Cops caught on tape twice: 1st beating handcuffed man, then huddling to get story straight

[Liberal_in_LA]

http://www.wpbf.com/news/19997991/detail.html

New Details Emerge In Police Beating Video
Documents Show New Details About West Palm Beach Officers

POSTED: 9:28 pm EDT July 8, 2009

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- New details emerged on Wednesday in a video that got two police officers fired and brought scrutiny to the West Palm Beach Police Department.

Documents showed that the former officers in question may have conspired to get their story straight before getting questioned.

Arrest documents showed that the officers concocted a story to explain the beating caught on dashcam video. The problem was that, when they huddled together to come up with a story, the discussion was also caught on tape.

Former officers Kurt Graham and Louis Schwartz first claimed they kicked and punched robbery suspect Pablo Valenzuela because they were trying to kick away his knife. Graham explained it that night to his lieutenant that he "kicked him in the head at the same time."

"When the knife was right by his face, I kicked the knife forward," he told the lieutenant, according to police records.

According to the investigative report, Graham went back and watched the dashcam video with his lieutenant, and on that video it was clear that there was no knife on the ground by the suspect's head and that the knife was still in the suspect's backpack. Then, the report said, Graham motioned to Schwartz and they went to the sally port and had a discussion, but it was all caught on videotape. There was no audio.

After they talked, they went back inside and their story had changed -- there was no mention of the knife. Instead, the officers said they punched and kicked the suspect because he tried to bite one of them.

here is the video of the beating: http://policecrimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4933&sid=8b964769912acfb81db362ed07511815 They both kick him just for the fun of it.

[Forkboy]

1. My sister's first husband was a cop/detective.

One night he started telling stories of the some of the things they had done, like pulling over black people and kicking their asses, then planting guns on them, lying in court, etc. I hated the fucker (I love my sister but she has some seriously bad taste in men. Her current husband is a Bob Jones U. graduate). We got into an argument the very first night we met (in my sister's hospital room no less). He used the word nigger and I laid into him. Needless to say, we never got along. And needless to say, after seeing how he and the entire police department (to a man) acted in my city, I have little faith in police (this is one among many reasons). I truly think it's the few good apples that ruin it for the rest of them, and if the good ones are bothered by that then it's time for them to stand up to the peer pressure and stop being silent. Until I see that happen, and I haven't even come close to seeing it, I have no reason to trust them.

[Liberal_in_LA]

2. Thank goodness for the dash cam!

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Forkboy]

5. Paulsby is a good DUer.

We may not agree on this, but he's someone I'm glad is around here.

And I want to be clear. I know there are many good people in law enforcement. They're just seriously outnumbered from what I see, and seriously intimidated to tow that secret line.

[izquierdista]

7. Seriously outnumbered

That's a good reason to have a mass purge of law enforcement departments, throw out clods like the ones here, and train some new recruits in the right way to deal with crime and social problems. Dashboard cameras and hidden webcams are indispensable in finding out candid, unscripted behavior and dealing with the weeds.

[Vinnie From Indy]

4. These dumbasses should get ten extra years just for being so stupid

[MikeE]

6. You don't need to give them extra time...

...just put them in prison with the general population and make sure all their fellow inmates know these guys were cops.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

8. At least they didn't use the suspect for target practice

The suspect was arrested for allegedly robbing a pharmacy of 1,000 oxycontin tablets using a mask and pepper spray. Incredibly, the police chief's (whose last name is Bush) initial statement was that deadly force would have been appropriate because the arrested man had pepper spray in his possession. And it appears that the latest excuse for the beating is that the suspect spit in the face of one of the officers and the latter said that he punched the handcuffed man because he was afraid of catching a disease. The suspect's jaw was broken and he's now suing the city.

[backscatter712]

9. My friend once applied to be a police officer...

but he was disqualified because his penis exceeded the 2 inch limit...