Calif. Man Forgotten in Cell Says He Drank Urine
Source: Associated Press
Calif. Man Forgotten in Cell Says He Drank Urine
SAN DIEGO May 2, 2012 (AP)
A San Diego college student who federal drug agents forgot and left in a holding cell for five days without food, water or access to a toilet said Tuesday that he drank his own urine to survive.
Daniel Chong also said that he bit into his glasses to break them and tried to use a shard to scratch "Sorry Mom" into his arm, according to U-T San Diego (http://bit.ly/JRlSr8).
The 24-year-old University of California, San Diego, engineering student was swept up as one of nine suspects in an April 21 drug raid that netted 18,000 ecstasy pills, other drugs and weapons.
Chong said federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents told him he would be let go. One agent even promised to drive him home from the DEA field office in Kearny Mesa, he said.
Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/calif-man-forgotten-cell-drank-urine-16257832
SunSeeker
(51,550 posts)Sounds like he should have a pretty good payday in court...
Live and Learn
(12,769 posts)"Chong also ingested a white powder DEA agents said was left in the cell accidentally and later identified as methamphetamine."
How the heck did that happen? Did they purposely ignore his kicking and screaming? He swallowed the glass after biting in to his glasses? He was released with no charges?
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)Your tax dollars at work. They probably couldn't hear him over the moaning of the cancer granny they were busy kicking in the teeth in the next room, because they kicked down her door and found her holding a pot brownie in her fucking wheelchair.
Liquorice
(2,066 posts)Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)"strange"? It's strange that we've got SWAT teams kicking down the doors to frat houses so they can drag college students off to be waterboarded for pulling bongs, that's what's strange...
I'm not sure how the story is supposed to be any more "strange" than that.
Magoo48
(4,708 posts)We can piss and moan all we like, but who is ultimately responsible?
Leftist Agitator
(2,759 posts)May they all infinitely suffer for the harm and evil that they do.
RitchieRich
(292 posts)I've never had my own personal cop when I didn't deserve it somehow. I certainly have friends who are not smooth and had all kinds of rank experiences, but my point is that individual cops are not the problem. It the whole police state we live in that needs to change- starting at the top, not from the bottom.
jerseyjack
(1,361 posts)jerseyjack
(1,361 posts)limpyhobbler
(8,244 posts)When are we going to stop looking at these as a bunch of isolated incidents and start asking what the root cause is? I'll go ahead and just say the root cause is that cops are relatively unaccountable for their abuses. They might lose their job, maybe, but charges are almost never filed against them personally. Depends what it is, but relativeley speaking, they get away with a lot. I also wonder how many of these cases we just never hear about because the victims are to embarassed to speak up.
Suji to Seoul
(2,035 posts)This kid must have done something to warrant being forgotten. Remember, in today's America, the police can do no wrong.
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)I suspect that's the problem.
geckosfeet
(9,644 posts)Lock em' up and throw away the key!
lovuian
(19,362 posts)Our system is out of control
myrna minx
(22,772 posts)That poor kid.
randome
(34,845 posts)If this guy had been arrested for speeding, would they be advocating for no speed limits?
What this guy went through was horrendous but it was an incredibly stupid bureaucratic fuck-up. And heads should roll because of it.
But it doesn't mean it's a license for people to start shouting 'Pigs!' because of it.
frylock
(34,825 posts)obamanut2012
(26,068 posts)Nor that it automatically resulted in arrest and being tossed into a holding cell.
Have we ever had a "Speeding Czar"? Or a Federally-mandated and led "War on Speeding"? Have the Feds thrown away an insane amount of money on the War on Speeding? Do we give 30-year-sentences to folks going one mile over the speed limit?
I'm just curious here about what agenda you are talking about.
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)I mean, can you imagine if our prisons weren't overflowing with non violent pot smokers? Who would we put in those cells?
REAL criminals, maybe?
Oh, you'd like that, bleeding hearts.
obamanut2012
(26,068 posts)And, the amount of money just thrown away on the War on Drugs.
Comrade Grumpy
(13,184 posts)Yeah, they don't write the laws, but they do seem to enforce the drug laws with special zeal.
White, middle-class people who hate the cops? This is probably the reason.
Other people and other communities have other reasons, such as police brutality and treating their communities like occupied zones.
RitchieRich
(292 posts)I was also wondering if part of their point was to agree with said war.
Dawson Leery
(19,348 posts)part of the problem. The police unions are aggressive supporters of overzealous punishments and the drug war, not to mention the "war on terror". This is one union to which I have no problem busting.
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)A giant, expensive, cruel disaster that is fundamentally antithetical to any cogent concept of personal liberty.
"oh, people dont want to spend $60 billion a year to harass Willie Nelson and cancer grannies for smoking a relatively harmless plant! People don't want the government in charge of what they can do WITH THIR OWN GOD DAMN BODIES!! waaaah!"
It's the same sort of pissy authoritarianism that makes the religious right mad when they can't stop gay people fom getting married, or women from using birth control. "you neeeed to let ME tell you what to DO!!! Because it's my right to fucking micromanage ALL of your god damn decisions!!"
Well, guess what. People are sick of that bullshit. And, for the record- lots of cops (although, oddly, not the ones milking the taxpayer financed drug war GRAVY$$$$ TRAIN$$$$ for all it's worth) are against the stupid drug war.
Uncle Joe
(58,355 posts)Thanks for the thread, Judi Lynn.