Seattle Police Stomping On (innocent latino) Detainee

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

"I'm going to kick the fucking Mexican piss out of you homey. You feel me?"

And check out how pleasant the cops are after realizing the guy is innocent. Hey, no hard feelings, right?

Video:

http://www.kirotv.com/video/23482801/index.html




Seattle Cops Stomp On Detainee
Chris Halsne
KIRO 7 Eyewitness News Investigative Reporter

Posted: 3:44 pm PDT May 6, 2010
Updated: 1:50 pm PDT May 7, 2010

SEATTLE -- Internal affairs detectives have launched a review after seeing a racially charged videotape of two Seattle police officers stomping on an innocent detainee.

KIRO Team 7 Investigative Reporter Chris Halsne received the footage from a freelance photographer.

Before the camera rolled, here was the scenario, gleaned from redacted public records provided by SPD: On April 17, Seattle police responded to several 911 calls near the China Harbor Restaurant on the west side of Lake Union. Patrons of a nightclub complained of an armed robbery occurring in the parking lot. They told dispatchers the suspects were Hispanic.

http://www.kirotv.com/news/23479966/detail.html

__________________

DU Post: Fox affiliate refuses to air video of cops brutalizing innocent Latino, even though ...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8296606

[FiveGoodMen]

1. Why are governments sponsoring gangs?

(If you're not sure what I mean, just look at who the aggressors are in that picture)

[gateley]

2. And a local report last night said they were on "administrative leave".

I'm assuming they'll be fired and I hope this man sues the hell out of the individual cops. SPD is probably only concerned about the politics, although there are some really good cops in the department.

Can those cops who were just observing be charged?

This sickens me -- it sickens us all. I understand that cops have a scary job and trying to apprehend an armed suspect would put them on edge, but this behavior is inexcusable and not the way to make an arrest.

Meanwhile, while these officers were busy stomping and yelling slurs and threats, did the real suspects get away? :grr:

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

3. And if it wasn't on tape the victim would be laughed at or ignored

[gateley]

6. Without a doubt. nt

[tblue37]

11. More likely he would be arrested for assaulting an officer and resisting

arrest.

[harkadog]

4. I hope the people falling over themselves in a rush to boycott Arizona

will now boycott Seattle. Me thinks they will find some excuse not to however.

[Bluenorthwest]

7. Did the entire State Legislature of Washington take part in this?

The comparison is absurd.

[harkadog]

15. Did the entire State Legislature of Arizona pass the law?

No. Your attempt at an excuse is absurd.

[4lbs]

21. No, just 62% of the legislature, and 70% of the people of Arizona support it.

As well as Arizona's governor.


I seriously doubt any more than very small minority (ahem) of people in Washington, including the state legislature and Governor, would justify what the Seattle officers did.

[harkadog]

39. Maybe someone should do a poll on it.

BTW I read many times on DU how the Arizona poll was false and not that many people supported it.

[Desertrose]

56. FYI- We did not elect our Governor.

Obama stole our Dem governor.:evilgrin:

I think the polls are wrong....depends what area they polled,ya know?

[tkmorris]

9. If this had happened in Arizona

The videotape would have been destroyed, the innocent victim would be in jail, and the cops involved would be publicly commended for their service.

See the difference?

[harkadog]

14. Since you just made something up no I don't see the difference.

I knew the excuse crowd would have to dig.

[dawgman]

13. so the actions of a few pigs

are the equivalent of the duly elected officials of a state enacting a racist law?

Hmmm...do you really think you should have DK's pic as your avatar? I'd like to think DK is smarter than that.

[harkadog]

16. I think I'll let DK speak for himself. He is smart enough to do that.

So you think this is the "actions of a few pigs". Police don't do these things unless they think they will get away with it. Which means they have the support of those above them including the city administration. But go ahead and defend them if that is your excuse.

[dawgman]

18. racism is instituional and widespread

and yet if you think for one instant that there is reasonable parallel between this video and the elected officials of an entire state you're out of your bloody mind.

read my post below. the spd is atrocious. but it is not an ethos that is spread throughout the area in all aspects of society like arizona.

your comparison is nothing short of ludicrous.

[harkadog]

20. Interesting you hide where you are from in your profile.

[Forkboy]

27. What's your real address?

Interesting that you didn't share that with us. It clearly says...well, it says something. :crazy:

[harkadog]

31. My profile is filled out with my location like most people on DU.

Unlike the poster who I was addressing.

[Forkboy]

34. But not your actual address, making your posing look pretty silly.

[harkadog]

36. Who on DU puts their actual address?

The poster I was addressing does not even put a geographic location as most people do. Yet he writes as if he knows everything about Arizona. Interesting you feel the need to defend him this much.

[Forkboy]

43. "Interesting you feel the need to defend him this much."

And the fact that you jump to conclusions, both with the poster in question and myself, might be why. :think:

[foxfeet]

24. The current acting Chief of Police is Hispanic: Chief Diaz.

So there's ample room to doubt that the offending officer has the support of the higher-ups.

[harkadog]

32. Police Departments in Chicago and New York have often

had African-American Chiefs. Yet in both cities police have routinely exhibited brutality towards minorities. The 'Chief" in those situations is merely window dressing.

[foxfeet]

33. Tell that to their faces.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

37. Why? Will they stomp on you if you do?

[foxfeet]

41. Are you seriously trying to bait me into defending that cop?

You're wasting your time. His actions (and those of the female cop) are indefensible.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

50. Not at all

I wasn't trying to bait you into anything.

I was merely noting that "tell it (that they are window-dressing) to their face" is an invocation of might-makes-right on a thread about police brutality.

It's ironic.

The implication that a person would respond violently to an accusation isn't much of an argument in their defense. I wouldn't want to tell Joe the Plumber to his face that he's a backward moron but that has little bearing on whether he is a backward moron.

[foxfeet]

55. Fair enough, but the subthread in which I posted concerned a ludicrous comparison between

the incident in Seattle and the recent blatantly-racist law in Arizona. My suggestion to "tell that to their faces" was predicated on the notion that to equate the position of police chiefs of color with "window dressing" is, at a minimum, in poor taste if not racist in itself. Irony, indeed. No violence was involved in the posting of that, or this, message.

[harkadog]

38. Well I wouldn't be the first one

Especially in Chicago where I lived. But if you can facilitate that I will be happy to participate.

[The Magistrate]

42. Funny, Sir: In No. 31 Above You Said Your Profile Had Your Location: Pheonix, Arizona

Yet now you live in Chicago....

"Always tell the truth, it's easier to remember."

[harkadog]

51. Please try a reading comprehension course.

Judging from your post and others I have seen you seriously need it. Yes I live in Phoenix. In my post I said "where I lived" in Chicago. Do you know the meaning of "lived" as opposed to "live"? In this country some of us move around. I lived in Chicago roughly 30 years. Please stop embarrassing yourself.

[The Magistrate]

54. My Difficulties With The English Language, Sir, Are Legend Around Here....

Your tale shifts at the need of the argument you are pressing, which interests me strangely....

[Forkboy]

26. Dumb ass comparison.

Seriously.

Now tell me how I'm excusing this action, and make yourself appear even sillier.

[harkadog]

35. Try a reading comprehension course in the near future

I didn't say excusing the action of the cops, I said making an excuse why there should not be a boycott of Seattle. If all you are able to say is "dumb ass comparison" other posters will decide who is sillier.

[The Magistrate]

40. Nothing, Sir, is Sillier Than Posting Under An Image Of Rep. Kucinich In Defense Of Racism

Just a little tip, for the future: you want to scuff the bottoms of your shoes, too....

[Forkboy]

44. "other posters will decide who is sillier."

Oh shit, dude, you got a bet! :rofl:

[Flaneur]

57. We've decided who is sillier. You lose. Or is it you win?

In any case, it's you.

[William Z. Foster]

53. you kicked over the bee hive now

One of the most powerful things keeping racism in place and making it impossible to examine or discuss is this notion that many liberals and Democrats have, especially those from "blue states" and "progressive areas," that they are the good people, and that all of the bad evil racists are over there, somewhere else. This is a clever and sophisticated way to deny the reality about racism - that it is pervasive throughout the society, from top to bottom as you point out, and by denying that they are denying racism itself.

Working in Washington state after living, traveling and working mostly in the Midwest and the South, I was shocked at the racism there, and also at the antagonism and contempt directed at poor and blue collar people. There is no part of the country where the gap between the haves and have nots is wider than in the PNW, no place where shallow and superficial partisanship has a more powerful grip on people's imaginations. There is no part of the country where liberalism is more gentrified, more closely associated with upscale lifestyles and higher incomes. There is no part of the country where immigrants have a more difficult time, where it is more difficult and looked down upon to be poor.

Give me Alabama or Mississippi any day, where you know where people stand, and where it takes courage and clarity to stand against racism and for the working class. Yet so many people from the PNW look down their noses at the rest of the country.

All of this is a gross generalization, of course, and certainly there are some good and strong left wing people in the PNW. The point is that we have people here who are very quick to make similar generalizations about Arizona, or Alabama or Mississippi.

There is an ongoing effort to associate tea baggers and racists with poor working class people, and the reverse of that - associating working people, as in the Greek uprising, with tea baggers. That is because for too many liberals their dream come true would be to divide the country up first and foremost on class lines, with the people who are doing better financially also being the more educated and also being the ones who are "good" on racism and politics in general. They are not speaking from a left wing point of view, they are speaking from an aristocratic and gentrified point of view. Nowhere can you see this in action more than in the PNW.

[KG]

5. i'm sure it's just one of those exceptional incidents. nothing to see here.

:eyes:

[demosincebirth]

8. This is why I love cops...

:sarcasm:

[RedCappedBandit]

10. I hate pigs.

I really don't give a shit if there's some good ones out there.

If they really exist in the numbers some people claim, they need to do more to prevent this bullshit from happening every god damn day.

[William Z. Foster]

22. 9 out of 10 are good people

But as you say, so what? On the job, they are enforcing white supremacy and social conformity and protecting the needs and desires of the wealthy. Their job demands of them that they see all of us as the enemy - potential trouble makers, potential threats to property, to order and decorum, potentially interfering with the desires of the wealthy.

"To serve and protect" perhaps - but how many of us are asking just who it is that is being served and protected? There are many here who have no desire to see that question asked, as we see with all of the anti-Labor, anti-public education, anti-Greek uprising, anti-immigrant and anti-left wing posts, the promotion of privatization and regressive taxes that we see here every day.

What is depicted in that video is directly connected to the anti-immigrant screeds people are posting here, and to the apologies and defenses of the ruling class, of the wealthy and powerful and their interests, and to the protection of the existing social structures and conventions. Do they know that their anti-immigrant tirades lead directly to brutality? I think they must.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

28. Excellent reply

[PM Martin]

46. Does that not make this not good people then?

How can we consider them to be of 'good' standing if they view us with hostility?

[The Straight Story]

30. There is a lot of peer pressure within the force

Not excusing it, just making an observation from experience. I can say one thing I hated about being a deputy was the whole 'us against them' mentality I found there. It drives people to look the other way, get involved in things they would not normally do and felt wrong about, and then it just snowballs as people become more protective of themselves (because they have done wrong before, they understand/explain it away) and the group.

Kind of like politics in a way where people give 'their' elected official a pass on things they would never even think twice about with an official not on their side.

[PM Martin]

47. As a former deputy, would say that the 'us vs. them' mentality

is the standard in most departments?

[dawgman]

12. SPD spreads through the city like an STD

To quote the Blue Scholars.

[Vinca]

17. Lawyers must be lining up to represent this poor guy.

[MODem75]

29. A large portion of cops are racists.

They come from right-wing religious backgrounds. Notice how none of them bothered to stop the officer that was way out of line. In fact the female officer even joined in and stomped the guy's leg.

[Vinca]

48. Ummm . . . I used to be a cop. Seriously.

I will agree that some are racists - and sexists - but the "large portion" are not.

[William Z. Foster]

52. yes and no

Since a large portion of the general public is racist, of course this holds true for law enforcement officers as well.

In the farming country where I am, a Black person driving though here is a magnet for cops, as reliably as tossing a bone will get a dog's attention. If that person is a young male, and driving an older car the Pavlovian response will be even more intense. The police are, unthinkingly and automatically, defending the dominant social group, defending the more wealthy, the ones with more status. That is their main job. all of their work is oriented around that.

However, let's say we put everyone right here on this board, supposedly liberals and progressives, into uniform and had them replace all of the police in this rural area. Look at all the chatter around here about "illegals" and about making people "face hard realities" and about "tough measures" and "they asked for it" and the like. Many threads are just dripping with racism, and people deny that they are making racist assumptions and statements with all of the fervor and the very same reasoning that people like Pat Buchanan and Sean Hannity use. There is very rarely any debate about that from anyone. People who are nominally Democrats are adept at couching their racism in clever euphemisms, but that may well be worse than overt and obvious racism. Then we have the contempt and hostility toward poor people and working people. All of the attitudes and prejudices that are the foundation for police abuse and selective enforcement are at play right here and go unchallenged for the most part.

There would no doubt be huge battles within this hypothetical DU police force. A few here would try to point out the bias and prejudice within the department. But they would be shouted down, just as they are here, and sooner or later those with the power would side with the racists and those favoring the wealthy, and those objecting to that would then be fired on some pretext and hounded out of the department.

What I am describing is the daily reality in this country, the pervasive atmosphere, and I think one has to have their head firmly in the sand to be able to deny this reality.

[fishwax]

19. .

:grr:

[Omaha Steve]

23. K&R!

So much hate for humans.

[CreatureFeature]

25. If a citizen did that to a policeman, they would be charged

with attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, attack with a deadly weapon, etc.

We are in deep, deep trouble as a society and a nation. When the authorities can do things to us and face "disciplinary actions" and the same actions taken by us to members of the government would land us in prison for 20 years, it is time to STOP GIVING ANY MORE POWER OR RELINQUISHING ANY MORE OF OUR RIGHTS TO THE GOVERNMENT.

[Heywood J]

45. I see five officers taking part here.

Maybe some of them rent, but it would be very nice to see their houses, bank accounts, and possessions liquidated to pay the civil judgment. After the city is done paying its share, it can pay the homeless shelters where the five officers should be living after they're released from prison.

[Echo In Light]

49. This thread will surely enrage those who worship sadist bullies