The Police Brutality Thread

[Eddie]

I think you're right. From the minute they knock him down he's got, I'd guess, a minimum of 450 pounds of cops pushing down into him. The will to breathe would make anyone resist that I would think. And the entire time, it's that reflexive resistance that fuels the response. Adding another 1,000 pounds of cop isn't going to decrease resistance from anyone who feels like they can't breathe. And what is the guy crying out most of the time? "I can't breathe".

Those were my thoughts exactly.

If you can't breathe and feel like you are suffocating, who isn't going to fight back? According to the CNN report linked above, ultimately he died "after having his chest compressed, leaving him unable to breathe."

Obviously the cops have something to answer for.

Robin - Initially I couldn't figure out why they were harassing him, but one of the articles states that they were called to the area due to reports of a man going from vehicle to vehicle trying to open doors. It appears they were searching his backpack to find corroborating evidence - and ultimately took the two letters with someone else's name on them as enough evidence to arrest him on suspicion of burglary.

Ultimately I don't have a problem with them questioning him or even with the decision to arrest him based on the information available to them at the time. But their treatment of a guy who was never threatening or hostile towards them, who never took an aggressive stance towards them, and whom they seem to have attacked when he presented as nothing more than defensive, etc., is surely something to be used for the future training of officers.

Speaking of training - do cops get any training related to de-escalation? Somehow I don't think that telling a guy who has been relatively benign to look at your fist because you are getting ready to "f*** him up" is representative of how to avoid the escalation of a conflict. And even if nothing bad had happened, if I were in charge I would be sticking him behind a desk for a little while.

And I agree with Robin's lesson learned for innocent citizen's everywhere - don't ever consent to search.

[UtahDan]

So they are all charged with felonies, two of them with forms of homicide. Good. Bullies with badges.

[creekster]

"We must always remember that the police are recruited from the criminal classes."

--Gore Vidal

[SteelBlue]

Robin touched on this, but holy crap, what's with the audio on that security cam? That's amazing.

[Commando]

... and people are outraged that songs with titles like "Fuck Tha Police" and "Cop Killer" come out...

[taekwondave]

Robin touched on this, but holy crap, what's with the audio on that security cam? That's amazing.

You know, it IS amazing, but is anybody else wondering what an apparently public camera with such startling audio is doing there anyway? It's legal for citizens to film in public, but since when can the city just stick up cameras everywhere and film the public, and who on earth was controlling that camera in the first place and knew that something was going on that they should zoom in on and film?

I mean, the footage is great, but this isn't some bystander who saw this happen and whipped out his cellphone, this appears to be a city spy camera. Is this normal in the cities where you guys live?

[wuapinmon]

So they are all charged with felonies, two of them with forms of homicide. Good. Bullies with badges.

Before cheap portable video cameras, this happened all the time. In the early 1980's, my own father had to watch while a New Orleans cop beat the shit out of his friend. As I remember the story, they had parked in front of a building to load some computer equipment. The cop pulled up and ticketed him, even though it was a loading zone, for being like 5" on the line. When they left, my dad's friend flipped the cop off. They went up a block, and got stuck at a light. Right when the light was about to change, the cop appears at the driver window and literally rips my dad's friend out of the car through the window (can you defenestrate from a car?) and proceeds to wail on him in the middle of Canal Street.

If memory serves, my dad had to bail him out; I think he was charged with only public indecency.

[Indy Coug]

How can any sober person be stupid enough to flip off a cop, regardless of what the cop does afterwards?

[taekwondave]

How can any sober person be stupid enough to flip off a cop, regardless of what the cop does afterwards?

I think you're missing the point.

[Indy Coug]

I think you're missing the point.

No the point is pretty damn obvious, so I'm left to ponder things that are less obvious.

[Sullyute]

How can any sober person be stupid enough to flip off a cop, regardless of what the cop does afterwards?

So we can flip off the President of the United States and call him all sorts of derogatory names, but we can't do the same to a cop? I agree that it is stupid, but we should have the right to do it without fear of reprisal. I also realize that there is a slippery slope of denegrating our public servants.

[Commando]

So we can flip off the President of the United States and call him all sorts of derogatory names, but we can't do the same to a cop? I agree that it is stupid, but we should have the right to do it without fear of reprisal. I also realize that there is a slippery slope of denegrating our public servants.

+1

I think people shouldn't be made to cower before public servants. Flip away, I say.

[taekwondave]

My family and I saw a man get beaten to death by the police about fifteen years ago about a mile off the Golden Gate Bridge.

We were right behind this police officer coming off the bridge when suddenly he started to swerve slowly and methodically across all three lanes, applying his brakes ever so little until he had the entire road blocked off and all his buddies showed up.

We watched as they approached a guy with a small backpack who was walking along the side of the road. We actually recognized him from a few minutes earlier when he passed us as we were walking the bridge and taking pictures.

The police called out to him. He looked bewildered, but he cooperated and they spoke together for two or three minutes. After that they had him turn around and put his hands on the car so they could search him.

If I remember right there was about eight police officers on the scene. The guy was totally cooperative until the officer searching him placed his hands on his buttocks. He didn't seem to like that (maybe he was hiding something, maybe he didn't like his butt touched, I don't know) and turned his head and swatted the officer's hand away.

Game on.

The flurry of pepper spray and billy clubs that followed was shocking, to say the least. Mom made us lock the doors . . . but I don't think it was the suspect she was afraid of.

We read in the paper the next day that he didn't even make it back to the hospital. Poor guy. I don't think anything happened to the eight cops who killed him either. Hope this story turns out differently.

[TexTechCoug]

The cop said he was going to fuck him up, and he did. Pure and simple bullying, no excuse, no viable explanation.

Sad to hear him say he is sorry as they beat him to death, ask for his daddy, and tell 7 adult men with clubs and tazers that he can't breathe. As he begs for his life they asphyxiate him by crushing his emaciated torso.

Every single one of the those officers should spend 10 years in jail, minimum, and the instigator should get the chair.

We shouldn't have to live in fear of the police, but we do.

[Indy Coug]

We shouldn't have to live in fear of the police, but we do.

Sorry, but I don't live in fear of the police. I've run the numbers and the numbers also agree with my risk assessment.