TONI- He didn’t produce his ID, so how could this have been a matter of name?

This guy was pushing and kicking the Officers, people could have gotten hurt.
He was not tasered over and over.  I have been tasered and yes you can stand up just after.  This guy was out of line and the Officers did a very good job of keeping him from hurting anyone.  In the end he is fine the Officer’s are not hurt and no one eles got hurt. 

Last thought, I think he set this all up.

What pricks! They expected him to stand up after they had used a taser on him?!?!? And he was handcuffed already?!! Let me guess, it was because of his name. Those idiots should have known that when you friggin use a taser on someone, they can’t friggin stand up much less have any other control over their body!! I hope they were fired and charged for that crap!

I have no idea what the hell goes through their minds. “Stand up”. YES...STAND UP AND WALK OUT...LIKE A MAN. 

Excuse me, but was he even read his rights? YOU DON’T NEED TO READ ANYONE THEIR RIGHTS UNLESS THEY ARE GOING TO BE CUSTODIALLY INTERROGATED. IF THE POLICE DON’T PLAN TO QUESTION HIM, THERE IS NO NEED TO READ MIRANDA RIGHTS.  ARREST DOES NOT = READ YOUR RIGHTS.  YOU WATCH TOO MUCH TV. 

And through the blinding pain would he have heard them even if they did, let alone understand them. This is a blatant abuse of power. The officers should also have immediately complied when asked for their badge information.
NO, THEY WERE DOING SOMETHING MORE IMPORTANT AT THE TIME THAN GIVING INFO TO THE NOSEY PUKES SURROUNDING THEM.

Wether or not the student prompted the first taser shot I don’t know. The video and the article don’t specify. But afterwards, those cops could have easily lifted him up and carried him outside. Therefore the repeated “get up” orders and shocks were unnessesary. WRONG.

Also those surrounding kids should have done more. I don’t know what, but something else could have been done. THEY WERE TOO SMART TO DO SOMETHING MORE...THAT WOULD HAVE GOTTEN THEM ARRESTED FOR INTERFERING WITH POLICE.

My brother was tasered by at least five officers of the Sarasota, FL Police Department at least 23 times (according to hospital records).  He too was on private university property.

My two brothers-in-law are police officers.  I hold all uniformed officers and service men and women in the highest regard.

For a while, I tried to justify these officers actions based on what my brother was doing at the time.  I tried to place myself in their shoes, and thought that I may have reacted in the same manner.  However, there is one major difference between me and these men.  I chose NOT to become a police officer, who should be TRAINED to handle these situations.

My brother, who is 23, about 6 feet and 115 pounds soaking wet, did not deserve this.  No human or animal for that matter, deserves this type of treatment.  Several months after my brothers’ incident, a young man very close to his age in the same sitaution DIED as a result of the incident.

THis could happen to anyone.  There needs to be federal guidelines on the use of tasers.

Well I can tell you one thing, when my mom turns 60 I sure as heck am going to keep her away from the cops, she tends to be a bit fiesty at times.

Dearest Frank,

Thank you kindly for the underscoring my weakness in the area of prepositional phrases.  Furthermore, your insightful comments on the various dangers posed by handcuffed individuals were certainly a bonus.  As a former viewer of the quality television program “Cops” I was very aware of that hypothetical situation.  What is remarkable, however, is the non-chalance exhibited in your ultimate statement..."Its appropriateness can be only judged in the context of a specific situation.” Thank you for pointing out the theme of this debate.  Ground-breaking.  If I had been unclear in my previous posts, allow me to be transparent. I have a problem with the individuals who believed it was appropriate!  The debate does not concern tasers.  It is and always will be about the individuals using them.

In 2004, a six year old boy was tasered by three police officers “as a last resort”.  A twelve year old girl was tasered by police “for her safety and the safety of the officer” when she became frightened and ran from police.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/11/14/children.tasers/

A 68 year old woman was tasered five times while seated in a police station waiting room.

http://www.nbc4i.com/news/5486903/detail.html

Today on CNN you will find a video link for a 6th grade boy who was tasered twice by police in an administrator’s office at Jonesburo Middle School in Georgia.

One might conclude that we live in a authoritarian police state, akin to Orwell’s 1984, complete with doublespeak.  Tasers are deemed “non-lethal”, but in reality they are lethal.  According to an ACLU report, 148 people in the United States and Canada have died as a result of the use of Tasers since 1999. 

http://dailybruin.com/news/articles.asp?id=38960

Tasers cause permanent damage to the heart which may not be symptomatic for many years.  Each successive jolt in a single episode brings the victim closer to death by heart failure, as was the case with the UCLA student who was tasered multiple times while handcuffed and immobile.  Why are we using lethal force on unarmed individuals who are already handcuffed, or pose no threat, or are too young to comprehend the consequences of disobedience to authority?  If the penalty for the alleged crime is less than execution, than why are the police using lethal force?

Here’s what is coming next for U.S. - the military wants to test “non-lethal” highly painful microwave bursts on lawful American demonstrators:

http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/usworld/news-articl e.aspx?storyid=64704

“The Air Force secretary says nonlethal weapons such as high-power microwave devices should be used on American citizens in crowd-control situations before they are used on the battlefield.” Apparently, only the top 1/4” layer of skin is cooked equivalent to 400 degrees.  They want to cook protestors.

Beware of Doublespeak in American Media.  My cousin returned from his third tour of service in the Middle East and his definition of “Water-boarding” is very different from the one you hear on the news.  It turns out, “Waterboarding” is stapping someone to a board with ducttape, usually naked, and dunking them headfirst into a bucket of water, and holding them underwater until they drown.  Then, medical personal revive them with CPR. They repeat this method.  Maybe a better doublespeak term would be “Die-reviving” or “Drown-saving”.  Do you support or oppose governmental, corporate and authoritarian fascism and torture?

CK, you’re an idiot.
the student didn’t “create a situation.” people resist arrest all the time, they don’t get tased 5 times. most police are better equipped to handle a situation when they resist arrest. the UCLA police were inept and did two stupid things:
1) ILLEGALLY tase a person. it is illegal to tase a person who is handcuffed.
2) tase the kid and expect him to stand up. how fucking STUPID can you be? tasing DEBILITATES someone. that’s the idea.
the cops are there to maintain order, and clearly, they failed at their job and broke the law.

i can’t believe how stupid you are, CK. it makes me die inside.

what the hell??? ok so i know that the guy wasnt moving, but honestly i mean he wasnt harming anyone, he wasnt destroying any property and he was not displaying any type of threatening behavior. ok so the guy wouldnt move his but off the floor, big deal, there was absolutely no reason for the use of that tazer!!!! i think that those clowns in uniform were just so happy to get that new equipment they just had to use it on someone. what about near the end of the video when the guy in the plain white t-shirt was standing there talking to the officers and another officer walked into the area and started telling him to go stand on the side and the kid hesitated for a moment, the officer straight up said that if he didnt move he would get tazered as well! now that if just messed up...the guy was causing absolutely no harm and all of those officers should be dimissed immediately!!!!!!!!

CK,

Although you may think that I blindly follow the leftist nation in any and all issues regarding anti-establishment, anti-capitalist, etc., the truth is I do not.  Never have I said or intuited that force by authorities is always inappropriate.  It is, in fact, at times very necessary.  In a perfect world of police officers, all situations work out perfectly; the correct amount of force, whether physical, emotional or mental, is used that matches the severity of the situation.  What I find unacceptable is the use of THIS force for THIS situation.  Guess what CK, not all individuals are compliant.  Does that make them bad?  Who knows?  I am not an employee of Fox News so I cannot judge individuals without knowing who they are and what they have done in their lives.  This didn’t go according to plan.  So NOW WHAT?  Because he refused to show ID and because he refused to leave and then decided to start screaming and kicking, once subdued, was no longer a threat and therefore did not warrant the use of a taser. He wouldn’t stand up...BIG DEAL!  Riots and marches that are broken up by authorities are absolutely hyper-dominated by people who won’t stand up.  THEY didn’t get tasered.  You simply can’t make the case for this.  Do I think taser is ineffective?  NO.  Do I think it’s cruel?  Not always.  The taser itself is not bad...in the hands of the wrong individuals it may become sinister.  It has saved the lives of the offenders as well as those who may have been in harms way.  You simply have to judge each situation separately.  We cannot resort to making sweeping punishments for any confrontation that does not go according to the text book.  Imagine, according your logic, if everytime some “guy asked for it by doing/not doing something or angering a police officer...” the police could simply administer their own form of lex talionis as THEY seem fit.  We would be living in world to crazy to imagine.  The police in this situation made a bad choice and there should be consequences.

Goffredo, whether or not the cops used unnecessary force after the student was handcuffed doesn’t change the fact that the student caused the whole thing with his assinine behavior and blatant disrespect for the University rules and the police.  He did three stupid things that caused this incident to happen:

1) refused to show ID

2) refused to leave when asked

3) physically resisted and started screaming when cops tried to escort him out

All of this happened before he was tasered, so anything that happened afterwards was a consequence of his own stubborn stupidity.

The cops will likely be disciplined. Some may find their careers as University police over with, because of this student and the situation he created. The student most certainly should be disciplined, and he does not deserve a payday in court for deciding to martyr himself at the expense of the police officers. Whatever happens to the cops, please don’t make this jackass student out to be some innocent victim or martyr. He’s not.

No, you are not beign punk’d. I know it may be shocking that not everyone in this forum is a 100% tow-the-line leftist automaton who will take the anti-establishment anti-authority view in every such incident that comes up, regardless of circumstances. Some of us are actually independent thinkers that try to look at things objectively, which means we won’t always agree with you or the Truthdig contributors. You can handle it.

Mostafa Tabatabainejad comes from a culture of entitlement, a culture of self pity, a culture of blaming everyone else for your problems, a culture of destruction, a culture of death. Throw the snivelling, whining dirtbag in a sewer and weld it shut. Y’all have a nice day now.

“His race is irrelevant. If you refuse to obey police orders and physically resist them, you are going to get tasered if they feel it is the best way to prevent serious injury to themselves and to you while protecting bystanders.” (as posted by CK)....

For a second there, I thought that the young college student was going to suddenly turn green and bust out of his Dockers and bust out of those steel handcuffs.

Mental note:  When in handcuffs and in a non-threatening position, expect to be tasered...as that defenseless position poses the greatest threat.

CK and Mike,

You’re kidding, right?  Am I on Candid Blog?  Am I getting Punk’d?  You guys can’t be seriously and believe what you’re writing, can you?  To taser someone who is handcuffed...because...?  Just like the 6 imams who were kicked off of their flight to Phoenix for “Flying while Muslim”.  This blog is intended for independent thinkers.  What gives?

Well, no the police will NOT read you your rights if you’re NOT being arrested. Being in cuffs does not mean you are being arrested. He was not being arrested....at first. He may have been after that big scene. I know from experience that if you comply with them, no matter if YOU think they’re wrong, your day will go alot easier if you just do what they say when they say it. I feel for the dude, I really do, but not going when he was told to go, and putting on a scene, and sitting down trying to use passive resisttance like he’s Ghandi, will naturally just piss them off more. I’m not a cop, and truth be known, I really dont like the lot of them. I’ve encountered on or two nice ones in my day though. But he was stupid and had it coming.

Daniel Clark, a suspect is only read their Miranda Rights if they are being formally placed under arrest. Being handcuffed and escorted out of the building does not constitute arrest unless the police decide to follow through and take the individual back to the police station for booking into police custody. If they decided to arrest him, the reading of rights would have been appropriate later, once the suspect was under control and the police were able to communicate calmly with the suspect.

As for your other comment, when a police officer is in the middle of handling a volatile suspect, their absolute last priority would be to stop what they are doing and take their attention off of the suspect so they can provide some bystander with their information.

Goffredo, this student was not tasered for refusing to show his ID. He was asked to leave the library for refusing to show his ID, as required by University policy.  He refused the police request to leave. At the point he refused to leave, he became legally guilty of trespassing and disobeying police orders. When police tried to escort him out by the arm, he physically resisted and started screaming. He was tasered for physically resisting the officers who were trying to peacefully escort him out of the building. 

His race is irrelevant. If you refuse to obey police orders and physically resist them, you are going to get tasered if they feel it is the best way to prevent serious injury to themselves and to you while protecting bystanders.

I have no idea what the hell goes through their minds. “Stand up”. Excuse me, but was he even read his rights? And through the blinding pain would he have heard them even if they did, let alone understand them. This is a blatant abuse of power. The officers should also have immediately complied when asked for their badge information.

Wether or not the student prompted the first taser shot I don’t know. The video and the article don’t specify. But afterwards, those cops could have easily lifted him up and carried him outside. Therefore the repeated “get up” orders and shocks were unnessesary.

Also those surrounding kids should have done more. I don’t know what, but something else could have been done.

I wonder if the two blonde sorority girls in mini-skirts would get tasered if they didn’t show their ID cards after 10PM?  Amazing what dark skin, a beard, and a foreign accent can do to the curiosity of individuals who in a position of authority and are supposed to “protect and serve” not “project and torture”. 
You right-wing idiots will never make the case for justifying the use of a taser on a non-threatening, handcuffed individual.

Goffredo, I wholeheartedly agree that brutality to the English language should be addressed, though I think the use of a taser to punish such an offense might be excessive.  Therefore, I will merely point out your grammatical error in lieu of subjecting you to a high voltage punishment.

In English, we use “conform to” or “comply with”, but never “comply to”.  Admittedly, this is a rather minor grammatical error, and not entirely uncommon. Of course, it is a bit more substantive than the inadvertent double-tapping of a key on my part, which you apparently thought significant enough to merit a mention in your opening statement.  Pardon my digression from the topic at hand, though.

As any seasoned law enforcement officer will tell you, handcuffed suspects can still kick, bite, head-butt, and otherwise physically resist the officers attempting to arrest them.  Use of a taser on a handcuffed suspect is neither inherently normal nor abnormal. Its appropriateness can be only judged in the context of a specific situation.

Enforcement officers enforce laws and rules. The citizenry is trained to believe they are “peacekeepers.” Keeping peace often requires patience and wisdom. Enforcers, however, rarely possess either.

When my resident alien wife, first learned to drive, I instructed her very clearly: If stopped by a cop for any reason, put both hands on the steering wheel with fingers extended. Do exactly what you are told and make no sudden moves to dig out your documents. Speak to the officer clearly, slowly and respectfully. Do not contest anything. Anything you do that might be in the least way interpreted as resistance or disrespect may trigger unpredictable, unprofessional or even illegal behavior, and there may be no witness.

Poor training is common and mental instability even commoner. Enforcers the world over are often unstable, insecure and armed. Many are so close to the line, their lives could just as easily have gone to the criminal side. Take nothing for granted. Protect yourself.

And if the cops had simply shrugged it off and left? and later on the unidentified man had raped or killed a student, the same lot of you would be screaming for thier badges and the university should be sued ... blah...blah...blah.

The truth is that american students have become so preoccupied in finding fault with the very institutions that support them that they have blinded themselves to the obvious.

*Why check IDs? is it to keep the student body safe?
* Why not comply? Was it just to gain attention?

I wonder how many of us have put ourselves in the shoes of the security officers who are trying to protect the students.
I wonder how many other students have been asked for ID before and complied to an officer whom thanked them and went about his way.
Do not allow your expectations of the officers reaction to the student, overshadow the responsibility of the student to adhere to the same policies that everyone else does.

Taser ought not and should not be used on non-threatening persons. This kind of brutal and violent behavior ought not be allowed in this civilized society.

I’m not a big fan of over zealous campus police, but in this case I can’t fault them for their actions. It looks to me like the student was acting is a challenging manner and got his just reward. This guys an idiot and he’s had his 15 min. of fame, so lets move on. The police have a tough enough job as it is. I’ll bet he will show his I.D next time.

The punishment exacted on the student by the policemen was not commensurate to whatever violation the student committed (not showing ID).  It may bee against the rules to not show an ID, but the question is does that warrant being tasered four times?  Tasers are supposed to be used when an individual is threatening the cops or others.  How can you construe that was happening in this case?  The victim was handcuffed and couldn’t stand up later after the shock of being tasered.  Sickening.

This is yet another video where we do not see what precipated the events.  On top of that we can’t see the subject for much of the video.  He made several outbursts but I couldn’t tell how many were from being tased. 

I agree with Jim Bosley #38687.  He clearly wanted a fight.  He refused to comply at every step and then shouted something about the Patriot Act.  I guess he believes he’s a martyr now.

Looking at the sentiment expressed here I don’t think the investigation will be fair.  I think the police will get the blame and some sort of punishment.

To the kind Mr. “Frank” Rumsfeld,

Brutality (not “brutallity") to the English language should be punishable by a police taser, repeatedly. Can you please cut and paste any documentation stating that it is perfectly normal to taser someone who is handcuffed? Perhaps police training has ceased to provide “real world” circumstances, where individuals may not comply with verbal commands.  In any police manual, I doubt there is a paragraph that states, “When a handcuffed individual does not comply to the command to stand in the upright position, the next logical course of action is to taser them.” They don’t do it in Europe and we have more riots and protests there than you have dollars in your defense budget. 

You lemmings just don’t get it.  Bush has you marching to the beat of wiretapping, racial profiling and thinking that anyone who has a beard and dark hair must be “one of dem Islamic fascists.” When you decide to switch your brain on again, I may take something you write more seriously.  Until then, I believe you were in the middle of celebrating something related to NASCAR today???

This is yet another sickening example of what appears to be police abuse. But does any one else remember the Humboldt County Police rubbing pepper spray directly into the eyes of non-threating protesters back in 1998 or 99? http://www.aclu.org/police/abuse/14551prs19990812.html I still remember that video, looked to me the police was getting their rocks off torturing the young women. What was worse the courts sided with the police.

Let’s look at the facts as reported by eyewitnesses and as seen and heard in the video, folks.

This student refused to show his student ID during a routine ID check as required by university policy. He did not forget his ID, nor did he state to officers that he had forgotten it, but simply refused to show it to the officers. This was his first provocative act.

The student then refused the police verbal request to leave the library. This was his second provocative act.

When police try to take the student by the arm and escort him out, he started screaming hysterically “Don’t touch me!” and resisted being moved.  He continued to yell to try and incite other students to come to his aid and resist police efforts to remove him.This was his third provocative act.

At this point he has been uncooperative from the start and is acting mentally unstable which gives the police every reason to consider him a possible threat to their own safety and other students around. This is when the taser is used for the first time.

After being tasered the first time for resisting arrest, he continued to refuse police efforts to stand up so they can escort him out. Anyone familiar with taser effects, including every officer there who had been tasered themselves during police training, knows this was not due to an inability to stand. This last provocative act was repeated several times.

This student owes the police an apology and should be subjected to disciplinary action by the school for his behavior. What is more likely to happen is the student will continue to play the victim and sue the school for damages, (which is what he may have had in mind all along), and students will blame police for the incident.

The fact that so many on this board are gleefully ready to start blathering about racial predudice and police brutallity while apparently ignoring this students provocative actions speak volumes about the anti-law enforcement bias and lack of critical thinking ability of many posters on the board.

Read this one for the bigger picture, the last page is incredibly telling…

http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/200601003_white_supre macism_sexism_militarism/

Hey:

Can you post a link on your blog to this online petition to ban the use of taser guns by UCPD + have a transparent and independent investigation of the UCLA tasering?

Here’s the link:

To read and sign petition, go to: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/stoptasersUCPD/

On Tuesday, Nov. 11, several UCPD officers arrested, handcuffed, and repeatedly electrocuted a UCLA student with a taser gun in a UCLA library because he did not show police officers his UCLA ID card and refused to leave the library.

For a video of the incident, go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3CdNgoC0cE

The incident shocked those who witnessed the abuse (as can be clearly seen in the video) and those who have seen the video. What happened to this student clearly shows how taser guns lend themselves to police abuse.

Taser guns are dangerous and cruel. Up until this day, over 189 people in the US have died as a result of being shot with a taser gun. In addition, taser guns cause great pain and muscular paralysis on those shot.

Imagine if UC police stopped and tasered every student who forgot to carry around their UC id!

If you are outraged about this incident and would like to do something to improve our UC communities, you can start by signing this petition addressed to UC President Robert Dynes, the UC Regents, and the UC chancellors asking the university administration to do the following:

1. Permanently ban the use of taser guns by the University of California Police Department.
2. Form an independent review board that will investigate the tasering of UCLA student Mostafa Tabatabainejad at Powell Library on Tuesday, November 14, 2006.
3. This independent review board should also review and recommend changes to policies regarding verification of student status by UCPD officers.
4. Consider setting independent review boards in every UC campus with the assigned role of independently investigating serious allegations of police abuse.
5. Extend a formal apology to UCLA student Mostafa Tabatabainejad for the physical and emotional harm done to him that evening.

Please join us in supporting these demands by:

1) Signing the online petition.

Again, to read and sign petition, go to: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/stoptasersUCPD/

2) Forwarding this email to as many people in the UC community as you can.

Thank you for joining our call. Together, we can make our UC campuses safer and more peaceful communties.

TheEnd,

Well said, my friend. Let the lemmings perform lemmingness.  We will continue to investigate, to question and to seek out the truth.  “If we restrict liberty to attain security we will lose both.” --Benjamin Franklin

Sure, and if you listen more carefully, you’ll hear a cop threaten to tase two other students because they asked for his badge number.  Maybe that’s why they weren’t helping?

If you listen to the witnesses you’ll also hear that the student was already leaving before the police arrived a cop stopped him and he was tased.  After which he said several times “I’m leaving” and “I said I’d leave.”

Of course tasing him several times, dragging him out in handcuffs, and threatening witnesses was a much better way to get him out of there than just watching him leave.  Remember, he might have been armed!  Students doing homework in the library might forget their ID cards - but they never forget their guns…

As a Canadian living in Paris, France and having lived in NY and LA, I am aghast by the deterioration of civil liberties that has crept up and gradually silenced those who once wouldn’t even consider this episode a possibility.  It is over....The people have become catatonic.  What ever happened to one’s coming to the aid of persons in distress?  What the police did was illegal.  They were not attacked nor harassed.  Perhaps a simple explanation could have been extracted, had they been a bit more patient.

It is really indicative how many comments are “we realy don’t know what really happened (university president)” or “that the student deserved every volt he got (the ignoramus preceeding my comment”.

Students should be demanding that university president be immediately fired… Should we discuss the good and bad sides of torture, power abuse?

We now have a vice president of torture, the entire country is militarized (solder-mercenariess are mere consumables but wrapped into “hero” package). The entire country is divided in economic inequality - few ultra rich - majority slidding into poverty. The torture of a student in a library of a major university is a sign of America marching toward fascism…

Well with lousy, cowardly, and uninterested videojournalism like that we all we get tased, and justice we get preverted again.  As far as I can tell there was excessive force; maybe one tase was needed, but three?  It does seem like the student was ready to play victim, but the video shows nothing leading up to the incident.  This coud be a case of too many idiots hitting heads, the student and the campus police.  Also, watching the groups of students watching like it was an esposide of UFC, proves the power a few can have over many.  Sad on so many levels.

I wonder what would have happened to this young man if he failed to comply in a country like Iran or Singapore.  America is not quite as bad as all that.  We don’t need to play the race card.  I’m white and if I failed to show i.d. in that situation and starting screaming “don’t touch me” after being asked to leave they would have tasered me too.  So we should let men walk around campuses without i.d. after female students get assaulted and worse?  No, produce the i.d., it’s not “beneath” you.

Dear TEX,

The issue here isn’t about following the rules or having ID cards, let alone stealing, robbery, or the other misdemeanors you cited in comparison.  The issue is whether or not the campus PD went overboard with their response to this situation.  Now, I can’t imagine why at least two big and burly cops couldn’t subdue a guy that was armed only with shouting and harsh language.  He didn’t swing at them, he didn’t threaten them in any way with an object, and there have been no reports of prior belligerent (drunk&druggy;) behavior in the library to make them think he was that kind of threat.  No no, this is an all too familiar case of cops in LA thinking they can do whatever they want and get away with it.  You don’t use a hammer to kill a fly.  If they really wanted him out, and he was leaving when they arrived, big guys like those PD officers could have lifted his ass and brought him outside, kind of like at a rock concert.

And so what if you weren’t there.  Neither of us was at Kent State when cops were shooting students, but we both know it happened and that it was wrong.  As for the poor video quality, you rightly cited another sense we have that is relevant: hearing.  I did hear the police ask him to get up.  I also heard the student say “I have a medical condition”, I heard the taser being juiced into the kid for extended durations while he was handcuffed, and I heard the pleas and disturbed voices of the on looking students.  I didn’t see or hear any disdain from students toward this kid for “egging on” the cops.  That is speculative nonsense.

To everyone else defending abuse of the power we as a democratic society have allotted to our civil servants, wake up and get help.  Our society seems to suffer from macro case of Stockholm syndrome.  It’s the only reason I can think of why so many of you would defend people and policy that is clearly not in your best interest.  TEX, “don’t be an asshole and you won’t get tased” is symptomatic of this mental disorder.  You are not someone’s plebe or property and police can’t just do whatever they want.

mostfa I love you,I hope that by the grace of GOD you will be quite well there.

“Lesson learned, follow the rules, don’t be an a@$hole, don’t try to cause a scene, and leave when asked to, and you won’t get tased.”

Why is it that stupid, dull-witted, misspelled comments like that are always posted by some guy named “Tex?”

Crawford Tex,

You are wrong, sadly.  To taser someone while they are handcuffed is torture (if you are unclear about what that is just ask your friends in the White House).  He doesn’t have to stand up.  In riot situations, police officers are trained to simply carry people off.  What you are saying is utterly ignorant and naive.

Unfortunately we can not tell what truely did happen because we weren’t there, and the video was of poor quality....

If you listen carefully to the cops in the video, they told him several times to get up, but he refused...The arguement about him not being able to walk or stand after being tased is false...I went through training in an academy and was tased several times and was able to walk immediately after

also, there are videos in the net, showing people and their reactions to being tased…

He sould have complied with the officers and left...I know I would..Listen, there are rules everywhere you go, like do steal, don’t robb..and yes if there is a rule about having ID cards and showing them, then people also need to comply with them...and if you don’t have your ID card, then leave when ask to, and don’t cause a scene, because even campus cops are paid to enforce library rules

Now this whole thing about the other college kids not helping.  They probably saw first hand what an idiot this guy was for egging on the cops...and for sure we don’t want them lynching now would we?

Lesson learned, follow the rules, don’t be an a@$hole, don’t try to cause a scene, and leave when asked to, and you won’t get tased

So, this is America ....!

I hope any college students that see this video learn one thing: this is your “real” education.  All those kids who stood round and did nothing to obstruct those rent-a-cop, GITMO, bastards just demonstrated for all of you (and the rest of us) what Noam Chomsky refers to as the discipline of educated people.  This event is a microcosm for America.  Here we have a library full of healthy young people on a blue state college campus right after a major election victory for Democrats, which was won almost exclusively by opposition to the illegitimate Iraq war, and these kids still didn’t feel they had the ground to stand up to a few fascist rent-a-cops, clearly engaged in an extensive abuse of power amounting to torture of an Iranian kid.  Good old LA.  Don’t these cops know there’s always some yahoo around with a camcorder these days?

What to do if stopped by Police? Read this ACLU “Bust Card.” This resource is a few years old. Are these rights still valid? Let’s hope so. Print this! It could be useful.

http://www.aclu.org/FilesPDFs/dwb bust card7_04.pdf

Please.  I’m as white as Pat Boone and when I was a student at UCLA in 1998, I couldn’t get anywhere near that library after 10 pm without producing my ID.

Islamic students are clearly using this as an excuse to act out their frustration with perceived anti-Muslim bias in the U.S.

Maybe the cops should have waited enough time for him to recover before asking him to stand up.  That is only reasonable.  But to make them look like the bad guys when they were only asking something that they ask a million, white Christians all the time is just plain idiotic.

They are not fooling anyone.

A previous poster claims that (1)"UCLA is a private institution. (2)If they demand someone on their property show ID he has to.”
------------------------------
1. The University of California is hardly a private institution. What gives you that idea? I’ve read that “The university’s state-funded budget in the fiscal year beginning July 1 will total $3.077 billion, an increase of $234 million or 8.2 percent above the 2005-06 level.” So, it sounds like UCLA belongs to every California citizen.

2. “Their property” is comical. Do the police own UC campuses? While it may be somebody’s POLICY that a student show their I.D., you have to wonder about the lengths these officers went to with a student who questioned the need to randomly produce his identification.

A smack down in a library that involves a patron using the library’s services is a sad affair.

But my real question is for the videographer. Why the heck did you hide behind the counter? Step up and tape the dang event if you are witnessing objectionable behavior. Don’t be scared. You have rights. Assert them.

I can’t even comprehend what I just witnessed.  I am no longer living in America.  I want to vomit. I can not even peel away the outer layer of my anger to ultimately provide some insightful commentary on this.  Diligite iustitiam qui iudicatis terram…

Sans civil liberties again,
Signed, the American people

what makes me frustrated is that there were so many students...soo little action.  even seeing that excessive use of force. 

a black, gay man beaten in the middle of a nyc street, people walked by…

my best friend, assulted outside of her apt. in the middle of the afternoon.  no one broke stride to help her.

fear, inaction…

do “they” have US under lock and chain..or have we locked ourselves and resigned?

how do I empower my peers to help each other and act in each others’ behalf? 

sad...but, I will act if YOU need help.  i hope you act for me. 

hope.

“This is not as bad as the time they shot a guy at UCLA for being in a lounge without a student ID.”

I remember that from a couple years back.. saw it in the DB in sociology and didnt hear much about it afterwards. It was only a matter of time before something like this got national press out of UCLA. As horrible as it was, I’m glad so much attention is being focused on UCPD.

A few people are calling the studnet an idiot for not behaving, and asking why the student didn’t “just stand up.”

Because he had just been tazed, which can cause temporary paralysis, nausea, disorientation, and weakness… besides really, really pissing you off.

I think there are errors on both sides.  Mostafa obviously was setting himself as a martyr with this one.  He was purposely causing a scene when he first was being escorted out, probably due to anger from being asked to leave.  He talked back to the cops.

The cops on the other hand over-reacted.  They should know that tasering can cause the body to lose control, which prevented him from standing up.  And the multiple tasering was not necessary.

Umm I don’t how people can think he can stand. A COP GRADE TASER WILL IMMOBILISE YOU FOR 15 MINUTES. Tasers are used to immobilise supsects, that are being violent, not telling the cops to stop treating him like an animal.

I wish that whoever shot the crappy video had gotten the entire confrontation. From what I saw the guy was lucky that they humanely tasered his ass instead of just beating the crap out of him as has happened in the past.

Hmmm...had he followed instructions in the first place he would not have been restrained, so it seems that he was the biggest dumbass there.

You gotta be [expletive deleted] me… Guys, a cop says show me some ID, you show it, or prepare to face the consequences…

... and giving my take on everything that’s gone down here the last few days. There’s not going to be any punches pulled in this post, and there’s gonna be a lot of spades called a spade… so if you’re of a weak constitution, or sick of all of this already, I’d suggest you go find another thread now.

Frankly, it’s tough for me to put into words how pissed off I am about all of this. There was absolutely NO NEED for Cheers to take the action she has here, except for her own ego and pride. EVEN ASSUMING all that she’s said is true, about the board needing to have one admin for technological reasons, and even ASSUMING that she had to be that admin for the time being to get the board up… once it was back up, there was nothing stopping her from making RPM the Admin again, and going down to moderator status herself. Nothing, that is, except her own arrogance and self-superiority. She claims that RPM didn’t really “Want” to run this anymore. Well then, why not offer to take it off his hands above board? Simple. He’d have turned her down flat. And if RPM was about to shut the board down, as she theorizes, then why not wait until he did, THEN start the replacement board? Because this phantom shutdown wasn’t going to happen—we ALL know RPM was just blowing hot air for attention, like he always has for years past. Well then, why not take the high road, and resign, and start her own forum from scratch, instead of making off with one in the dead of night? Again, pretty simple. Everyone knows the toughest part of getting a board going, is the first few months. Why struggle like that, when there’s a ready-made pool of sheep who don’t care who’s running things, so long as it’s here? Why struggle indeed, unless you have charachter and scruples… two things that seem to me to be sorely lacking in this whole sordid affair.

What pisses me off a lot about this, is not that she stole the board from RPM; it’s that she stole the board from US. ALL of us have posted here for years and years now with the understanding and compact that not one person would have absolute power over us. We’ve ALL put our time, our thoughts, and our efforts into making this board the community it was, and NOBODY, not RPM, not Cheers, not Maggie… NOBODY has the right to take that away from us. And before you say that nothing has been taken away from us, I ask you to bear in mind what the individual now in sole power here DID to get hold of that power, and also ask yourself what compunction she will have against using that power now that she went through such machiavellian machinations to get hold of it. She’s already shown a remarkable appetite for keeping her power, and very little reluctance to use that power in the past. I see no reason why that would change in the future. What it comes down to is, she seems to think that this forum needs a LEADER… when in fact, all we’ve ever needed is a facilitator, an administrator, soemone to keep the lights on and the door open. My friends, that day has come and gone here. We’ve all been to places that have had “Leaders”. We’ve all been through Racestuds, and many of us have had experience at Qwaz’s as well. And that’s EXACTLY the situation we now face at this board… a single person, with the biases and preconceptions that are inherent to the human condition, and who’s shown NO scruples or charachter whatsoever, nor a desire to control her impulses, in charge of everything that goes on here.

I will taser anyone, I do not discriminate-- so all you whining pukes-- remember this!!!! one step outta line and it’s ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ for you!!!

This is not as bad as the time they shot a guy at UCLA for being in a lounge without a student ID.

I’ve been around law enforcement many many times. A competent cop would never need to use a taser in this situation, let alone think about it. These guys have poor people skills, which is not a good trait in that line of business!

Furthermore, the way the police managed the situation obviously caused a great deal more trouble than if they would have simply let the guy stay there and study. sheesh. Its not as if UCPD doesn’t already know a thing or two about looking the other way now and then so as to avoid a fiasco that would result from confrontation over an otherwise harmless and extremely minor infraction.

UCLA clearly needs to send these guys out for more education and experience to build their common sense and people skills.

WE WANT JUSTICE FOR MOSTAFA

This video gives credibility to those politicans that constantly make speeches about how America is NOT the land of the “free"…

this is DISGUSTING, and OUTRAGEOUS!!!!

and the IRANIAN community WORLDWIDE will NOT FORGET THIS and WE WILL NOT LET THIS GO UNNOTICED....

To all those NEOCONS out there..the clock is ticking and your time is nearly up.

“UCLA is a private institution. If they demand someone on their property show ID he has to. On the other hand, if he was walking down the street, the cops do not have that right. “
- posted below

Demanding identification and escorting the non-comliant off the property is one thing, handcuffing the individual and repeatdly shocking him with 100,000 volts to compel behaviour OUGHT to be illegalif it is not already. 

Tasers are dangerous.  Police should not be allowed to use them to compel behavior.  Arrest him for trespassing, YES.  But do not torture him for resisting.  He was in handcuffs.

This is really an outrage!  I am not sure but it would seem to be as torture.  I wonder if people start to protest peacefully and they do not move if we are going to start performing mass taser.

seriously, as i watched this, i couldn’t help but think, why don’t some of these other people just beat the shit out of the cops.  i wonder, where is the compassion in the cops and why the public doesn’t start to standup against this kind of abuse.  if they guy doesn’t stand up, carry him away, you don’t electrocute people.  Some people have been killed with one shock. I guess we need to start developing clothes that protect against this.

A bit much,just to have someone stand up.

Yessir Jeddy-- it’s certainly sickening behavior for someone to question the use of potentially unwarranted force against them. It’s completely unreasonable for the other students to question it too. The officers were completely justified in threatening to taze other students who were asking for their identification. This is a shining example of what the police creed “to protect & serve” is all about. I hope you sing the same tune if ever you run into such fine officers.

Tasers should not be used as to compel behavior, they should be used only to protect the officer in situations where the officer’s health and well-being is it risk. 

Repeated use of tasers against an individual who has not been found guilty of a crime is cruel and unusual punishment without due process of law.

It turns out this guy was a UCLA student who said he would leave. 

The biggest problem indicated in this story is that police are acquiring tasers by the boatload and society leaves it to them to determine protocol for use. Bad Policy. 

PS. For anyone sending a child to college next year, this episode is a good reason to send them to a college where campus security does not use tasers.

What exactly did he ‘get away with’ not carrying his student ID card?  I say, screw the tasers, shoot him.  That’ll teach those rule breaking college studetns.

Jeddy believes that a police officer believes that a cop can do no wrong. This neocon might feel differently if it happened to him.

Yeah, I don’t understand why he just didn’t STAND UP and walk out with them when they asked.  It sounds as if it’s SOP for them to check ID’s after 11, buddy didn’t have his, therefore he had to leave and he CHOSE to give the police a hard time by refusing to stand up.  That’s about all I can ascertain from that video.

jeddy, stop being a prick and get some sympathy.  How old are you, 12?

He “resisted” the cops because he felt he was falling victim to racial profiling.  Perhaps he should have complied, but that’s hardly the point.

If you watched the video it is blatantly obvious that those cops went far beyond necessary force.  The student was in handcuffs and they were still tasering him because he was “resisting”.  Right, let’s see you stand up and walk after being tasered jeddy.  What’s that, you can’t do it...too bad b/c now you’re going to get tasered again.

You’re the only idiot mentioned in this page.  Read before you post garabge.  Have an informed opinion and back it up with evidence.  If that’s too much for you, perhaps you should refrain from posting until you grow up.

I agree with Jeddy 100%.  I used to have a firnd like the guy who got tased.  Some people get pulled over for speeding (for example) and there’ nothing they can do to stop themselves from mouthing off.  This guy is one of these people.  He doth protest too much.  He loved every minute of ot probably.  Having said that cops can piss me off too when they are unreasonable.

the comment by jeddy is clearly ridiculous. The police all need to be fired for clearly unjustified excessive force and actions.

Police these days seem to have robotic behavior, where the tone of voice they use is completely unfriendly. The days of the wise old policeman seems long gone.

Please, “jeddy”, tell how many times have you been tasered? Are you volunteering to be?? CAN I WATCH??? XD

The thing you fail to understand, idiot, is that tasering is tantamount to killing so