Saginaw man TASERed at City Council meeting

[twilight_sailing]

Man refused to remove hat, struggled with police

SAGINAW (WJRT) - (11/07/06)--Saginaw's City Council meeting featured a shocking incident Monday night. A Saginaw Valley State University student was TASERed after he became unruly after being asked to take off his baseball cap.

There is a new rule at Saginaw City Council meetings. Men are required to take their hats off. Evidently, they are pretty serious about this new rule.

The man was wearing a Los Angeles Dodgers hat. Officer Doug Stacer of the Saginaw Police Department asked him to remove the hat. The man raised his voice and did not remove the hat.

As the officer tried to grab the hat and then tried to grab the man, the man with the hat tried to kick Saginaw Police Chief Gerald Cliff, who was coming to help out.
http://abclocal.go.com/wjrt/story?section=local&id=4738161


Then the cops whipped out the TASER and let him have it.

Remind me to stay the hell out of Saginaw.

[Horse with no Name]

1. You think that was radical?

Hell they could have beheaded him.:sarcasm:

[rodeodance]

2. people are too eager to use that new toy.

[wtmusic]

3. What an idiot

Take your damn hat off. It may be a stupid rule, but it's a rule.

[Horse with no Name]

4. TASERS should only be used when the force of a gun

should be used.
They are weapons.
I mean, seriously, couldn't they have just given the guy a ticket and walked away?

[wtmusic]

5. Depends

if he was disrupting the meeting, it sounds like the ticket might not have helped.

Probably hurt like hell. Also hard to know how aggressive he was. Good rule of thumb: don't use physical force against a police officer.

[Bonobo]

6. People with opinions such as yours are responsible for this fascist shit.

[wtmusic]

7. Assaulting a cop is a felony

and it should be. These guys put their lives on the line every day to protect your ass.

IMO that response was EXACTLY what was called for, and it has absolutely nothing to do with fascism.

[Ferret Annica]

12. The cop should of request he remove it or leave

To grab the hat was the cop assaulting first and was out of the continuum of force protocols police observe when they are not in a country sliding into being a fascist state as we are doing here in the United States with recent laws regarding changes in Posse Comitatus and habeas corpus.

If I was violating a minor, highly irrational rule like this, I would consider the cop touching me as assault. This public servant has a right to request compliance, or ask the man to leave.

The cop was wrong and his aggressiveness and lack of concern for this man's rights sparked the incident above and beyond any wrong this man may or may not be guilty of because of his response.

[Bonobo]

13. Yeah! What you said!

:)

[Pithlet]

15. Yes, they do.

They are there to protect and serve us. And they usually do a good job. But, sometimes they screw up, and sometimes they use unnecessary force, and that is what it looked like happened here. Men with hats aren't a direct, physical threat. There was no need to escalate it physically. They wouldn't have whipped out the gun and shot him because he took exception to them forceably removing his hat (which was ridiculous, anyway. Ticketing him, or making him leave would have been the appropriate response), so they shouldn't have tasered him. It looks like it was bullying and extreme use of force in this case. Use of extreme force for non-violent offenses is indeed fascist, and that still applies when the police themselves escalated the situation. This was a man wearing a hat.

[Ferret Annica]

16. Cops have to act appropriately too

These guys put their lives on the line every day to protect your ass.

They are also accountable if they act inappropriately. In 1996 in Eugene, Oregon the city had the cops sweep people hanging around the University of Oregon Campus a week before parent's week. They arrested people who were unwittingly standing on the wrong parts of the sidewalk that were part of private property with a letter of trespass gave them license to act as the agents of the property owner.

People who paused to drink their drink after buying it at the Circle K were arrested and taken to jail for activities not in compliance with the conduct of normal business at that retail establishment.

I was doing Cop Watch activism and was arrested for walking on part of the sidewalk that was part of the Eugene Flower Home, a florist at E13th and Patterson. I actually was first surprised, as I had positively no idea that that part of the sidewalk was private property.

Of course being a trained forest activist who does allot of non-violent civil disobedience, I slumped limply to the ground refusing passively to aid in my own oppression.

I had the cop blow in my ear. He was trying to get me to yell and fight as to accrue additional charges on me above and beyond the criminal trespass violation. Naturally I verbally made it into a joke and did nothing but laugh at him.

Sorry friend, but cops are wrong to grab private property merely because a minor rule is broken. Ask the guy to remove the cap or to leave. Otherwise the cop needs to keep his meat hooks off of people.

[KansDem]

8. I agree...

I don't know when baseball caps became a fashion accessory, but wearing them as if they're glued to your head just isn't good sense, particularly when there's a rule requiring you to take them off.

Getting zapped, however, is pretty extreme. The corporate media report makes it sound like he got zapped because of the cap and not necessarily because the citizen became violent...

[keepCAblue]

10. So if you go to a Bush rally...

...wearing a "Send our troops home" t-shirt and the rally nazis (Secret service thugs) tell you to remove your shirt, would you? I think most people on DU recognize the ridiculousness of such an order (or "rule", to use your verbage). Do you think an attendee at a Bush rally deserves to be jumped on, pushed, shoved, and subsequently tasered just because they are wearing a t-shirt someone doesn't like?

Substitute "ballcap" for "t-shirt" ... it's the same thing.

Some "rules" are purely stupid and this is clearly one of them.

[wtmusic]

17. It is a rule (read the article)--and there is also a rule he has to wear pants

and that he can't take a dump on the mayor's desk and call it free speech.

In Saginaw apparently people have decided that to speak before the town council you gotta take your hat off. Personally I think it's a little silly, but that's the rule. It may piss you off, it may be stupid...but unless you change the rule you are gonna have to live with it.

This dude not only chose not to live with it, but he attacked the cop for enforcing the stupid rule. Ouch! I guess we learned our lesson! :crazy:

[keepCAblue]

18. Yes, let's all be little mindless sheeple and follow "the rules"...

...no matter how stupid they may be.

I believe it was also a "rule" in Nazi-occupied parts of Europe for Jews to wear a yellow Star of David bearing the word "Jude" on their outer clothing whenever they appeared in public. If they didn't, like the young man in Saginaw, the SS would arrest them, beat them, even kill them.

Don't take your ballcap off, get arrested. Resist arrest, risk getting beaten and/or tasered and possibly killed.

Don't wear your yellow star, get arrested. Resist arrest, risk getting beaten and/or shot, possibly killed.

But them's the rules. Obey and you're okay. Resist, and the government has the right to beat the shit out of you and use potentially deadly force against you. Reasonable? Sounds reasonable to me.

[wtmusic]

19. Absolutely right...one day it's a baseball cap, the next

IT'S THE GAS CHAMBER!!! :scared:

:rofl:

[keepCAblue]

9. Tasers have caused many fatalities...

...and should be considered a form of deadly force. Is deadly force justified in a case where someone simply refused to remove their baseball cap?


This is a case of truly perverted justice. I hope the young man sues the PD involved in this.

[readmoreoften]

11. You don't use a life-threatening weapon against someone for not

removing his hat. Police brutality is getting out of control.

[Strawman]

14. How idiotic. Dumb rule. Cops have to enforce it, but how about a ticket?

That is absurd. Not only is it an offensive and unacceptably disproportionate use of force, but it will probably cost the city money when this guy sues them.