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[Cops Gone Wild] Pepper-sprayed toddlers edition
Posts
Murphy should have explained this all to you already.
Don't police learn to grapple anymore? It was a while into my life when I started hearing about this "pepperspray" gadget.
Yep. Nor do cops use pepper spray when suspecting a person is reaching for a concealed weapon.
Additionally blinding a person on a subway platform creates an incredibly dangerous situation.
I think the bottom line here is that if a family with kids got pepper sprayed, or people were thrown down stairs, or harrassed, then it is most likely excessive and illegal use of force. If even none of this story were true but that children were pepper sprayed then it is an indication of excessive and irresponsible force.
If it didn't happen and this was all a fabrication, then everyone would agree that this is a moot point.
The reaction seen in this thread should not be on arguing whether or not this happened, but given the potential for this to happen, as it is highly documented that things of this nature do, what is the best means for correcting this behavior. The visceral imagery of a toddler vomitting from blinding pain will stir a reaction in even the most callous of observers.
If you want though, I'm typing this while sitting an office down from the police department, and don't mind popping by and talking to some of the guys about this.
The amount of cops who do illegal stuff is also way too high.
Personally, in my office, 100% of the complaints that our guys who have cameras have received, have been exonerated by the camera.
Her allegation is that after having done nothing illegal that a cop for no apparent reason other than "Maybe she didn't buy a ticket but we aren't sure" decides to pepper spray her while she does her motherly duty of consoling her child, then shoves her down a flight of stairs, then harasses her afterwords. That seems really implausible, but by no means impossible. Police brutality cases are usually more along the lines of "The cops were in a helluva fight with that guy. They cuffed him, and one of the cops got in a few sucker punches after he was handcuffed." Or "After that guy ran over that cop and was ejected from his rolling vehicle, one of the cops gave him a couple knees to the rib when he was unconscious." and less "He pepper sprayed us and beat us for literally no reason at all"
In summary its a fishy story with no witnesses or evidence. The whole "Innocent until proven guilty" thing applies to cops too. If this cop did do this, I hope he gets fired and put in jail for it. My money is on someones mad they got pepper sprayed / arrested, and is trying to make a quick buck. Even if they completely made it up, the department will likely settle out of court.
Don't you also have the issue that while the alleged victims are free to make any claims that they want / speak to the media, the police are far more limited in what they can say about an ongoing investigation? Both for the investigation of police conduct, and the investigation that may lead to possible charges for this woman?
I mostly agree with you - I'm not completely discounting the possibility that this happened, but it seems a bit implausible that this scenario happened exactly the way she described with no extenuating circumstances or provocation.
I read it as "there are less repercussions for alleged victims making stuff up in cases like these than for a police person to make stuff up".
If that is what the post was implying, I'm not sure I agree or disagree with the sentiment.
Ahhh, that makes more sense. In our society as well, silence is implied guilt, too.
I got a friend who's house was busted into by the cops and tazered in the head (causing medical issues he still suffers from) because they literally had the address confused (st vs ave) and he lost the civil suit against them, it's very very hard for sympathy to translate into anything
Oh, for sure. If anything, keeping quiet helps any legal cases even more than yelling and screaming around town. But it sure makes it easy to yell about terrible cops on an internet forum.
True heroes.