posted
"the student was in the process of leaving the library when the police arrived."
"He had all the time between when he declined to leave the premisis and when the cops got there to leave."
It doesn't matter whether he was trying leave. It doesn't matter whether he had plenty of time to leave before the police showed up.
Once the police receive a complaint which gives grounds for probable cause, they do have the right to investigate. And attempting to leave when confronted by police officers investigating that complaint is not a legally defensible action. Had the person charged with the complaint left, it would have been legal to IDstop and question anyone who somewhat matched the description of the suspect. Probable cause for an investigation is not negated merely because the suspect left the scene.
posted
Of course, I'm not sure its a legally defensible action to instigate violence by starting an investigation through laying your hands on a suspect from behind when he is not a threat.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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posted
What about personal responsibility? Why give the guy a free pass? He's an adult, and had every opportunity to behave in a respectful, civilized manner. He made a series of choices, each one causing himself greater and greater discomfort, while at the same time, intentionally or not, causing greater danger to himself and the people around him.
He had the choice to come to the library with his Student ID (if he had one), he had the choice to leave when asked to do so, he had the choice to comply with the police when they arrived, he had the choice to walk out with them when they threatened to shock him the first time, and he had the choice to comply with their orders each additional time. Even if he was physically unable to stand at any point, which is not clear, he could have said "I can't stand up, I'm trying to do what you want. Give me a minute."
Instead, he made the choice to continually offer resistance and cause a scene. He wanted attention, he wanted to make a point, and he wanted to be a martyr for some cause. Maybe he wanted the police to stun him so he could sue them. Maybe he wanted to cause a riot. Maybe he just wanted to be the center of attention.
The point is, he made choices, fully understanding the consequences of those choices. And he should be held responsible for his own actions. It's not as though the police came in and beat him up. They gave him a reasonable choice, come with us or we will use a taser on you. He chose to resist arrest and be shocked.
That's fine if he wanted to make a statement, but I don't think it's right that he cause a situation in which he will be treated with force, repeatedly invite that force to occur, and then gain some kind of benefit from putting police and bystanders in a dangerous situation. If anything, he should be punished for this stunt, not rewarded.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
If he were leaving how could they "lay hands on the subject from behind" so much of this debate is inferrence and hyperbole.
He allegedly trespassed and resisted arrest while being subject to being detained or arrested. If he didn't resist he would not have been tazed. Detaining or arresting is not instigating violence. Resisting those acts is.
Posts: 686 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
So, from my understanding of what happened, mightycow...
He had the choice to come to the library with an ID. He had the choice to leave the library when asked, but instead chose to leave the library within 10 minutes of being asked, as he was on his way out when the police arrived several minutes after he was asked to leave. Seems reasonable. Maybe he was saving hsi work and gathering up papers? Or finishing reading what he was reading?
He didn't hve a choice to comply with the police, though, because the way they approached him was not the way to start an investigation... they laid hands on him from behind. Fairly certain that is NOT in the police training handbook. Once thats happened, the situation is at least as much the policemen's fault as the student's fault, because they screwed up the initiation of the investigation into the complaint. There's no way to comply with the police when they come into the situation looking to assert their authority, because no matter what you do it can be viewed as "resisting arrest," or one of the other dozen or so tools in the police arsenal for asserting power.
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posted
The police do have the right to judge whether a suspect leaving the scene is a flight risk, and to "lay hands on" a flight risk if that was their determination. They are not required to give a flight risk the opportunity to flee by issuing a warning beforehand.
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posted
And that just brings this to a whole new level of absurdity...
He's a flight risk because he's walking out of the building he was asked to leave?
Great.
And eyewitness accounts from the students who were say they grabbed his arm from behind. Those could be wrong. Eyewitness accounts often are. But we don't know HOW the accounts are going to be wrong until an investigation.
Did the student act stupidly once the police laid hands on him? Possibly. Should the police be charged with criminal assault? Also possibly. From the available evidence, they didn't try to de-escalate teh situation... they were the one's escalating to the point where violence was necessary.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: He had the choice to come to the library with his Student ID (if he had one),
He is a currently enrolled UCLA student. He has an ID (or at least had), and in the course of a normal week, should expect to need it a handful of times.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:Another issue that has been brought up here, but I don't think has been addressed by the "police did their job right" crowd:
Isn't it a legal requirement that police show their ID if asked when making an arrest?
They don't have to stop in the middle of what they're doing to show it to someone they're not arresting.
quote:errm... I said that I wasn't made aware of a probable cause through news reports I've scanned through. I did not say that there was no probable cause. Hence my question, "So what is the preceding/underlying probable cause in this case?"
posted
If you commit a crime, and then stop, that doesn't prevent the police from taking you into custody, questioning you, escorting you to another location, or attempting to act in the best interests of the students they are charged to protect.
From the perspective of the police, the man they were apprehending could pose a danger to the students in the library. His behavior only reinforced the fact that he might be dangerous.
Imagine if the situation had gone thusly:
Police arrive and "lay hands" on the unknown person from behind.
Unknown person says, "I'm sorry, I forgot my student ID, I'm going to get it right now."
Police say, "We need to escort you out of the building and ask you some questions."
Unknown person says, "OK, I'll cooperate." and calmly clears the matter up.
Sounds like a pretty good outcome to me. It's really too bad that the guy who was indeed a student and did have the right to be there didn't simply show his ID if he had it, or cooperate fully if he didn't have it.
I'm certain that if he said, "Here's my name. I live in such and such dorm. I would be happy to go get my ID and show you." there wouldn't have been a problem.
As they say, he made his bed, now he has to lie in it.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
From articles already linked in this thread:
quote:He said that Tabatabainejad, when asked for his ID after 11 p.m. Tuesday, declined because he thought he was being singled out because of his Middle Eastern appearance. Yagman said Tabatabainejad is of Iranian descent but is a U.S.-born resident of Los Angeles.
His lawyer told the Los Angeles Times that, though Tabatabainejad eventually decided to leave the library, he went limp after an officer refused his request to take his hand off him, since he considered it a case of racial profiling.
He was making a conscious choice not to comply - and, in the case of the request to leave, failure to comply is most likely a crime.
quote:Some witnesses disputed that account, saying that when campus police arrived, Tabatabainejad had begun to walk toward the door.
Some witnesses dispute this. It doesn't say all.
quote:And eyewitness accounts from the students who were say they grabbed his arm from behind. Those could be wrong. Eyewitness accounts often are. But we don't know HOW the accounts are going to be wrong until an investigation.
Yes, but other eyewitnesses - namely the officers who were paying attention to him before he began to scream - say that they spoke to him first.
quote:"Since, after repeated requests, he would neither leave nor show identification, the CSO notified UCPD officers, who responded and asked Tabatabainejad to leave the premises multiple times. He continued to refuse. As the officers attempted to escort him out, he went limp and continued to refuse to cooperate with officers or leave the building.
He refused several chances from the officers themselves to leave or show ID. So, according to the eyewitnesses closest to the event, the incident did not start with the arm-grabbing.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Yes, but the police made THIS outcome much more likely in how they approached the situation.
Do the police also have to lie in their own bed? Or should we give them a free pass?
And, dagonee, it bothers me that the police can make a violent arrest and not show people asking either ID or their badge number so they can be identified. If they have to make a violent arrest, it needs to be completely transparent, and that means making sure that the people who are around the arrest know that it is legit, if they are questioning the legitimacy.
Police power only works if peopel are willing to be policed, and I think the police handled this situation in such a way as to maximize the unwillingness of the crowd to be policed. Which is what led to the situation having the outcome it did. The police have the power here... they are responsible for making sure that the problem is approached correctly.
The student also deserves some blame, but it really does not appear to me as if he deserved to be tased. Multiple times. Not based on the actions that led up to the tasing. He handled the situation almost exactly like I would predict ANY radical college student to handle the situation, and thats a large percentage of the college population, especially at a school like UCLA. The cops need to know that before they head onto campus, and approach the problem in order to minimize the liklihood the radical anti-establishment-ness of college students will come to the fore.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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quote:And, dagonee, it bothers me that the police can make a violent arrest and not show people asking either ID or their badge number so they can be identified. If they have to make a violent arrest, it needs to be completely transparent, and that means making sure that the people who are around the arrest know that it is legit, if they are questioning the legitimacy.
They don't have to stop in the middle of the arrest to do it. One guy asking for ID was waving his hands right in the officer's face while people were crowding up to them. He needed to back off when told to do so.
quote:Yes, but the police made THIS outcome much more likely in how they approached the situation.
Again, no basis for this based on available evidence. None.
You've been making lots of sweeping statements about the facts here - about who put whose hands on whom - but you don't know any of the facts upon which your conclusion about the police relies.
quote:He handled the situation almost exactly like I would predict ANY radical college student to handle the situation, and thats a large percentage of the college population, especially at a school like UCLA. The cops need to know that before they head onto campus, and approach the problem in order to minimize the liklihood the radical anti-establishment-ness of college students will come to the fore.
No way do cops have to take anti-establishment points of view into account when enforcing the trespass laws.
I'm tired of people treating trespass as something to be tolerated. The police were criticized for arresting the protesters who kept deaf children away from their daily therapy at Gauladet for days. This guy didn't close down the library, but he still, based on what his lawyer said, severely interrupted the purpose of the facility solely to make some imaginary political point about racial profiling. He wasted a bunch of people's time, pulled in police officers from their patrols, and possibly endangered people so that he could write his little drama.
His little game went horribly wrong, we don't know due to whom yet, but there is absolutely no reason the police should indulge this sophomoric crap because some students are anti-establishment radicals. Anti-establishment radicals wasted a lot of my time in college by interfering with my rights to free passage and use of facilities. They canceled several of my classes, shut down libraries and cafeterias I needed at least twice, and they were coddled for doing so.
No, the police don't need to indulge this crap. They need to arrest people for it and stop treating the people who do it as someone to be negotiated with.
I hope the investigation turns over the accurate facts here, and anyone who needs to be punished is punished. But I don't want the police to decide that radical anti-establishment-ness should cow them from making an arrest when needed.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Now I know why I stopped posting in this thread. Dag is so much more eloquent than me. But then, I knew that already.
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posted
You need to stop saying I said stuff I said.
" But I don't want the police to decide that radical anti-establishment-ness should cow them from making an arrest when needed."
I didn't say this. I said this needs to be taken into account in hwo police approach situations. Or do you think police should approach all problems in exactly the same way, even if that approach will often CAUSE violence?
"Again, no basis for this based on available evidence. None."
Wrong. Many of the eyewtinesses have said that the police instigated the investigation by laying hands on the students. Many have also said that he was on his way out of the building when the police arrived. That is not "no evidence." It is a lot of evidence. All the evidence? No. But it IS evidence.
"No, the police don't need to indulge this crap. They need to arrest people for it and stop treating the people who do it as someone to be negotiated with."
They also need to approach trespassing as a less serious offense, until it turns into a serious offense. Someone leaving the place he is asked to leave is not a serious offense.
Resisting arrest is one of those offenses that is serious, but also needs to be understood as oftentimes a reaction to how police approach the arrest, and that resisting arrest can actually be the fault of the police officer
And if it is the POLICE turning it into a serious offense, they need to be fired. And if they use tasers because they turned a tresspassing offense into a serious offense requiring arrest, they need jail time.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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quote:I didn't say this. I said this needs to be taken into account in hwo police approach situations. Or do you think police should approach all problems in exactly the same way, even if that approach will often CAUSE violence?
According to his lawyer - who we must assume is speaking for him, assuming the lawyer knows the rules of evidence - he decided to go limp to protest racial profiling. The police should not anticipate that, and they should not respond to that in a manner different on the UCLA campus than they should in the mall.
quote:Wrong. Many of the eyewtinesses have said that the police instigated the investigation by laying hands on the students. Many have also said that he was on his way out of the building when the police arrived. That is not "no evidence." It is a lot of evidence. All the evidence? No. But it IS evidence.
You didn't say some evidence. You said (emphasis added): "From the available evidence, they didn't try to de-escalate teh situation... they were the one's escalating to the point where violence was necessary."
If you meant "From some of the available evidence" then I welcome your correction on the matter. If the police's version that they asked him several times to leave is accurate, then they did, in fact try to de-escalate. In fact, they gave him a chance to avoid charges after he had already committed the crime.
quote:They also need to approach trespassing as a less serious offense, until it turns into a serious offense. Someone leaving the place he is asked to leave is not a serious offense.
Not if the person has ignored repeated requests to leave.
quote:Resisting arrest is one of those offenses that is serious, but also needs to be understood as oftentimes a reaction to how police approach the arrest, and that resisting arrest can actually be the fault of the police officer
Again, this only turned serious - i.e., into an arrest situation - because this person decided to stage a protest in the middle of the UCLA library.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
You are right dagonee, I did not mean to say "From the available evidence it is the police who..."
I meant to say "from the available evidence I think that it was the police..."
The police report is contradictory to the facts that many eyewitness accounts are saying. For example, I am fairly certain the student was not in the same place he was at the time that the librarian asked him for ID, when the police arrived. That suggests to me, since he told the librarian he was leaving within 10 minutes, that he was on his way out.
More later, I suspect Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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quote:I'm tired of people treating trespass as something to be tolerated...
His little game went horribly wrong, we don't know due to whom yet, but there is absolutely no reason the police should indulge this sophomoric crap because some students are anti-establishment radicals...
No, the police don't need to indulge this crap. They need to arrest people for it and stop treating the people who do it as someone to be negotiated with.
I disagree. Crimes of little consequence don't merit violent intervention. If someone is an inconvenience, but not a danger, to others, I don't think that gives anyone (including the police) moral license to hurt him for it -- not unless he's bringing important business to a halt and can't be dealt with any other way.
That's not to say that you haven't made some good arguments, but the good ones were based on the fact that from the cops' point of view, the student might have been dangerous.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:I disagree. Crimes of little consequence don't merit violent intervention. If someone is an inconvenience, but not a danger, to others, I don't think that gives anyone (including the police) moral license to hurt him for it -- not unless he's bringing important business to a halt and can't be dealt with any other way.
I just want to be clear on this. If someone is trespassing but not bringing important business to a halt, should the police be able to arrest him if he simply refuses to leave?
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
They should be able to. Whether they actually should arrest him on a given occasion is a judgement call the cops have to make. And there's a limit to the amount of force they should be willing to use.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
That means that all someone has to do is know those limits and they can flout the less important laws with impunity.
Of course there's a limit on force used. But arresting someone is a use of force. It can be minimal, but very few officers will arrest anyone nowadays without cuffs. If the arrest is lawful, then resisting putting the cuffs on is a new offense, and one that can be dealt with using a certain degree of force. The original offense becomes irrelevant for much of the escalation of force.
The original offense is an element in determining if deadly force can be used to stop escape (the taser does not count as deadly force as I use the term here - and yes, I know tasers can kill). But most escapes from several officers will involve violence, and that gets factored into the use of deadly force as well.
If this guy had run before the officers reached him, they would not have been correct to shoot him. They would have been correct to tackle him, which is more dangerous than tasing, possibly to tase him (although I'm not sure how well it works against someone fleeing). Once involved in grappling, then the officer can defend himself.
Trust me, I'd rather be tased than be in a wrestling match with the officers I know.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
I'm not trying to make a point here about what the laws are or should be. I'm just saying that a cop who uses a taser to arrest someone for trespassing is doing something that I find distasteful. Something I wouldn't do if I were in his position.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
First, I again remind people that critical information has not been made available to us. We don't know clearly what happened before the tape started rolling.
Was the guy an idiot; certainly. Was the guy being a total ass, certainly. But that is not the question. Obnoxious as he may have been, the question is whether the police had a right to repeated taser him once he had become passive in his arrest.
No, he may not have been completely passive, and certainly wasn't vocally passive, but he did seem be be passive the arrest aspect. That is, he wasn't resisting being arrested, but he wasn't cooperating in his arrest either. He was engaged in a form of passive protest used by many demonstrator in which they allow themselves to be arrested but do so without facilitating that arrest.
As I said, we can only speculate what came before. He may have been a jerk and blew off the Student Cops. That's not that uncommon because they themselves can be a bit obnoxious and don't actually have any real authority. Lots of students disrespect them.
But the Real Campus Police were called, and indications are that he was uncooperative with them. But why and how was he uncooperative? Was he as beligerent as he is at the beginning of the video? Or was he just trying to get a last minute bit of research done before he had to leave. Again, that is not that uncommon, and I have to believe we have all experienced something similar.
With out this critical before-the-video information it is difficult to make a judgement. Naturally we all agree that the guy was an idiot and an ass, but the world is full of idiots and asses, that in itself is not justification to take action.
So, we can only judge what we see in the tape which again confirms the guy was an idiot. But should he be allowed by reasonable interpretation of the law to remain passive during his arrest? And if he remains passive in the arrest, is that alone justification to repeatedly taser him?
Remember, he is physically restrained by two officers and handcuffs, so that doesn't seem to be the immediate problem. Also, from the video, there seems to be a total of about 6 officers of various sorts on the scene. That seems like sufficient force, if the subject truly turned physically nasty.
The crowd while gathering does seem to be keeping their distance. Even the students who are confronting the police and asking for ID number seem to have the good sense to not invade the officers personal space. In other words, the crowd is making an effort to be non-threatening. Further, the officers that the students are talking to are not the two officers that are arresting the student. I see at least three officers engaging the students in general while the other two are handling the arrest.
I say again, that this is about the two officers issuing a command and becoming so hung up on complicance to that one incidental command that they lost sight of their primary objective. They felt they had to enforce absolute complicance to that command even if the effort resulted in apparently unnecessary butality, and further incited an already volital situation.
That is where I see the flaw in the police action. Again, they could have just drug the student out which is what they eventually had to do anyway. Again reminding very one that there were at least 6 officers on the scene, and probably more if student police and campus police are counted.
It is a case of unyielding training that was not tempered with common sense. They made a bad situation worse, by focusing on an incidental rather that focusing on the task at hand.
Given how I interpret the situation, even considering how big an ass this guy was being, the police overreacted, and I believe use excessive force because the use of force was easier than common sense.
Still would like to hear Deputy Browns take on my interpretation of events.
posted
Here is a link to an interview with this students lawyer. It gives a clearer picture of what happened before the video started.
While you can be sure the lawyer is putting a bit of postive spin on it, pay attention to the questions asked by the new reporter. He ask much the same questions we ask.
It seems the student WAS finishing up a report or assignment that was do very soon. The student object to himself being asked for an ID while all the white boys sitting right next to him were ignore. It seems he asked the officers to ask the 'white boys' for their ID's before he would produce his own. The officers refused.
The student finished his work, according to this interview, and was leaving the computer room when the police showed up an grabbed him. When they grabbed him and place him under arrest, he went limp both in the presumed interest of his safety, and as a form of passive protest.
Even the new reporter asked why they didn't just drag him out, which is what they eventually did anyway.
posted
Based on how he's acting during the entire video, before any force is applied to him and before even the threat of tasers being used, I think it would be quite reasonable to believe that he acted in a similar manner prior to the start of taping. As someone else mentioned, obviously he was causing a scene if people across the room decided to start recording events.
If a suspect is holding a knife and the police tell him repeatedly to drop the weapon, or they'll shoot, and he takes a step toward the officer, would anyone suggest that it is not the suspect's fault that he gets shot?
How does the same not apply to this situation? The officers applied slowly increasing, less-lethal methods to remove a person who was breaking the law and possibly posing a threat. At each step of escalation, the officers offered the man being arrested the option to comply, and at each step he refused, increasing his criminal behavior, increasing the officers' reasonable belief that the situation could turn more violent, and effectively asking that the more excessive force be used against him.
How many people without IDs should the police allow to stay in the library when asked to leave? Should anyone who wants to non-violently break the law be allowed to as long as they refuse to comply with minimal force?
That's going to be a great precedent to set. How about I steal your car, but when the police pull me over I stop the car and quietly sit in it. I'm not stealing it any more, and I say that I'll get out pretty soon. I suppose they should just let me stay there, since I said I'm going to get out, and I'm not doing anything violent?
Law is only meaningful if the people charged with enforcing it are allowed to do so.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
The mistake the officers made was tazing the suspect after he was handcuffed. After they handcuffed the suspect they should have dragged him out. There is no defense for that action, even the officers admit that he went passive after being tazed.
Other then that one mistake they did everything by the book. Unfortunately police are not allowed to make mistakes in our society. I do not believe the police officers would have treated someone of different backround any different but simply they were either inapproiately trained or used bad judgement. Even though the suspect brought it on himself we expect officers to make good decisions under pressure which was not the case in this certain situation.
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quote:But the Real Campus Police were called, and indications are that he was uncooperative with them. But why and how was he uncooperative? Was he as beligerent as he is at the beginning of the video? Or was he just trying to get a last minute bit of research done before he had to leave. Again, that is not that uncommon, and I have to believe we have all experienced something similar.
With out this critical before-the-video information it is difficult to make a judgement.
Why? It doesn't matter why he refused to leave. Especially since he apparently had his ID and had an easy way to get the time he needed to complete his report - comply with library policy and show the ID.
quote: The student object to himself being asked for an ID while all the white boys sitting right next to him were ignore. It seems he asked the officers to ask the 'white boys' for their ID's before he would produce his own. The officers refused.
I would refuse, too. We've heard from several sources now that asking for ID is common in the library at night. If his report was that important to him he should have complied with the perfectly legal request.
quote:There is no defense for that action, even the officers admit that he went passive after being tazed.
quote:Pain compliance techniques may be very effective in controlling a passive or actively resisting individual. Officers may only apply those pain compliance techniques for which the officer has received Departmentally approved training and only when the officer reasonably believes that the use of such a technique appears necessary to further a legitimate law enforcement purpose. Officers utilizing any pain compliance technique should consider the totality of the circumstance including, but not limited to: (a) The potential for injury to the officer(s) or others if the technique is not used, (b) The potential risk of serious injury to the individual being controlled, (c) The degree to which the pain compliance technique may be controlled in application according to the level of resistance, (d) The nature of the offense involved, (e) The level of resistance of the individual(s) involved, (f) The need for prompt resolution of the situation, (g) If time permits (e.g. passive demonstrators), other reasonable alternatives. The application of any pain compliance technique shall be discontinued once the officer determines that full compliance has been achieved.
quote:6) CRITERIA FOR USE - DRIVE STUN Authorized personnel may use a Taser in a drive stun capacity, as a pain compliance technique, in the following situations. A) To eliminate physical resistance from an arrestee in accomplishing an arrest or physical search. B) When a skirmish line is deployed and/or for pain compliance against passive resistors as allowed in UCLA Police Policy § 301.24 (Pain Compliance Techniques). C) To stop a dangerous animal.
There's no mention of the suspect being cuffed. Passive resistance - which the suspect has now admitted was being used - can justify pain compliance via drive stun use of the taser.
Since dragging a limp, cuffed suspect can cause injury to both the suspect and the officers, it's going to be hard to demonstrate the officer acted outside the bounds of this policy, assuming he received the training mentioned in the policy.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
"They also need to approach trespassing as a less serious offense, until it turns into a serious offense."
"Crimes of little consequence don't merit violent intervention. If someone is an inconvenience, but not a danger, to others, I don't think that gives anyone (including the police) moral license to hurt him for it..."
I work in a bank, and I have a SERIOUS problem with these statements. If someone is hanging around making us uncomfortable, we have every right to ask them to leave. I'm not going to wait until we get robbed to call the cops when I could have stopped it in the casing stage.
You have no right to demand that I make my work environment less safe. You have no right to put anyone in a dangerous situation they could have stopped but were afraid to becuase the person they had a bad feeling about was "only tresspassing".
No one can know what this guy intended to do that day. No one can ever know what a complete stranger intends to do. I refuse to concede that his right to be a jerk in public is more important than the rest of the public's right to be safe from danger.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
"Since dragging a limp, cuffed suspect can cause injury to both the suspect and the officers, it's going to be hard to demonstrate the officer acted outside the bounds of this policy, assuming he received the training mentioned in the policy."
"(g) If time permits (e.g. passive demonstrators), other reasonable alternatives"
Your telling me carrying him out would cause him and the officers carrying him injury come on. They ended up carrying him out at the end anyways.
Posts: 29 | Registered: Apr 2006
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quote:Your telling me carrying him out would cause him and the officers carrying him injury come on.
If he struggled, went limp at the wrong time, if there were stairs,
Come on. You can't judge their decision based on what did happen when they finally carried him. He was clearly irrational, they had no idea what they would do, and him simply deciding to thrash around could cause serious injury, let alone if he decided to kick.
quote:They ended up carrying him out at the end anyways.
And they knew they would have to do this when they first used the taser? Come on.
The last factor is one of many factors. It's a totality of the circumstances test, not a checklist.
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And notice how his client is a victim, and both the lawyer and Olberman (who I have long known to be a manipulative idiot) make this about the LAPD in general. Disgusting.
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posted
I guess I dont understand your thinking on this once you have a suspect hand cuffed you tase him until he is unable to move. To me the logical thing would be to drag him out and if he would try to resist bound his legs.
Posts: 29 | Registered: Apr 2006
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quote:I work in a bank, and I have a SERIOUS problem with these statements. If someone is hanging around making us uncomfortable, we have every right to ask them to leave. I'm not going to wait until we get robbed to call the cops when I could have stopped it in the casing stage.
That sounds reasonable. I guess I see a difference between a bank and a university library.
I didn't mean to lump together all cases of trespassing (eg trespassing at the Pentagon). I meant typical, non-dangerous trespassing.
quote:There's no mention of the suspect being cuffed. Passive resistance - which the suspect has now admitted was being used - can justify pain compliance via drive stun use of the taser.
Since dragging a limp, cuffed suspect can cause injury to both the suspect and the officers, it's going to be hard to demonstrate the officer acted outside the bounds of this policy, assuming he received the training mentioned in the policy.
I don't see why that should be so hard, given that we have every reason to think that time permitted the officers to try other reasonable alternatives, as in (g) on your list. I mentioned one such alternative before: talk to the guy and give him some time to cool off.
I imagine the policy you quote was intended to be used to justify police tasering passive resistors during big, chaotic, organized demonstrations.
Also, since this will be a civil suit, the burden of proof is not 'beyond a reasonable doubt.'
And come on, let's be realistic for a minute. Do you think it'll be so difficult to convince a jury, using the video we've all seen, that the cops were in the wrong? I think they were wrong, but even if I didn't I'd at least grant that the kid has all the makings of a very persuasive case.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:I don't see why that should be so hard, given that we have every reason to think that time permitted the officers to try other reasonable alternatives, as in (g) on your list. I mentioned one such alternative before: talk to the guy and give him some time to cool off.
As for waiting, there was a riled up crowd. Again, (g) is not the only factor. Therefore, the mere presence of an alternative - even if your alternative were feasible - does not mean the decision was outside the policy.
quote:I imagine the policy you quote was intended to be used to justify police tasering passive resistors during big, chaotic, organized demonstrations.
hence the mention of pickett lines in the taser standards. However, the policy also allows the use of a taser whenever pain compliance is allowed, and those standards don't require pickett lines to be present.
quote:Also, since this will be a civil suit, the burden of proof is not 'beyond a reasonable doubt.'
But it's very likely the officers' decision will be given a lot of deference.
quote:And come on, let's be realistic for a minute. Do you think it'll be so difficult to convince a jury, using the video we've all seen, that the cops were in the wrong? I think they were wrong, but even if I didn't I'd at least grant that the kid has all the makings of a very persuasive case.
Yes, I do. It depends on where the jury is pulled from and the instructions given. If the defense can present past situations that present just like this one did that ended in violence, and then admit studies showing how use of tasers in these situations leads to lower injury rates, I see little chance of a jury not composed of students or people who have had police run-ins finding in favor of the plaintiff. And that's assuming it even gets to the jury.
It's possible these standards themselves violate the Constitution. That decision will be made by a judge, not a jury. If they policy doesn't, then the defense will be very, very strong.
I only give it about a 3 in 10 chance of getting to a jury. It's possible that one side or the other will win a judgment as a matter of law.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:I guess I dont understand your thinking on this once you have a suspect hand cuffed you tase him until he is unable to move.
Are you saying I advocated tasing until he can't move once cuffed? Because I didn't.
quote: To me the logical thing would be to drag him out and if he would try to resist bound his legs.
Are a police officer? Do you know if it's safer to do that or not? I guarantee you a strong case can be made that it's not.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Your saying they were justified in every tase they used against the suspect and if they decided to continue tasering him those would also be justified because he didnt completely obey their commands.
No im not a police officer but im studying to become one. The officers did a good job all the way up to when they began tasering a handcuffed suspect when they should have been deescaleding the situation.
do you think the Rodney King incident was justified because he would not remain motionless lying face down?
Posts: 29 | Registered: Apr 2006
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quote:Your saying they were justified in every tase they used against the suspect and if they decided to continue tasering him those would also be justified because he didnt completely obey their commands.
Nope. I absolutely have not said that. I'll let you look back over the thread to see what I have said.
Hint: I've been responding to people making absolute statements about what they have done. Such as your absolute statement that once handcuffed tasing is always wrong. It's not, at least according to those police procedures. That says nothing about whether it was correct in this case, and everything about wanting people making sweeping generalizations to back them up.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Every response in this thread is targeted to if these officers were correct in their actions that day. These are all personal feelings on the matter based on our own preception of this vague clip we watched.
Im sorry if i miss intereped your post as your thought on the matter rather then raw informational acknowledgements to the incident.
Now yu got me curious to what you do think Posts: 29 | Registered: Apr 2006
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posted
I think they were correct to arrest the guy even if he was leaving.
I think they were entitled to use force of some kind to effect that arrest.
I still haven't decided if I think their actions were illegal. I tend to think they weren't.
I still haven't decided if I think their actions were excessive. I tend to think they were.
I also tend to think that almost all of the criticism I've seen of the officers tends to underestimate the seriousness of what this kid did and the potential threat represented by the crowd and tends to oversimplify the analysis of what force is appropriate when.
I think it's fairly safe to say, based on what we now know, that the police could have gotten this kid out of there without resorting to tasers. It's far more questionable to me whether the officers could have known this, especially since I think the kid took intentional steps to misrepresent his intentions to the police. I tend to think that even if the officers acted incorrectly, the decision made to tase initially would be an understandable error the proper response to which is training, not punishment.
I think there's almost no way to make a criminal case against these officers, and little chance of a civil suit prevailing.
And I think he should be convicted of resisting arrest or trespass, based on his lawyer's statements.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
I just imagine the officers walking in, seeing Tabatabainejad, and, instead of grabbing him, they ask him what the problem is. The student then replies, "The problem is that I feel like I've been racially profiled, repeatedly--and now I'm leaving."
"Hold up, son, we'll walk out with you and talk this over..."
If the police had taken this attitude, there would have been no problem. Instead, the police showed up looking for a fight. It's an "I'm the authority here" attitude. The best cops I've known have the attitude of "I want to make this situation better, and I hope I won't have to assert my authority today."
The student was not showing his ID on purpose because he WAS trying to make a statement about the racial profiling. The stubborn officer who originally asked for his ID refused to look at any other IDs, proving that it was indeed a case of profiling. (If the officer made another white boy produce an ID, I think Tabatabainejad would have complied)
That said, the first tase was definitely warranted. Although it was incredibly stupid of the officer to grab him, you just don't fight an officer, period.
All subsequent tases were completely unreasonable, as the student was not fighting and simply went limp.
I think that's what they'll end up saying in court.
Posts: 1314 | Registered: Jan 2006
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quote:The student was not showing his ID on purpose because he WAS trying to make a statement about the racial profiling. The stubborn officer who originally asked for his ID refused to look at any other IDs, proving that it was indeed a case of profiling.
That doesn't prove it was racial profiling. It proves that the officer won't let some student dictate how he does his job with guilt trips.
quote:All subsequent tases were completely unreasonable, as the student was not fighting and simply went limp.
Pain compliance techniques - including ones that resulted in a small percentage of broken wrists - have been upheld for use against limp non-resisting protestors. I don't know if there's SCOTUS precedent or not, but the mere fact he was limp does not make it unreasonable from a court's perspective.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
Once again Dag beats me to the punch and says what I wanted to better.
Obviously I am white and I cannot fully see the whole picture in regards to racial profiling but I HAVE tried to see it as much as possible. I dated a Hawaiian girl who had to put up with it (the police thought she looked hispanic) and I am taking a class the dabbles in racial profiling.
I was in an airport soon after 9/11 and I swear from my perspective I was always the one asked to empty my bags and produce ID. My check in luggage was flagged that day and I had to watch them unpack my carefully packed luggage. They put it back in the wrong way and one of my suitcases was too heavy to be admited to the airplane. I had to repack it so it was equally distributed. My carry on bags were opened again and I had to explain why I had some of the items I did and I thought they were harmless. I almost missed my flight because of all the security.
Growing up in China if I go to mainland China I EXPECT to be treated with greater security concern. I cannot go anywhere without a govt appointed deputy/tourguide there to make sure I am legit in all my dealings.
My point is, even if you are being racially profiled why not supply your ID, just DO it. It takes police just a few moments to examine your ID and be on their way. By telling the police "Why don't you ID the white kids first." Even if you mean only that, you are in fact refusing to show your ID. The Police don't take orders from you. And your refusal is a blip on their radar.
When I was at the airport if I had said, "The security guards back at the front already checked my bags, please check somebody else's bags and get back to me, I would fully expect to rope in MORE trouble for that comment and MORE delays. You don't mess around with security in airports, why should a library be any different.
I empathize with minorities who feel picked on and get peeved with one more ID check, but the more you supply your ID and the more there is no problem while doing so, the less police will see cases of getting trouble from minority groups.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
"No one can know what this guy intended to do that day. No one can ever know what a complete stranger intends to do. I refuse to concede that his right to be a jerk in public is more important than the rest of the public's right to be safe from danger."
So your response is to violently arrest him because you don't know what he intends to do? Lovely.
Tresspassing IS a less serious offense. Its someone being where they aren't supposed to do. There is no crime to property, nor crime to people.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
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quote:Pain compliance techniques - including ones that resulted in a small percentage of broken wrists - have been upheld for use against limp non-resisting protestors.
Against lone protestors like this kid, or against large groups engaged in some sort of demonstration?
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
"My point is, even if you are being racially profiled why not supply your ID, just DO it."
Really? I have a really hard time accepting this. It doesn't feel that far, really, from saying, "just sit in the back of the bus."
I'm not a rabble-rouser, I swear. It's just that I've seen the "don't make waves" philosophy cover a lot of injustice in my lifetime.
Posts: 628 | Registered: Nov 1999
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