Thursday 1 November 2012

*Inadvertent* Cop Brutality?

Or teaching kids what police can and will do to them?
Officer Chris Webb was attending “career day” at Tularosa New Mexico Intermediate School when he sent 50,000 volts of electricity into the child’s chest on the playground. 
The young boy blacked out and has, according to his legal representative, been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder ever since; the officer faces a civil suit. 
According to the complaint, Webb shot his Taser at the child (referred to only as “R.D.”) after he said he did not want to join fellow classmates in cleaning the officer’s patrol car.  [...] Webb responded by pointing his Taser at R.D. and saying, ‘Let me show you what happens to people who do not listen to the police.’

From here. More.

Such casual and callous disregard for a child's life because he gave the cop "attitude", such reactionary and self-protective response to the legitimate criticism that this was abusive - and illegal - police authority.

We've written much about the systemic and tactical deployment of cop brutality at DJ!, from brute force directed at adolescents, reprisal against someone reporting inappropriate police actions, sexualized violence and degradation of female detainees, to G20 security and SPVM accountability.

4 comments:

Sixth Estate said...

A CIVIL suit? Why isn't this a criminal case?

Anonymous said...

Wow. Shooting a taser is supposed to be a replacement for shooting someone with bullets. Years ago, pre-taser would the officer think something like "Uh-oh, a kid doesn't want to clean my car. Better murder him so he doesn't grow up to be a criminal."

deBeauxOs said...

It seems that the district attorney is taking the cop at his word; he claims he "accidentally" discharged his taser into the kid.

So, no charges laid against him.

Ugh.

deBeauxOs said...

That "pre-emptive" strike for prevention and justice is an important element of authoritarian political systems.

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