UCLA student tasered by UCPD in campus library

[Carrah]

Here is a brief summary of what happened as well as relevant links.

UCPD officers shot a student several times with a Taser inside the Powell Library CLICC computer lab late Tuesday night before taking him into custody.

Quote from Daily Bruin article

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.

Quote from LA Times article


Also, here is a capture of the incident from a student's camera phone. The vid begins when Tabatabainejad is on his way out of the library and is yelling at officers to let go of him.

YouTube Video


I seriously couldn't believe it was campus police who tasered him. Campus police at my university are lucky if they get walkie talkies.

[Gaviani]

Watch the video. This kid has the whiny, self-righteous "DON'T TOUCH ME!" of someone trying to stage a mock-up political protest. You know what? Big men with government-sponsored tasers asked you nicely (several times, apparently) to leave a building you don't own. If you don't want to leave, you pretty much get what you deserve - in this case, several debilitating electric shocks right to the ass. It reeks of "I am intentionally disobeying with a reasonable regulation in order to cause a political protest I can capitalize on, because I want to seem like an oppressed minority."

[xaxer]

No, some you give a badge to and they abuse their power period! here is one that they Tazered 3 times just because he belonged to a 1% bike club and then they SHOT DEAD ,like after being zapped he was a threat to them




Police lacked cause to kill suspect


Deleware - The 25-year-old man shot to death last week by a Wilmington officer never threatened police, according to five witnesses working nearby and a sixth witness standing next to the victim when the confrontation began.

Derek J. Hale, a U.S. Marine who served two tours in Iraq, died on the front steps at 1403 W. Sixth St. after a Wilmington police officer fired three .40-caliber rounds into his chest. He was killed after receiving multiple shocks from electronic Tasers.

"He didn't deserve to be shot. He wasn't any kind of threat," said Fred Mixson, 53, a contractor working in the home next door who watched the shooting unfold from across the narrow street. From the initial confrontation with police to the fatal shooting, only two to three minutes elapsed, witnesses said.

Four members of Mixson's work crew witnessed the shooting from a variety of angles and distances, although Mixson was the only one interviewed by investigators after the shooting and the only one willing to allow his name to be used for this article.

But in interviews with The News Journal last week, all five said Hale did not pose a threat.

"No matter what his background was, he didn't deserve that," Mixson said. "They had him surrounded. They could have grabbed him."

The News Journal canvassed the neighborhood. Residents across the street and living next door said they either were away or saw nothing of the events.

Police said Hale, who had recently joined the Pagans Motorcycle Club, was a "person of interest" in a recent drug investigation conducted by the Delaware State Police. The U.S. Department of Justice classifies the Pagans as an outlaw motorcycle gang with a history of violence and drug offenses, but Hale, police have said, has no arrest record in Delaware. At the time of his death, Hale had a valid permit in Virginia to carry concealed weapons, according to the clerk of Circuit Court in Manassas.

Concealed-carry permits in Virginia are issued only to people who never have been convicted of a felony, narcotics or a domestic violence charge and who have no history of mental illness or substance abuse.

Two days before the shooting, officers searched the residence as part of a wide-ranging drug and weapons investigation and had charged the owner. According to a written statement by state police, Hale was seen Nov. 6 moving items from inside the house to a vehicle and officers "had reason to believe he was preparing to flee." Mixson said he saw Hale place a large Tupperware container into the vehicle.

"It was during the attempt to take Hale into custody outside of the residence that a confrontation ensued, and Hale was fatally shot," police said. Hale never displayed a weapon, police said, but a spokesman for the Wilmington police said officers found a can of pepper spray and a switchblade knife in Hale's pockets after the shooting.

Hale's stepbrother, Jason Singleton, who lives in Missouri, never knew his brother to carry a switchblade. "The last time I saw Derek, he had a small Swiss Army knife. To my knowledge, I've never seen Derek with anything like a switchblade."

In a written statement issued last week, Wilmington police Master Sgt. Steven Elliott said Hale was shot three times because an "officer in close proximity to the developments feared for the safety of his fellow officers and believed that the suspect was in a position to pose an imminent threat. That officer then utilized deadly force."

Wilmington police denied a request from The News Journal for their use-of-force policy, which addresses how and when officers may use deadly force and less-than-lethal weapons such as Tasers. They cited an August 2005 Freedom of Information request in which the Attorney General's Office found that the policies are not public documents.

Asked if Hale ever threatened the officers, Elliott said in an interview last week: "In a sense, when he did not comply with their commands" to show him his hands. Wilmington police Chief Michael Szczerba did not respond to calls, e-mails or messages left with his staff about the shooting, although Elliott handled press calls after the incident.

Friday night, John Rago, spokesman for Wilmington Mayor James M. Baker, issued a "joint statement" attributed to Baker, Szczerba and Public Safety Director James N. Mosley.

"The incident that occurred in the 1400 Block of West 6th Street is being investigated internally by both the Wilmington Police Department and City Solicitor's Office," the statement reads. "All information from those investigations will be shared with the Delaware Attorney General's Office which conducts its own investigation and issues its own determination of the action of the officer involved. This is standard practice with regard to shootings involving police officers to ensure that all matters related to the incident are given a thorough review."

The News Journal informed city and police officials that it had received eyewitness accounts that questioned the need for Hale's shooting. In his written statement, Rago said: "If the News Journal, or any other organization or individual, has information regarding this incident that can be helpful to the investigation, it is recommended that they present that information to the Wilmington Police Department, the City Solicitor's Office or to the Delaware Attorney General's Office to aid in the thoroughness of the investigation."

On Monday, Nov. 6, Mixson arrived at the 1400 block of W. Sixth St. just before 4 p.m., quitting time for his work crew, which was renovating one of the row houses next door to the shooting.

Mixson parked across the narrow street from 1403 and was standing by the driver's door of his work van when a black SUV sped up the wrong way of the one-way street and screeched to a halt in the middle of the road.

Several police officers jumped out and ran to where Hale was sitting on the steep steps of 1403, approximately six feet higher than the sidewalk.

Mixson and his crew had barely noticed Hale before he was confronted by police. Hale, they said, was chatting with Sandra Lopez and two children at the top of a 10-step concrete stoop. Hale was seated on the third step from the top. Mixson and another witness were standing across the street from 1403, while others were on the sidewalk in front of a row house adjacent to the site of the shooting.

The officers ordered Hale to take his hands out of the front pockets of his hooded sweat shirt.

"About a second later, they Tasered him," Mixson recalled. "He was just sitting there. He didn't do anything."

A compressed air charge in the Taser cartridge launched two metal barbs, attached to wires trailing back to the hand-held device, at a speed of more than 160 feet per second. On impact, a strong electric charge was carried into Hale's body, which caused what the manufacturer, Taser International, describes as "an immediate loss of the person's neuromuscular control and the ability to perform coordinated action for the duration of the impulse."

The witnesses said Hale shook violently from the charge, as if sitting on an electric chair. His right hand came out of the front of his sweat shirt and was shaking violently.

Seconds later, police repeated their command for Hale to show them his hands, and they Tasered him a second time.

Mixson and others said Hale, who was still seated on the steps, rolled onto his left side and vomited into a flower bed.

"My brother yelled at the police that this was overkill. That this was crazy," Mixson said. "They told him to 'shut ... up,' or they'd show him overkill."

Hale rolled back to his right, into a sitting position, still shaking, and police Tasered him a third time, Mixson said.

Lopez, who lived at the home where Hale was killed and was talking to Hale when police arrived, told her attorney Hale was trying to show police his hands. Lopez was standing with her two young children until police ordered her to move.

they found a knife and a peperspray IN his pocket AFTER he was dead so he didnt brandish them, and I'd like to see anyone move their hands after getting Zapped 3 times best he could probbly do is clench his fists and drool.

[Leshrak]

Originally posted by Gaviani
Watch the video. This kid has the whiny, self-righteous "DON'T TOUCH ME!" of someone trying to stage a mock-up political protest. You know what? Big men with government-sponsored tasers asked you nicely (several times, apparently) to leave a building you don't own. If you don't want to leave, you pretty much get what you deserve - in this case, several debilitating electric shocks right to the ass. It reeks of "I am intentionally disobeying with a reasonable regulation in order to cause a political protest I can capitalize on, because I want to seem like an oppressed minority."

Don't be a douchebag.

There's no reason to taser someone when they're not being violent. There's especially no reason to taser someone a second time for not standing up after they were already tasered. I doubt I'd be able to stand 30 seconds after being jolted with multiple thousands of watts of electricity.

What they should have done is placed him into handcuffs for not showing his student ID, read him his rights and carried him out/arrested him for tresspassing without showing the proper student ID.

[Gaviani]

Originally posted by Leshrak
Don't be a douchebag.

There's no reason to taser someone when they're not being violent. There's especially no reason to taser someone a second time for not standing up after they were already tasered. I doubt I'd be able to stand 30 seconds after being jolted with multiple thousands of watts of electricity.

What they should have done is placed him into handcuffs for not showing his student ID, read him his rights and carried him out/arrested him for tresspassing without showing the proper student ID.

Don't you be a douchebag. So you'd have preferred they take five officers, grab him from each limb, possibly having to -physically restrain- him (read: tie up or beat into submission) and drag him outside rather than having tasered him?

I'm not saying tasering isn't harsh - it is. It was, however, the LEAST long-term damaging manner by which a person can be forced into submission, short of, uh, blowdarts - and I'm pretty sure if they'd used tranquilizers, we'd be hearing about how the police poisoned some poor, innocent protester right now.

It's not as easy as "just escort him outside" when a person is intentionally trying to resist moving. Have you ever seen a child trying to resist going to bed, or, specifically, getting a shot? Let me reference a personal story as a little bit of an anecdotal analogy for how difficult it is to forcibly move someone WITHOUT either physical violence (nightsticks, clubs), mace, taser, or the threat of lethal force (which obviously would have been excessive here).

At the age of 8, I was afraid of needles. Not afraid of needles, deathly afraid of needles. You were not getting me near a needle voluntarily, ever, and I did not care what kind of scene I caused. The long story made short, it took my mother, my father, and my grandfather - three grown adults - to manage to pry me away from the floor, door, doorway, and every other solid object I could get any limb attached to. That was when I was an -eight year old child.- You really, honestly think one adult can't kick up a HELL of a lot stronger of resistance against a police officer or two? You think that wouldn't have risked damage to property, harm to the police, or harm to the suspect?

Tasering is somewhat painful, but the long-term risks are extraordinarily low, compared to the alternatives. This guy was intentionally resisting the orders of police officers who were reasonably executing a legitimately applied university rule, and resisted doing so MULTIPLE TIMES before the police even ARRIVED. I have no doubt in my mind that, if we had a picture of thirty minutes beforehand, this protester certainly would have amply demonstrated multiple refusals to cooperate civilly - leaving the only two options at "concede, because words aren't working" and "back words with action." To bastardize a saying, you can get a UCLA douchebag a lot farther out of your library with a kind word and a stun gun than just a kind word, apparently.

[Gaviani]

As an addendum, you know what tips the balance for me? When he shouts out, "Here's your fucking PATRIOT Act." Nothing involved in his situation had ANYTHING to do with the PATRIOT Act, whatsoever - in fact, if PATRIOT was invalidated 24 hours prior, nothing about this scene, as it was acted, would have been different. To me, that screams that he had a prior, pre-conceived agenda going into this scenario, a message he wanted to generate, and he happened to use the campus and officers in question in order to generate publicity for that message.

[Leshrak]

Originally posted by Gaviani
So you'd have preferred they take five officers, grab him from each limb, possibly having to -physically restrain- him (read: tie up or beat into submission) and drag him outside rather than having tasered him?

Read: When someone isn't moving it'd pretty easy to put handcuffs on him. With five officers carrying five or ten sets of handcuffs, it'd be pretty easy to restrain and put handcuffs on him. If he resists having that done, then I definitely don't see any problem with tasering him. With five trained officers, it would also be pretty easy to carry someone out of the building who isn't moving, or even resisting moving once they've got handcuffs on.

It's not as easy as "just escort him outside" when a person is intentionally trying to resist moving. Have you ever seen a child trying to resist going to bed, or, specifically, getting a shot? Let me reference a personal story as a little bit of an anecdotal analogy for how difficult it is to forcibly move someone WITHOUT either physical violence (nightsticks, clubs), mace, taser, or the threat of lethal force (which obviously would have been excessive here).

Read above. It's completely unnecessary to jump the gun and pull out the taser when someone yells at you (unless they are verbally threatening your safety, which in this case he wasn't), but isn't trying to run away.

At the age of 8, I was afraid of needles. Not afraid of needles, deathly afraid of needles. You were not getting me near a needle voluntarily, ever, and I did not care what kind of scene I caused. The long story made short, it took my mother, my father, and my grandfather - three grown adults - to manage to pry me away from the floor, door, doorway, and every other solid object I could get any limb attached to. That was when I was an -eight year old child.- You really, honestly think one adult can't kick up a HELL of a lot stronger of resistance against a police officer or two? You think that wouldn't have risked damage to property, harm to the police, or harm to the suspect?

Five trained officers > 1 student trying to protest the use of excessive force.

Tasering is somewhat painful, but the long-term risks are extraordinarily low, compared to the alternatives. This guy was intentionally resisting the orders of police officers who were reasonably executing a legitimately applied university rule, and resisted doing so MULTIPLE TIMES before the police even ARRIVED.

So are you saying that the second, third, or fourth tasering is justified, since 30 seconds after the initial taser he wouldn't stand up? As I said, it'd probably be pretty difficult to stand after being tasered. It would definitely be difficult to stand after the second tasering, and that much more difficult after the third, fourth, fifth, etc...

I have no doubt in my mind that, if we had a picture of thirty minutes beforehand, this protester certainly would have amply demonstrated multiple refusals to cooperate civilly - leaving the only two options at "concede, because words aren't working" and "back words with action." To bastardize a saying, you can get a UCLA douchebag a lot farther out of your library with a kind word and a stun gun than just a kind word, apparently.

Unfortunately, we don't, however, the student who ended up capturing the video once the officers arrived obviously didn't think the previous 'clash' with the campus administration was worth taping. That would suggest to me that it wasn't violent and there probably wasn't any yelling involved.

In addition, multiple students that were interviewed by the newspaper said that this guy was cooperating and walking out of the building until one of the officers grabbed hold of his arm:

From LA Times Witnesses disputed that [police] 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.

Also, this is the third video tape that's made headlines for the LAPD's reportedly using too much force in the last few weeks... This is just further evidence that these officers overreacted majorly.

Hopefully (ha) the investigation by their superiors will show that these guys need to be reprimanded and re-trained.

[Leshrak]

Originally posted by Gaviani
As an addendum, you know what tips the balance for me? When he shouts out, "Here's your fucking PATRIOT Act." Nothing involved in his situation had ANYTHING to do with the PATRIOT Act, whatsoever - in fact, if PATRIOT was invalidated 24 hours prior, nothing about this scene, as it was acted, would have been different. To me, that screams that he had a prior, pre-conceived agenda going into this scenario, a message he wanted to generate, and he happened to use the campus and officers in question in order to generate publicity for that message.

This still doesn't excuse the use of excessive force.

[Malacasta]

It only takes 2 people to carry a limp person. God knows how many demos I've been on where those numbers have played out.
The cops were just completely out of control on some hard cock power trip.
What surprises me is that the students didn't even try to stop them.
Things have sure changed in the last 10 years. Maybe it's fear? If so, then that's bloody terrifying.

[Malacasta]

Originally posted by Gaviani
he had a prior, pre-conceived agenda going into this scenario, a message he wanted to generate, and he happened to use the campus and officers in question in order to generate publicity for that message.

Yeah so this guy thinks to himself...
"I need to get tasered multiple times by the police and have some stranger record it so that I can make known my objection to the PATRIOT act. Let's see... how bout if I stay till after dark in a university library and not show my student ID card, that's bound to work!"

And they say the left-wing wear tin hats.