Was the UCLA Tazzing of a student excessive?

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Abomb-baby said:
No one said forgetting your ID is tazer worthy. I agree with you that after he was cuffed, it should have ceased.

So then it was excessive. Wasn't that the whole point of this thread?:huh:
 
I'll concede that the cops used excessive force after he was handcuffed if you can concede that he should have left when he was asked the first time. :wink:
 
Let the Racial Profiling Suit Begin.:rolleyes: How do we know the officers didn't approach other students before confronting him. I am sure it's a pretty big Library.

Tasered student claims racial profiling 2 hours, 24 minutes ago



LOS ANGELES - A student who was shocked by a campus police officer's Taser gun after he refused to show ID at a UCLA library thought he was being singled out by the officer because of his Middle Eastern appearance, his lawyer said.

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Attorney Stephen Yagman said he plans to file a federal civil rights lawsuit on behalf of the U.S.-born student, Mostafa Tabatabainejad.

Tabatabainejad, 23, was shocked Tuesday night after arguing with a campus police officer who was conducting a routine check of student IDs at the University of California, Los Angeles Powell Library computer lab.

Yagman said his client declined to show his school ID because he thought he was being targeted for his appearance. His family is of Iranian descent.

Police have said Tabatabainejad encouraged others at the library to join his resistance, and when a crowd gathered, the officer used the stun gun on him.

Yagman disputed that, saying Tabatabainejad started yelling to draw attention after the police officer pulled out the Taser.

Tabatabainejad was arrested for resisting and obstructing a police officer and later released on his own recognizance.

The incident, recorded on another student's camera phone, showed Tabatabainejad screaming while on the floor of the computer lab. It was the third time in a month in which police behavior in the city was criticized after amateur video surfaced.

UCLA's interim chancellor, Norman Abrams, urged the public to withhold judgment while the campus police department investigates.

Several civil rights organizations, including Amnesty International and the Council on American-Islamic Relations, have called for an independent review.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061117/ap_on_re_us/student_stunned
 
It's always very easy to say it was racial, but since it was a routine check where they ask everybody to show his ID I don't see his point.
It would rather have been racial if everybody else was asked and he left out. But it's not racial when everybody gets asked.
But of course it looks like a good way to get some money out of it, especially for the attorney.
 
The whole premise of this is quite ridiculous... They need to check IDs randomly at the library because some 'intruder' might get inside and read books or maybe learn something? This is just crazy. My school library was open to everyone, only the non-students needed to check in their names at the entrance. If you're going to say someone might steal books or something, it's not like a student can't do the same. You increase security at the entrance to make sure that doesnt happen.

The response from the student? Well, if I was in my school library, studying or whatever, and this guy came and asked me to leave, I'd be pretty upset too. It is a totally stupid policy!

The tasing is obviously uncalled for, I mean, its a school library, come on. The officer threatening to tase another student because she asked for his badge number - plain outrageous. Why didn't he give his badge number if he thought what he did was right?
 
I think checking id's at the library is fine. It's a great place to steal small electronics - laptops, ipods, etc. Students think it's a safe place to leave things, but it's really not. They had the right idea, but obviously went waaaaaaay too far.
 
:| Did anyone watch the youtube video of that? His screams are horrible to listen.

Wow...he was already handcuffed and they still tased him?
I agree it's stupid to argue with a policeman, and I don't know whether he didn't have or didn't want to show his ID...still I think tasing him 4 or 5 times was completely out of line.
 
They went too far, they shouldn't have tazed him five times. I understand the ID policy is to keep students safe. This is fine with me since I'm a student myself and I want to be safe on our campus. Don't we all? But it's no excuse for the tazing, that was excessive. I'm going to try to find the YouTube video of this so I can hear those screams. Yeah, I'm a glutton for punishment.
 
I'd say it was excessive. I think everything up until the tasing was reasonable though. He should have had ID, and since he didn't he should have either left to get it, or come back when he had it. A uni has every right to require people using their libraries to have ID. He should have left right then and there. I think it's fine the cops were called. I think it's fine they cuffed him and tried to take him out. However, once he's cuffed, and he's not trying to get away, there was no reason to zap him. Drag him out if you want, but no reason to taze him. And doing something like that in a public place is completely assanine. That's how riots start.
 
It's crap like this that leads a lot of Americans to distrust the police. Granted there are still some folks who apparently grew up/live in Mayberry and think every cop is Officer Friendly, but those of us in the real world know that there are some people who become cops because they're on a power trip. These particular goons were apparently that type, indicated by the threats to Taser the bystanders who asked for names & badge numbers.

There is corruption everywhere, why do some have such a hard time accepting that there are corrupt/dirty police?
 
As a student at UCLA I, along with most of the student body, am outraged. Technically, you are supposed to have a student ID just to get into our libraries - quiet absurd, but true. From my understanding, other students weren't asked to show their IDs, just the terrorist (I mean, Muslim).
 
blueyedpoet said:
As a student at UCLA I, along with most of the student body, am outraged. Technically, you are supposed to have a student ID just to get into our libraries - quiet absurd, but true. From my understanding, other students weren't asked to show their IDs, just the terrorist (I mean, Muslim).

Post hoc ergo propter hoc.

Eyewitnesses claim that not everyone in the area was being checked, but that some students besides him were asked for ID.

The CSO could have been singling him out for being Persian, but he easily could have been checking every fourth person or whatever.

Now if he claimed that he'd been asked for ID every time he was in the library after hours while others weren't, then he's almost certainly being profiled.
 
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The UCLA police officer videotaped last week using a Taser gun on a student also shot a homeless man at a campus study hall room three years ago and was earlier recommended for dismissal in connection with an alleged assault on fraternity row, authorities said.

UCLA police confirmed late Monday that the officer who fired the Taser gun was Terrence Duren.


Duren said Monday that he joined the UCLA police force after being fired from the Long Beach Police Department in the late 1980s. He said he was a probationary officer at the time and was let go because of poor report-writing skills and geographical knowledge.

In May 1990, he was accused of using his nightstick to choke someone who was hanging out on a Saturday in front of a UCLA fraternity. Kente S. Scott alleged that Duren confronted him while he was walking on the street outside the Theta Xi fraternity house.

Scott sued the university, and according to court records, UCLA officials moved to have Duren dismissed from the police force. But after an independent administrative hearing, officials overturned the dismissal, suspending him for 90 days.

Duren on Monday disputed the allegations made by Scott.

In October 2003, Duren shot and wounded a homeless man he encountered in Kerckhoff Hall. Duren chased the man into a bathroom, where they struggled and he fired two shots.

The homeless man, Willie Davis Frazier, was later convicted of assaulting an officer. Duren said Frasier had tried to grab his gun during the struggle. But Frazier's attorney, John Raphling, said his client was mentally ill and didn't do anything to provoke the shooting.

It remains unclear when the independent investigation of the Taser incident will be completed. It will be headed by Merrick Bobb, a veteran watchdog of both the Los Angeles Police and Los Angeles County Sheriff's departments.
 
i read somewhere the student was Iraqi, not Persian, not that it matters

speedracer said:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-taser21nov21,0,1459046.story?coll=la-home-headlines

If you're going to post an article, leave a link and don't selectively edit it.

For all I know, the cop could be a complete jerk. But if you're posting the article in order to measure his reputation based on past incidents, you should provide a complete picture.


provide a complete picture?


26523621.jpg


Is that better?

sure, i chose (or edited) what I posted

it seems many are happy to give this officer the "benefit of doubt", by suggessting things that might have happened

yes, it is impossible to know exactly what happened

all of our conclusions involve degrees of speculation

saying he might be a "jerk", seems a bit dismissive

i believe this cop is "too alpha" to be trusted with deadly force.
 
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