Florida Student Tasered - This makes me sick

[bomba]

If he just co-operated and stopped resisting maybe he wouldn't be in that situation, but no he's there to make a point and wont shut up about it. The taser yea probably was not needed in that situation.

[Mr. Happy]

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/offbeat/2007/09/university_of_florida_student_1.html

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1776114

I want to avoid a cops are dicks rant, but it sickens me that 1: the mans right to free speech is being denied

Well, I agree he should NOT have been getting arrested in the first place, BUT: he did resist arrest. It doesn't matter why your getting arrested, if you resist arrest, even an unlawful arrest, thats bad.

Actually he didn't resist arrest. He resisted having the mic taken from him, he resisted being detained, but not arrested, since they never said your under arrest.

But the sound quality aint great so who knows.

[ghost12332]

If you listen closely, around 1:15-1:24, somewhere in there the cop says "We will tase you" so he was given fair warning. They also repeatedly tell him to stop resisting, and he doesn't. Now mind you, I wouldn't have done it for the media repercussion, but they were perfectly justified. He was also disturbing the peace.

[Mr. Happy]

It's not disturbing the peace if your not in a public place, they weren't justified because he was simply asking questions. His tone of voice doesn't mean he was doing anything wrong, especially since Kerry was trying to answer his questions.

Saying "I'm going to taze you" doesn't justify excessive force.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no expert, but I took a course in crimonology so I asked my professor from last semester about this (whom used to work in Internal Affairs) and according to him the police were in the wrong.

Don't assume you know the law just because you have an opinion, sure, maybe I'm wrong, but I feel I'm better backed up

[Sgt. Sickness]

Well what I would have to tell you all is welcome to Florida. Cops here do not need an excuse to do anything. I once saw a story on the news where a cop shot a suspect multiple times for trying to "back his car into me"... the bullet holes were in the windshield not the rear of the car. The police in Florida don't have to have an explanation why they do anything. Just like yesterday I got pulled over for doing 46 in a 45 when my cars speedometer showed I was doing 43. He was a real dickhead about it too most cops will allow a few MPH due to speedometer fluctuations and misreads. I luckily did not get a ticket. I bitched at him though but you see he couldn't do anything because I can bitch at him. The police in Florida are just bullshit plain and simple. However I do think there are parts of this story that are not all there. He may have been asked to leave but I did not hear that all I saw was a bunch of dickheaded cops rushing to pull him away from the mic. But also they did it the the moment where he was asking Kerry about a secret society. Which leads me to believe they did deny his right to free speech. Just because you have a time limit doesn't mean shit if you are a citizen and you want to say something it doesn't matter you can say it. The only thing you can't say is something that can endanger someones life. Which to me is reasonable. But if say I want to walk into a town meeting and say "I hate Cubans" I can. There are some facts here that to me A. are not there. B. Have something to do with the question he asked. Which leads me to a more totalitarian dictatorship USA appearing. Seriously must we restate the rights that are violated in the has noting to do with patriotism Patriot Act? Or the mistreatment and rudeness I get every time I fly. There is a difference between being safe and being completely ridiculous.
Sorry for the sort of off topic reply. But it makes you wonder whats next. Arresting people for speaking out about the government and the actions of it on internet forums?

Ah here we go part of the missing link!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NWukZhsiBw

Apparently he was inciting a riot? LoL 100% pure bullshit but yeah 1 thing he needs to grow up.

[MELVIn]

If you listen closely, around 1:15-1:24, somewhere in there the cop says "We will tase you" so he was given fair warning. They also repeatedly tell him to stop resisting, and he doesn't.

"Stop resisting or I will shoot you in the face." Thats a fair warning, but still very excessive force. And also... How much resisting can a skinny kid do with 4 guards (two of them very big and strong guys) holding you down?

[Dionysos]

If you listen closely, around 1:15-1:24, somewhere in there the cop says "We will tase you" so he was given fair warning. They also repeatedly tell him to stop resisting, and he doesn't.

"Stop resisting or I will shoot you in the face." Thats a fair warning, but still very excessive force. And also... How much resisting can a skinny kid do with 4 guards (two of them very big and strong guys) holding you down?

Also, he only resisted in trying to hop away, he didnt even use force. Garr, last post in this thread for me PERIOD. Arguing on the internet is still like running in the special olympics

[Athlete{UK}]

I've been dragged out of s night club by 2 guys not much bigger then me with little effort and i'm a 14 stone rugby player. You telling me the 4 guards couldn't take the kid away without resorting to the tazer?

Warning or not it's excessive force. It's an standard stereotype of Americans using a punch in the face rather then a slap on the wrist.

Now before you all get in a hissy fit because i'm saying something negative about Americans i want to first state it should really be taken as read that a statement such as this isn't saying all Americans. I shouldn;t have to punctuate it with "not saying it's all of you."

Secondly yes America isn't all bad but by just saying that doesn't negate the negative (interesting term there) sides of the USA and its culture(just as there are inherent flaws in every culture on the planet again this should be taken as read.)

You can't just turn a blind eye to the fact as a whole you're an aggressive people and quite often will go straight to the most drastic show of force. Violence is engrained in your culture and shows very often in your actions. Now I agree every American police man will not go in for the beating on every arrest. But it happens frequently. I agree every US soldier will not use his gun as soon as he can pull it from his hip to shoot some "rag heads" but there is a reason why all my friends in the army state they get horrible treatment from the locals in the middle-east until they find out they aren't American.

Rather then argue the toss with foriegn people for pointing out these flaws and then rushing as quickly as possible to point out their flaws instead and deny your own. Try accepting it and doing something to change them even if that just means adopting a less confrontational mentality in certain situations. Just stop deluding yourself into thinking you're perfect and everyone else just hates Americans and makes this shit up to get at you.

And jsut because someone makes a post focusing on a negative don't assume he doesn't think there aren't any positives. He just assumes he shouldn't have to list them all just to appease people.

[Mr. Happy]

Most of the cops in place like Florida, where there is really nothing to do, join up because they think they are gonna be shooting people every day.

And campus cops, those were the campus cops, are the fucking work. It's perfectly safe there, there's nothing for them to do, and they are the jock douchebags that dopped out of highschool who just want to hurt people. So they get all antsy, and then they've got a gun, which they really shouldn't, which makes them feel more powerfull and you get shit like this.

The worst, and some of the best, go to be cops and it fucks everything up. Everytime I watch cops I see ten things they do that are illegal. When I was in the dorms, a kid that lived below me got a tazer held to his head because he wouldn't let them in his room, I got my arm nearly torn off because I simply walked to my door to see what was going on when they decided to walktz into my room like it was their right. Another kid got kicked in the stomach for video taping some of this.

I think there are plenty of good cops, someone out there is catching all those serial rapists we here about afterall, but overall I think they are the worst segment of American society. No wonder they kill themselves more often than whiney 14 yr old girls.

[onyx]

[Meotwister]

Look the guy had an agenda and went inside with the intent of obstructing the event.

He cut directly to the front of the line got all in someones face about it.. gave a camera to a girl and asked her to record him and proceed to spill over his minute time with loaded questions in his own little diatribe.

When he was asked to leave he gets all defensive and starts throwing a huge fit about it and the cops try to get him out of there by grabbing him (like the bouncers at a club) when he resists that and is shouting like an idiot all about they go after him and try to cuff him while he's still squirming around and resisting still making it hard to cuff him and rather hard for them to pick him up and get him out.

They warn him to stop or they were gonna tase him and guess what? he keeps going so they tase him and makes that half faked sounding scream of his. The pick him up and get him to the lobby area where someone with a camera had followed and he was sure to act in front of it being all standing up for free speech etc.

There was something I read that said when the camera turned off he was completely cooperative and told the officers in the police car that it wasn't their fault etc.

Also a little food for thought: he was a journalism major

Now there's more to stories than a lot will look for most of the time and instead fall back on "America is so violent" speech.

[Dionysos]

Look the guy had an agenda and went inside with the intent of obstructing the event.

He cut directly to the front of the line got all in someones face about it.. gave a camera to a girl and asked her to record him and proceed to spill over his minute time with loaded questions in his own little diatribe.

When he was asked to leave he gets all defensive and starts throwing a huge fit about it and the cops try to get him out of there by grabbing him (like the bouncers at a club) when he resists that and is shouting like an idiot all about they go after him and try to cuff him while he's still squirming around and resisting still making it hard to cuff him and rather hard for them to pick him up and get him out.

They warn him to stop or they were gonna tase him and guess what? he keeps going so they tase him and makes that half faked sounding scream of his. The pick him up and get him to the lobby area where someone with a camera had followed and he was sure to act in front of it being all standing up for free speech etc.

There was something I read that said when the camera turned off he was completely cooperative and told the officers in the police car that it wasn't their fault etc.

Also a little food for thought: he was a journalism major

Now there's more to stories than a lot will look for most of the time and instead fall back on "America is so violent" speech.

I know he seems to be a retard, and he prolly was provoking it, that however is not really the most important thing here. Five guys can put cuffs on a guy like him, and they tasered him when he was on the ground, without him ever being a physical threat to anyone... I wonder how they would have handled him or what would have been the outcome if they hadnt had tasers? Would they have failed at putting cuffs on him? Come one... (Then again they couldve pinched him *really* hard )


When you already have someone pinned down and THEN taser them its punishment. Jesus christ... Oh wait, right he didnt stop yelling when they had pinned him down, stupid me, yelling is the most effective form of resisting and can kill from a hundred meters away.

Him being an ass or idiot has nothing to do with whether the police/guards over-reacted or not.

Dammit, I posted again.

@ Mr.Happy, I would have gotten so angry... Id have prolly sued someone

[Meotwister]

well they don't know at the time that he isn't a physical threat... some guy coming in shouting acting belligerent who knows what the guy's gonna do?

And yeah he would have been harder to take out of the place without using a taser, but you're right they probably could've not used it and everything woulda been sunshine and flowers here, but hindsight is 20/20. In the middle of the ordeal you got these college officers who have to stop this guy from doing whatever he plans on doing that's disrupting the event and ruining it for others, without hurting the guy necessarily, so the obvious choice is the taser.

I'd be a little more concerned if it was like that story earlier where the guy used it like 9 times, but just once to get a guy to cooperate who is being so disruptive he could've been a threat to someone there, especially since he's resisting arrest? Why is he? Does he have a reason to not want to be touched etc etc.. these are things that come to mind at the moment and the resulting actions are perfectly reasonable.

It goes beyond the fact he was being a retard.

[Mr. Happy]

Have you ever been tazed? I haven't lol, but no have you ever watched a tazing demonstration? They tazed a giant burly cop and he couldn't get up after like five minutes, they tazed this guy like ten times, that was unneccessary.

I think it comes down to the purpose of law and order. Personnally, I believe that the laws and cops are there to implement society, rather than control it, it's like a funeral procession. If your in a funeral procession you get to run red lights, granted, you need a sticker and you drive slow, but that's one of our traditions and so the law makes provisions for that.

Yeah, he went over his time, it's not like he stole the mic from someone, and this wasnt the cops event. The cops were there to protect Kerry. It was Kerry's event. Kerry wanted to answer the questions. The decisions of how the guy should be dealt with is on Kerrys shoulders. Kerry decided he wanted to answer the questions, and he called off the cops. But the cops were bored so they kept going because they wanted to keep up an image.

Personnally, I don't care if the guy was a douche bag, it's all about the cops, and the cops did the opposite of what they should have done.

[SlappyBag]

Cops need to use more force imo, they let people get away with too much.

You say its not official because he they didn't say they were going to arrest him, well, by the sound of it, he certainly had that impression. "Don't arrest me".

Maybe the purpose of what they were doing was wrong, I agree, but the way they did it... there was nothing wrong with it. They gave him warnings, people who don't respect the police should be punished, they are meant to be there to keep the force and recently, in the last 20 years or something people seem to hate them. Therefore, they need to show their power tbh. Tasering is a pretty simple, non-lethal method, in England they wouldn't of done it, because as far as I know they just don't seem to use them that often. They had to get him out of there to stop the disruption and it seemed to work.

As I said before, the reasons for taking him "under authority" were in the wrong, but the way they did it was fine by me. Except they really should of stated "Sorry but we are arresting you" or whatever, before they grabbed him. Meh. No big deal really, so a lad got tased, meh.


Do note, I'm British, and I feel that our culture needs more respect for the cops. If this is going on all the time as stated then its really bad, but if its a one off thing then meh @ it.