Deaths and Injuries in Police Custody

[*Anya*]

Teen girl files claim against police who mistook her for a male suspect and punched her

By Amy B Wang September 5 at 5:10 PM

Nearly three months later, Tatyana Hargrove still can’t talk about what happened to her on June 18 without tearing up.

It had been a sweltering Sunday when, on a bike ride back from shopping for a Father’s Day gift, Hargrove was suddenly stopped by police officers in Bakersfield, Calif.

The officers had been looking for a suspect — described as a 25- to 30-year-old, bald, black man standing 5 feet 10 and weighing about 170 pounds — who had threatened several people with a machete at a nearby grocery store, according to a police report.

Thinking she was that man — and despite her protests — the officers seized on the 5-foot-2, 115-pound Hargrove, in an altercation that escalated until police punched her in the mouth, unleashed a K-9 dog on her and arrested her. It wasn’t until officers placed her in their patrol car that they asked Hargrove’s name and realized she was female — and thus not the suspect they were looking for.

Though police later admitted it was a case of mistaken identity, Hargrove was charged with resisting or delaying an officer and aggravated assault on an officer. It wasn’t until August that those charges against her were dropped, her attorney said.

“It changed me. Very bad,” Hargrove, 19, said last week at a news conference. “My friends tell me I’m different.”

That’s about as far as she was able to get before breaking down crying.

“I hope and I pray this doesn’t happen to anybody else,” she said through tears.

Frustrated with what they say has been a lack of accountability for the officers’ actions, Hargrove is filing a claim against the city of Bakersfield. A precursor to a lawsuit, the claim will almost certainly lead to legal action against the city.

Neil K. Gehlawat, Hargrove’s attorney, said this option was the only way they felt they could bring justice in this case. Only the district attorney’s office or a U.S. attorney’s office has the ability to punish the officers, he added, but there was “virtually zero percent chance” they would.

“Our job is to hold the officers accountable for what happened and all the law allows us to do is to seek money,” Gehlawat said. “But our hope is that, by going through this process and by potentially having this case heard by a jury, that they will send a loud and clear message to the officers in the department that what happened is not appropriate and it should not happen again.”

Bakersfield police spokesman Ryan Kroeker said the department is aware a claim was filed and had been expecting it, but did not comment further. In July, a police spokesman told The Washington Post the department had determined the officers had exercised appropriate use of force on Hargrove.

Gehlawat said the Bakersfield police chief did call Hargrove and her parents to apologize for what happened, but also suggested Hargrove should have complied before complaining.

“Which I think is just victim-blaming,” Gehlawat said.

In a widely shared video of Hargrove’s account of the incident, filmed by the Bakersfield chapter of the NAACP in July, the teenager stands with a pair of crutches near the intersection where she was stopped by police and described how one of the officers demanded she give him her backpack, she said.

When she asked if they had a warrant, one of the officers gestured toward a police K-9 behind him, she said.

“I then got scared and then I was like, here, take the backpack, just take the backpack,” Hargrove added.

After that, she said in the video, the officer grabbed her by her wrist, then punched her and threw her onto the ground; shortly afterward, the police K-9 “came and started eating at my leg.”

The same officer then put his knee on her back and other knee against her head, despite her protests, she said.

“I told him ‘I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe’ and then I started yelling out, ‘Somebody help me, somebody help me! They’re gonna kill me!’” she said. “And then finally, he let me up, he tied my hands behind my back and then he tied my feet together and he threw me in the back of the car.”

Hargrove was arrested and taken to a nearby hospital for treatment of her injuries, including abrasions on her face and scrapes and punctures from the police K-9’s “engagement on her right thigh,” Christopher Moore, the arresting officer, wrote in his police report.

Moore wrote that “several nurses” at the hospital referred to Hargrove as a male and that “when I corrected them and advised she was a female they were surprised and apologized for the mistake.”

After she was treated for her injuries, Hargrove was booked into jail, the report said. She was detained for nearly 16 hours there before being bailed out by her parents, according to the NAACP.

In the police report, Moore wrote that Hargrove had “spun into” one of the officers with her left shoulder, causing him to fall backward, and then “quickly maneuvered her body to get back on top of him” after the officer punched her.

“At this time I was forced to quickly consider the following; [Hargrove] matched the description of the suspect that had brandished a machete, her backpack was within her arm’s reach and the main compartment was unzipped allowing her immediate access to the machete,” Moore wrote. After weighing whether he could use his Taser or baton on Hargrove, Moore wrote that he decided to unleash the police K-9, Hamer.

In the police report, Moore wrote that after officers placed Hargrove in a police car, she continued to scream out of the window at them for about five minutes.

“While Hargrove was in the back seat I asked what her name was and when she provided it as ‘Tatyana’ I said, ‘Don’t lie to me, that’s a girl’s name. What is your name?’ ” the police report stated. “Hargrove said, ‘I’m a girl, I just don’t dress like one.’ This was when I first discovered she was a female.”

A search of her backpack revealed no weapons, the report stated.

The claim against Bakersfield alleges police used “excessive and unreasonable force” against Hargrove, as well as civil rights violations under federal and state law.

“One of the questions in my mind is, even if this case is a case of mistaken identity, why didn’t they do more to ascertain her identity prior to using excessive force?” Gehlawat said.

He described the impossible situation Hargrove had been put in to reporters last week: “She tried to get the dog off of her. The officers described that as her not being compliant, but I bet that if any one of us had a canine biting onto some part of our body, our natural instinct might be to try to get the dog off of us so that the dog wouldn’t keep biting us.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.9181edad4058

[Andrea]

Man Claims Citrus Heights Police Used Excessive Force During His Arrest

http://fox40.com/2017/09/13/man-claims-citrus-heights-police-used-excessive-force-during-his-arrest/

CITRUS HEIGHTS -- The fence is still locked in front of the boarded up, three-story house where an electrical fire burned everything back in June.

"All's I can remember yelling is this is my mom's house, this is my mom's house," said Dryw Westerman.

Westerman's childhood home in Citrus Heights was burning.

"I'm just trying to figure out where my daughter is, where my mom is," he said.

But instead, the 34-year-old father, who has no criminal history, ended up going to jail.

Westerman says police used too much force that day.

"The subject refused, and again tried to drive forward, causing one of our officers to have to get out of the path of the vehicle he was driving," said Sgt. Richard Wheaten with the Citrus Heights Police Department said.

Police say Westerman was trying to drive through police tape at the scene, something they admit people attempt regularly when emotions are heightened because they are worried about their family members.

"It is rare for people to go this far to not follow directions when we're trying to help get them to their family and help keep them safe at the same time," Wheaten said.

Westerman was charged with resisting arrest and being an unauthorized person in an area closed for safety.

"Wasn't blocked off at all, I had plenty of room to go down there," he said.

Westerman says he was trying to turn down a side street that wasn't blocked off and that he explained that to officers. But he says they opened the door to his car and twisted his arm out of the window.

"Pressed me against the steering wheel," Westerman said.

And then he says they tackled him to the ground while he was wearing shorts, burning his knees on the hot asphalt.

It's something he's seen happen in Citrus Heights before with James Nelson about a mile and a half away and within days of his arrest in June.

"I'm grateful that didn't happen to me, but it could have been me," Westerman said.

Westerman says the burns on his knees are much less severe, but he also got abrasions on his wrists from the handcuffs.

"His injuries are not consistent with a burn or anything like that," Wheaten said.

The police department says he was brought up from the asphalt rather quickly and that Westerman's story is not entirely accurate.

"I wasn't raised like that," Westerman said.

Right now, he's raising his 4-year-old son, Michael.

"He teaches me everything," Michael said.

When Michael grows up, he wants to be a cop.

[Andrea]

Man Holding Stick Shot Dead By Oklahoma City Cop

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/police-shooting-oklahoma-city_us_59c23f23e4b0f22c4a8dce68

An Oklahoma City police officer shot and killed a man holding a stick on Tuesday, according to authorities. The shooting is under investigation.

The slain man had been a suspect in a hit-and-run that occurred on Tuesday evening, Capt. Bo Mathews, a police spokesman, told reporters.

At least two officers confronted the man, who was holding a stick, in the front yard of a home. One officer fired a Taser stun gun at the man, Mathews said, and the other shot the man with a gun.

The dead man, whose identity wasn’t released, was pronounced dead at the scene.

The identities of the two officers have not been released.

During a press conference ― footage of which was shared online by KOCO 5 News ― a reporter noted the slain man had been identified by several locals as deaf. Mathews said that he had no such information, and stressed that the investigation was in a “preliminary” phase.

The officer who shot the man, Mathews added, had been placed on paid administrative leave.

[Andrea]

As arrests are made, protesters question the tactics used by St. Louis police

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/as-arrests-are-made-protesters-question-the-tactics-used-by/article_e58481b7-f7c2-541e-91d2-31a6379f272c.amp.html

ST. LOUIS • Police used a technique called kettling on Sunday night to box in about 100 people at a busy downtown intersection and arrest them for failing to disperse.

It’s a tactic used to corral a group of people who fail to follow police orders. St. Louis police took the action after several windows were broken and concrete planters and trash cans overturned.

But some of those caught in the box made by rows of officers said police overstepped their bounds, using excessive force and chemical spray on people who were not protesting, including residents trying to get home and members of the media. As police closed in from all sides, they struck their batons in unison on the pavement, in a cadence march.

Tony Rice, an activist who goes by Search4Swag on Twitter, said he was shocked by the police behavior.

“It was the most brutal arrest I’ve ever experienced in my life,” Rice said. “I thought I was going to die.”

He said he could not lie prone on the ground, as ordered, because he had his bike with him.

Rice said his neck was being pressed against part of his bike, and he told the officers: “I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe.”

Those bused to the jail seemed confused by what was happening, Rice said. Pedestrians were arrested along with legal observers, protesters, a freelance photographer and a doctor, he said.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Mike Faulk was caught in the kettle Sunday night. A line of bike cops formed across Washington Avenue, east of Tucker Boulevard and police in helmets carrying shields and batons blocked the other three sides of the intersection at Tucker and Washington. Faulk heard the repeated police command, “Move back. Move back.” He had nowhere to go.

The police lines moved forward, trapping dozens of people — protesters, journalists, area residents and observers alike. Multiple officers knocked Faulk down, he said, and pinned his limbs to the ground. A firm foot pushed his head into the pavement. Once he was subdued, he recalled, an officer squirted pepper spray in his face.

Police loaded Faulk into a van holding about eight others and took him to the city jail on Tucker, a few blocks to the south. He arrived about midnight and was released about 1:30 p.m. Monday after posting a $50 bond. Faulk was charged with failure to disperse, a municipal charge.

Nigel Jernigan, 27, a cook from Jennings, said he came downtown around 9 p.m. Sunday to join others protesting the not-guilty verdict in the case of former St. Louis police Officer Jason Stockley, accused of murdering Anthony Lamar Smith.

In doing so, he got caught up in the sweep by police. He said he saw officers hit and roughhouse people around him on the ground who wouldn’t put their hands behind their backs.

“Most of the people who didn’t have their hands behind their backs were making sure they weren’t pepper sprayed in the face,” he said.

Jernigan said he put his face to the concrete. He said he heard police chant and yell even though the majority of the protesters were already terrified from being cornered and not allowed to leave.

Dellicia Jones, 23, said she and her boyfriend were also caught up in the sweep. She said she hadn’t participated in any of the earlier protests but wanted to see what was happening Sunday night.

She and her boyfriend parked on Washington Avenue and joined other people who were mostly standing around and talking, Jones said. After about 30 minutes, police began advancing while banging their batons on the ground in unison.

She and her boyfriend were quickly boxed in. “When we tried to walk one way, they came at us with pepper spray and batons and told us to go the other way,” Jones said, but they had nowhere to turn.

Jones said she wasn’t treated roughly by the officers who arrested her but she saw others who were hit with pepper spray and some who were slammed to the ground.

She thinks police were too harsh in how they swept in on the protesters.

“It was nowhere near right, at all,” Jones said a few hours after she was released from the City Justice Center. She had spent about 15 hours there and was among the many charged with failure to disperse.

Controversial tactic

Kettling has been used across the country as well as in Europe to defuse violent situations, which is how police described their Sunday night actions. After several hours of peaceful protests, which started at police headquarters west of downtown, the group of about 1,000 people moved to the St. Louis University campus and then back to the police station. Then a group peeled off and headed downtown, where several windows of businesses were broken, and concrete planters and trash cans overturned. Police warned protesters several times to disperse, saying it was no longer a peaceful assembly.

People run up Olive Street in St. Louis as some windows are broken and bicycle police begin arriving in the area on Sunday, Sept. 17, 2017. Photo by David Carson, dcarson@post-dispatch.com

Tony Rothert, legal director of the American Civil Liberties of Missouri, said his office has been busy fielding complaints and been in contact with Mayor Lyda Krewson’s office as well as Acting Police Chief Lawrence O’Toole regarding what Rothert called inappropriate police behavior.

“We’re exploring whether litigation will be necessary to bring police in line with the Constitution,” Rothert said.

He said examples of questionable behavior by police include use of chemical sprays and ordering people to stop recording officers and to delete images they had already taken.

“And then engaging in kettling, which caused people who were doing nothing wrong to be detained and arrested along with those who were breaking the law,” Rothert said. “It has been used infamously and does very often bring in journalists, legal observers and innocent bystanders. It was used at the presidential inauguration (in January) in D.C., and in New York during Occupy Wall Street. It’s really a military tactic for controlling crowds and controversial because it leads to constitutional violations.”

Rothert said he is unaware of it ever being used in St. Louis before Sunday night “and I don’t recall it ever happening during Ferguson or any of the other protests of police shootings.”

The St. Louis Police Department said the design of the area downtown St. Louis prompted their actions Sunday night.

“The geographical layout of the area, and not a technique, dictated how tactics were deployed,” a police spokesman said in a statement Monday.

Police said anyone who wants to make a complaint about officer misconduct can contact the Internal Affairs Division at slmpd.org, 314-444-5652 or in person at Police Headquarters, 1915 Olive Boulevard.
Used in Portland

In November 2014, when it was announced that a grand jury would not indict former Ferguson police Officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown, protests broke out across the country, including in Portland, Ore., where kettling was used to control a crowd of about 100 demonstrators. Ten people were arrested for disorderly conduct or interfering with police, but prosecutors dismissed the cases.

A citizen review board determined that orders by police brass to have officers corral and arrest the group of protesters was unlawful. The board investigated after about 40 complaints were made to the city’s Independent Police Review Division, a part of the city auditor’s office.

Constantin Severe, director of the Independent Police Review, said those who complained said there was a “lack of articulation” by officers as to what the demonstrators were doing wrong. And without that component, police were wrong in kettling the group, which makes it impossible for anyone boxed in by police officers to leave, he said.

Severe said that after the findings, the Portland Police Department vowed to use the kettling procedure rarely, and stopped for nearly two years. They resumed the practice after Donald Trump was elected president, which launched several protests in Portland including one in June where kettling was used again.

“Those on the protest side say (kettling) is killing our First Amendment rights,” Severe said.

Police say it’s an effective way to defuse a volatile situation without resorting to violence. Portland is reviewing police policy on crowd containment, he said.

David Klinger, a criminal justice professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, said that kettling serves a lawful purpose when crowds disobey police orders to leave an area. Those who have done nothing wrong should not pick that particular time to try to wage a debate with officers.

“If you are in a crowd and next to a guy that is breaking the law and police say it’s an unlawful assembly, you are going to get scooped up if you don’t leave,” said Klinger, a former Los Angeles police officer.

He said many of those protesting have done so before and know that in a volatile situation, ignoring failures to disperse typically leads to arrest.

“This is no time to play the victim game,” Klinger said. “It’s time to leave.”

[Andrea]

Originally Posted by Andrea

Man Holding Stick Shot Dead By Oklahoma City Cop

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/police-shooting-oklahoma-city_us_59c23f23e4b0f22c4a8dce68

An Oklahoma City police officer shot and killed a man holding a stick on Tuesday, according to authorities. The shooting is under investigation.

The slain man had been a suspect in a hit-and-run that occurred on Tuesday evening, Capt. Bo Mathews, a police spokesman, told reporters.

At least two officers confronted the man, who was holding a stick, in the front yard of a home. One officer fired a Taser stun gun at the man, Mathews said, and the other shot the man with a gun.

The dead man, whose identity wasn’t released, was pronounced dead at the scene.

The identities of the two officers have not been released.

During a press conference ― footage of which was shared online by KOCO 5 News ― a reporter noted the slain man had been identified by several locals as deaf. Mathews said that he had no such information, and stressed that the investigation was in a “preliminary” phase.

The officer who shot the man, Mathews added, had been placed on paid administrative leave.

The Latest: Neighbor says man shot by cop didn’t speak

https://apnews.com/fc652ca4660848c3a6c6b4733ff74ada



OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — The Latest on a man holding a stick who was shot and killed by an Oklahoma City police officer (all times local):

4:15 p.m.

A man who saw Oklahoma City police officers open fire on his deaf neighbor says the neighbor was developmentally disabled and also didn’t speak.

Julio Rayos tells The Oklahoman that 35-year-old Magdiel Sanchez mainly communicated through hand movements. He says he believes Sanchez became frustrated trying to tell the officers what was going on, and that he shouldn’t have been killed.

Two officers investigating a hit-and-run involving Sanchez’s father Tuesday night shot Sanchez with a gun and a Taser after he left his front porch and approached them holding a metal pipe.

Police Capt. Bo Mathews said Wednesday that Sanchez didn’t obey the officers’ commands and that they didn’t hear witnesses yelling at them that Sanchez was deaf.

Sanchez died at the scene. The officer who fired the gun has been placed on administrative leave while the shooting is investigated.

Oklahoma City police officers who opened fire on a man who was approaching them holding a metal pipe didn’t hear witnesses yelling that the man was deaf, a department official said Wednesday. (Sept. 20)

___

10:20 a.m.

Authorities say Oklahoma City officers who opened fire on a man who was approaching them with a metal pipe in his hands apparently didn’t hear witnesses yelling that the man was deaf.

Police Capt. Bo Mathews said Wednesday that 35-year-old Magdiel Sanchez wasn’t obeying the officers’ commands before one shot him with a gun and the other with a Taser on Tuesday night. He says the officers didn’t hear witnesses yelling “he can’t hear you” before they fired.

Sanchez died at the scene. The officer who fired the gun has been placed on administrative leave pending an investigation.

Mathews says the officers were investigating a reported hit-and-run. He says a witness told one of the officers the address the vehicle had gone to and that Sanchez was on the porch when the officer arrived. He says Sanchez was holding the metal pipe, which had a leather loop on one end.

A neighbor told The Associated Press on Wednesday that Sanchez carried a stick to ward off stray dogs when he walked at night.

___

10:10 a.m.

A neighbor of a man shot and killed by an Oklahoma City police officer say he was either deaf or hard of hearing and often carried a stick to protect himself from stray dogs.

Police Capt. Bo Mathews says officers were responding to a report of a hit-and-run Tuesday night and said they found a vehicle that matched the description of the one in the crash. He says two officers confronted a man holding a stick near the vehicle.

Mathews says one officer fired a Taser and the other shot with a gun. The man was died at the scene. He has not been named.

Jolie Guebara said Wednesday that she didn’t know her neighbor’s name, but that he used notes to communicate with her and her husband and often carried the stick when he walked at night.

12:50 a.m.

Oklahoma City police say a man holding a stick was shot and killed by an officer on the city’s southeast side.

Police Capt. Bo Mathews says officers were responding to a report of a hit-and-run around 8:15 p.m. Tuesday when they found a vehicle that matched the description of the one in the crash.

Mathews says two officers confronted a man holding a stick near the vehicle. One officer fired a Taser and the other shot the suspect with a firearm.

The man was pronounced dead at the scene. Names of the suspect and the two officers have not been released.

Mathews says the officer who shot the man with the firearm was placed on administrative leave.

An investigation is ongoing.

[Andrea]

Rocklin PD: Officer arrested for using excessive force

Rocklin PD: Officer arrested for using excessive force

ROCKLIN, Calif. (KCRA) —

A Rocklin police officer was arrested Tuesday for using excessive force while arresting a DUI suspect, the police department said.

Officer Brad Alford, a 15-year veteran of the Rocklin Police Department, was taken into custody around 6 p.m. and booked into Placer County Jail on charges of assault with a deadly weapon causing great bodily harm, assault under the color of authority and filing a false police report, police said.

The investigation into Alford stems from the arrest of a DUI suspect on Sunday, police said. Officers were in the 5400 block of South Grove Street around 6 a.m. to arrest the suspect.

Police said during the arrest, Alford “used a baton in a manner that appeared to be excessive.”

The officer’s actions were later reported to the police department. Investigators reviewed video footage and then “immediately” reached out to the Placer County District Attorney’s Office to conduct an independent review.

The district attorney’s office determined that Alford’s actions “rose to a criminal level” and decided to press charges against the officer.

Alford, who was on paid administrative leave during the investigation, was arrested Tuesday.

The district attorney’s office will continue the criminal investigation into the case while the Rocklin Police Department will conduct an internal investigation to determine if department policies and procedures were violated.

“This is a sad and unfortunate incident for all of those involved, including the community and our organization,” the Rocklin Police Department said in a news release. “This type of behavior will not be tolerated. As a department, we pride ourselves on working with our community and an incident like this tarnishes the reputation of the hardworking men and women who work here.”

Police Chief Chad Butler said during a news conference Tuesday night video of the incident will not be released per a request by the district attorney's office. The DA's office told Butler the video is part of an ongoing investigation and will not be released to the public at this time.

[Andrea]

‘You like that?’: St. Louis cops savagely beat handcuffed filmmaker while wife watched, suit says

https://thinkprogress.org/st-louis-filmmaker-beating-556a6d98b229/?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_con tent=59cdbe3d04d30111925ef4c8&utm_medium=trueAnthe m&utm_source=twitter

On St. Louis’ most restless night of protests for some time, interim police chief Lawrence O’Toole seemed to embrace a tribal us-and-them attitude toward demonstrators in his city. Hours after reporters watched black-clad riot cops chant “Whose streets? Our streets!” at dispersing protesters, O’Toole boasted to press cameras that “police owned the night,” comments which Mayor Lyda Krewson (D) would criticize days later.

It all may have seemed hollow posturing and harmless banter. But a new lawsuit illustrates the very real abuses that such a domineering mentality from law enforcement can foreshadow. O’Toole’s cops allegedly beat, taunted, and repeatedly maced a handcuffed filmmaker that Sunday night, singling the Kansas City man out from a herd of arrestees to punish him physically for recording them. Drew and Jennifer Burbridge sued the city on Tuesday, alleging the kind of unprofessional, illegal mistreatment at police hands that’s routinely drawn protesters into American streets in recent years.

The Burbridges were present late Sunday night, September 17, when officers suddenly encircled a mix of protesters and reporters in a “kettle.” The tactic involves riot police cutting off all exit routes for a group of people and then arresting everyone. The Burbridges say they were not warned at any point to leave, or to avoid going to the intersection where they were filming protesters and police, before the sudden kettling. With the perimeter established, the suit says, officers began indiscriminately spraying pepper spray into the trapped group.

The couple sat down and held onto one another. Police moved inside the kettle. “One of the two officers…stated ‘that’s him’ and grabbed Drew Burbridge by each arm and roughly drug him away from his wife,” the suit says. Despite being told Burbridge was a member of the media and not a protester, the officers “then purposely deployed chemical spray into his mouth and eyes and ripped his camera from his neck,” according to the suit. Officers beat the man repeatedly, first with hands and feet as they got plastic zip-tie cuffs onto him and then going back for seconds with their batons after his hands were bound.

“Do you want to take my picture now motherfucker? Do you want me to pose for you?” one officer allegedly said to Drew during the beating. When the assault caused him to lose consciousness, Drew “awoke to an officer pulling his head up by his hair and spraying him with chemical agents in the face.”

The officers running the kettle and alleged beating were not wearing name badges on their uniforms and declined to identify themselves to either Burbridge throughout the encounter. Multiple officers seemed to taunt Jennifer as she watched her husband beaten, the complaint says. “Did you like that? Come back tomorrow and we can do this again,” one allegedly told her. Another, the complaint says, asked her, “What did you think was going to happen?”

An hour or so later, O’Toole and Krewson would appear on local television to praise their officers for effectively balancing the First Amendment rights of peaceful protesters against the criminality of a small minority of those still present on the streets after dark.

The basis for the police crackdown that night was a handful of smashed windows downtown. But the vandals had been arrested hours earlier by the time the Burbridges arrived and got caught up in the kettle, according to local news reports from the night.

Wide array of unconstitutional tactics alleged in suit over chilling round-up that hit peaceful protesters, journalists, and anarchists alike.

The allegations of collective punishment, targeted brutality against non-resistant arrestees, and a seemingly intentional singling out of media members all echo a separate lawsuit in Washington, D.C., over the city police’s handling of protesters during President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

The protests the Burbridges attempted to cover in St. Louis didn’t have anything to do with Donald Trump personally. The city is on edge because another white police officer has been vindicated in the suspicious slaying of a young black man, not because of any acute action from the White House. But the tone and momentum established for police forces around the country by the new administration in Washington has an influence on how both individual officers and whole department cultures view dissent, protest, and civil unrest.

Immediately upon Trump’s taking office, the administration made clear to law enforcement observers that any protest they deemed to be violent should be met with force. In the months since, the president himself has given aid and comfort to the enemies of civil rights, encouraging cops to knock people around after they are arrested but before they have been proven guilty of any crime or even formally charged with one. In his informal political alliances with men like David Clarke and his own speeches, Trump has repeatedly betrayed an affection for roughing up his critics — something a few optimists in political journalism had hoped he might leave behind on the campaign trail.

[Kätzchen]

Originally Posted by Andrea

‘You like that?’: St. Louis cops savagely beat handcuffed filmmaker while wife watched, suit says

https://thinkprogress.org/st-louis-filmmaker-beating-556a6d98b229/?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_con tent=59cdbe3d04d30111925ef4c8&utm_medium=trueAnthe m&utm_source=twitter

On St. Louis’ most restless night of protests for some time, interim police chief Lawrence O’Toole seemed to embrace a tribal us-and-them attitude toward demonstrators in his city. Hours after reporters watched black-clad riot cops chant “Whose streets? Our streets!” at dispersing protesters, O’Toole boasted to press cameras that “police owned the night,” comments which Mayor Lyda Krewson (D) would criticize days later.

It all may have seemed hollow posturing and harmless banter. But a new lawsuit illustrates the very real abuses that such a domineering mentality from law enforcement can foreshadow. O’Toole’s cops allegedly beat, taunted, and repeatedly maced a handcuffed filmmaker that Sunday night, singling the Kansas City man out from a herd of arrestees to punish him physically for recording them. Drew and Jennifer Burbridge sued the city on Tuesday, alleging the kind of unprofessional, illegal mistreatment at police hands that’s routinely drawn protesters into American streets in recent years.

The Burbridges were present late Sunday night, September 17, when officers suddenly encircled a mix of protesters and reporters in a “kettle.” The tactic involves riot police cutting off all exit routes for a group of people and then arresting everyone. The Burbridges say they were not warned at any point to leave, or to avoid going to the intersection where they were filming protesters and police, before the sudden kettling. With the perimeter established, the suit says, officers began indiscriminately spraying pepper spray into the trapped group.

The couple sat down and held onto one another. Police moved inside the kettle. “One of the two officers…stated ‘that’s him’ and grabbed Drew Burbridge by each arm and roughly drug him away from his wife,” the suit says. Despite being told Burbridge was a member of the media and not a protester, the officers “then purposely deployed chemical spray into his mouth and eyes and ripped his camera from his neck,” according to the suit. Officers beat the man repeatedly, first with hands and feet as they got plastic zip-tie cuffs onto him and then going back for seconds with their batons after his hands were bound.

“Do you want to take my picture now motherfucker? Do you want me to pose for you?” one officer allegedly said to Drew during the beating. When the assault caused him to lose consciousness, Drew “awoke to an officer pulling his head up by his hair and spraying him with chemical agents in the face.”

The officers running the kettle and alleged beating were not wearing name badges on their uniforms and declined to identify themselves to either Burbridge throughout the encounter. Multiple officers seemed to taunt Jennifer as she watched her husband beaten, the complaint says. “Did you like that? Come back tomorrow and we can do this again,” one allegedly told her. Another, the complaint says, asked her, “What did you think was going to happen?”

An hour or so later, O’Toole and Krewson would appear on local television to praise their officers for effectively balancing the First Amendment rights of peaceful protesters against the criminality of a small minority of those still present on the streets after dark.

The basis for the police crackdown that night was a handful of smashed windows downtown. But the vandals had been arrested hours earlier by the time the Burbridges arrived and got caught up in the kettle, according to local news reports from the night.

Wide array of unconstitutional tactics alleged in suit over chilling round-up that hit peaceful protesters, journalists, and anarchists alike.

The allegations of collective punishment, targeted brutality against non-resistant arrestees, and a seemingly intentional singling out of media members all echo a separate lawsuit in Washington, D.C., over the city police’s handling of protesters during President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

The protests the Burbridges attempted to cover in St. Louis didn’t have anything to do with Donald Trump personally. The city is on edge because another white police officer has been vindicated in the suspicious slaying of a young black man, not because of any acute action from the White House. But the tone and momentum established for police forces around the country by the new administration in Washington has an influence on how both individual officers and whole department cultures view dissent, protest, and civil unrest.

Immediately upon Trump’s taking office, the administration made clear to law enforcement observers that any protest they deemed to be violent should be met with force. In the months since, the president himself has given aid and comfort to the enemies of civil rights, encouraging cops to knock people around after they are arrested but before they have been proven guilty of any crime or even formally charged with one. In his informal political alliances with men like David Clarke and his own speeches, Trump has repeatedly betrayed an affection for roughing up his critics — something a few optimists in political journalism had hoped he might leave behind on the campaign trail.

This is just one of many tragedies occurring in the state of Missouri, but is so heartbreaking because isn't this the same state where the white cop was let off the hook for killing a black man too? There's so many disturbing accounts of horrible violence all over the country, but it seems to me that it's at an all time crisis point , way past the threshold of reported violence, deadly violence in Missouri. It makes me sick at heart to read that deadly violence committed by public law enforcement is occurring in epic proportions. So sad!