Video Supports Student's Police Brutality Claim

Video Supports Student's Police Brutality Claim

www.news8.net

COLLEGE PARK, Md. - Video obtained by ABC 7 News seems to support a University of Maryland's claim that he was attacked -- unprovoked -- by Prince George's County police, ABC 7's Brad Bell reports.

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Luckily there is a clear video of this incident. It's horrible that first he gets beaten up but to make it even worse he is the one who gets charged for a crime. What happens is a clear crime on behalf of the cops but the likely outcome of this is that they get away free with a 'non admission of guilt' kind of settlement.
People are the only ones who police the police so keep those cameras handy and learn how to use them.

www.news8.net
(visit the link for the full news article)

It's hard to say what was happening closer to the actual incident. He might have made comments that ticked them off that started the whole thing.

That's no excuse for what happened then.

They continued to beat him even after he was on the ground.

The Supreme Court has upheld...I can't remember the case...but it says basically you can say anything to the police that is non threatening...like "f-off" and as long as no one else could hear it, you can not be arrested. That is not considered disturbing the peace.

So even if he did say that, you clearly can't hear it on video, but you can hear other comments made. So what if he said something. That is no reason to arrest him, and certainly no reason to beat him.

Provoked or not, this tape should result in the arrest of the police involved. You don't beat someone like that that clearly poses no threat.

Well doesn't he know we are now living in a police state? You don't get that close to officers without expecting to get tased, beaten or shot. Get with the program people, the cops are our masters they can do whatever they want.

that's so messed up. there was zero physical threat from the guy, so all it could have been was something he said and nothing he could have said would have merited that police reaction, particularly after the guy was obviously not a threat ... not that he ever was.

seeing as how the prince george's county police department just emerged from federal oversight, it looks like the feds better swoop right back in. as if the actions in this video aren't bad enough, for this behavior to occur after federal oversight which was put in place for precisely this problem, indicates myriad issues with both the prince george's police department and whatever government agency was supposed to be correcting their inadequacies.

I have always wondered how many 'protest holligans' there are in a crowd. I have seen videoes where these things were staged. These guys would throw coffee or go for the officer's gun, run into the crowd, and they would start the filming. Not to say this happens in every incident, but I/O campaigns work both ways.

reply to post by Awory


There is no indication from what we can see that there was any kind of physical interaction from the person who was beaten. The only thing you can see is something spoken.

Even if he did throw something before we can see it, he is continually beaten after being "subdued." That is totally uncalled for. It doesn't matter what he had potentially done which we can't see. He is down. Subdued by a clearly superior force. There is no reason to continue to beat him.

Blatant police misconduct. There is no other plausible explanation at all for what we see occurring.

reply to post by Awory


They weren't exactly protesting to begin with. They were celebrating after a sports event. They probably were loud and drunk but that's to be expected and I see no reason to speculate wheter or not there was some kind of consipiracy to lure the cops into acting like this.

The world is insane don't you ever forget that, WE are the sane ones.

No more excuses. This is not an isolated event. The real problem is not the three pysco, masochistic cops that commit aggrevated assualt on a teenager.
The problem is the cops that walk by and do nothing to stop it.

Quit lying to yourself that "Most of the Police are Good Cops, spoiled by the few bad ones"

Police start cleaning your own ranks. Become the Whisle Blower at your department. Regain your humanity

LIGHT UP THE DARKNESS !

The problem is far deeper than just cops.

It's a human problem. Especially among males because we are territorial and testosterone increases the odds of becoming aggressive.

When filled with anger, and given full reign to unleash violence, we revert to our primal instincts. We become animals exactly like in the wild.

Vicious, brutal, reactionary, aggressive.

It's one of modern societies major dilemmas. How do we overcome our aggressive nature as we increasingly become more sophisticated in our technological ability to unleash destruction?

Many people apparently believe that our society as a whole is based on violence. This seems to be true in more ways than one.

What do governments do when they have major issues with each other? They resort to violent warfare.

This instills a acceptance of brutality and outright killing as a form of coping with people we are enraged with.

I think governments need to start by sending the right message, and setting the right examples by refusing to resort to violence.

This is a human problem throughout our entire history. People in positions of governmental authority have always been brutal.

It was way way worse prior to our age. Any history book will show that.

We should consider ourselves lucky that they are this restrained. They could have just mowed down everyone. But they didn't.

As a whole species, we are definitely toning it down a lot. I mean look, the guy gets to actually sue and screw up these cops reputation.

Liberty and the Republic may win the battle against Tyranny after all. You never know...

[edit on 13-4-2010 by muzzleflash]

Originally posted by warisover
Well doesn't he know we are now living in a police state?

Police brutality is nothing new and they have been getting away with it for quite some time.

Cellphone technology however...

- Lee

They really can't afford to loose highly trained officers like that.

Not like they would be fired immediately and or charged.

Try dancing on neighbor or stranger on the street like they did to that poor student. I think a short time in a cell as Bubba's squeak toy will straighten them out.

You know, make an example out of the officers, like they did to an unarmed frail partier. Looks like that student couldn't fight his way out of wet paper bag.

Probably scared the crap out everyone else that witnessed it too.

It says in the article one officer has been suspended and will likely be fired. Also, that it is possible more will be fired.

I say - "So? How does that punishment fit the crime?" They will likely just get a job at another department.

If they are proven guilty of beating this kid and then making false statements to cover their actions - I do not see how they not guilty of a crime.

Basically, its like this the way I see it. Police do not want us to paint them all with the same broad brush. Ok fine, I can accept that. If the police want us to do that then they in turn must be willing to clean their ranks. If police activity pursue criminals in the general population - why do they protect criminals in their ranks? It needs to be done across the board.



[edit on 13-4-2010 by Frogs]

Well the way I see it is that the problem is within justice system and the way it protects it's own. Police time and time again are given far less of a punishment if any at all than 'normal' people. That in a way puts them above the regular folk which in turn just breeds more and more of such behaviour. Ask yourself this, if this were a civillian mob attacking the teen what would happen? They'd spend each at least 5 years in prison. If this was a mob of civillians beating on a police officer then they'd all spend a life in jail. Police are granted power and authority to enforce the law by the people. That should make it so that they're hold to a higher standard than normal folk but as we've seen time and time again, power corrupts. There is no respect for police and they're not part of the community. When a figure of authority you have no respect for tries to interact with you it's more likely that you will not respond or respond negatively. This cycle of no respect in the end comes back to bite the cops in the butt.
Cops are armed with guns and laws but the peope can arm themselves with cameras. Few points:
1) Whenever you see a cop make sure you know where your camera is and be ready.
2) Know your rights. In US you're entitled to film cops but they have a habit of trying to tell people otherwise. One of their new favourites is claiming that it's against the wiretapping law which isn't true. You are in risk of arrest by bogus charges thought and that happens alot. On the other hand if it were you or a loved one in danger of abuse by cops wouldn't you wan't someone there with a camera?
3) Even a low resolution video can be very telling as long as it's steady. Keep yourself braced against something when you film.

i hate how the officers who commit these crimes are always punished with "suspension with pay" it seems like it almost encourages them to act this barbarically.


need more vacation time? wanna an extra week for your upcoming trip to Hawaii? just go beat the snot out of some innocent people!

Why do we need police officers again? Our whole system is a joke. Literally, it is actually a joke. Hopefully soon everyone will realize this.

I support the police in this one. I am a little disappointed by the lack of use of non-lethal weaponry. Couldn't they have at least shot him with some of those 12 ga. bean bags? I mean it would have at least been a good target practice session, with the boy passed out on the sidewalk, they could have shot him point blank.

I mean really, the kid is lucky they didn't just execute him on the spot. When will people learn to obey? What will it take until we stop seeing these kind of incidences?

I really think the only answer to this is more funding for law enforcement, and possibly mandatory tazer bracelets for all. Within the tazer bracelet, or necklace, there would also be a GPS module, so that if a person wandered too close to a police officer, or police car, they could be instaterminated on the spot, from a satellite in space, kinda like on-star.

To me, and I'm usually the one that supports the police, I think that the police just beat the student up for no reason.

Then to compound the issue, they filed a blatantly false report of the situation.

I think that the officers involved should be charged with assault and the officer(s) that filed the false report should lose their jobs.

How can there ever be justice if the police officers lie on their reports.

Article related to this in AP here Talks about modern trends in video vs. police brutality.