Investigation Launched After Cop Punches Teen Girl At Pride Fest

[Arctish]

They're both use-of-force situations. I find the comparison reasonable.

Why is violence required to subdue the teen?

What should he do, say pretty please?

She's already trying to get away. I would be very surprised if force in some fashion wasn't used.

Do you have evidence she tried to get away, or are you just assuming she did? Do you have any evidence she was resisting arrest, or are you just assuming she did? There is nothing in the video evidence presented in this thread that supports either claim.

 

[dystopian]

Oh good, in that case I'm just going to go outside and randomly punch girls in the stomach now. After all, I wasn't trained not to do that.

Yes, I think you were in fact trained to not randomly assault people.

No, I'm pretty sure I wasn't. I never attended a class or training seminar where I was specifically *trained* not to assault random people.

You have been trained to do that long and at heat pains to your teachers and even yourself. It is fortunate that this isn't what the cop did. He didn't just randomly decide to go and punch a girl.

No, that's exactly what he did.

He decided to (take whatever action was most readily apparent) to (subdue someone he knew was committing an assault).

Except he *didn't* know that that someone was committing an assault and in fact had no good reason to think this was likely the case. Furthermore, his actions were grossly disproportionate even if his baseless assumption had turned out correct. He responded with overwhelming force without having even the slightest hint as to the actual facts of the case. What he did was the equivalent of me blowing up and beating someone up because the casual glance they gave me was weird and I assumed they were about to try to rape me with a pineapple.

It just happens that the system that was supposed to guarantee (readily apparent action) was (armbar and cuff by rote) wasn't sufficiently rigorous,

He didn't try to 'armbar and cuff' her. He repeatedly punched her in the gut. So yeah, 'the system' apparantly wasn't sufficiently rigorous.

and he needs more time to stew on that and demonstrate his ability to execute that action before being a cop. If he can't, or is shown by history to be situationally biased towards punching when the target is a teen, female, or is gay, then he shouldn't be a cop and I'll gladly help you nail him to a cross.

No.

I don't think you understand how the law; or basic human morality for that matter; works. If *I* assault someone, regardless of my reasoning, I don't get to say "well, I made a mistake and beat someone up, but there should only be consequences if you can demonstrate that I do so repeatedly and only when I do it against teens, girls, or gay people. (And just those btw, I mean, fuck straight men right? Totally okay to beat the shit out of them)"

No. When *I* assault someone, even just once (and regardless of who it is or why I did it); there will be legal consequences.

Similarly, when a cop assaults someone; regardless of his fucking reasons for doing so or the nature of his target; there ought to be (and in any law-abiding society, will be) consequences. He shouldn't get ANOTHER chance to demonstrate his ability to not be an abusive asshole; he lost that privilege the moment he fucked up; same as any of us would (moreso even, since higher standards apply to those in positions of authority). He should be immediately suspended from active duty and subjected to a full criminal investigation.

 

[dystopian]

I can also fairly say that because of both the timescale and the urgency to act, that he didn't have time to test his knowledge before acting on it. You have hindsight. He had no line of sight and a perceived duty to act. Or would you prefer the world where cops never intercede except to clean up bodies?

You may think this is a convincing argument, but it really isn't. People in jobs that involve high-risks and the potential need for quick decision making are specifically trained NOT to go off half-cocked and do the first thing that comes to mind. A cop who'se first instinct is a violent response aimed at hurting rather than subduing subjects; and then *acts* on that first instinct, IS A GREATER DANGER to society than the dangers he's supposed to protect us from. Cops (and soldiers, and firemen, and EMT's and so on); are supposed to be trained and knowledgeable enough to understand that they need to properly assess the situation first, because if they don't; and they act WITHOUT knowing the facts, their actions can cause more harm than good. If a doctor's faced with a patient he's never seen before who'se frothing at the mouth and in immediate danger, he *doesn't* just immediately go and inject some chemical that works for some situations but poisons people in other situations, not without knowing more about the medical history of the patient and the problem at hand; if he does and the patient dies or is harmed as a result: that doctor *goes to jail*.

"I needed to act fast, there was no time to think" IS NOT A VALID EXCUSE in a court of law unless there is sufficient evidence to demonstrate that the person had a reasonable expectation that his actions would help and not cause further harm; there will *never* be sufficient evidence to demonstrate that this cop had a reasonable expectation that repeatedly punching someone in the gut would help and not do further harm.

Your argument *might* work if he tried to subdue and cuff her. If he had, he'd still be in the wrong since he would still have been require to properly assess the situation before acting without knowing even the most basic of facts; however, assuming no real harm was done we could write that off as a rookie mistake (assuming he's a rookie, a veteran officer should not make a mistake like that) and give him a second chance after he brushes up his training.

He did *not* try to subdue and cuff her, however. Instead he just started throwing punches. That's criminal assault. Worse, it's coming from a *cop*; someone who is supposed to uphold the law, not break it. This is a person in a position of power and authority over others, with a duty to protect. Instead, he abuses his power and authority and hurts people. THAT is why people are "calling to string him up" (or you know, not so much stringing him up as subjecting him to the same fucking standards the rest of us would expect to be subjected to if we assaulted someone).

 

[Sajara]

I just don't go after the ONE guy in this situation who was actually attempting to prevent major and irreparable violence.

Instead of preventing *POTENTIAL* major and irreparable violence, he *CAUSED* major and irreparable violence. You think that girl will ever look at police officers in the same way? If he cracked/broke a rib, you know there is no way to fix that right?

 

[RavenSky]

Let me tell you about a situation involving a soldier in basic training.

let me stop you right there.

This is not a soldier in a war zone. It is a "keeper of the peace" at a protest/rally of US citizens.

Moreover, even soldiers can be held responsible and prosecuted for acting out and over-reacting in a violent manner. Even soldiers are expected to PROPERLY assess situations and react PROPERLY.

This cop was nothing more than a violent thug. Moreover, he lied about his actions and everyone else's. If his actions were appropriate to the situation, he wouldn't need to lie.

 

[RavenSky]

In this case he was being manipulated by a protestor.

then he is not fit to be a cop.

 

[RavenSky]

I don't think it was much of a decision at all; usually 'decide' implies an availability of perceived alternatives. Letting someone get attacked by an unknown person was not an option, and he wasn't trained well enough to ignore her struggles and just arm-bar her and cuff her. That later thing is not a failing in him but of his training, and the society that let him be so untrained.

the bolded is what is most bullshit about your defense of this violent idiot cop. You want to blame "society" (instead of the cop) for the cop's actions, yet here we have a "society" that is uniformly condemning the cop's behavior - and you are telling us all we are wrong.

So society is to blame for violent cops, but society is not allowed to censure violent cops. WTF!?

 

[RavenSky]

They're both use-of-force situations. I find the comparison reasonable.

Why is violence required to subdue the teen?

What should he do, say pretty please?

She's already trying to get away. I would be very surprised if force in some fashion wasn't used.

If she was "trying to get away" then she was not assaulting anyone or being a threat to anyone, and there was absolutely no reason for the cop to use the violent force that he used as per Jarhyn's claim of immediate necessary action.

 

[KeepTalking]

That a girl got injured because of those bigoted fucks incenses me. I just don't go after the ONE guy in this situation who was actually attempting to prevent major and irreparable violence.

That's the way you see it, but the way I see it is the cop was the ONE person in this situation who escalated potential violence into actual violence.

 

[Underseer]

That a girl got injured because of those bigoted fucks incenses me. I just don't go after the ONE guy in this situation who was actually attempting to prevent major and irreparable violence.

That's the way you see it, but the way I see it is the cop was the ONE person in this situation who escalated potential violence into actual violence.

You're welcome to your own opinions, but not your own facts. That cop was clearly defending Christian protesters from brutal persecution by that lone teenage girl. No matter how much you enjoy persecuting Christians just for being more moral than you, it does not justify cheering on those who brutalize and oppress them, nor does it justify demanding harm to those who rightfully try to protect them. [/theist]

 

[Jarhyn]

I don't think it was much of a decision at all; usually 'decide' implies an availability of perceived alternatives. Letting someone get attacked by an unknown person was not an option, and he wasn't trained well enough to ignore her struggles and just arm-bar her and cuff her. That later thing is not a failing in him but of his training, and the society that let him be so untrained.

the bolded is what is most bullshit about your defense of this violent idiot cop. You want to blame "society" (instead of the cop) for the cop's actions, yet here we have a "society" that is uniformly condemning the cop's behavior - and you are telling us all we are wrong.

So society is to blame for violent cops, but society is not allowed to censure violent cops. WTF!?

The censure does nothing to correct the problem. If you have a car where the steering is misaligned, do you throw away the car or realign the steering? The cop reacted wrong in the heat of the moment, after an initial correct action. He lost control in a confusing melee. This doesn't seem to me to be the sort of behavior that cannot be corrected. The uncorrectable, socially awful behavior of the protestor, that's a different story. He needs to go to a facility with soft walls and good psychologists until he can curb his desire to see little girls get tackled.

In all, the problem is not unlike the one I talked about several months ago in a thead about islamophpbia: the reasons people give that. Cops are bad drives their resulting solution. People think the cop was spiteful of the girl because he was power-mad and a cop. It was actually because he wasn't trained to react in the proper, and counter-intuitive way necessary to create an acceptable outcome. That solution means increasing tax dollars for training cops and research into why current training is ineffective for creating reflexive reaction to assault situations that results in less violent takedown. Cops are bad, or at least some of them, but not for the reasons you think. And that reason comes down to our not giving them the tools they need to be right.

 

[Underseer]

They're both use-of-force situations. I find the comparison reasonable.

Why is violence required to subdue the teen?

What should he do, say pretty please?

She's already trying to get away. I would be very surprised if force in some fashion wasn't used.

If she was "trying to get away" then she was not assaulting anyone or being a threat to anyone, and there was absolutely no reason for the cop to use the violent force that he used as per Jarhyn's claim of immediate necessary action.

Don't be absurd. The fact that she was trying to get away is the thing that made it necessary for that government agent to use violent force. If you were a libertarian who believed in personal freedom and in curtailing the power of the government like Loren, you would understand that.

 

[dystopian]

The cop reacted wrong in the heat of the moment, after an initial correct action.

You keep saying that it was an 'initial correct action'; but it *wasn't*. The correction action would have been to assess the situation. He did not.

He lost control in a confusing melee.

Watch the video again; it was not "a confusing melee".

This doesn't seem to me to be the sort of behavior that cannot be corrected. The uncorrectable, socially awful behavior of the protestor, that's a different story. He needs to go to a facility with soft walls and good psychologists until he can curb his desire to see little girls get tackled.

Unbelievable. Random tard on the street saying that someone should be arrested = ship him off to the asylum. A supposedly trained cop who beats up people = eh, lets give him another chance.

How about no?

 

[braces_for_impact]

Why is the cop excused for reacting in this fashion for being a rabid dog with lack of training, when the Duck Dynasty taint-tard is even more rabid and possesses less training? If that is the case, hey, he's human, we should also cut him some slack eh?

No. Taint-tard (and anti-gay protesters in general) have specific training TO be assholes, TO handle cops in such a way as the violence isn't directed at them, and TO posture themselves in such a way to get cops to actually react. They're lawsuit trolls, going to a place that could be a powder keg and then intentionally making it worse in an attempt to get SOMETHING to happen; it's well documented that it's what the Phelps family did, and if you think for a second that these people aren't using the same playbook, you're an idiot. There's a difference to reacting in an attempt to do your job, and intentionally going to a place to stir up trouble, and taking clear, conscious, deliberate actions to do so. The protester here is no better than the cop in the other thread who slit a dog's throat. They're perverse control freaks, and no amount of training short of brain surgery that we don't have the technology or means to execute would fix that. That a girl got injured because of those bigoted fucks incenses me. I just don't go after the ONE guy in this situation who was actually attempting to prevent major and irreparable violence.

I agree with you that sometimes this is the case. Nevertheless, we don't know taint-tard here is one of those. They could just be a sincere believer that was also overcome with negative emotions at the time, as she watched their lifestyle being threatened (from their point of view) by the passers by. Remember, often these people are told of the "homosexual liberal atheist agenda" are told about how we have no morals and are evil, wretched people. They may have panicked at the sight of girl coming up and also being obviously confrontational back at them, causing them to panic and ask for police assistance. I submit that it's your emotional state overcoming your judgement and allowing you to easily assume that they are Phelps style trained and true type protesters. I understand that being a homosexual yourself, you're angry at such a sight, that's understandable. YES it's ugly. You and I know they are bigots, and their behavior is reprehensible, the only point that everyone is trying to make with you is that the cop is also responsible for how he inappropriately handled the incident. In fact, if they were despicable douche-gargling Phelps style protesters, this makes the cops actions and his training even MORE of a serious issue, because he is being used as a tool for violence and does not have the proper training (or intelligence) to discriminate when he's being used as a weapon to silence someone else. That is a serious problem, and one which MUST be corrected. It would be much easier to train officers appropriately (or choose officers that have cooler heads, better social skills, and less violent tendencies) than it would be to stop Phelps style bigot-bastards protesting at a parade or whatever since despite the their evil message, these ass dandruff fart-knockers are constitutionally protected.

 

[laughing dog]

The censure does nothing to correct the problem. If you have a car where the steering is misaligned, do you throw away the car or realign the steering?

The recognition of the unacceptable response ( i.e. the censure) is the first step to deal with problem. Defending the unacceptable response cannot possibly be thought to help correct the problem.

The cop reacted wrong in the heat of the moment, after an initial correct action. He lost control in a confusing melee. This doesn't seem to me to be the sort of behavior that cannot be corrected. The uncorrectable, socially awful behavior of the protestor, that's a different story. He needs to go to a facility with soft walls and good psychologists until he can curb his desire to see little girls get tackled.

There is no basis in fact or logic for these claims unless you have deep personal knowledge about the police officer and the victim.

In all, the problem is not unlike the one I talked about several months ago in a thead about islamophpbia: the reasons people give that. Cops are bad drives their resulting solution. People think the cop was spiteful of the girl because he was power-mad and a cop. It was actually because he wasn't trained to react in the proper, and counter-intuitive way necessary to create an acceptable outcome. That solution means increasing tax dollars for training cops and research into why current training is ineffective for creating reflexive reaction to assault situations that results in less violent takedown. Cops are bad, or at least some of them, but not for the reasons you think. And that reason comes down to our not giving them the tools they need to be right.

Again, unless you have personal knowledge of the police officer, you cannot possibly know whether this police officer was properly trained or not. Proper training alone does not insure proper responses all of the time.

Your persistent and backtracking defense of this police officer ignores a crucial element: police officers represent the law and are rightly held to higher standard of conduct. Society should accept criminal behavior on the part of the very people whose job it is to uphold the law.

 

[Underseer]

http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2014/06/pittsburgh-investigation-launched-after.html#disqus_thread

A Pittsburgh police officer has been placed on administrative duty pending an investigation after he was caught on video punching a teenage girl who had been confronting Christian protesters during the city's gay pride event.

Potoooooooo, you always post a link not to the article, but the discussion about the article.

See that URL you pasted? Simply delete the "#" and everything after it after you copy and paste.

Like this: http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2014/06/pittsburgh-investigation-launched-after.html

 

[Underseer]

YouTube deleted the video. Obviously, they wanted to remove evidence that this teenage girl was viciously and brutally oppressing those Christians. YouTube is part of the Liberal Homosexual Agenda! [/theist]

 

[laughing dog]

This report (http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/6291525-74/officer-woman-pittsburgh#axzz35BrPOcFx) adds the following information:
1) the police officer claims the woman attacked him first,
2) the victim is facing assault charges for this incident and an earlier incident with her mother, and
3) according to the officer Chatterji's report

The video shows the officer grabbing Lawther by the hair and punching her several times in the stomach. Chatterji wrote that he was forced to do so because he was being struck by onlookers and she kept fighting. He wrote that he feared for his safety.

 

[dystopian]

This report (http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/6291525-74/officer-woman-pittsburgh#axzz35BrPOcFx) adds the following information:
1) the police officer claims the woman attacked him first,
2) the victim is facing assault charges for this incident and an earlier incident with her mother, and
3) according to the officer Chatterji's report

The video shows the officer grabbing Lawther by the hair and punching her several times in the stomach. Chatterji wrote that he was forced to do so because he was being struck by onlookers and she kept fighting. He wrote that he feared for his safety.

What nonsense. The video shows very clearly he wasn't being struck by onlookers and that she didn't "keep" fighting (if she ever fought to begin with, the video doesn't show anything remotely like that), she adopted a fetal defensive posture, and clearly wasn't fighting. The fact that she's facing assault charges for this incident (regardless of the validity of any prior charges she's faced with) when the evidence so clearly shows her to be a victim is quite frankly, sickening. Even if his claim that she struck first is correct, which I have serious doubts about, it's painfully obvious that his response was extreme and unwarranted.

 

[beero1000]

This report (http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/6291525-74/officer-woman-pittsburgh#axzz35BrPOcFx) adds the following information:
1) the police officer claims the woman attacked him first,
2) the victim is facing assault charges for this incident and an earlier incident with her mother, and
3) according to the officer Chatterji's report

The video shows the officer grabbing Lawther by the hair and punching her several times in the stomach. Chatterji wrote that he was forced to do so because he was being struck by onlookers and she kept fighting. He wrote that he feared for his safety.

What nonsense. The video shows very clearly he wasn't being struck by onlookers and that she didn't "keep" fighting (if she ever fought to begin with, the video doesn't show anything remotely like that), she adopted a fetal defensive posture, and clearly wasn't fighting. The fact that she's facing assault charges for this incident (regardless of the validity of any prior charges she's faced with) when the evidence so clearly shows her to be a victim is quite frankly, sickening. Even if his claim that she struck first is correct, which I have serious doubts about, it's painfully obvious that his response was extreme and unwarranted.

Of course, we shouldn't blame him for falsifying his police report. If he had taken the time to stop and assess, an attack of conscience might have harmed someone. He was just doing as he was trained, and it was completely ethical given the information he had at the time.