says otherwise. Police applying unnecessary violence is harming the innocent. This isn't some stupid loophole it's a cornerstone of the justice system, if they cannot adhere to the rule of law they should get the hell out of the industry. If you want to do your own vigilante justice go right ahead but don't cry to me when you end up in prison with those you enact your justice on. Personally I hold criminals with badges in the same regard as criminals without them.
Well you're right in theory, but in practice if their is an overuse of force, circustances can and should mitigate (or not) the severity of the offense. As a civilian, it's not my right to dispense punishment either. But, I think we can all agree that it's reasonable that I would be treated differently if I hit punched someone after they hit my daughter than if I punched them after they called me an asshole. It doesn't mean I didn't commit a crime, same with the officer, but it does mean I get a far smaller sentence.
Relax I just want some peanuts.
I thought about this some, and I think the sympathetic public is part of the crime problem. As it is now, police are afraid of pulling a gun--and trying to subdue a suspect can lead a policeman into potential litigation (as it is with this video). If you're a smart criminal, you'd quickly realize:
(1) don't carry a weapon
(2) If you are caught in the act of the crime, and the police tell you to stop, run for the nearest populated area.
(3) If the police catch up with you, don't hit them, simply tense up your muscles so they have to roughhandle you. All the while crying "please don't hurt me!"
(4) Then sue the police department afterward.
If you are a policeman, it appears the best course of action if the perpetrator doesn't pull a weapon on you is to yell "stop! police." If they run, let them go.
Somehow I don't think this trend is in the best interest of society.
This can't be propaganda because no one is spinning it.
/. ID on ebay or something?
It's just you and I watching a video, with no announcer. It's pretty clear that they guy is restrained yet still getting punched in the face by a cop.
Doesn't matter what came before this video, because the guy is under control with a frickin knee on his throat, claiming not to breath between beatings to the face by 1 of 2 cops.
That isn't spin, that's what happened. Claiming this is propaganda is bullshit, did you buy your
If you dont understand what the man is saying,
go to mtv.com.
As someone who has cop friends and has also been in trouble with the law on occasion my opinion of law enforcement officers generally is piss poor. Sure I've run across cops that are actually friendly and helpful, but for the most part they have the Barney-bad-ass mentality.
I have personally been involved in the old case of..."Well Mr. Ballz, that red-hair you got is way better than the Mexican shit I've been seeing lately. I'm just going to take your bong and stash. I won't write this one up. Have a nice day." *obnoxious laughter* I know, not exactly brutality but it felt pretty fucking brutal at the time. That was some good shit!
The bottom line is your typical cop usually is not from the upper echelon of society. We're talking someone middle class, not very cultured or sophisticated, with a strong chance of being ex-military. Let's face it, a blue-collar, fairly low paying profession like law enforcement is not going to attract the brightest sparks, so I don't see why anyone should be surprised by cases like these.
that's also why what, 70% of all inmates are blacks, and the rest is mexican. this obviously isn't because they're biased, but because caucasians in the US, other than in the rest of the world, are actually paragons of virtue, whereas the black and mexican populations have to compensate for all that goodness.
He doesn't have control of the guy's hand. Which makes the rest of your comment irrelevant.
Watch the video, watch the suspect's right hand at 15 seconds into the video.
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I said unable to avoid being punched as in he couldn't protect himself. Even boxers who get punched in the face a lot try to protect their faces it's a natural reaction for one to attempt to protect themselves. The suspect trying unsuccessfully to protect himself does not distract from the fact that he was restrained and at no time in the immediate time in which the punches were thrown was any officers life in danger from him.
Until he was handcuffed and in custody, the officers were in danger. The fact that he was continuing to resist despite having two cops holding him down means the officers were still in danger. The fact that his arms were clearly not fully under their control and that he was actively resisting being cuffed means the officers were still in danger. The fact that it took two officers to bring and keep him down suggests that he is quite capable of putting up a fight. Until he was completely subdued, he was a danger. In that situation the cops had the following choices:
1) Allow him to keep struggling until he hurt himself
2) Allow him to keep struggling until he hurt someone else
3) Allow him to keep struggling until he passed out (assuming he really couldn't breathe which I doubt)
or
4) Subdue him
Every minute his arms are free or no completely restrained (as they clearly are not in this video) he is a threat to everyone in the area. Failure to try and subdue him as quickly as possible will result in someone getting hurt or dying.
It's also quite clear that these are calculated strikes as it's 3 hits and only 3 each time. He's not pummling the shit out of him, he's trying to get him to stop fighting.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
"And if we go back to the You-tube video that is featured in this story.. what could have possibly been edited out that exuses puching someone that is being held down in the face?"
Squeezing one's nuts too hard usually does it.
Is that same generosity of spirit applied to people who get labelled "criminals?"
If you cant breathe then you usually have great difficulty talking too.
The police werent going to suffocate him.
If you've ever been in a real fight you might know that there is a wide are where you feel like you can't breath even if you physically can. Survival instinct mixed with a liberal dose of adrenaline and you will do anything to make sure you continue breathing. Chances are you won't even know what you did later. Police should be aware of this and well enough trained to handle such situations without further aggravating the subject further(getting an arm lock and keeping hands/arms away from the head and neck as appeased to punching them in the face, for example).
And if someone is punching you in the face and choking you and causing you to suffocate, you're supposed to just lie there and let someone murder you?
Perhaps you aren't fully considering just how far people will go to defend themselves against death?
i am a soviet space shuttle
It's not the job of a patrol cop to punish. Their job is to secure and arrest. If the suspect has tried to resist arrest, they're charged with that and tried via due process. Not beaten up -- which results in suits against the police, and damages paid as a result of the unnecesary brutality.
Punching someone in the face is not necessary to restrain them especially when the person being punched is unable to breathe and as a result will die. That's not arrest, that's murder.
i am a soviet space shuttle
And how do you know he wasn't trying to get free with his arms. The reason he can't breathe is because he didn't want to get handcuffed in the first place. I don't have any sympathy for these individuals. If an office wants to handcuff you, you oblige him and then settle things in court. You do not fight with the officers.
How about a camera which tracks the cop himself?
Let's mount the lens on the roof of the car, pointing forwards by default (where the cop is approaching/chasing). If the cop gets out of the car, the camera tracks the cop, including extending upwards to keep a proper vantage point and maintain a view, so that if the cop gets into ... trouble, someone back at base can immediately send more backup.
"Perhaps the officer was more cognizant of the potential danger than you are."
If he was, he wouldn't put himself in that position.
I have a lot of training in this area, so let me say a few things:
1) You never put yourself in a position where the other can can pull you down. There are ways with chokes and joint locks to incapacitate even an inebriated person quickly and effectively. These guys crawling over the guy like they're trying to make love with him.
2) The punches are the kind that we tell student not to do. They're called "pissing off" punches because they don't do anything in a fight except piss the other guy off.
These guys are the equivalent of drunken guys in a bar. They have no idea what they're doing, or at best, they forgot their training the heat of battle.
It always shocks me how few police officers are to fight. You're putting yourself in a position where your reactions will literally save or cost your life, and these guys are too busy eating. They're clearly out of shape and overweight.
No wonder cops shoot people all the time... they're too out of shape to do anything else, so they let the bullets do the work for them.
I train with a police officer from Ghent and he will kick your ass without breaking a sweat. He trains hard because he takes his job seriously. I train with another cop from the D.C. area. He and I hit the gym all the time. He says most cops never do the yearly fitness test because they can't pass. Great.
The next person who tells me cops are professional is just going to make me laugh. Most of them know how to pull the trigger (but don't even train weekly with their weapon), and don't even know how to use a nightstick effectively.
It's like big burly guys who can't do much of anything except depend on the fact that guys won't put up serious fight with a cop because the cops will shoot them. And so they get fat and lazy and don't train which means they really will just shoot somebody because of their laziness and unwillingness to be professional.
So stop making excuses for guys who don't take their jobs or themselves seriously.
P.S. If you want to see cops that are serious in the D.C. area, check out the Capitol Police on Capitol Hill. These guys are so professional that nobody screw with them because their manner shows them as tough, well-trained, well-practiced officers. They don't let emotions take over and they are what you expect from law enforcement. Why people keep making excuses for the turkeys on this tape is beyond me.
So you'd let the guy perform his ball-crush attack just so that you could get a couple licks in yourself?
Look at the relative position of the cop and suspect. With the guy on his back, all the officer has to do is grab the suspect's arm and put weight on it, and the suspect wouldn't have had the leverage to do anything, much less get a death grip on his balls. Maybe you don't know anything about grappling, but I know the cops do. If he was really worried about a deadly groin attack he would have protected his groin by restraining the arm, not thrown a series of punches to the face.
But let's check the assumption that you're describing it accurately. What really happens is that the suspect moves his right hand near the officers thigh (above the suspects head, with an improbably arm bend necessary to get at the groin), then stops, his hand doesn't move for several seconds. The cop then grabs the suspects left hand with both hands in order to switch his grip and free up his right hand, which he then uses to punch the suspect repeatedly.
The idea that the officer punched the suspect -- after a five second delay involving switching hands on the suspect's other hand -- as a self-defense response to the world's slowest groin attack is simple laughable.
The enemies of Democracy are
Wait, wait, I can tell you how this is going to go down.
The LAPD is discovered to be corrupt. Officers from Rampart Division are dipping into the dope stash in the evidence room, or some officers are engaging in "monkey slapping time". There's an outcry. Something Must Be Done. The Christopher Commission or its like is convened. Anti-corruption measures are proposed. Memory fades, and they never really get implemented. Lather, rinse, repeat.
You can go back to 1902 with this shit.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Riiight. In a country in which Habeus Corpus has been indefinately suspended? I'm sorry, but at this point relying on "your day in court" to right wrongs committed against you is plain foolish. Sure it doesn't happen that often (But at the same time how many US citizens or legal US residents are held captive without trial? Oh that's right, we don't KNOW), but the reality is that in America today anyone can be arrested and secreted off to Guantanamo Bay, or any of a hundred other secret US prisons around the globe. A "They'll never take me alive!" attitude is perfectly justified.
Some of these replies are so fucking ignorant that I don't even know where to begin. ...OK, I'm taking a deep breath here. I promise the rest will not be a rant or a troll-fest.
Some are saying things to effect of "The guy was breaking the law, so he deserved it!" What about the fact that the officers who behave as such, meting out their own justice whenever it suits them? Are they obeying the law, or are they breaking it also? Why is one any better than the other? Should I, seeing an officer behaving badly, beat the living shit out of him, or should I record him acting badly and report him to his authorities?
By the way, I have seen this argument from both sides. I have been thrown on many hoods of many cruisers for no good reason. I have been harassed by police officers who later claimed "they were just bored". Also, 3 of my uncles are cops, and every one of them is crooked. Then again, when I was falsely accused, one particularly stand-up cop was my strongest advocate, and the charges were dropped. So what I'm saying here is that cops require no special modicum of trust outside of that which we afford them in their commission as an officer of the law.
Working in a DevOps shop is like playing in a band made up entirely of keytarists.
There is, of course, a great way to keep people from distrusting police. In cases of police brutality, you don't rationalize away the action, even if the criminal was Bin Laden himself. You go after the cop, and you make an example of him, because it's situations like that - where we rationalize away anything from a single unnecessary strike to a permanent disfigurements- that gives people a reason to fight arrest in the first place.
No doubt there would still be nuts who fight arrest, but if we routinely brush off brutality as mere "resisting arrest," then we can't separate those who are nuts from those who have had their rights violated. Defending cops who break the oath they make to the public doesn't help real cops- ones who would never commit crimes in the course of their jobs.
groupthink: It's good for self-esteem.
while your points are vaild, and it is probable that the suspect in question was, in fact, an antagonist prior to the events shown on the video, it must be said that these points are close to irrelevant in the situation. It's in the public eye now, and the opinions of the public are fickle.
Also, if punching a prone (position) suspect in the face is considered a vaild tactical method, it's no wonder that people get upset. I can think of a dozen methods that would be more effective, less obvious, and far less controversial than the 3 'calculated strikes'. One of them involves the 2nd officer putting the cuffs on the suspect, while the first restrained him. That, i believe, is the textbook method, and probably would have been sufficient given the circumstances.
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
In response to the surge in amateur videos, some law enforcement agencies have installed cameras in squad cars to protect officers against false allegations.
I think this is a good idea anyhow. There have been too many he-said-she-said accusations and they consume too much court time and officer down-time, and fuel suspicions of the disenfranchised.
Table-ized A.I.
I apologize in advance for making an out-of-context, trolly post, but really, I have never understood anyone who defended a sole unnecessary strike. I theorize that I would respect them if I met them in person, but that remains in the theoretical realm.
I bring you the year 2039.
Until they were in court and before a judge, they remained a threat to society. The fact that they were continuing to resist despite having officers attempting to control the situation indicates that the officers and the society remained in deep danger. The indisputable fact that the crowd was continuing to defy the law, and that they were actively resisting being taken to court for their fair and speedy hearing, proves that they were still a danger. The fact that it took two brigades to bring and keep the crowd under control clearly indicates that they were actively resisting and performing subversive activities. Until they was completely subdued, they were dangerous. In that situation the commander had the following choices:
1) Allow the crowd to continue their activities, destroying property and threatening civilians;
2) Engage the crowd but not thoroughly, until they realized the error of their ways, possibly resulting in the deaths of soldiers who had not violated a law, unlike the crowd;
or
3) Subdue them.
Every minute they remained free to disturb and destroy society - as is clearly shown by the debris left in the streets after the engagement- they were threatening everyone in the area. Failure to try and subdue them as quickly as possible would have been negligence on the part of the commander.
This committee therefore finds that the Commander of the Twelfth bridage will not be held responsible for the events of...
Look at what these guys did to that fax machine:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=J_dHJYyQDJk
Table-ized A.I.
Being gentle with that kinda criminal is ony gonna get the arressting officers killed.
One of them involves the 2nd officer putting the cuffs on the suspect, while the first restrained him. That, i believe, is the textbook method, and probably would have been sufficient given the circumstances.
Looking at the video, that's exactly what they were trying to do. You'll note they have one cuff on (which by the way, makes him more dangerous than if he had no cuffs) and they're trying to get his arms under control. That's when he grabs the one officer. The strikes were calculated to do 3 things:
1) Subdue him (he's grabbing at an officer)
2) Distract him (if someone is hitting your face, you're probably going to stop what you're trying to do, in this case, grab the officer)
and
3) Losen his resistance (which it succeeded in doing as you'll note they manage to bring his arms together at the end of the video and get him further under control)
In the end, I would rather the guy have a bloody nose (those weren't very hard strikes) than have a dead perp or dead officer which is a possible senario when your perp is grabbing at the officer. Idealy as an officer, you don't want to have a perps hands anywhere near your body except to handcuff him.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Again, there are better places to do this and ways to do it. Especially when someone is filming you in the process.
I don't disagree with you, btw, and i've already said i believe that the suspect was likely an antagonist prior to the events shown on the video. However, I do think that the officers might have considered the legal implications of being shown striking the man's face on video.
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
Its a thin line on who and how to operate. I work at a juvenile detention center and there are basically two types of staff members. Type A personality, agressive people, and the more laid back (like myself). The more, laid back people take different approaches to descilating incidents than the type A people. Type A tend to try to take control of the situation. The type A step past the rules we are bound to more often, but at the same time, the people we are dealing with (murders, rapist, armed robbers, etc.) have no bounds at all. We are bound up by design (especially because we work with juveniles). My personality style can deal effectively with 95% of issues, but its the other 5% I'm worried about. That's when I need the help of those type A people. The problem lies in the fact that these people are also the ones that tend to lose control when they are threatened. I see the only possible solution to this issue is psych tests and pairing of people based on this. An aggressive and a laid back person. Yes, it is unrealistic goal, and one that won't solve every situation, but all aggressive or all laid back people will not solve any issues either...
My problem is, I don't think it should matter whether it was on video or off video, and I certainly don't think officers in the field need to be concerned with any legal implications other than "is the force being applied legal and neccessary" anything else is distracting and can get someone killed.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Are we talking morally, legally, tactically, etc? How about principles, or specifics?
In general, I agree that there is (and should be) a justified amount of force avaliable to police, based on the specifics of the situation. The police are allowed to respond with equal force to what they believe the suspect has avaliable to them. For example, If the suspect is able-bodied and has a weapon of (almost) any description, the officers are justified in using their own.
The problem here is that the suspect didn't appear to pose a significant threat to anyone's life. If he had some kind of weapon, that might have been quite different.
And, no, i'm not sure that a handcuff counts, since the suspect was clearly overwhelmed.
http://www.xkcd.com/354/
On /. these days, I see way too much OMG POLICE BRUTALITY!!1 and not enough OMG THEY ARE ONLY T3H HUM4NZ!!!11
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
Shouldn't it be say:
Rodney King "trial"
instead of:
"Rodney King" trial
in the blurb?
I'll be your candy shop of infinite deliciousity if you'll be my discotheque of endless rump-shaking.
They better be careful cuz there's a lot of Reno 911 clips on there too and they might get confused :-P
Is it just me or is it not going to upgrade to Vista in here?
The post I was replying to claimed the cop had ahold of the guy's hand. I also used a nice little qualifying word, you might have heard of it. The word is "if" -- sounds like you might need to look it up.
Reading comprehension is important.
You must be new here.
One winter back in the 1990s in Manitoba, there were some cops who picked up a local teenager, drove him to the outskirts of town, and left him there. It's important to note at this point that during a Manitoba winter, the temperature gets down to -30 celsius and the wind chill can easily bring it further down to -50. Unsurprisingly, the kid froze to death and died. Guess who covered it up? Every single cop in the entire city. No heroes, no whistleblowers, just a blue wall of evil, evil people.
Then it turned out that they did this regularly with anyone who was homeless, perceived as a troublemaker, or "First Nations". It took an extensive public inquiry to determine what happened and collect enough evidence to make a case. A good, decent, honourable cop would have spearheaded the investigation and crucified his colleagues for committing such a heinous act in inhumanity. A shitty evil cop would avoid doing an investigation because he doesn't give even the slightest thought to justice, the law, or even Human life.
Stonechild Scandal.
So what was the final outcome? The officers responsible were suspended WITH PAY, and the family got an apology from the current police chief. That's what a Human life is worth to the police: early retirement and some hollow words from someone who has nothing to do with the situation whatsoever.
Chuck D. said it best
a) has no members that commit crimes or abuse their power --
or
b) doesn't try to cover up the crimes of its members, and invites independent public inquiry to eliminate corruption because they actually respect laws and justice --
and I'll respect its members. In fact, show me a whistle-blower cop, and I'll respect him or her. They exist ... they're just an extremely rare breed. I'm sure there are a few neonazis out there that respect other races. There are at least one or two Christians in the world who actually respect the freedoms and rights of others. Anything is possible. And I respect those people. But they're hideously rare. The local cops? They protect each other. No whistleblowers. Not a single one of them has a spine. I'm not generalizing -- I'm referring to precisely those cops that either commit crimes or protect those that commit crimes. Covering up a crime is itself a crime -- and you know that. So you also know that every single cop who turns a blind eye to corruption is also a criminal.
I'm not suggesting we get rid of the police. I'm suggesting complete and independent oversight of their actions by the public, and that any cop who commits a crime (including abetting the crimes of others) while on duty be tried for treason. Any cop who doesn't want to obey the law should quit. Abdicate their responsibility?! Good, if they throw in the towel on their own, so much the better. If they didn't it would have to be stripped from them by force.
Do you really think that it would be bad if criminals were removed from the police force? Of course you don't. No one wants to give criminals guns and body armor and a license to kill at will. Just keep in mind that abetting a crime is itself a crime. Conspiracy is a crime. And so most cops are in every legal sense criminals.
So are you saying those inmates are innocent ? Just because there is a difference, there necessarily is racism involved ? Maybe it simply is true what every statistic keeps repeating : immigrants commit many more crimes than natives. 20 or 30 times more. This is statistic is not isolated to america. Les than 30% of people in the belgian prisons are belgians. 4% of muslims in the UK perpetrate 72% of reported antisemitic attacks.
w s/news.html?in_article_id=412697&in_page_id=1770
f change.net/pics/2006/r3443127481_o.jpg&usg=__G3_28 -sYXxU2Lu5snXpe9BxqMsc=
... why don't you check how blacks are treated in the rest of the world. Why don't you check how muslims treat blacks ? It's been in the news so much lately in sudan. Also note that muslims have no word for "a black person" only one single word denotes blacks in the muslim word. You know which one ? "slave".
... check your facts.
islam teaches muslims to kill infidel males, and rape infidel females. The statistic on rapes in brussels, unfortunately, confirms this is exactly what's happening. There are maybe 5% muslims, but they do nearly 60% of rapes. That's racism right there for you. Also note that in many muslim countries, it is either explicitly or de-facto legal to do so.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/ne
Or look at the case of ait oud. He's a muslim who raped and killed 2 children. Then he dumped them in the sewer. Traces of his jacket and his hair were found on the victim, including the areas where they really, REALLY shouldn't have been found. His entire mosque agrees : he didn't do it, and even if he did do it, he did nothing wrong, and he's being accused because of racism. The papers reported this small detail once, and now they shut up about any of his relatives or other muslims. Coincidence ?
http://images.google.be/url?q=http://watch.windso
And
But as always
Or, and this one is particularly good, my Dad's affair; the woman's husband was a high-ranking, highly-decorated detective. When they both decided to divorce their current partners, this pinnacle of the community, this man of honour and justice, came to kill my dad. Fortunately my father and his bride-to-be had made haste out of town, because they were pretty sure that he would do exactly that. Funny how a man so willing to commit murder would rise so high in the police... he later took custody of his children illegally, and spent the next decade convincing them that their mother was pure evil. And of course, being a cop, he was never held accountable for any of it and was able to have the custody made official (judges hate cheating women; oddly enough, cheating men seem to do just fine in court :roll: ).
Suffice to say, no cops have ever stood up for me or my rights. They shut down parties that I go to. They've ignored me the few times I've needed to call the police for thefts at my store. They spend 90% of their time hunting down grow-ops -- and then they auction off the siezed hyrdoponics equipment to line their pockets, putting it back in the hands of drug producers. Then they do nothing about the heroin dealers who operate in the open on Main and Hastings. Everyone knows they are there, you can watch deals go down as you drive past. You'll step on needles as you walk through the area if you're not careful (not to mention tripping over the junkies sprawled everywhere). The cops do nothing, other than to lobby the government to shut down treatment programs. Yes, you read that right. They lobby the government to shut down treatment programs. These are evil, evil men and women.
I could go on and on... examples of police corruption shouldn't be this easy to find! They should be rare aberrations! Not the status quo.
Come on guys, I don't see the problem at all. If arrested, LA cops will treat you like a King!
or else!
Sorry, no sale. Cops are evil, stupid, bullies. The ones who don't hurt people cover for the ones who do. They'll hurt you for nearly any reason, legitimate or otherwise.
LAPD has a really tough job. Not only are they hated,
but getting shot at, ambushed, cussed at, etc. ain't no fun.
How does getting a house call sound...only to have the door
open and have a gun pointed at your face sound?
I give props for the officers in the LAPD.
The police are given resect, power and a release from many of the problems we, the public, face. If it is your word against an officer, who wins? UK citizens aren't allowed guns but police can. The police are allowed to speed. They can arrest you (temporarily) for no reason at all.
For these powers, we are supposed to be selecting the best of us and then training them to the use of this power.
If they are allowed to be ordinary joes then why do we not give our ordinary joes the same powers?
For their failures, they should be removed from the police force. If their excuse is that they are only human, they should resign.
the suspect is restrained.
In much the same way as you cannot shoot a prisoner of war after they have surrendered, you cannot punch the face of a suspect who is restrained.
You, Colin and Grolsh all seem to think that that is the context necessary.
Well, if those officers get whacked next week is it self defense because these officers assaulted this man here? It is, after all, the context for this killing.
Given that his vew was restricted and his arms were already being controlled?
If he HAD taken hold of the gun, there isn't the leverage to actually REMOVE it from the holster (the elow doesn't bend that way unless you're a contortionist). Then he's got to point the gun at someone laying on his legs while another lies on his neck and shoot.
Two problems then with this story
1) Unlikely to occur
2) Unlikely to have had any consequence
Clever signature text goes here.
italian men also rape women who wear tight jeans, because they are "provoking them by flaunting their bodies".. is this so different from the reasons arab men give for why women shouldn't wear western clothing? i realise it's hip to bash islam, but really, you seem to be somewhat biased.
"4% of muslims in the UK commit 72% of all antisemitic attacks in the uk"
again, marvellous figures. who invented antisemitism again? islam? right, let's move on
try to remember.. police officers are people, who bring their own taught biases to their work with them. i could probably also pull figures either out of my ass or from some report that tell you minorities are far more likely to be fined or taken in for crimes committed than 'majority' members of the population.
also try to remember how well pro bono lawyers do their work [i'm sure you can find multiple cases reported where the lawyers either fall asleep during trial or show up drunk], and look up the definition of "class justice".. i'm sure you'll find the notion shocking.
sure, people who have few good job opportunities will commit more crimes than those who have many, but i don't think you're trying to cast doubt on that.
i think you actually believe that somehow, race or religion is indicative of whether or not people will commit crimes at all [insert shocked face here], rather than economic prospects being the primary motivation. yes, there are countries where women have fewer rights than men, but it's not like we haven't had the same thing happen here at some time in the past (and not even that far off, too)
"but as always, check your facts" -- sure. but as always, try to be unbiased. far more important
If a pair of civilians were to hold down a person with a knee on his throat while punching him in the face, they would not be suspended from their jobs, they would be charged under the criminal law and spend some time in prison (not to mention have a criminal record).
Policemen (or any other authority figures) should face at least the same consequences. Probably even more serious because the temptation to use that excessive force is quite high.
"87%" hmm, - if you're going to be as definite as that, quote your reference.
I'll take no response as you acknowledging you made it up.
Sheesh, that's not even a beating. I've been hit harder by my 9 y/o nephew. If I had a 9 y/o niece, I'll bet she could hit harder as well..
Someone needs to teach the cop how to hit. From the position he's in, he shoulda rocked the cholo to sleep with an elbow or two and then turned him the fuck over.
I guess they wouldn't want me on the jury.
Christ, I wonder how many boys get through high school w/o ever taking or throwing a punch. Boxing or wrestling should be fucking mandatory.
Yes, only some cops commit crimes. But the rest protect them and hide their crimes. That works out to a grand total of zero good cops. Well, there are always a few who do act as whistleblowers. They come along about once in a generation, so the percentage of cops sufficiently good as to not warrant hanging is still just slightly over 0%.
All cops would need to do to have my respect is this: fire and then arrest ANY cop who commits ANY crime whatsoever. Period. That's it. But it doesn't happen. Until it does, they're all scum; some of them are criminal scum, some of them are the scum that protects the criminal scum.
There are two more videos of the incident on YouTube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xF7zejCaRc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XhkghjIGYw
The first is only one second long. The second shows the suspect face down.
It's a combination of the uniform and the attitude that garners respect. If I pass a police officer, in most cases I'll usually be polite enough to tip my hat and say hi. If a few officers in life for a coffee, I might be obliged to let them ahead since they have an important job to do.
Now if I run into an officer who is being a dick, or breaking the law, then he doesn't deserve my respect any more than any other jerk does. I think that's what's being discussed here, rather than disrespecting good people doing their job and a service to the community.
It is nice to see so many insightful posts.
1) The clip is edited. The editor went out of his/her way to NOT show what happened before and after the punching.
2) The non-punching cop is clearly attempting to stop his partner from punching the guy on the ground.
3) The guy on the ground is lying. He can be heard taking deep breaths.
I know the FBI will take all of this into account, and more. For example, if the suspect had kicked the punching officer in the nuts prior to being taken down, that must be taken into account. The man is a human being after all, and the suspect is NOT complying with the officer's requests (they are trying to cuff him and he is fighting them).
Personally, I beleive an officer has the right to use various kinds of force during a take-down. If indeed the suspect had kicked the officer in the nuts prior to the takedown, and the suspect is clearly attempting to resist arrest, it may be entirely legal and justified for the officer to use his fists to incapacitate the suspect--even if it looks bad on youtube.
This smacks of the John Kerry video on youtube. Just 10 seconds, and they clipped all the earlier information. Kerry told a joke about the republican party, then a joke about bush, then the botched sentence. No one in the media showed all three statements, just the last one. Without the full context the facts are easily skewed.
While I agree with the spirit of your argument, I see two major problems with it. Its not that people would never pass the law, its that:
1. Noone would ever willingly become a law enforcement officer
2. A large number of "false positive" accusations will occur when guilty people try to smear the reputation of an arresting officer.
I agree. My adult daughter says that everyone she meets automatically gets "10 points of respect" from her as a "good will" gesture, after that it is up to them to increase/decrease their "respect score" by their deeds.
A uniform shows people you have some sort of authority, it doesn't teach you how to use that authority wisely.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
My planned career is to be in the sciences. The code of conduct there? Don't falsify data. That's pretty much it. Somehow I think I'll manage to do those things. And exposing scientists who violate those rules is a VITAL aspect of science. That's the whole point of peer review and repeating the experiments of others -- to expose those who falsify data. So there again, anyone who violates the rules needs to be fucked over as hard as possible.
I'm not suggesting that cops be fired for violating their own silly little rules. I'm suggesting they be fired and jailed (and maybe hung) for BREAKING THE LAW THAT THEY SWORE TO UPHOLD. Why is having to obey the law considered so difficult for cops? Should I be able to get away with flagrantly breaking the law, just because I'm human and imperfect? No one gets in a fuss when lawyers are disbarred for even the slightest breech of their professional code of conduct. No gets in a fuss that doctors lose their license to practice medicine for violating their oaths. But when it's a cop, everyone is up and arms and defends their right to rape and assault people and then cover it up. Well fuck them. The fact that cops are held to a lower standard of behaviour than lawyers is frightening.
Every time a cop is held accountable for anything, it was because someone outside of the police force fought like a rabid weasel to make it happen. It almost always requires enormous media attention, enough so that the people at the top come to believe that their jobs may be on the line. It often takes years or decades to get any action taken at all. The police never take compaints against their officers seriously. I never suggested that cops always get away with things; they don't. But it takes outside action.
Troll. Wish I had mod points. Go watch the video. "Desperately"? Pah.
Something bad is coming when people are suddenly anxious to tell the truth.
You conveniently ignore the fact that the guy was still resisting arrest. But hey, since when did trolls such as yourself start caring about facts?
Clever signature text goes here.
Even boxers who get punched in the face a lot try to protect their faces it's a natural reaction for one to attempt to protect themselves.
Umm, duh. I would hope a boxer was trying to protect themselves.
if they cannot adhere to the rule of law they should get the hell out of the industry.
Haha, you are funny dude. The police force is not an "industry" like the software industry or the auto industry. Believe it or not, law breakers (drunk drivers, murderers, wife beaters etc...) usually don't bother with OSHA standards or worry about whether or not the cop is going to have to work overtime. Police protect their own for a reason, nobody else is there to protect them, regardless of what the law says.
People with your mentality are the reason I posted. You just don't understand. Applying black and white legalalities to a very gray reality is not always reasonable.
That video is a political tool (to what ends, I don't know) and you are being used by it. Congratulations, you have been duped by someone elses agenda.
I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. -Confucius
You know nothing about me and tell me I don't understand. You are going to have to try something better then that.
What a weak excuse. It came from someone with an agenda... So what? It certainly doesn't make it wrong. At least I have some evidence to base my opinion on. That is a heck of a lot more then you got. I really don't care what you think of me but removing police brutality in addition to many things I don't like IS my agenda.
You know nothing about me
I know that you are willing to jump to a conclusion based on 12 seconds of video. If you can condemn the officer based on that clip; then no, you do not know what you are talking about.
removing police brutality in addition to many things I don't like IS my agenda.
I made a mistake when I said it was someone else's agenda, I should have said somebody else's depiction of the facts which follow an agenda (which you may or may not agree with). Perhaps your agenda, or the many things you don't like, have been influenced by other people's stories and biased depicitons of events in the past. Or perhaps, you yourself are only capable of seeing something from a particular angle based upon personal biases that have been influenced by god know what. I really don't know what your problem is, but it has made you into the kind of person that is unwilling to pursue possibilities that lie outrside your initial gut reaction. I am just trying to get you to understand that 12 seconds of shoddy edited video is not enough to condemn a man from his career.
As for the rest of your previous post, I don't care to try and explain anymore. This is not a personal attack on you, please don't take it that way. I'm actually not really arguing with you, I'm trying to get you to see the big picture here. However, I don't think you are understanding and you keep thinking I support police beating the crap out of people.
We don't live in a legal utopia, where everything we do, every action we take, is guided by the law. I actually happen to like the fact that from time to time I can perform an act without having to look up penal codes or worry if Big Brother is looking over my shoulder.
We are continually losing freedoms in thie country and it is not from the police. It is from people who disregard the big stuff (like the right to property, liberty, and justice)to try and fix smaller stuff with laws that infringe on the afformentioned fundamentals. These FUNdamental rights are slowly slipping away from us while we run around trying to fight wars against terror, poverty, drugs, internet piracy, racism, and yes even violence.
I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. -Confucius
Does the video say what what the guy did wrong to get the cop's attention? Does it say if he was hurt? Does it show anything other than the cop throwing a few cheap shots?
If you answered no to any of these questions, then it is impossible to understand the context of the abuse. Therefore, it is also impossible to come to any sort of conclusion about whether this is "bullshit" or not. The context is very important, and should not be just disregarded.
FYI, the suspect was not in hand cuffs yet, you coward!
I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. -Confucius