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Now, would *I*? I don't know. Am I throwing stones? Maybe. But [expletive].
LOOK at that video, listen to the screaming, and tell me that a huge MOB of students did nothing to stop it. Nothing besides hurl words.
Chris is right that this incident wouldn't exist without the power of ubiquitous recording, and that it's important to get out there and show the true power of new media.
This was amazing in the level of conversation it brings to the experience. Thank you.
What's amazing to me is the speed the news is traveling:
http://news.google.com/news?q=UCLA+police
Just in the last hour, more and more blogs and mainstream news sources are picking this up.
As a student, what would you do if this were your campus?
As a college administrator, what would you do?
If you were the guy or gal with the video camera, what would you do?
The Southern California office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) is calling for an independent investigation:
http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/a...
As evidenced by the speed that this has gone from "cops taser student who refuses to comply with instructions and resists arrest" to "Police abuse muslim who was not able to comply" shows that these kids did good.
The power os ubiquitous media is that it's not just the gathering of content that is everywhere, but the distribution. This might have made the police blotter in the college newspaper when I was in school. Now it's national news and the abuse of power will be much harder to sweep under the rug.
The actions of the student did seem suspicious.
The routine checks of student IDs, especially during the night hours seems to be their policy.
Were this guys actions suspicious enough to justify the actions of the LAPD? I don't know as I wasn't there.
Should the students have physically done anything?
I'd say only if they were damned sure of who this guy really was - I didn't hear anyone screaming that they knew who that guy was, only screams about the treatment of him.
Citizen journalism definitely came into play here.
I thought that the quality of the video was not great at all, but I think that the audio was clear enough to convey the story.
This is the only downfall of viral video is that we only take the story from a little portion of what is being submitted.
Check out this taser archive to see how far this police abuse really goes.
http://www.infowars.com/subject_archives/ps/tas...
"Public Servants" Going After "Constitutional Terrorists"?
http://www.keepandbeararms.com/newsarchives/XcN...
Wake up and warn everyone before it's too late.
I'm from the UK. The most our police are armed with is pepper spray, and I've never seen it being used.
Once they had the guy in custody, that was it. Why the need for continual tazing? It makes no sense to me.
Presumably the guy had done something to warrant being stopped, but still...
I would be interested to see what the College Administrator had to say if he did post a video response.
And to anyone suggesting some kind of physical intervention or assaulting the police: that's really not a very good idea. Not only would you put yourself at risk but everyone in the immediate area if the situation were to escalate. It's really not a good idea to put law enforcement-types on the defensive, whether you think it's "justified" or not.
Not a random, but a routine ID check. Please read everything and not just blog comments.
I would also like to know the context of the situation a bit better before launching into a judgmental rant.
We heard the screaming and we heard the police saying "stand up," but we couldn't really see what the student (presuming he was a student) was doing when the police were holding him. We also don't see or know what the student did that led police to use the Taser gun on him in the first instance.
There are plenty of unanswered questions here.
There are plenty of unanswered questions here,
I graduated from UCLA last year, and while I was there for four years, there were SEVERAL occasions of late night run-ins at the library involving people who shouldn't be there. (one homeless person got shot by the police after trying to grab his run and they got in a fight).
Every UCLA student knows that they check IDs late at night at the library to insure it's UCLA students and not crazy cooks hanging out there. They even have signs posted! This kid was just being a [expletive].
The other students should have just rushed the cop and beat the living crap out of them.
It was a good thing that nobody jumped in, to help. The cops would of said they had to subdue, the prisoner, because they were afraid. There was a riot about to happen, we had to shock. If someone had pointed their finger at a cops gut; he would spin it, as a hostile gesture, towards his gun. When they write out the report,they are prosecuting you.
Think of a cop as a lawyer with a low IQ, and a sidearm.
On that note, I still feel that way and can't even begin to think about what the right answer is regarding the actions of the other students. For the simple fact it would be misconstrued as abusing an officer, I personally would have stayed away, and who knows what could have happened if the mob mentality were to set in.
Also, I wonder too if it is a case of racial profiling but it frustrates me that its the first thought that comes into our minds. Not that it isn't possible, or that it's not a critical question to ask, but it is frustrating none the less.
...because this discussion isn't only about the content of the video, but the citizen-journalism and media that surrounds posting videos like this on youtube, I am curious if any of the students involved have made their story public in blogs.
I agree that we do not have all the facts. I also have a hard time believing that the young man was physically acting out towards the campus police or himself-- and that would be the ONLY justification to taser.
As a parent, I am horrified. As a citizen, I am embarassed.
In the UK this incident wouldn't have happened because hand guns are not readily available over here. Law enforcement agencies in the US are constantly facing the prospect of being in potentially armed situations.
There needs to be a big change, especially in the US... but with all the guns in circulation it might be 500 years before all "personal killing devices" are out of peoples homes.
The Islam situation in the UK is a farce aswell; our local hospital admitted an asian guy, and then rang the police after being "concerned about the illness of a 28-year-old man and the behaviour of four men with him".
They had an armed unit close off part of the hospital. later in the news: "Police said on Thursday afternoon there had been no terrorist incident."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4859496.stm
These kind of incidents are being reported in the media more and more everyday
If I was in that crowd, with the rest of the students, I know my emotions would have gotten the best of me, and I would have jumped in to physically MAKE those cops stop. We can't stand for this anymore, it can only lead to Martial Law, and Police turning into Military!
how the police weren't even giving that guy a chance...
i posted the report on my myspace blog also
My Blog URL
http://blog.myspace.com/anti_socialism69
However - you can indeed stand up within a few seconds of a Taser hit. I know, because I've been taser trained and have done this. The research is quite sound.
Second, resisting law enforcement is a really really bad idea. This guy was making a huge scene when he should have complied. Again, the video doesn't show the beginning of this incident so its very hard to tell what transpired.
Third, interfering with the police by jumping in physically is a great way to find yourself on a short trip to jail. Better to collect evidence and deal with it later.
I resent that. As should any other law enforcement officer out there - college educated (graduate degree in my case) - and now we have low IQs.
There are thousands of them out there laying it on the line everyday so that we can have a safe community - campus - country, etc.
Matt
I'm a student at UCLA. I think this event is horrible. I can't watch that video anymore. And I'm really glad I wasn't there. I'm going to keep my Student ID pasted to my forehead from now on!
Just in case you haven't seen the university's LAME comment(as of today):
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/page.asp?RelNum=7513
Interesting thing is, nobody (the parents, the student, the university) is talking about it around here in any substantial way, which you know means lawyers are involved.
This reminds me of an incident a few years ago in Boston after a sports victory in which a cop shot a pepper gun at a celebrating/rioting (depends on your take) girl 6 inches from her face, killing her. Sure enough, the investigation found out that these cops had never been trained about the capabilities of these weapons.
I think we may have a similar problem here at UCLA, given that the cops kept asking the kid to get up.
The other thing I'm curious about is why, when the student refused to leave when he couldn't show his ID, did someone working at the library just ask for another photo ID. They could have looked him up on the UCLA internet directory. Maybe they did, maybe the kid was being a jerk and giving them a hard time, in which case maybe the police should have been called, but nothing justifies what happened after that.
As for this being a targeted racial attack, I have no idea. My gut feeling is no. This is about cops being bored and being in an authority position and playing with things they shouldn't have because they don't know how to use them but are very eager to. My friend was walking past the library at the time and said you would've thought there was a fire by the number of cop cars. Too much testosterone, too boring a neighborhood. I think these are the guys who didn't make the LAPD. You should check out the Daily Bruin, the campus newspaper as the story unfolds because it will probably have the best coverage.
http://www.dailybruin.com/news/articles.asp?id=...
Also I noticed a couple people on here asking about perception of Muslims in the area, and while I can't speak for UCLA or West LA, I think it is a very tolerant environment. In addition, there is a large Persian community on campus and in West LA in general, don't quote me on this but the largest community outside of Iran I think, that is religiously (Jewish and Muslim) and economically diverse. The student is American and I think he's from the area.
How so?
What are the guidelines for the use of this type of force? Can you explain how this falls on the force continum and what force should have been used instead?
Matt
This is incorrect. Police in the UK are also armed with Tasers in some roles - and firearms in other roles.
Example - when I was in London a month ago, police at Parliament and at #10 Downing Street were armed with handguns and MP5 rifles.
Matt
A bunch of words and a video circulating. It's not enough to just pass around a single clip. It means 10 minutes of anger and outrage and then most of us move on to the next thing. Most Americans would rather watch Dancing with the Stars.
It isn't power to have the camera on. It's what you then do with it. If folks decide to take this a step further then I think that *that* is power.
Shock value is ephemeral. This video may find itself as part of something big, or just exploited as something violent to watch. I guess it's up to us to decide which way it goes.
I was a Boston resident at the time that Victoria Snelgrove was killed unintentionally by Boston PD after the Red Sox won the ALCS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Snelgrove
She was hit in the eye by a FN303 pepper spray projectile. It wasn't fired "6 inches from her face". Where do you get facts like this?
The officer who fired the weapon was fully trained and certified in the use of this weapon. The commander of the operation, however, was not trained and certified in the use of this weapon and was administratively punished. He is not the officer that fired the pellet that killed Ms. Snelgrove.
Resisting law enforcement is a crime. Police may use force in order to effect an arrest. There's also video that we do not have in this situation - in particular the video of how this got started so that we can put all of this into the right context.
An officer is fully within their rights to use a Taser on someone who refuses to submit to arrest.
Matt
And I'm not going to argue about the first Taser hit. Some may consider it excessive, others may not. However, the subsequent ones were completely unjustified.
Consider: there were at least four police officers visible in the video, and they would have had absolutely no trouble physically removing the man from the library. He was not threatening to harm anyone. And, while you may be able to get up after a single, normal-length Taser shock, these cops ran them for fully 5 seconds, and by the time they were demanding that he stand up, he had received at least two separate shocks. Furthermore, you can see that for much of the time he was being restrained by two officers even as he was being Tased. I read one report stating that he was Tased while already handcuffed. In other words, the officers continued inflicting pain while this man was already well and truly arrested.
What makes this incident all the more disturbing to me is that officers threatened to turn the Tasers on bystanders who had only requested their badge numbers. That is abuse of power any way you look at it.
It has been reported that the victim was in the process of leaving the premises, as asked, when he was prevented from doing so by the police. Detainment by the police usually makes it a lot harder to leave anywhere, especially after you've been zapped by a Taser.
Regarding Update 2 - This isn't an issue about Muslims Vs. State, it's an issue of State Vs. the People. You only have to look at the actions of the police in America, and increasingly in the UK, to realise that anyone is considered fair game by the State's troopers, irrespective of colour or creed.
It's worth remembering that, just because it's 'the law' or 'the rules' doesn't mean that anything goes in their enforcement. Who decides 'the rules' or 'the law' anyway? The likes of George Bush, who is an international war criminal that is responsible for the deaths of nearly a million Iraqi civilians on the basis of lies and manufactured 'evidence'?
If it's the laws of such criminals that people are willing to live by, where every working class member of the public has been criminalised for their poverty, or is labelled a terrorist because they find the actions of their State and Government abhorrent and oppose them, then we are living in very dark times indeed.
Maybe people need a reminder of what being a student was all about not so very long ago:
http://antagonise.blogspot.com/2006/08/rage-aga...
On another note, resisting by yourself is not wise. Resisting in a large group is easily possible. People have been trained to fear authority figures. 30 students vs. a few UCPD would have resulted in some beat up cops who deserved it.
Sadly, getting evidence and "complaining" about it later will only result in the authority figure getting a slap on the wrist. Getting beat by the crowd will make them fear violating someone like that. Only then will something like this not happen again.
The police were more than justified in what they had to do. This guy left them with no alternative. They warned and they warned and they warned. And this was after repeated requests to provide a student ID or leave.
And yes Matt, by all accounts I've heard, the kid was being a jerk to the campus volunteers who told him to leave. They are random checks, everyone at UCLA knows that. And they are not intended to persecute anyone. I am ashamed that the most UCLA has done though is produce a statement reiterating a policy everyone knows.
However, why does getting one kid out of the library need to involve a taser gun "in a drive stun capacity"? And they were NOT arresting him as you say, not that it would be justified in that situation either. I feel like the many officers on scene could have picked him up. But I think they liked using the gun better, don't you? I'm also at a loss as to what this "joining the reistance" was that UCPD officers keep citing as their justification. Notice how the guy shooting the video was just sitting at his desk, probably not expecting what was about to happen, until he heard the screaming. The most other students did was ask for officer badge numbers. Some resistance.
http://www.ucpd.ucla.edu/ucpd/zippdf/2006/Taser...
And if it is campus policy that a taser gun is allowed to be used in that situation, I, and most people at UCLA, are going to do something to change that, and see that the officers involved are at least administratively punished.
And that's a silly example, yes. These UCLA Rent-A-Cops were behaving no better.
Honestly, did you justify the Rodney King beatings as well? What about Kent State?
[expletive] this stupid [expletive] police state garbage.
I'd say that puts the fault squarely with the college itself. It also probably means those incompetent rent-a-cops can be personally sued, each one of them, for the injuries they caused that kid.
Sakes, if I was that kid's parent, I wouldn't stop until each one of those screwups was giving me 90% of their wages for the rest of their life. :P
In this case: cops = wrong.
The issue comes when they told him to stand up immediately after tasing him, and tased him again when he didn't comply. I counted five times.
As a Justice Studies major, I'm quite familiar with police protocol. A university police department is a full-fledged PD. They operate the same way any other does.
The issue is that the cops on the department aren't used to dealing with an unruly arrestee. Any cop from the inner city would be in shape, and trained in non-taser compliance techniques, and wouldn't have needed to tase him in the first place.
The problem is bad cops. Don't hold all cops responsible; I plan on joining the force soon, and I will do my job right.
As far as it being racial profiling: Consider that every major terrorist attack on US soil has been perpetrated by roughly college-age middle-eastern males. I'm not saying most middle-eastern men are terrorists, but you can't deny that most terrorists are middle-eastern men. I have friends who have to put up with slightly more scrutiny because of what a couple of fuckwads did, but they deal with it because they realize it's asinine to scritinize a five-year-old girl as much as a 22-year-old Iranian.
The other problem here is that we are putting a face of racism on this that isn't called for. From what I could see---and admittedly, I only saw the six minutes of tape shown here---this guy was a brat of a kid who was trying to show that he wasn't going to be pushed around by anyone---and he found out differently. Let's keep religion and race out of this---it was an instance of an ugly situation made uglier by the fact that the kid just didn't do as he was told.
To say the victim was asking for is not different from the ludicrous claim that a rape victim was asking to be raped.
A New Twist on School Violence from UCLA
Not being able to get up after being electroshocked is now deemed 'resisting and obstruction'. I guess the next thing will be if you're dead your loitering.
This is utterly disgusting.
I think it's a prime example of messing with the bull and getting the horns. Don't have your id? Leave. He had to know, even if it’s in retrospect, that he was dealt a losing hand, here. And he dug his own grave. I don’t like pain, and feel for anyone who suffers pain; but I can’t go with a defiant student. I look at it like this: he just earned a few stripes towards rank in the real world.
Similar cases abound in the so-called land of the free, including the video above in which a housewife, Abbey Newman, is assaulted and arrested for simply refusing to tell the gestapo her name at an unconstitutional checkpoint. Another case in which an Alex Jones listener, Ferrell Montgomery, was tasered and had a dog set on him again underscores the brutal and sadistic nature of the police. Like Tabatabainejad, Montgomery was repeatedly told to put his hands behind his head and stand up while he was electric shocked and a dog savaged him for not complying.
In November 2005, Deborah Davis was reading a book on a Denver bus when a guard of a nearby federal building got on board and demanded everyone show their ID. Davis refused, leading the guard to "call on federal cops, who then dragged Davis off a public bus, handcuffed her, shoved her into the back seat of a police car and drove off to a police station within the Federal Center."
http://dailybruin.com/news/articles.asp?id=38958
http://dailybruin.com/news/articles.asp?id=38958
I saw the words "horrific beatdown" and that just floored me. The cops didn't punch or kick him. So when was he "beaten"? Fact of the matter is that he refused to cooperate. He decided to play dead weight in order to make a scene. He brought it on himself. What else would the cops do? Pick him up? He struggled and yelled not to touch him when they did that. Pepper spray him? not in an enclosed area that would have effected other students, and they certainly weren't going to shoot him. The cops were more than justified in thier actions. The students should be thanking them for thier protection instead of coming down on them. That kid should have cooperated.
I will have to say that it's not that unusual for school staff to ask for student ID; I was in a community college in Ohio for a few months and got asked for it in a computer lab.
That said, this guy being Iranian-American and therefore "looking Muslim" (or hey, just being a brown person), and especially in the wake of 9/11, he probably gets asked for ID a LOT and probably in the middle of doing completely innocuous things. It's like black guys getting pulled over for DWB. If you're a comfy middle- or upper-class white guy who never has to put up with this crap, how can you sit there and pass judgment on someone who does? How do YOU know how you would have reacted? Maybe he'd already had a bad day and the staff asking him for ID was the last straw. I mean, it's still possible he's just an idiot, but if we can't know the whole situation from this one video clip here, we sure as hell can NOT know what was going on in his head even if someone found a full video of the entire incident filmed by library cameras.
I don't think police are justified in playing God. I don't think they are justified in using any more force than is directed at them, except for picking someone up and bodily removing them from a situation. This is not a police state. No moral person would want these guys to act like bullies. No *sane* person either, because when they get done with the darkies and the hippies I guarantee they will turn on you next.
Again, it won't be so funny when they run out of dark people and hippies to harass and have to turn on "normal, decent" folks. Unfortunately I don't know that they will ever run out of the former, so I guess you guys will keep sitting at your computers making excuses.
* A college student refuses to cooperate with authority figures / maintains his civil rights (pick a side)
* People in authority use justifiable force / abuse their power to complete their duties (pick a side)
* Dozens of witnesses harrass the authority figures who were doing their jobs / do absolutely nothing and allow an innocent man to be assaulted by misanthropes (pick a side)
* Casual observers are outraged at the liberal / conservative bias on display
As with most situations in life, this all boils down to what side you were on in the first place. I wasn't there. I don't know what happened. None of us ever will because of the bias of all journalism and the inability to report facts objectively. All we'll ever be able to do is form an opinion, and that amounts to zero unless action is taken.
Bobby Knight punches a kid? A guy in a library gets tazered? Shocking? Justified?
Yawn.
However, someone pursues this video, and this incident, to the ends of the earth to produce something moderately resembling truth, and then either student rights or security tactics are altered as a result? Then bravo, the American public did its job.
In the meantime, everything else is talking, and talk is nothing without action.
I love American spectator politics.
Still waiting to hear the whole story, though. As fun as all of this is...
He was on his way out the door when he was accosted. He repeatedly told them he was leaving. The campus cop had no business grabbing him (that's deemed assault if you didn't know) and when he rightfully said Let me go, the other campus cop had no business grabbing him.
The cops didn't beat him? WTF do you think tasers do? Tickle?
Do you know what tasering does? Them telling him to get up after being tasered is beyond stupid. It takes anywhere from 5 to 20 minutes for someone to recover enough to move under their own volition.
Do you know there are different kinds of tasers? The one with the wire leads that are shot at a distance have a different result, which is why their effectiveness and recovery time are given in RANGES.
Small handheld ones, you are going to be incapacitated. they are known to cause blackouts and unconsciousness. Three guesses which one was used on that student.
Now, go try getting tasered 5 times in 5 minutes. That is called torture. Now unless you are all for waterboarding, I can't understand how anyone can justify that abuse of power.
People who say they get up right away were probably tasered by the 'distance' taser. The ones shocked with the hand held one don't realise they have lost a block of time. And so what if SOME people can get up quicker than others when tagged by the one with wire leads? I can use both hands equally, not everyone can. Some people can run a 4 minute mile, but I can't.
So a few can get up after being tasered... not everyone can.
Does that justify the cops not giving their ID when requested to do so? Or threatening to taser the bystanders for daring to LEGALLY ask for their credentials?
I have done this. I have tasered suspects that have done this. I've watched cops do this following being tasered. I've seen taser instructors do this.
The requests were not unreasonable.
Matt
This is wildly inaccurate.
Have you been tased before?
Matt
As a law enforcement officer attempting to subdue an unruly suspect and being confronted by a large crowd of individuals, I do not feel that an officer advising an individual to back away is a problem.
I would likely not have made a comment about tasing a bystander - but I am not going to give over my name and badge number in the middle of a situation until it is under control and everyone is safe.
Then I'd be quite happy to return and give my name and badge number to the student that had requested it.
What I saw on that part of the video was a large crowd of students becoming vocal and on the verge of interfering with the officers attempting to subdue an unruly suspect - the officers were well within their rights to call for backup and advise the students to back away until the situation was resolved.
Their choice of the method of doing so was unfortunate...
Matt
He had refused to show ID and was being unruly - the police were called. They had every right to stop and question him and to touch him in the process of restraining him as a part of this process.
Matt
Ten years ago, when a deputy on my old department was pinned between his squad car and a suspects truck after the suspect backed into him on a traffic stop - crushing both of his legs - and then drove away in an attempt to escape.. and was shot and killed by the other deputy at the scene... these two deputies brought this upon themselves?
I think not.
Matt
Sure, that's excessive.
Lacking the rest of the context of this situation and clear video of the entire incident, it's hard to tell.
However - using a taser is more effective than fists, or a baton, or pepper spray, because once you end the taser shock, the pain fades and muscle control returns. There are no lasting effects in most cases.
Using a taser on a suspect who refuses to cooperate is a much safer method than others - and continuing to use a taser in a drive-shock mode is an effective and legal method of gaining compliance.
Your example is completely out of whack to this situation.
University Police in California are POST certified and have obtained the same training as any other POST certified police officer in California. They are not "rent-a-cops".
I would have indicted and fired the officers involved in the Rodney King situation - in fact, I was in the law enforcement academy at that time and that situation was regularly discussed during our ethics training.
Kent State? Come on now...
Matt
This is inaccurate. Campus Police in California are POST certified police officers - they are not glorified security officers.
Matt
No, I work for BlogMedia, Inc. Get your facts right.
Thanks,
Matt
"Chris Brogan... Says:
November 16th, 2006 at 10:57 am
The first impression I had while watching this was “oh [expletive].” The second impression I had was, “Isn’t it strange that there’s what? 40? 60 students all there, and besides verbally protesting, they didn’t exactly step in to stop the situation.”
Now, would *I*? I don’t know. Am I throwing stones? Maybe. But [expletive].
LOOK at that video, listen to the screaming, and tell me that a huge MOB of students did nothing to stop it. Nothing besides hurl words.
"
The cops didn’t beat him? WTF do you think tasers do? Tickle?
Do you know what tasering does? Them telling him to get up after being tasered is beyond stupid. It takes anywhere from 5 to 20 minutes for someone to recover enough to move under their own volition.
**that is completely incorrect. Tasers emit a charge of 2 - 3 milli amps. 100 mili amps can kill if administered for more than 3 second. This guy was tapped. Enough to get your attention, but no where near debillitating. He could have easily gotten up had he chosen to cooperate.**
Do you know there are different kinds of tasers? The one with the wire leads that are shot at a distance have a different result, which is why their effectiveness and recovery time are given in RANGES.
Small handheld ones, you are going to be incapacitated. they are known to cause blackouts and unconsciousness. Three guesses which one was used on that student.
**I don't have to guess. Not only is it in the police report, but it was in the video as well. They used the drive stun method. Which is similar to a cattle prod. And in actuality there are dozens of different kinds of tasers, however they only work in 2 styles. Drive Stun and projectile leads.**
Now, go try getting tasered 5 times in 5 minutes. That is called torture. Now unless you are all for waterboarding, I can’t understand how anyone can justify that abuse of power.
**That's because they weren't being abusive. Now I have had the opportunity to be tasered somewhere around 15 times in one sitting. I was a part of a police demonstration for the OCPOA. I was hit with the projectile leads as well as the drive stun. And while it certainly didn't tickle, I was not paralyzed nor incapacitated.**
People who say they get up right away were probably tasered by the ‘distance’ taser. The ones shocked with the hand held one don’t realise they have lost a block of time. And so what if SOME people can get up quicker than others when tagged by the one with wire leads? I can use both hands equally, not everyone can. Some people can run a 4 minute mile, but I can’t.
So a few can get up after being tasered… not everyone can.
**Once again the information you presented is incorrect. The wire lead style of taser packs more of a punch than the drive stun type. The reason for this is because the leads are stuck into your body and you are pumped with the charge less than the drive stun, but for a longer period of time. This taser WILL incapacitate. And what is this loss of time stuff? That's completely false.**
Does that justify the cops not giving their ID when requested to do so? Or threatening to taser the bystanders for daring to LEGALLY ask for their credentials?
**Did you not see the same mob I did? Would you have turned around in the middle of that situation and said "here ya go. what info do you need. I'm not busy or anything". Please**
Do you have a comment policy? If not, please create one and clearly point out where you are creating edits.
matt
I'm from Canada.
This video just shows that police unnecessary use of force and logic is at work.
Isn't a taser used to make you not able to move. So my question is , why the hell are they asking him to stand up if they just tasered him.
They could have just hand cuffed him.
I would likely not have made a comment about tasing a bystander - but I am not going to give over my name and badge number in the middle of a situation until it is under control and everyone is safe.
Then I’d be quite happy to return and give my name and badge number to the student that had requested it."
Matt, perhaps your professional training may teach you otherwise, but my common sense told me that if the students had been about to get physical, they wouldn't have bothered to ask for names and badge numbers.
And if your intention is to avoid a physical altercation, threatening to taser a student for asking your name is a great way to achieve the exact opposite of your goal. I'm not a lawyer, but my guess is that that's a pretty flagrant abuse of power, if not outright assault.
You make it seem as if the UCPD cops were in the middle of a shootout with a bunch of armed robbers. They were facing a group of COLLEGE STUDENTS in a LIBRARY, for Christ's sake! No one was armed, everyone involved was sober. It's not as if the bystanders were out to pick a fight--most of them were studying quietly when it all went down and were surprised and understandably appalled to see an unarmed man tasered while he was obeying the cops' orders!
"However - using a taser is more effective than fists, or a baton, or pepper spray, because once you end the taser shock, the pain fades and muscle control returns. There are no lasting effects in most cases.
Using a taser on a suspect who refuses to cooperate is a much safer method than others - and continuing to use a taser in a drive-shock mode is an effective and legal method of gaining compliance."
Recently on Fox News, they had a reporter undergo waterboarding to demonstrate how "safe" and "harmless" it was. My first response to this absurdity was, if it's so safe and harmless, why do they think it'll make people talk?
Your claims that the effects of tasers are mild raises a similar question. If the person is not immobilized and is only down for a few seconds while thrashing uncontrollably from the shock, how does that help an officer restrain him? Unless you use multiple prolonged shocks at high voltage.
When you underwent the training session, did they stun you repeatedly in the space of a few minutes? At full voltage? Or did they just zap you for a fraction of a second at the lowest setting?
Moreover when you were in training, you knew it was a completely controlled situation and your instructor wouldn't really hurt you. A real-life victim of a taser doesn't have that guarantee. My guess is that they're often scared and confused, and wondering if they're going to die.
Suppose a suspect had grabbed hold of your taser and started using it on you at maximum power. Would you have mentally shrugged and said, "Well, I know from my training it's not really that bad?" Or would you have feared for your life?
Regardless of what you say about the safety of tasers, you can do real damage with them--people have died from them. And their use--and abuse--should be tightly controlled if they're to remain an effective tool.
As far as the student himself: all this talk about whether the student was an a$$hole, whether he deserved it etc. is entirely beside the point. If being an a$$ deserved tasering, we'd have half the population of this country lined up to be zapped. The question is, did they behave abusively in resolving the situation the way they did. And I think they did.
I'll concede that a case could be made for the first tasering (though I don't think they should have). But they tasered him eight times over the span of six minutes, even after he was handcuffed and on the ground. And there were four officers there to handle the one man, and more than that on the scene. For a man who never physically threatened the cops and was on his way out of the building in any case, this seems, putting the best face on it, excessive.
I do hope this incident serves to make people think about how accepting we've become of authoritarianism and of the naked exercise of power in this country, and whether we want to rely on the infliction of agonizing pain as our preferred means of dealing with anyone who seems to threaten us.
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Unfortunately, the theft of a flat-panel monitor occurred right in front of two cameras but, since no one had checked to see that the camera was installed so it was pointed at the ceiling (instead of anywhere useful) the thief's image was not recorded.
Very interested to see what that camera recorded since it seems to point to where the student was seated originally. Either way there seems to be an 'OK to beat Rodney King' mentality in LA, just like the reign of terror prevalent under Rudy Guiliani in NYC (do the research - Guiliani was as bad if not worse than Bush despite his 'heroic' gesture in the bunker during 9/11; he allegedly made a lot of money off 9/11 as well).
If I were in the same situation, I hopefully would have had the courage to pull the tasers from the guy. I would DEFINITELY have been arrested for obstructing justice, or similar, but it would have ended his suffering and the police PROBABLY would not have loaded up and shot him again once everyone was yelling and protesting.
Something to think about next time you see a blatant abuse of police power.
Sadly, getting evidence and “complaining” about it later will only result in the authority figure getting a slap on the wrist. Getting beat by the crowd will make them fear violating someone like that. Only then will something like this not happen again. [/quote]
Well said, friend. I could not agree more completely.
That is total [expletive]. No cop has any right to so much as touch me, period, unless it's to defend himself or somebody else, whose rights I am actively violating.
The student in question violated no-one's rights, and therefore committed no crime. He warned the cops not to touch him and they assaulted him anyway. That student would have been totally justified to use any and all means at his disposal to defend himself. Likewise, the spectators would have been completely justified to step in and defend him. In fact, I'm embarrassed by the fact that nobody did so.
- just how many [expletive] times to do the cops have to say "Stand Up!" before they realize it's not going to happen? (they ended up dragging him out)
- there's a meta-lesson being taught to the person who is told to "Stand Up!", then gets shocked and then is told to "Stand Up!" again.
- the psychological effect of using negative reinforcement to produce compliant behavior in public that makes the suspect appear as though they're guilty only sets the framework for what happens at the police station.
- college students have become a bunch of bovine, spineless cowards. If this were the 1960s that library would have been burnt to the ground. [expletive] citizen journalism... right on to citizen revolution.
- if you're going to use your camera phone for 'citizen' "Journalism", get in the cops faces or at least get a front row seat where the action is. Don't hang back in the crowd like the [expletive] that you are.
- this thing is just begging to be mixed up with the waterboarding video, set to something like "Born in the USA".
- if you think these cops were bold, just think what could happen on some back road with a hick cop who took his sweet time listening to you squeal like a pig. The application of non-lethal force desperately needs guidelines and consequences (trust me, non-lethal force will eventually lead to the application of more lethal force against police officers). I believe that every tool used to apply non-lethal force should require a video recorder and black box that would show, without a doubt, just how the tool was used and why. Otherwise every [expletive] encounter becomes an opportunity to apply non-lethal force and escalate the charges to something more substantial (read: allows the judicial industrial complex to extract more money from the victim). It's like radar guns folks... instead of catching people driving +90mph down the freeway, it will be used to extract $100 twice a year from aunt emma for driving 40mph in a 35mph zone.
Looks to me like the kid should have left the library when asked if he was not authorized to be there. The idiot cops should have just carrued him out of the building if he wouldn't walk but these bozos just couldn't resist a little torture since they had the kid cuffed and he was not a threat.
I think the uniforms and the side arms compensate very well for the tiny penises, don't you?
For anyone out there thinking of condoning the UCLA PD's acts, here's a word from a friend,
"Here's your reprogramming. Repeat after me: "Becoming a cop is not a magical ceremony that transforms normal men and women into justice-minded super-heroes. A badge and a uniform do not guarantee that someone is operating in the best interests of me, my friends or family, my tribe, or even the nebulous concept of society. People who the cops beat the shit out of do not always deserve it. http://archangelbebop.livejournal.com/"
The breathtakingly astonishing inference one can draw from the flagrant conflict of interest here, is the fact that this will encourage officers in search of prestige to use the taser more often -even when unnecessary- in order to recieve some 'positive' recognition, including the Taser Award.
The fact that our society condones special interest groups such as the Taser gun manufacturer to not only sell products to public servants, but also present officer's with the incentive to use the product shows just how irresponsible and unconcerned for the welfare of the public we really are.
he had the Nuts to use His camera phone for ‘citizen’ “Journalism,
every news Chanel is Using his video. [expletive]
What is wrong with You? i can't see your name
MR anonymoustroll
or [expletive]
I am completely shocked by this outrageous behaviour and hope that some severe action is taken against these rogue policemen. For me it amounts to nothing more and nothing less than serious assault.
The only common point between every story that I've heard about friends going in America is an ID-check that went really wrong for no reason: most of my friends were Army officers taking a PhD program, not unruly, uneducated suspicious-looking guys. Several of them had a gun pointed at them either because they made stupid jokes, or because of their bad understanding of "Cop"-English: who else says "Freeze" and "Vi-icawl"? What does it mean, and what is wrong with asking? Isn't the "wheel" one of the four large rubber things that support the car? These were before "non-lethal" weapons.
The official statements don't seem to help that: it seems there are more concerned by the safety of the students around while the crowd is clearly sympathetic to the person tasered. (Anyone complaining about being disturbed by too much noise for ten minutes around 11pm? Or any concerns about going to a university were the computer room is not perfectly quiet?)
What I would like to understand is why the officiers didn't resolve to carry him: nothing seemed to prevent them, and riot polices whom I know do that all the time.
Ewan,
This French rule is actually a medieval tradition (that then spread to the nacent Oxford and Cambridge) after a XIIIth outburst of "scholars" (read: sex-hungry theology students, sic) threatened to "cross the Seine" (Sorbonne is a ten minutes walk from the Louvres, were the military power was). The dean knew they were just upset; the marchal feared they were armed (with "knife and cisors", for eating and correcting spelling mistakes). Because the marchal reaction made such a fuss, he obtained that no armed force should enter University ground without his express acknowledgement.
(I know because a friend studying medieval history mentionned it last year, during the student outburst about a job law.)
This rule was critical in 1968 and last years riot, because it is interpreteed by the academics in charge as a failure to resolve a mostly internal crisis. Arguments to opening the gates "has" to be of academic nature, and takes time: e. g. rare books being burned last year. The Police prefect doesn't like it too, because they get blamed for abiding little-know rule and waiting, while their are usually judged on taking swift decision.
What to remember is that students are unruly, and should be treated with a special understanding. This case proves it once again.
The rule still applies, and it is the reason why we have Rent-A-Cop's in our Univesrities.
What world are you living in where a police officer cannot use force in order to affect an arrest?
Matt
I think I've come amongst a group that has a severe misunderstanding of what the law is - both statutory and case law - as well as a complete lack of comprehension of the duties, policies, and functions of law enforcement.
The student should have left when asked.
While I still believe that we do not know the whole story here - calling the cops idiots and bozos doesn't exactly help the situation.
Oh, I see. An objective statement.
wow
Matt
Umm, no, he would have not. And no, they would have not either.
Doing so would have had him end up either charged with a felony or killed by a police officer for "using any and all means at his disposal to defend himself" - and the same for the crowd.
Using force against a police officer is simply not a good idea.
Matt
True, but hindsight is 20/20 - prosecutors, courts, and internal investigations must deal with the mindset of the officer at the time that the situation occurred.
If you're an officer in this sitution - trying to deal with an unruly suspect - and you have a large crowd that seriously outnumbers you and your fellow officers - there's not alot of room for niceities.
Again, I believe the officer's comment was inappropriate. However, I wouldn't have been much nicer in his shoes with that crowd. We could debate the situation after it was over - not during it.
I am not an officer in California and know little about their state statutes, however this is borderline assault under common-law and would likely never result in a conviction. I can't think of a single prosecutor that would seek a charge on this.
I don't know this - and neither do you. And certainly the officers in the middle of this situation did not know this.
I underwent shocks of 3, 5, and 10 seconds. Once using the barbs and the other two in drive-stun setting. It's not a pleasant experience by any means. I would describe it at the most pain I have ever experienced - that instantly faded when the voltage was turned off.
That said, I can assure you that you'd rather be hit with a taser than hit with a baton.
I agree completely.
I don't agree with your comment about naked exercise of power - but that's your opinion and I get to have mine.
As a law enforcement officer, I would not hesitate to use an appropriate amount of force against any individual that I felt was threatening myself or another individual - and that includes tasers, impact weapons, or lethal force.
Was this situation out of hand? I'm not sure. There are things that we don't know - and we've yet to hear from the officers involved... I do know that there's an awful lot of folks commenting here who are completely misinformed and ignorant of both the law - and of role and responsibilities that law enforcement officers have.
Matt
I'm not a police officer, so I can't possibly know the extent to which you endanger yourselves for the sake of duty - but I imagine that the extent to which you do is by no means a small feat. That being said, one thing that we do know from the video is that the young man was already handcuffed upon recieving multiple blows with the taser gun. Altho I understand that it is in the police officer's interest of safety to manage him, I have a very hard time seeing how an already handcuffed guy -who already insisted to police on leaving the premises - is justifiably tasered over and over again.
Secondly, since tasers are meant to incapacitate suspects, why do the officers repeatedly demand the guy stand up after having used a taser on him? This makes no sense to me and in fact seems to undermine the very point of a taser gun.
I watched a guy who was properly handcuffed get up and proceed to seriously injure an officer by striking him with his head repeatedly. The officer's skull was cracked and since suffers seizures regularly. He can no longer work on the street and works now as a communications officer.
Just because a person is handcuffed does not make them any less of a threat.
Because once the taser is turned off, the pain fades immediately, the an individual can move relatively quickly after that. It is not a permanent or long-lasting effect.
Matt
I am not trying to justify anything, who I am to say what the cop did was right or wrong, but this is not a racial issue. As a hispanic UCLA student, I have had opportunities to create situations like this. I am a forgetful person and last year I did forget my student ID when I went to the Powell to pull an all-nighter. I think it was about 11:30pm or so, when the CSO (Community Service Officers) came around to check ID's. First of all, they never target just one student. I have witness this checks upwards of fifty times. When the CSO came to check mine, I was politely asked to leave, and from a distance, he watched me walk out the door. Was I targeted because of my race? Answer this question to answer the previous: Was I the only person asked to show proof of being a student? This guy was trying to make a point right off the bat. In a statement released by his lawyer a few days ago, it states that he refused to show his ID because he felt he was being targeted because he was a persian male. Does that not clearly state his intent in the whole incident? He was trying to make a point, cause a scene, and provoke the enforcement officers. Once again, I want to point out that I am not saying I approve or dissaprove of the actions the UCPD took, I am trying to take a neutral stance.
All of you people screaming racism and asking for this cops head, get off your high horse and be rational. When developing opinions about situations like this, be objective. Bringing emotions and other agendas into this could lead me to the conclusion that the cop should have used his taser ten times as much. Obviously, I am not saying that, but the irrationality that leads to that conclusion goes both ways. Too bad my devil's advocate stance isnt the popular opinion or there would be a hundred posts on this page supporting it.
People, just please be objective and rational. You owe it to yourself and those who read your material.
Granted that situations exist in which simply handcuffing a subject nevertheless fails to prevent him or her from violently attacking an officer. Does that fact by default justify preemptively tasering a subject repeatedly simply because the student 'goes limp' when the officers try to escort him out? Once again, I have a hard time imagining a proper justification for repeated tasering when the subject is merely demonstrating a non-violent, albeit annoying, resistance to police.
Secondly, your remarks about the effects of the taser gun support my argument that the taser was improperly used. You claim above, "Because once the taser is turned off, the pain fades immediately, the an individual can move relatively quickly after that. It is not a permanent or long-lasting effect." Given that the effects of taserering don't actually incapacitate the subject for a significant amount of time, how is this supposed to ensure the officers involved a non-violent compliance from the subject? Even if I grant you that the first tasering was justified (which I don't) I do not see how the repeated use of force against the subject serve any purpose other than to provoke him into a rage and consequently a violent retaliation. The officer responsible for handling the taser at the scene certainly doesn't have a clean record for good judgment: http://blogging.la/archives/2006/11/ucla_taser_...
Thirdly, -and this next comment doesn't necessarily apply to you as I don't know your position on this issue- but I want to address it because I come across this defense of violent police force all the time. Having been born in a country in which the brutal use of police force against civilians was common practice I consequently know how easy it is for a good system to become corrupt. I therefore cringe at the thought that we should by default trust in the good judgment of the individual members of a police department here simply because the group as a whole aims to apply the law (which is fallible and often unjust). Just because someone carries a badge does not by fiat ensure that he or she has good judgment while handling suspects in often stressful and difficult situations. This I'm sure sounds profoundly mundane to say, yet I routinely meet people who practice this blind faith. On a much smaller scale, I see on a daily basis how aggressive security guards can be with what little authority they have (my job takes me into courthouses all day). Having the power to legally use a baton or gun of any type can provoke the worst kind of behavior in the beholders and so I am extra weary of many of those with the most license to use them.
Finally, I'd like to give most police officers a huge amount of credit for the exceptional job that they do. Certainly not everyone is capable of putting themselves literally and often in the line of fire (certainly not myself) and nevertheless continually carry themselves professionally with good judgment and humility. I make a perfect case out of myself as someone who most likely would not have great judgment in a potentially dangerous situation and hence I actively take responsibilit for that by not going out and doing something inappropriate for me, like joining the police force. The fact that most police officers do not abuse their powers even tho many civillians abuse theirs speaks to the amazing capacity the police force has to do good in the world. Tasering an uncooperative student studying in the library, however, does not fit into the above category. It is just as important to credit those who do their jobs right as it is to criticize those who don't.
I have both supported the use of force in situations where the community as a whole came out against it - and have been opposed to the use of force at times when it has been used. If that makes sense.
The thing to remember that hindsight is 20/20 - officers only know what they know at the time of the incident - and sometimes what might seem wrong and illegal after the fact may indeed be legal at the time that it happened.
This is why the complete context of the situation is important - and not just what we see on the video - we need to know the whole story.
There's a great set of videos on youtube that illustrate this point. One of the videos makes a police shooting look like an unjustified use of deadly force - but the second video angle from the other squad car shows what really happened - and what the first video didn't show - making the shooting a clean and proper use of force.
Have a great thanksgiving -
Matt