<They used force, violence and violence when they could have instead tried a bit more diplomacy. >

Adam, my friend - at first they turned off his microphone and asked him to STFU. Then, when he would not STFU, they asked him to leave. When he would not leave, they tried to escort him out using NO force. When he would not leave on his own, they tried to take walk him out. When he resisted this action by squirming out of the grasp of the cop that was trying to simply throw him out of the room, more cops became involved and tried to walk him out. When he struggled with (I think) three cops, they took him down.........

What else should they have done? Pleaded? Spent time begging him to STFU and go back to his seat? Come on now......

<Not at all. You keep talking about the possibility that the kid had a weapon, I'm giving you a case where the person does have a weapon.>

Yes, and when someone DOES have a weapon at range, they can't then just take that person down, because that person may then stab them. So, when you have someone on the ground, you have to as quickly as possible stop that person from having ANY chance of harming you. So.........you do what you have to do. In this case, after he would not relent and allow them to handcuff him, they tased him after giving him TWO warnings.

<Do they _need_ to gain control as quickly as possible or not? >

Adam, you are backing yourself into a corner. You are 100% right in that sentence. The problem for you is that when I wrote and you then used my words, "as quickly as possible", that means that the figure of speech "as possible" means that they have to do it as soon as possible within the constraints of the situation. And, someone with a knife presents different constraints as someone with four cops on them, right? One would not treat both the same way. Right?

<If that is true, then how dare you advocate the police using violent force when it's not necessary. As I see it, that is unquestionably police brutality.>

Because, I feel that the level of force that they used WAS necessary. In prisons, they will go into a room with ONE GUY with like eight officers with full armor. Overwhelming force. This was the same. The difference was that the cops that day did not want to use the same level of violence that they may use on the street when there's not 100 people watching, some with cameras. So...they use a taser which is a 'less than lethal' and best option at that point.

<Why should they use any potentially lethal means when the have the option to surround the person at a safe distance and try to "talk down" the situation?>

Because, they did not expect him to put up a fight. When they tried to walk him out, HE instigated the issue by resisting. Once he resisted, he opened himself up to increased force. Once they were forced to have to constrain him - when he squirreled out of the grasp of that first officer, they HAD to use force, because they did not know if he had a weapon on him.

They did not know if he had a weapon, Adam. So, they had to restrain him AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE to mitigate ANY damage that he potentially could do.

Adam, let's say that he DID have a gun on him and they did not tackle him, but they tried to '"talk down" the situation' and five people were shot, two of which were killed.

What would you say then? You STILL think that they did the right thing?

No, of course not. They need to do the EXACT SAME THING, EVERY TIME. That way, no one can say that anyone is racist, no one can say that anyone is using force for different reasons.

Come on man. If he had a gun and started shooting people because they wanted to be nice and conform to what HRW suggests would have been a better way to handle it..........how many of you would be congratulating the cops for their restraint.

And, moreso: If ten people went to the next HRW public discussion forum and chose to take as much time as they wanted disrupting the event, how successful of an event would it be? What if these same people decided to do the same disruption EVERY TIME. Would HRW just never again have any of these forums? No. They'd have security walk people out. And, if the person put up a fight, the policy of the security would be to get them out of there as fast as possible so as to minimize the amount of damage that this person did........

Right?

< WHAT?! You want police officers to have no discretion in the field?>

Hmm.

I know a number of cops/ex-cops and such, and they have policies for many situations which they train on endlessly.

In a situation like this one in Seattle, they are trained to AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE, get the person who is resisting their control down on the ground - NO MATTER WHO THEY ARE - in handcuffs so as to make sure that they do not have the ability to harm either the police, or; more importantly, any innocent citizens in the area.

The issue of discretion is one that needs a case buy case basis. You can't say and you don't want every cop to be allowed total personal discretion with every issue.

No, I do not want cops to decide in a situation like this who they think is dangerous and who is not. That allows racist cops to always use force on the person that they are racist against, and allows someone that the cop thinks is 'safe' to pull out a weapon and start shooting people. Oops.

Salil, go and try to resist when a cop stops you next time and asks for you to produce your license. Go on. In fact, do it the next ten times. If you are in a city where there are well-trained police, they will do the pretty much the same thing every time I am willing to bet. I doubt that some may plead with you, while some will let you go and others will punch you in the face. They are trained to handle certain situations with certain actions - their discretion is not trusted.

I remember this show about racist cops, and how one cop would react one way to white people and totally another to black people. BECAUSE of this video, this city's policy towards traffic stops was codified and EVERY cop had to act the same way. Discretion was no longer allowed in certain situations.

This makes sense to me. You're not a lily-white guy, and I don't want some asshole racist cop roughing you up for doing the same thing that would get me a stern talking to.

Well................maybe you. But, not others.

<<> Adam, they DID NOT use "potentially lethal force".>

<If hundreds of people have been killed with tasers, they are by definition "potentially lethal force". >

Fair enough, Adam. But, that's not really a good point, anyway, because ANYTHING can be "potentially lethal". In this case, I do believe that they specifically call it, "less than lethal".

<Dude, do you understand that they kill people? >

Dude, I assume that you mean the tasers. Yes. They kill people. As does mace/pepper spray. As do ALL forms of physical submissions of any form, whether it be sprays, truncheons, chokeholds or; of course, tasers.

<Also because of the mistaken idea that they don't cause harm. >

I do not think that ANYONE is under this misapprehension that "they don't cause harm". They case LESS harm than the other methods.

<You're making assumption of logic by our government! That's a poor choice. >

"our government"? We're talking local police forces. You're now assuming that EVERY on of them lies with the purpose of......what..............to simply torture people? Simply to get out of having to use chokeholds? Simply to get out of the chance of a cop spraining a shoulder in hitting someone over the head a number of times with a baton? Come on.

You are basically trying to make an argument that police should go back to chokeholds, hitting people with batons (a' la Rodney King) and pepper-spray?

When cops started using tasers, there were TONS of studies on them, and as I recall (but cannot substantiate right now), they were proven to be LESS LETHAL than all other forms of the same level of restraint.

Here's a question: If I can find a study that YOU like that shows that tasers are LESS lethal than these other forms of restraint, would you then be OK with their use?

<If tasers are harmless, then why have 8 states forbid their sale for use by individuals as self-defense? >

I do not know, but that has NOTHING to do with police using them. I GUARANTEE you that in those 8 states, the cops use them......

<The kid is using non-violent resistance. He tries to pull away from the cops, but he makes no violent actions towards them, and makes no threats of violence.>

He's resisting the demands of FIVE cops. What - should they put him in a headlock? Should they beat him with batons? Should they spray him with pepper spray? Should they reason with him and beg and plead with him until he sees the error of his ways and agrees to quietly go along with their requests?

Come on. If one resists - even if that resistance is NOT specifically fighting back - then one opens oneself up to whatever use of force the police believe is necessary in order to regain control. I'm not saying that I like this idea, but this is a reality.

I was watching that "To Catch A Predator" show yesterday - the one about catching those old guys that try to fuck kids, and in that show, when they arrest the fucker, the cops will have four cops jump the old, sad bastard sicko and throw him to the ground. They don't ask him nicely to comply. They don't reason with him. They throw him to the ground. Why? Because THAT IS THE POLICY!!!!!!

The cops can't choose when to be nice, and when to use force on their own. The POLICY is to use force to as quickly as possible get EVERY PERSON into submission AS SOON as possible. Otherwise, at some point, someone WILL have a weapon, and they WILL use it against the cops and maybe kill an innocent bystander.

It WILL happen some time, and the reason that the cops act like this is because either:

A) They used force only against people that they felt were a danger to them (read: Minorities)
and/or,
B) They chose to NOT use this kind of policy and a cop or a bystander got hurt or killed.

So, they have to use the SAME use of force EVERY time. That is just logical.

<Watch the last couple minutes of the video. There are 5 cops holding the kid down. He's completely pinned to the ground.>

Yes, but he's still struggling and not allowing them to put the handcuffs on him. THAT is when they taser him. And, as I recall they WARN him beforeheand. THEN, they hit him with the taser and he STILL will not comply!!! So, ........they hit him again. THEN he complies.

<There is no possible way that he could have harmed the police or anyone else.>

If he had a hidden weapon on his body, and since he was not allowing them to handcuff him - then he conceivably COULD have harmed a number of people, and I am sure that in the past, when there was someone that was thought to have been harmless, they DID harm someone. Ergo: They now have this policy of submission as quickly as possible.

<And the police chose to use potentially lethal force against them. >

The kid should have just conformed to the cop's demands and then argued about it later. Sadly, when a cop tells you to do something, it's immature and; frankly, stupid to fight against them. If he had just walked out, we'd not be talking about this today.

<(Can you explain to me how in that case he could have hurt anyone? Are 5 cops so incompetent that they cannot keep one kid pinned to the ground?)>

Adam, they COULD have controlled him - through a chokehold, using a baton or another kind of pain submission. They COULD have, but they DID that for the last 100 years, and lots of people died. Remember Rodney King? They were beating the FUCK out him and he didn't stop. This kid was not allowing them to handcuff him - and unless they used pepper spray, choked him or hit him with a baton...........

Instead, they tased him twice. That got his attention and submission.

What part of this do you not like? That this happened AT ALL? Do you think that the cops should have instead beaten him? Sprayed him with pepper spray? Used a chokehold?

<I fully support the use of a weapon in cases where the person is armed and threatening people.>

Too bad that the cops don't know who is using or holding a weapon, 'eh? They have to assume that EVERYONE is dangerous to the SAME degree, or cops or bystanders will eventually be harmed as has happened in the past. Basically, you want an individual cop to make the decision of who needs to be treated with polite requests and who needs to be beaten. So, a racist cop will always beat a perso n that they are racist against, and will always be nice to the person who looks like them. Really? That seems like a good idea to you?

<But use on an unarmed subject who is making no threats and no violent actions should be a crime!>

So, yo uare saying that the cops should have:

A) Taken as long as it took to reason with this dumbass kid, and if it took an hour - then so be it.

or,

B) Hit him with batons, used pepper spray or a chokehold.

Got it.

<The cop who used the taser should not only be fired, but should be in jail.>

But, it's OK to beat him with a baton? That would have been OK with you?


Adam, is ANY use of force appropriate EVER unless one can SEE a weapon?

Should the police EVER use force if a weapon is not obviously present?

whats so political about this--this is a dumb post who gives a shit----whoops--i guess all you old bastards on tribe.net do---HAhahahahahah!