‘Please Don’t Let Me Die Back Here’: Aurora Police Video Released Of Woman Cuffed, Hogtied In Back Of Patrol Car

AURORA, Colo. (CBS4) – Aurora Police Chief Vanessa Wilson said bodycam video released Tuesday appears to show one of her former officers, Levi Huffine, “punishing” a female prisoner who was handcuffed, hogtied and rode upside down in the back of a patrol car for more than 20 minutes following her arrest in August 2019.

“In my opinion she was just tortured back there. It makes me sick,” said Wilson after watching the video again Tuesday, during a civil service commission appeal hearing for Officer Levi Huffine, who was fired over the incident. “We are not judge, jury and executer,” said Wilson. “We are not to treat people inhumanely like they don’t matter.

“And he is lucky she did not die in the backseat of that car. Because he would be — in my opinion — in an orange jumpsuit right now,” said Wilson.

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Chief Wilson said she lost count of how many times Kelly asked for help. Wilson said she was particularly struck at how panicked and desperate Kelly seemed to be at one point, saying, “I beg you master.”

https://denver.cbslocal.com/2020/09/29/shataean-kelly-levi-huffine-aurora-police-video-released-woman-struggling-back-patrol-car/amp/?fbclid=IwAR0vdRS_WkQt8uRbaD-q0H1_1TgW4pW2ramaOg_yiz6g1sLz8yp28BHWyBw&__twitter_impression=true

By Charlie Savage | The New York Times

The House may pursue a constitutional lawsuit challenging President Trump’s use of emergency powers to spend more public funds on a southwestern border wall than Congress was willing to appropriate, a federal appeals court ruled on Friday.

In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that the House had claimed a sufficient injury to give lawmakers legal standing to pursue a lawsuit against the Trump administration.

The 24-page ruling partly reversed a decision by a district court judge in June 2019. That ruling had thrown out the lawsuit on the grounds that the House had no legal standing to sue the executive branch over a claimed threat to its constitutionally authorized control over federal spending.

That earlier ruling, by Judge Trevor N. McFadden of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, whom Mr. Trump appointed to the bench, was wrong, the appeals court said. It would undermine the “ironclad constitutional rule” that the president has no power to spend money without the approval of both the House and the Senate, the panel said.

https://roselawgroupreporter.com/2020/09/appeals-court-permits-house-to-sue-over-trumps-border-wall-spending/

Undercover journalist Valentin Gendrot describes culture where officers act with impunity

A French journalist who infiltrated the country’s police force has described a culture of racism and violence in which officers act with impunity.

Valentin Gendrot claims the violence was so frequent it became almost banal and describes one incident where he was forced to help falsify evidence against an adolescent who had been beaten by an officer.

“It really shocked me to hear police officers, who are representatives of the state, calling people who were black, Arab or migrants ‘bastards’, but everyone did it,” he says.

“It was only a minority of officers who were violent … but they were always violent.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/03/french-reporter-who-joined-police-exposes-racism-and-violence-valentin-gendrot