Taser's in the News - Put your taser article here!

[GRiM]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

"Don't Tase Me, Bro!" Jolts the Web
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/09/dont-tase-me-br.html

(its a compilation of the material found on the net about the incident (and on mainstream))
(...)
the video is number one on the viral-video list UF Police Taser Student During Kerry Forum Popularity over last day YouTube 322 new posts 3,659,400 views. (from: http://www.viralvideochart.com/)

 

[Locksmith]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

SAO you are probably right in your assessment of this idea. I know better than to make decisions while outraged or frustrated.

In a watered-down way, the spotlight was put on these cops in the numerous videos that were taken and made available on the Net. Some even made it through the air waves without too much editorializing. No doubt some people who are close in one way or another to these cops saw some of the video. Just maybe we will find out if it plays out in any positive way, such as any of the cops voluntarily quitting that particular force. I won't be holding my breath for any sincere public apologies.

In fairness, I did state that shaming would not work on psychopaths. My thought was that it might work indirectly by way of people who are close them, and that that might have a retarding effect on their future actions. Probably just pie-in-the sky thinking. But, I think beat cops are usually part of the decision making process, and not subject to quite the autocracy as the military is. But, when the order is given it is almost always complied with.

To reply to your query about any historic example of shunning/shaming, I can immediately think of only one. That was from early US Colonial history and was a pretty closed off and strict religion. I don't want to go there. In fact its leadership may even be an example of a petty pathocracy.

I have known a few very professional beat cops. You are right in that one should approach them particularly, but really anyone in general, with slow appeals to reason. Cops in daily high-risk beats have to have an on-guard mindset to be prepared for the worst to happen in the next second. That mindset doesn't just go away when they go off duty. In one of my previous posts in this thread I tried to make a distinction between a true policing force and the wannabes like these campus cops.There really is very little comparison between these two, very different policing situations.

Finding what caused the cops to go into action at the time that they did is probably the key to finding the real problem. I first suspect it was someone behind organizing this forum, and secondarily the police sergeant or above, someone in the university or even Kerry's own protection if he had any there.

I saw this earlier in a comment to the following piece. I don't recall seeing the suits this person refers to, and need to review them again. I did note a male in a suit tell people to stay back, from leaving the hall, just after Meyer was taken outside.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_michael__070918_student_tasered_for_.htm

There's been a lot of stories about how this fellow was talking for too long, but if you watch some of the videos you see that he was being prodded before he had even been speaking for 40 seconds, so they were planning on bothering him from the start.

I would still like to know who the men in the suits were who "told" the police to move in and who ordered the mikes cut and who tried to keep people with cameras "back" from the action and told one photographer to stop taking pictures. Kerry Gestapo? Campus admins? Secret Service? Somebody else?

 

[Locksmith]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

Hi NormaRegula and Anart:

I didn't see your posts until I had already SUBMITted a reply to SAO, sorry.

My emotions must have really been hanging out the, and I though they were tamed down by this moring.

Both of you offer fine insight and advice. I appreciate it all. And, it help to know that my outrage and frustration, bad as they may be, are not alone.

Thanks to both of you for the encouragement,

Jim ..... :)

 

[Kesdjan]

Handcuffed women tasered by Ohio Police

Yet another unjustified taser incident.

WARREN, Ohio—Police are investigating an officer's use of a stun gun on a handcuffed woman who fell to the pavement and was knocked unconscious when the officer shocked her.
Video from Patrolman Richard Kovach's cruiser shows him jolting the screaming woman with a Taser electronic device both before and after she was handcuffed.

The woman had been ordered out of a bar.

Heidi Gill, 38, was arrested Sept. 2 on charges of falsification, assault, resisting arrest, criminal damaging and unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, officials said. She has pleaded not guilty. A hearing is set for Oct. 25 in Warren Municipal Court.

Gill told WYTV-TV in Youngstown that she has bruises and impaired vision from her struggle with the officer.

"I didn't think I was going to make it out of there," she said.

Gill won't have further comment on the matter, her attorney, Martin DeMatteis, said today.

Kovach is on paid administrative leave and the city is investigating.

Kovach's report said he made several attempts to use the Taser on Gill, but it misfired repeatedly. Once inside the cruiser, his report said, she kicked at a rear window and tried to climb into the front seat, ignoring his commands to stop, the police report said.

"I deployed a second Taser cartridge into her and the violent turbulent action stopped immediately," the report said. "I then requested a car with a cage for transport."

She was again stunned during an attempted transfer to the second car, she fell and was knocked unconscious, and an ambulance took her to a local hospital, the report said.

The video is at hxxp://video.aol.com/video/i-caught-cops-shocking-act/1973290. On a disturbingly related note I found a site called funnytaservideos.com. With the potential lethality of tasers in mind, anyone who uses them in such a casual way is not deserving of the title of police officer.

 

[NormaRegula]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

And, it help to know that my outrage and frustration, bad as they may be, are not alone.

You're not alone. Controlling strong negative emotions is difficult. When I first came to the QFG, I thought "If only I knew some of this stuff back when I and others took on the local PTB." A fews months into it, I realized that even armed with a few concepts gleaned from the C's transcripts, recommended books, and some forum threads wouldn't have changed a thing back then. Without Work on oneself, one usually fails when confronting the Matrix. Currently, the odds are with the House here on the BBM.

Hopefully, those here who are doing the Work, learning about themselves and others via feedback from members, combined with their own research/contemplation into why things are the way they are, will be stronger in the days to come...and not fall into any emotionally-charged traps.

UPDATE: Hope you see this update, LockSmith. Here's an excellent thread on outrage, anger, and being able to see things as they really are that might help you sort out things. Anger and outrage can be beneficial if directed in the proper manner.

Go here for Laura's thread on The Usefulness of Negative Emotional Center: http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=7197.msg50812#msg50812

 

[OCKHAM]

Handcuffed women tasered by Ohio Police

It seems police officers are getting lazy. People have always been crazy and especially when they are drunk. Their ability to safely restrain people has moved from carefully strapping someone in the car where they cannot harm themselves to it’s easier to just zap-em! At least one police officer should be sitting next to the person being arrested instead of standing outside talking to his buddies being cool.

If you think of PTB central thinking, you immediately have the answer in the fact that the media are dogs for violence, and now we have a new element of physical violence to add to the news for stories that are HOT and that sell very well as the populous is attracted to them. It’s strange if you think about why they sell, you come up with a thinking that all the advertisers need this physical element somehow to survive.

So if you look at all the news stories and advertisers, what do you see? You see lots of shocking things; they might be called stigmas or something, and the advertisers play on the emotional disorders created from them, a carefully interlaced plan.

On TV, of which I no longer watch, the news stories are always laid out with shock treatment first, then weather so the observer can wear off some of the shock, and then sports, so the physical element it seems is targeted emotionally by their methods in presentation, and becomes subconsciously mislead for further use, fwiw.

Kesdjan, the funny website you mention is exactly what they like to see. It’s the same as sports. As long as everyone keeps jumping off cliffs, racing their cars, beating each other up, being better than the next person, shooting guns and tasering each other, PTB knows everything is OK.

 

[Mr. Premise]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

Watching the video made me physically sick. To hear him ask the crowd for help and everyone in the crowd ignored him or smirked at him... The lesson is clear. We can't depend on our fellow citizens.

Also the look on the police man and woman's face when he asked about Skull & Bones. Unbelievable.

To me he did nothing wrong and of course nothing to "deserve" what he got.

 

[GRiM]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

Watching the video made me physically sick. To hear him ask the crowd for help and everyone in the crowd ignored him or smirked at him... The lesson is clear. We can't depend on our fellow citizens.

Also the look on the police man and woman's face when he asked about Skull & Bones. Unbelievable.

To me he did nothing wrong and of course nothing to "deserve" what he got.

Yeah, and whats even worse is how many have surfaced recently... I guess its about 5-10 'Taservideos' out just in the last two weeks. Is it increasing in frequently or are they just being more widely reported?
About the non-intervention of the crowd, I think I can understand that to a certain degree, but the snickering... Thats just horrible.

 

[Mr. Premise]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

Also, another thing that disgusted me was Kerry's reaction (not surprised, though). He could have really scored points by telling the police to "leave the kid alone, I'll answer his questions" but he let the police do the dirty work while mumbling some pathetic joke.

 

[Nienna]

UF Student Tasered at John Kerry Speech

And all of this just makes me wonder if this isn't another little "testing of the waters" to see how ponerized our society is becoming.

"Will others act to protect an innocent if we taser him?" Well, if this is so, they got their answer. So onward and upward to the next level of testing.

 

[Happyville]

Man dies after being Tasered by police at Vancouver airport

When It rains it pours... Another article about tazers...

I thought this article was a little strange... This article makes reference to an "unidentified man"... So if he just got off of a plane why was he unidentified??? Its odd how the "bad guys" always manage to aviod the flight manifest!!!

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2007/10/14/bc-taser.html

 

[Peter]

Open letter to Roberto Santiago regarding UF Tasering incident

Hey SoTTs,
The email included in the body below was sent to Miami Herald reporter Roberto Santiago. Please note that The Herald's publisher and Executive Editors are cc: recipients. This letter will also be forwarded to University of Florida President Bernie Machen and others as I see appropriate.
Please feel free to republish as you wish. If you do, please do so in its entirety, including my name. Please do not publish my email address on the web.
Pete

Note: Original story is http://www.miamiherald.com/top_stories/story/283492.html

Note: chihuahua reference in the last paragraph refers to former Herald Executive Editor Tom Fielder's gaffe as referenced here:
http://www.jossip.com/gossip/miami-herald/miami-herald-editor-words-are-important-sometimes-i-use-them-20061005.php

**********************************************************************


Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2007 15:35:25 -0700 (PDT)
From: "peter oleary" <peteoleary@*****.***>
Subject: Don't Tase Me, Bro - investigative reporting?
To: rsantiago@MiamiHerald.com
CC: dlandsberg@miamiherald.com, agyllenhaal@miamiherald.com, dwilson@miamiherald.com

Mr. Santiago,
Like some of the UF students you alluded to in your Oct. 25 story, I
have had different views of Andrew Meyer. I have watched most of the
videos posted online, and have visited Mr. Meyer's website.

On the surface, he appeared overly cocky and theatrical at the Kerry
forum. It is also readily apparent that the campus police initial
reaction was premature and heavyhanded. The subsequent Tasering of
Meyer was recorded with a high-quality handheld steadicam, the type
that might be used by a journalist covering an emergency or a war zone.
Approximately 9 other video recordings were made with Meyer being the
subject.

Meyer was the first audience member called on by Kerry. Several campus
police were standing directly adjacent to the audience microphone. One
of the officers began interrupting Meyer at 13.0 seconds into his
question. There was recorded communication between the campus police
and with Meyer until the first female officer put her hand on Meyer.

Meyer's behavior was curious while he was in custody, forgiving
officers' behavior and asking officers whether media would be at the
police station.

These facts stand on the surface but beg deeper questions. Some may
simply think Meyer was acting like a bratty know-it-all college kid and
deserved to have officers "beat him with some batons" as one
interviewee pointed out. Others may reasonably point out that campuses
had formerly been places where controversial discourse took place
without risk of electrocution.

Still, the deeper questions persist with me and many others who have
analyzed this incident. We look to the late '60s when drugs were being
introduced onto college campuses seemingly instantaneously and from
nowhere. We then look at an organization named the Tavistock Institute
that has held many real-time social experiments on college campuses and
wonder if they are involved. Was this a calibrated media
event/experiment?

This stands as a challenge to you, your peers, and to your employers.
Would you be ready to take on an investigation into such a shadowy
organization and their workings in contemporary college life? You do
not need to answer, however I wish you would. And I wish your answers
would be affirmitive.

Suffice to say, there are many independant investigators that are
looking into this and other campus incidents, including the Virginia
Tech shootings, among others. There is, in fact, a whole legion of such
investigators. Almost a complete establishment of such investigators
and journalists exists. I belong to this unorganized establishment and
the Internet is our domain. It is as if we are a shadow press. We
operate in the public eye, mostly without funding or salaries. We tend
not to protect sources, and do not enjoy the normal protections or
constraints afforded the Fourth Estate.

We are also a huge growth "industry", unlike conventional mainstream
media. We also tend to enjoy greater credibility than such media. We
do have an agenda however, and are usually quite candid about this
fact. We support and serve Liberty (capital L), Truth, and Justice.

We may openly support a political candidate(s). We may openly take
seemingly controversial stands on controversial subjects. We often
incorporate these stands as assumptions in further analyses of complex
events, such as the UF Tasering incident.

We tend to support Dr. Ron Paul for President. Many of "us" are
certain there exists a "shadow government" running most important
aspects of our lives, including our information streams. We liken this
and other shadow institutions to the military/industrial complex that
Dwight D. Eisenhower warned of in his farewell address. We know that
the Founders of our great Nation similarly warned us of such
institutions, should Federal power be allowed to concentrate unabated.
Some call us conspiracy theorists, as if quantum theory or the theory
of relativity infers something kooky. Rather, we see these
"conspiracies" as the things our world is made of. We are not afraid
to say so, and we think this is healthy for the human race.

Many of us tend to think that the tragic events of Sept.11, 2001 were
planned and accomplished by parties close to our President, George W.
Bush, his Vice President, Dick Cheney, and joint
Israeli/Saudi/Pakistani interests. We have extraordinary evidence to
support this extraordinary claim. In fact, most of this evidence has
been gleaned from major wire service stories, declassified US
Government documents, and eyewitness accounts. Recent polls worldwide
seem to indicate that people tend to believe our assertions more than
they believe the mainstream media and "official" accounts of this
seminal incident. Much of ths evidence is available online at
http://www.cooperativeresearch.org and countless other internet
addresses.

Unlike "little chihuahuas nipping at your heels", we are more like pit
bulls with our teeth firmly clamped on your asses. We don't want your
jobs, we already have them.

Sincerely,

Peter J. O'Leary
Chicago, Illinois
Occupied USA

 

[Peter]

Open letter to Roberto Santiago regarding UF Tasering incident

with our teeth firmly clamped on your -bootays-

It slipped my mind that that I used a questionable word in the original text, however I still remember the SotT rules regarding this. I do respect this rule, and beg y'all's pardon.
Pete

I actually like bootays better than the original word in this context. Thanks for the correction!

 

[Laura]

Open letter to Roberto Santiago regarding UF Tasering incident

Also, my pet peeve: the difference between imply and infer. Think of it this way:

Imply = to hint or suggest or "toss out a suggested meaning" (like a ball)

Infer = to "catch the meaning" that has been tossed by another or to derive a suggested meaning from something that has been said.

When you wrote: "as if quantum theory or the theory of relativity infers something kooky", I think you meant "implies".

 

[Laura]

10 hours frustrated by airport bureaucracy, now Dead By Taser

Questions hang over taser death
He spent 10 hours frustrated by airport bureaucracy. Just 24 seconds later, police shot him with tasers

MARK HUME AND SUNNY DHILLON

From Friday's Globe and Mail

October 26, 2007 at 3:19 AM EDT

VANCOUVER — Dazed and confused after more than 15 hours of travel, unable to communicate in English and scared because he couldn't find his mother, Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski was jolted by a taser just 24 seconds after being confronted by police in Vancouver International Airport.

That allegation was made Thursday by a lawyer for Mr. Dziekanski's family who says video evidence will show that the RCMP took him down with a taser jolt moments after approaching him.

"I've been in touch with witnesses. I have viewed a video, which was taken by a bystander, which is not going to be released until at least the time of the inquest. From my observation, the interaction between the police and this individual, who didn't appear to me to be posing a danger to anybody at the time … was 24 seconds, roughly, before he was tasered," Walter Kosteckyj said, adding the airport surveillance videos also won't likely be released until an inquest is held.

A CTV News report Thursday night, based on emergency radio logs, shows police arrived at the scene at 1:28 a.m. and, two minutes later, it was reported a "male has been tasered."

The radio log does not indicate when police first approached Mr. Dziekanski, just that he was down two minutes after they arrived — and that by 1:32 he had lost consciousness.

CTV reported there was a 12-minute delay before medical help arrived. Mr. Dziekanski died shortly after being tasered — only 10 hours after arriving in the country that was to be his new home.

Asked to describe what he saw on the video, Mr. Kosteckyj replied: "I would describe it as something that will be shown to police academies around North America as not the way to intervene in this kind of situation."

Police have described a much more measured response in which officers gave a wildly agitated Mr. Dziekanski two jolts from a taser just to subdue him long enough to put handcuffs on him. The RCMP say they too have videos, but they can't be released because an investigation is under way.

Mr. Dziekanski died not far from dramatic Coast Salish totemic "welcome figures" that had greeted him at the entrance to the Arrivals Hall several hours earlier.

Mr. Kosteckyj described how a journey to a new life devolved into a nightmarish scenario, in which Mr. Dziekanski was left wandering helpless and alone in a busy airport while his mother, Zofia Cisowski, was searching for him nearby.

The waiting mother and increasingly frantic son were separated by glass walls and what appears to be impenetrable airport bureaucracy that somehow failed to help them connect.

"Unbelievably, these people were probably no more than 150 to 200 feet apart for at least five hours, and she was unable to get any message to him. And no one on the other side [of the glass walls] thought to interview him or come outside or vice versa," Mr. Kosteckyj said.

He said he could not explain why no one was able to come to the assistance of Mr. Dziekanski in an airport that handles 17 million visitors a year.

"For all the high-tech stuff they have at the airport, and all the security they have, somehow a guy can sit or be in that baggage area, that immigration area, for a period of nine hours … without anyone really taking much notice of him — as unbelievable as that sounds," Mr. Kosteckyj said.

He said Mr. Dziekanski's journey to Canada began in Poland about 3 a.m., when he left his home town of Pieszyce to get to an airport for his first airplane flight. The 40-year-old construction worker, who had never left Poland before, was immigrating to Canada to join his mother, 61, who lives in Kamloops, about a five-hour drive from Vancouver.

They had arranged to meet at the baggage carousel in the international terminal at YVR. What neither of them seemed to know, however, was that the baggage area is inside a secure area just past Canada Customs and Immigration. There is no line of sight into the Arrivals Hall from the public waiting area, except for a short distance through sliding glass doors.

Mr. Dziekanski arrived at about 3 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 14.

"He made his way to primary customs in the ordinary fashion … he went through there in the normal time frame … he then proceeded through and was directed to secondary customs, which is normal for someone who doesn't speak English and is immigrating to the country," Mr. Kosteckyj said. His papers were in order and he proceeded without difficulty.

But what happened after that was far from normal. For nearly 10 hours, Mr. Dziekanski stayed in the Arrivals Hall, growing increasingly frustrated and eventually becoming frantic.

Outside, in the public area, his mother spent nearly six hours pacing the corridors and, in broken English, asking airport officials for help in locating her son.

Mr. Kosteckyj said she visited one booth in international arrivals "at least three to four times and conveyed to them that she was concerned about her son being in the area and she wanted to get a message to him and how could she do that? They wrote her name down and said that they would make inquiries."

At about 10 p.m., she was told he wasn't there. She made the long drive home, only to find a phone message waiting, saying her son had been found.

"She called back to immigration when she got in, which would have been around 2 a.m., and spoke to someone there and was advised that her son was somewhere in the area and was fine. And she advised, you know, 'Please take care of him because he can't speak English and I'll get there as soon as I can.' And of course he had died, been killed really, some time on or about 1 or 1:30," Mr. Kosteckyj said.

At a news conference, Ms. Cisowski said she had dreamed of opening a small business in Kamloops with her son. "I've lost my only family," she said. "I studied English during the day and at night I saved money to get my son to Canada."

Mr. Dziekanski arrived with three bags, two of which were filled with geography books.