The latest nationally recognized incident of excessive use of force by the LAPD police in Los Angeles (the third this week) came Tuesday night right here on the UCLA campus’ main library. Apparently UCLA has a policy by which they do random ID checks at the library after 11 p.m. That’s all good, since it is for the benefit of student safety. That’s what started this incident:
According to a campus police report, the incident began when community service officers, who serve as guards at the library, began their nightly routine of checking to make sure everyone using the library after 11 p.m. is a student or otherwise authorized to be there…When [Mostafa] Tabatabainejad, 23, refused to provide his ID to the community service officer, the officer told him he would have to show it or leave the library, the report said.
After repeated requests, the officer left and returned with campus police, who asked Tabatabainejad to leave “multiple times,” according to a statement by the UCLA Police Department.
“He continued to refuse,” the statement said. “As the officers attempted to escort him out, he went limp and continued to refuse to cooperate with officers or leave the building.”
Witnesses disputed that account, saying that when campus police arrived, Tabatabainejad had begun to walk toward the door with his backpack. When an officer approached him and grabbed his arm, the witnesses said, Tabatabainejad told the officer to let go, yelling “Get off me” several times.
“Tabatabainejad encouraged library patrons to join his resistance,” police said. “The officers deemed it necessary to use the Taser.”
Officers stunned Tabatabainejad, causing him to fall to the floor. [Link]
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Here is my issue with what I see in the clip. If a person violates a law and you want to arrest him then go ahead. I am certainly not going to argue that Tabatabainejad did not deserve to be arrested. There are legal ways to change a law if you think it is stupid. What I take issue with is the repeated use of a Taser as a punitive measure against a passively resisting citizen that is already on the ground. Passive resistance is a gift given to us by Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. If the officers need to then they can call for backup. A handful of officers shouldn’t have a problem cuffing and carrying a limp, non-compliant man to their waiting car unless he is morbidly obese. The Taser is used here to punish the victim for disobeying authority. Is this what could happen to me if I ever non-violently protest something? And what if this individual was mentally ill or off his meds? Add to this toxic mix the fact that he was Muslim (and I’m guessing that he probably has brown skin).
You will note in the video that the other students in the library are on the verge of rioting against the police. The police start looking like cornered animals as more and more students gather around, ask for their badge numbers, and tell them that they are abusing their power.
As the student and the officers were struggling, bystanders repeatedly asked the police officers to stop, and at one point officers told the gathered crowd to stand back and threatened to use a Taser on anyone who got too close.
Laila Gordy, a fourth-year economics student who was present in the library during the incident, said police officers threatened to shoot her with a Taser when she asked an officer for his name and his badge number. [Link]
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p>As you might have expected, CAIR is all over this:
The Southern California office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-LA) today called for an independent investigation of an incident late Tuesday in which a student at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) was given multiple “Taser” stun gun shocks by campus police.
CAIR-LA was contacted by several UCLA students who expressed their concern about possible civil rights violations by police officers. [Link]
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p>Tabatabainejad got off a few shots of his own as he was being Tasered:
Video shot from a student’s camera phone captured the student yelling, “Here’s your Patriot Act, here’s your fucking abuse of power,” while he struggled with the officers. [Link]
Thank goodness for cell phone cameras.
Update:
Let the UCLA PD know what you think. Here is what they have to say about it.
this was utterly HORRIBLE… if a man is tasered… he is not able to walk for at least a few mintues.. basic physiology..
wtf is going on?
W to the T to the F? thank god they have it on video.
abhi, glad you brought this up. i saw this clip too and was shocked. while the guy should have had an ID on him, as the library requires that, but the use of tasers…..left us all UCLA wallas shocked.
oh my God .. that was horrid – I couldn’t even make it through the whole video.
abhi, according to your post, this involves the UCLA police, not LAPD.
horrible
I’ve corrected at the top.
wow this is just crazy what the ass….
This is fucking ridiculous.
I saw this on the news last night and I was absolutely appalled at the use of violent force against a non-threatening student. I think that this kind of behavior is inexcusable. My heart goes out to Mostafa.
Actually some of the witnesses are saying he didn’t refuse to leave the library, that he was actually on his way out on his own volition and that the cops tasered him anyway.
From the LAT:
Yep, I used that same quote above.
Very gut wrenching. I think the issue has more to do with power. People with power abuse it a lot. Even police officers in India get away with murder. It is sad.
Insane reverence for authority in some conservative quarters of the country has led to the police usurping way more powers than they should have in any advanced industrialized society. Ad Nauseum police worship, calling them ‘heroes’ ‘brave’ ‘honorable’ ‘the best’ and the beatification of them in the local media is so over the top that some cops actually believe that they are the judge, jury and the executioner. If this is what they do in a freaking public place, imagine what they do when they are ‘arresting’ someone who has little means/influence and there is no public spotlight over them. The police department should be hit with a civil lawsuit ASAP.
That’s scary. There was absolutely no reason for the multiple use of the taser. But even if the officers receive some sort of “reprimand” I’m more interested in the specific protocol that would prevent an event like this from occurring again.
AMERICAblog is reporting there is a protest on campus tomorrow (Friday), but I can’t seem to find any information to confirm/for details.
Stupid motherffers. This is what happens when you allow fin rednecks into the force. f trailer trash
|You will note in the video that the other students in the library are on the verge of rioting against the police.
I did not get this impression at all from the video. There was one dude (white t-shirt) who seemed to be arguing and some others asking for the badge initially, but the majority were just lamely following the show. That dude incidentally was promptly out of the pic once the officer threatened to taser him.
Maybe they should have sat on the road and blocked the police vehicle or something..
There was one dude (white t-shirt) who seemed to be arguing and some others asking for the badge initially, but the majority were just lamely following the show.
I agree. The fellow students really disappointing.
Chi_diva and AMFD – I think you both are right on the money regarding abuse of power and police/[and I’d say military] despotism/worship.
I meant the fellow students were *really disappointing.
Giving officers tasers was a very bad idea. The instruction they recieve with them makes it sound like a taser is the same as pepper spray. Thats just not true. a taser should be drawn with the same caution as a gun. Within a month of Cincinnati police being issued tasers they killed an unarmed black man with it…though they did that a lot anyways.
Possibly of Persian descent.
I think you raise a very important and subtle point about how the true atrocity lies in the policy of tasering those that are merely passively resisting enforcement of laws, rather than violently protesting.
When it was introduced, the purpose of the TASER was to be able to incapacitate those acting violently without necessarily shooting at them. I find it remarkable that police forces across the country do not have a uniform policy on the use of the TASER. In this particular instance, I believe that the officer was extremely insensitive and lazy. I think to a large extent, the users of the TASER are desensitized by the pain that can come of it, and hence tend to use it as an easy short-cut deterrent rather than exert any physical effort. To them, the TASER has become the equivalent of a harmless magic-spell that simply incapacitates people with no apparent harm. That is the key problem here.
I hope he gets the officers fired, sues the school, and becomes a national spokeman for how NOT to use a Taser.
I am gonna be blasting NWA’s Greatest Hits, including “Fcuk tha Police”, on my way out of work today.
This is disgusting.
Side note regarding LAPD, all of the recruits get tasered in the academy. It’s part of the training section on the use of tasers.
Famous lines from NWA:
Without a gun and a badge, what do ya got? A sucka in a uniform waitin to get shot,
At least one of the officers’ necks looked brown to me.
Quite plausable. But this incident was instigated by an individual who clearly did not have a respect for authority, and perhaps a disdain for a certain (working) class of people (“Pigs“, “Trailer Trash“). The key is for police forces to recruit individuals with the temperence necessary to disregard such disrespect and snobbishness.
that was gut wrenching. I saw the whole video but I could barely stand it. It was terrible. They kept on tazing him instead of simply carrying him out. I’m disappointed with the students too, but who wants to be tazed. Holy cow that was like in some bad futuristic movie about state power and control.
This needs to become a national incident.
I thought that the officers did a good jod, considering the fact that if that happened in most places he would have been beat beyond recognition or even shot !!!!!!!!!! In fact, they may have been too patient. They should have grabbed him and dragged him out of the library. Why wait for him to walk out. He broke the law, place him under arrest and get him out. He was obviously causing a disturbance. So much so that all of the students had to walk into the hallway.
The key is for police forces to recruit individuals with the temperence necessary to disregard such disrespect and snobbishness.
Yes, but the people will not express that to the police so what will the training amount to?
I think your comment is the perfect example of the hero worship that goes in some parts of this country. Instead of being outraged by the police brutality you feel it incumbent upon yourself to attack the commenters who dared address the brutes in less glowing terms than ‘heroes’ and ‘braves’.
I thought that the officers did a good jod, considering the fact that if that happened in most places he would have been beat beyond recognition or even shot !!!!!!!!!! In fact, they may have been too patient. They should have grabbed him and dragged him out of the library. Why wait for him to walk out. He broke the law, place him under arrest and get him out. He was obviously causing a disturbance. So much so that all of the students had to walk into the hallway.
As I always say, the right is its own best parody.
But this incident was instigated by an individual who clearly did not have a respect for authority, and perhaps a disdain for a certain (working) class of people (“Pigs”, “Trailer Trash”).
How do you know he had a disdain for the working class people?
Amfd,
Did something snap in your brain? Have you lost it? Do you need help?
Regards,
Almd, I knew before reading Manju’s first comment on this post what his opinion of the incident would be. He takes the reactionary position on almost every issue and needs to maintain his reputation. Trying to argue your point will be futile. Notice how he cleverly shifts the onus upon the victim. Here he inserts into this debate phraseology not used in the video:
Then without knowing anything about the individual he sides with power by saying the following:
Yes, because civil disobedience must = snobbishness.
Anindo, Is there a reason you think personal attacks are a good idea?
Was it personal? If so, I apologize.
I do have a reason to be uncomfortable when somebody posts something like this –
“Without a gun and a badge, what do ya got? A sucka in a uniform waitin to get shot,”
It might be the lyrics of a song written by somebody else but Amfd seems to be condoning them. A question about the state of mind is quite valid in this context.
Regards, Aninda
Well, there is also a disdain for a certain type of people (rednecks, pigs, trailer trash) and authority that may have had a hand in this incident…a disdain i see on this thread and in some parts of the country (like San Fran) and from some liberal quarters…to reverse your argument.
the same way you know conservatism lead to the police brutality. i don’t know what motivated him to refuse to cooperate with the community service officers, perhaps it was disdain, it’s plausible. perhaps the officers reacted like they did b/c he was brown, it’s plausible.
i provided links so you can see where i got the phraseology.
I was providing a possible motive for his refusel to show his ID, just as others were providing a possible motive for the police over-reaction.
Really disgusting!! I can’t believe this happens in the US of A and that too in a university library before the midterms (correct me if I am wrong on that). Who would you believe the observations of witnesses or the statement from the police?
Really now?! Is screaming in pain the same as “encouraging resistance”?
Been following this story on many blogs and news boards and whats more disgusting is the hatred from the posters for the student who got tased! He deserved it?! f**kin animals. All I can hope is that I have no such cowardly friends.
Possible motive for the police? did you watch the video buddy?
Abhi, thanks for this post. I’m at work and can’t watch the video, but this incident is disturbing nonetheless.
Tu Quoque Watch:
False sighting. AMFD and I were both speculating as to what lead to this incident.
Vinay, r u saying it’s obvious from the video that the police were motivated by bigotry?
The most appalling thing to me is the shoddy camera work. Failed to maintain the key light and rim light. Seriously, this is bad, but coming from incidents like this, this and this, it’s a bit of an improvement.
It isn’t a false citing. I only appear in a text-book case. Look me up. You are excusing your position and your comments by blaming liberals and San Francisco:
Manju,
A Taser.
In a library.
What exactly are you defending?
So, let’s review. Some dude didn’t have his ID. After getting hassled, he decided he should probably take off (for whatever reason). Then some cops show up, tase him repeatedly and drag him off, screaming, while students look on in horror/outrage, and, amazingly, don’t riot or break bottles over cop heads. In what parallel universe could this POSSIBLY be the fault of the student? What should he have done to prevent an attack? Perhaps he didn’t simper enough?
As to this being about the race of the cops, or their training, bullshit. This is simply what happens when you have people put in positions that allow the use of force and place them in hostile relationships with, well, pretty much everyone. Cops almost NEVER have community oversight; they are very rarely disciplined for incidents such as this. There’s a nearly endless history of “non-lethal” weapons being used in improper ways, despite training (a friend of mine had his ear blown off by one). The way to deal with this is simply make the cops more responsible to the community. This has worked very well in Boston, where cops are historically mild, and police/community relationships have been taken as a model for other cities to emulate. A few years ago when a girl was killed by “non-lethal” weapons following some post-Red-Sox celebrations, public outrage resulted in some demotions and suspensions, and a drastic review of procedure. The more oversight, the less violent the cops.
Here’s what I got from the video: 1) The student was showing non-violent protest for being grabbed even though he was leaving the library – his decision to do so can be questioned but ultimately it’s not an act deserving a painful punishment. 2) The officer’s were lazily trying to contain a possibly volatile situation. They could have simply dragged him out of the building but their decision to repeatedly taze the student was unnecessary.
I doubt that the police were behaving in a racist manner; more than likely they were reacting to the situation.
Here’s what SHOULD come out of all of this: a serious reprimand (possibly suspension) for the officers with a lesson in how to use tazers effectively and a public apology for the student. And an acceptance of that apology by the student and an understanding that they are ultimately human beings who reacted over zealously and have been disciplined accordingly.
Here’s what will come out of all of this: No harm no foul for the officers (Not to downplay what happened to the student but if Rodney King’s beaters can walk…I am sure these guys will too) and the student will become a spokesperson for the Iranian community (I believe I read elsewhere that that is his background) and how the LA (possibly American) police uses force.
The human condition is ultimately always gray, never black nor white. * my rare two cents. *
University Cops are dually stressed as well. Cops in general are people who lack formal educational background, a university may as well be planet Venus for them. All the kids who became cops are those that couldn’t get admitted or came from families that didn’t encourage a college education. Their fathers painted or installed alarm systems or something like that. It’s screwed up that you have someone under so much emotional duress in a uniform with a badge and weapon.
Did this guy do something wrong by not leaving right away? Yes. Would the person have been treated differently if they looked like Pamela Anderson and not a 9-11 hijacker? Yes.
HMF are your really John Kerry?