Humboldt State University Student Assaulted and Battered by Police

File a lawsuit right now . The ACLU ought to be able to do it for you. If not, the Green Party must have some attorneys who will do it. It is very clear that we are witnessing a growing fascist state. This is the daily terror experienced in the black and Latino ghettos, and now they have expanded it to everyone. This is the same government that perpetrates blood for oil wars, illegal detentions as in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, and is now promoting repeal of habeas corpus, with the US Senate vote on November 10. The City of Arcata can pay for every single blow, to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Are these the same cops who swabbed pepper spray in the eyes of protestors some years ago? These are not cops - they are thugs in uniform and we pay their salaries?

The same thing happens in Oakland when the protestors were attacked at the port demonstration. Of course, our elected public officials do all they can to deny everything.

America is in a state where human rights are being violated daily. I hope Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch will continue to focus on these abuses in the USA.

Next time, spark up in your own home. And get a lawyer that is LOCAL, not from SUNNYVALE

Address Allen & Allen
990 Edmonds Way
Sunnyvale, CA 94087-4104 Phone Number (650) 321-1011

He lit up the bowl? What then about this quote, taken from the original post:

"After exiting Toby & Jack’s Bar on the plaza, I was standing in a crowd of people, trying to locate my friend. A man handed me something: a pipe. I did not want it and was giving it to the person standing next to me when two police officers stepped into the crowd."

Furthermore, if you're saying that the police violently assaulting someone over some pot is justified, then I really don't know what to say to you. Personally, I think that's pretty reprehensible on your part.

Yeah, let's just believe THEIR STORY without ANY PROOF, because cops are nothing more then PIG and ALWAYS START SHIT.

>let's just believe THEIR STORY without ANY PROOF

Prove that the person who is quoted in the article wrong, then.

>Cops always start shit

Frequently they do exactly that. Your point?

So the cops are guilty until proven otherwise? Doubt it. You people seemed to have missed that class in High School. So someone who gets busted with a pot pipe in their hand is the angel and the police officers without any proof otherwise are the bad people.

Nice World you live in. Do as I say, not as I do.

Enough said.

Unless you have a prop 215 card. And even then, this is a public place.

We are, after all, getting only one side of this story from a very biased source.

did the cop even stop to ask if the person had a 215 card?
did the cops have a reason to cause such a large bruise? there was no charge of assaulting an officer or anybody else, so why was the person hurt so bad?

To one commentor, it seems ridiculous to believe anything other than the cops' version of whatever story. Apparently the commentor has not witnessed much police activity or been the target of much police activity. Or maybe the commentor is the perpetraitor of police activity. After having witnessed and read about plenty of dishonesty and poor behaviour on the part of law-enforcment officers (recent story: humboldt county sherff deputy caught lying in court), it seems perfectly reasonable to be critical of what the police say.

Any PROOF that a cop did that? Sure, the police are all out to hurt you, bend over and let them rape you!

This isn't a news site, this is nothing more then a circle-jerk of people "reporting" nothing and trying to make themselves feel good.

Well OK, y'all -- but this is obscuring my point. Presuming that the person telling their story is not lying (which is a reasonable thing to do, lacking evidence to the contrary,) is assaulting someone multiple times and threatening to taze a witness to one of the beatings a valid thing for the police to do?

Further, if you are going to challenge the veracity of a story, providing evidence to counter it is completely valid and more than within the mission of this site. But in my view, saying "nyah nyah, you just hate the cops, you can't prove that" is not. If you don't want high school level discourse on this site, I think you need to look in the mirror.

Finally, using a "you can't prove that' argument against a first-person account is not only really weak, it can also be applied to anything, true or not. No WMDs? Prove it! The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan? Prove that too! North Korea exists? Hey, I've never been there -- and you know, those mapmakers, they just lie out their ass. I think I even saw one of them sucking on a bong one time. You follow?

From wikipedia.org:

Appeal to ridicule is a logical fallacy which presents the opponent's argument in a way that appears ridiculous and mocking it:

* If Einstein is right that would mean that when I drive my car it gets shorter and heavier. That's crazy!

* If Evolution was true, that means your grandfather is a gorilla! (this also uses appeal to consequences)

This is a rhetorical tactic which attempts to inspire an emotional reaction in the audience and to cause the opponent's argument to appear foolish and illogical. This is typically done by stretching the argument's logic to an absurd extreme or presenting the argument in an overly simplified way. This should be contrasted with reductio ad absurdum which is a valid logical argument form. Ridiculing the person making the argument is specifically an ad hominem attack.

From the Reducto Ad Absurdum listing at wikipedia.org:

As a figure of speech

Among some people, there is a misconception that reductio ad absurdum just means "a silly argument".

In general practice, a reductio ad absurdum is a tactic in which the logic of an argument is challenged by reducing the concept to its most absurd extreme. It is thus often similar in nature to the slippery slope logical fallacy.

For example:

A — I don't think the police should arrest teenagers for soft drug possession.

B — So, you are basically arguing the police should not enforce the law and we should live in a society of violent anarchy.

See also appeal to ridicule, which is another type of logical fallacy.

Two wrongs make a right

Two wrongs make a right is a logical fallacy that occurs when it is assumed that if one wrong is committed, another wrong will cancel it out. Like many fallacies, it typically appears as the hidden major premise in an enthymeme—an unstated assumption which must be true for the premises to lead to the conclusion.

It is often used as a red herring, or an attempt to change or distract from the issue. For example:

* Speaker A: President Williams lied in his testimony to Congress. He should not do that.

* Speaker B: But you're ignoring the fact that President Robertson lied in his Congressional testimony!

If President Robertson lied in his Congressional testimony, that does not make it acceptable or OK for President Williams to do so as well.

----

I could also cite others -- Appeal to Motive, Wishful Thinking, and so on. I think that Argument from Ignorance (as in, "You can't prove your views, so don't argue with me!") is particularly relevant to this discussion, but alas, the clock is ticking. So many flaws, so little time...

Relax buddy, your WORD SALAD needs more dressing.

>Relax buddy, your WORD SALAD needs more dressing.

What are you talking about?

LOL

Go ahead and rant and rave Word Salad boy!

> Go ahead and rant and rave Word Salad boy!

Um...thanks for making my point?

In other words, it's not going to work. Nice try, though.

I am sorry this happened to you. I also am sorry that your post has been subjected to verbal violence from fed sympathizers. May all who care unite in opposing the final destruction of sanity and our suffeirng mother earth. May we come together as never before to address the termination of life and land. Indigenous peoples and people of color know this level of suffering nonstop since the inception of colonialist capitalism. May truth and justice prevail.

In peaceful struggle,
swaneagle

Santa Clarita sheriff, dirty cop terrorist tactic....


-----

(1) beat up innocent citizen for no apparent
reason in front of a neighbor's House.
I had fled to the neighbor's house
because the two DIRTY COP TERRORISTS


refused to leave my house. I was scared for my life.
To this day, I do not know the reason for their
appearance at the house.


(2) after beating, improperly put on a
"3-day forced psych. detention" AKA 5150
The dirty cop terrorists favored term: "3-day hold"

At the Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital,
Psych Unit, I was forcibly drugged via buttock
with an unknown psych. drug.

After release that night, there was a
self-stabbing, induced via a forced psych.
drugging and police incited beating.......


I am writing this , to warn, most especially,
those citizens, who have never , ever dealt
with the police before. This was my case.


This happened to me. Santa Clarita, Calif.

I ask myself everyday, am I living in
AMerica or North Korea ?
----------------------------------------------------- sun. Nov. 13, 2005.

P.S. I am having trouble getting my 9-1-1 call record, I
made at my neighbor's house, panicked telling
the 9-1-1 operator, that two cops were refusing
to leave my house.

----------------------------------

First, I'm no stranger to police harrassment. I've been pulled over by cops fishing for drugs/DUI under false pretenses and I've had guns pointed at me by redneck deputies who would have loved to blow me away. A friend was tased for being drunk and disorderly but not physically threatening. It sucks, but even if the cop is being a dick you've got to stay calm and polite and not show an attitude that can be remotely construed as resisting.

Use just a LITTLE street sense to know when there's a situation you should avoid. Anybody with any sense knows that the plaza is a hot zone. Yes the cops get an attitude but a lot of the plazoids have an equal attitude. I'm not particularly fond of either. Anybody who accosts cops over the way they are walking, like the poster's friend, is a fool with an attitude. Anybody who sparks up in front of TJ's when the cops are around, or likely to be around, is a fool with an attitude. Standing in the smoke circle wasn't a smart thing to do. If somebody is doing something stupid, their friends need to reel them in before the situation gets out of hand. If they persist, they should be avoided.

This whole incident sounds like a classic he said/she said, and from what I gather, nobody warrants the benefit of the doubt to be taken at their word based on the information in the post. Not the poster, not the cops. If the poster was charged with marijuana possession, there has to be physical evidence or the arrest is illegal. What does the police report say?

The following is an article by Ward Churchill located at http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/1999-03/mar10_1999.htm and is a responce to such comments retorting "WE CAN ONLY TRUST THE COPS VERSION". Ward Churchill is a respected academic, and professor at CU Boulder.

March 10, 1999

Wages of COINTELPRO Still
Evident in Omaha Black Panther Case

by Ward Churchill

In 1980, former FBI Director L. Patrick Grey and Edward S. Miller, one-time head of Squad 47, the domestic counterintelligence unit in the FBI's New York Field Office, were convicted of having "conspired to injure and oppress the citizens of the United States." The context of their crimes was COINTELPRO, a secret, nationwide campaign conducted by the Bureau from 1956-1971 for purposes of destroying "politically objectionable" organizations and individuals through any and every means available to it.In 1975, an invesigating committee headed by Senator Frank Church found that the operation had, from start to finish, be "fraught with illegality."

Neither Grey nor Miller ever spent a day in jail as a result of their convictions. In April 1981, President Ronald Reagan interupted their appeals to announce that he was bestowing pardons on both men. The reason stated was that their miseddeds had occurred during an especially turbulent and divisive period in American history. It was time to "put all this behind us," Reagan said, and "to forgive those who engaged in excesses" during the political conflicts of the era.

At the time, it was pointed out that if this were to be Reagan's policy, it would be at least as appropriate for him to pardon the numerous victims of COINTELPRO as to forgive its perpetrators. We noted how the Church Committee had discovered that a COINTELPRO technique had been to use the courts to "neutralize" selected activists by obtaining false convictions against them, that the FBI typically involved local police in such endeavors, and that of all the groups targeted in this manner the Black Panther Party (BPP) had been hit hardest and most extensively.

No action was take by the Reagan administration in this connection, however, and former Panthers continued to serve time, many of them in cases showing clear signs of COINTELPRO manipulation. It would be another decade before the first such prisoner, a once prominent New York BPP leader named Dhoruba bin Wahad (Richard Moore), was finally released after spending 21 years behind bars on a wrongful conviction. His case is instructive.

In 1989, it was conclusively established that the prosecution, with the active collaboration of Miller's Squad 47, had withheld exculpatory ballistics reports during the 1973 trial in which bin Wahad was found guilty of attempting to murder two police officers. It was also shown that members of Squad 47, working with detectives from the NYPD Red Squad, had suborned perjury from the state's star witness. The FBI had repeatedly denied the existence of documents confirming these facts for a dozen years (1975-87), thereby thwarting bi Wahad's right to appeal. The conviction was finally overturned in 1990.

Similar circumstances attend the case of Geronimo ji Jaga Pratt, former head of the Panthers' Los Angeles chapter. Charged in 1970 with a 1968 murder in Santa Monica, Pratt always maintained that he was 350 miles away at the time, attending a BPP meeting in Oakland. At trial he argued that, since the FBI had bugged the meeting, its electronic surveillance logs would verify his whereabouts, and thus his innocence. An FBI official then took the stand and denied that any such surveillance had occurred.

Years later, after the Church Committee confirmed that the surveillence had in fact been conducted, the FBI rather implausibly claimed to have "lost" the relevant logs. Nonetheless, Pratt's conviction was not overturned until 1997, when it was proven that Julio C. Butler -- the state's star witness and, unknown to the jury, a paid FBI informant -- had perjured himself on key points. By then, Pratt had served 27 years.

This case is especially illuminating in that a career FBI agent, M. Wesley Swearingen, has testified that Pratt was deliberately framed by the FBI as part of its campain to destroy the Black Panther Party. Swearingen's testimony corroborates to a significant extent an earlier account provided by Louis Tackwood, at one time an informant paid by the PAPD Red Squad to infiltrate the Los Angeles BPP chapter. According to Tackwood, Red Squad detectives and FBI COINTELPRO personnel simply sat down one afternoon with a stack of unsolved case files, looking for the murder with which Pratt might be most feasibly charged. They then orchestrated appropriate "evidence" and had him prosecuted.

Currently, attention is shifting to still another case involving former Black Panthers and bearing the indelible imprint of COINTELPRO. From its inception, the allegation that one-time Omaha BPP leaders Mondo we Langa (David Rice) and Edward Poindexter were involved in the 1970 murder of Police Officer Larry Minard has been strained. Duane Peak, the only person known for certain to have particupated in the bombing that killed Minard, mentioned neither man in his original confession. Nor did he in his second, more detailed statement to the police. Indeed, he testified at a preliminary hearing that Rice and Poindexter were not involved.

Meanwhile, Peak had named six other men, none of them active BPP members, and none of them ever charged. His story changed only after prosecutors offered him a deal in which he could plead as a juvenile -- thereby serving only two years -- in exchange for incriminating the local BPP leadership.

Rice and Poindexter were convicted in April 1971, mainly on the basis of Peak's testimony. There is ample indication he perjured himself. As to physical evidence supporting Peak's account, a federal court ruled in 1974 that the search through which it was allegedly found was illegal (a matter admitting to the possibility that it was planted, as Rice has insisted all along). A new trial was ordered at that time, but prevented by a jurisdictional technicality applied post hoc by the Supreme Court in 1976.

Further appeals were blocked by yet another technicality: the statutory time limit for filing in Nebraska courts had expired while Rice and Poindexter awaited an outcome in the federal process. One result has been severe constraints on their ability to reopen the case in light of FBI documents released in 1978. These reveal that police detectives collaborated with FBI personnel to suppress exculpatory evidence during the 1971 trial.

Such subversion of the judicial process is consistent with the COINTELPRO methods employed against bin Wahad and Pratt, as well as the fact that the Omaha BPP chapter -- Rice and Poindexter in particular -- were targeted for COINTELPRO neutralization in mid-1968.

The motive underlying police performance in the Rice/Poindexter case was recently spelled out by Jack Swanson, the detective who headed up the 1970 bombing investigation. "I think we did the right thing at the time," he told a BBC interviewer, "because the Black Panther Party...completely disappeared from Omaha [after] we got the two main players."

Former Nebraska Governor Frank Morrison has observed that Rice and Poindexter "were convicted for their rhetoric, not for any crime they committed." Amnesty International, the NAACP, Jericho '98 and the Congressional Black Caucus have all taken up the case. Since 1993, the Nebraska Parole Board has voted unanimously and repeatedly to commute both men's sentences to time served. Yet, to date, the Nebraska Board of Pardons has refused to schedule a hearing in the matter. One Board member has even asserted that there are "no circumstances" under which he would consider commutation.

Simple justice demands reversal of this position. Surely, even if one believes Rice and Poindexter were involved in Minard's death, it must be conceded that 28 years of incarceration is sufficient punishment. After all, Nebraska's Board of Pardons commuted the sentence of even the notorious Caril Ann Fugate -- an admitted participant in 11 murders -- after less than 20 years.

Moreover, the fact that Rice and Poindexter were denied the due process rights to which all citizens are and must be entitled leaves a quite reasonable concern that they are innocent of the offense for which they have been imprisoned for more than a quarter-century. Contrary to the sentiment expressed by the Board member quoted above, there are no circumstances in which prolonging the situation is an acceptable option.

Ultimately, and perhaps ironically, Ronald Reagan had it right. By 1981, it was indeed time to forgive those whose offenses, real or perceived, accrued from the sociopolitical vortex of the Vietnam era. Can there be serious doubt that the principle is as applicable to former Black Panthers as to former FBI officials? Anything else would be a travesty of justice, and the country has already witnessed far too many of these.

What is done cannot be undone, but the future can be changed. Mondo we Langa and Ed Poindexter deserve at this late date not just to be heard but to be free men, reintegrated with and contributing their undeniable talents to their community, participating fully in the ongoing process of healing and reconciliation about which President Reagan spoke so glowingly 18 years ago.

Those desiring further information on the Rice/Poindexter case and/or wishing to support their petitions for commutation of sentence should contact:

Tekla Johnson Lincoln Justice Committee P.O. Box 4756 Lincoln, NE 68504

Hmmm, the cops never harrass me, never brutalize me, never falsely arrest me. I wonder why that is, oh yeah, I never do anything that warrants being arrested.

Lets face it, the person in this story was probably very abusive, stoned or drunk or both, and resisted arrest. If you want to act like a dirt bag hippie that is your right, but then you will get treated like a dirt bag hippie.

So either stop being a criminal or accept responsibility for your actions. But don't blame those that are trying to enforce the laws of the community and keep the place safe for all of us.

Whenever I engage in acts of petty vandalism, civil disobeidience, or downright thuggery, I am always clean, well dressed and smiling. I've never had a problem with the police, and I've been caught "red-handed" more than once. Its amazing what being polite can do for you. I've had policemen look me in the eye and say out loud "I can't arrest you". And they don't.
Didn't gramma tell you you get more flies with honey than you do with vingear?
Be nice. Its effective. Really.

Why? Because he says so.

If someone is a dirtbag hippie who deserved what they got, then by gosh, then that's what they are.

Why? Because it's Mr. "Democracy," dumba**! Now shut up before I really give you something to cry about.

Saluting those who have made America what it is today, a proud, bullying nation run by imbecilic cowboy contra lovin' cowards,

no heroes save ourselves

ps: yes, I'm being sarcastic.

Look, I don't care how long you served in the military, Mr. "Democracy," you're a coward. A s***-talking, I know everything, bully boy coward. I grew up around a**holes like you, and you know what? I've learned better than to even give you the the time of day.

Besides, *if* you were in the military, you probably sucked up to the brass and made everybody else's life a living hell. Good job, soldier. Whatever.

You wouldn't know democracy if it bit you in the ass. People like you are a slap in the face to whatever good is left in this country.

Consider yourself ignored. Have a nice day. 'nuff said.

Look, you have no idea what happened to this person. You're assuming that she flipped some attitude, when you have no proof of that.

Friendly hint: if you want people to listen to you, calling them "dirtbags" isn't a good start. But if you want to be right in your own head, an emperor in your own mind, then go right ahead. I'm just saying I'm not willing to play along if you want to resort to that kind of desparate bullying. It's just abuse, guy. OK?

You seem like you have enough of a mind to be able to use it without going there. but maybe I'm trying to find a silver lining in a very dark cloud...

The slams against the poster as a "dirtbag" are nothing but hateful stereotyping. More likely just some sheltered college kid from SoCal who thought her middle class bubble would protect her if she copped an attitude over being checked out by the cops who saw her with a pipe in her hand. Foolish attitude.

Yes, cops shine bright lights in people's eyes in those situations. It's part of the diagnosis for intoxication. Drunk people's pupils don't contract as rapidly as they otherwise would, and they are more dazzled by the bright lights as a consequence. Just something ya gotta deal with.

One bothersome inconsistency in the poster's story: if she wasn't really part of the smoke circle and was just looking for her friend, why did she accept the pipe rather than just politely declining it and moving on? Clueless. A smoke circle in front of a plaza bar is trouble waiting to happen.

>One bothersome inconsistency in the poster's story: if she wasn't really part of the smoke circle and was just looking for her friend, why did she accept the pipe rather than just politely declining it and moving on? Clueless. A smoke circle in front of a plaza bar is trouble waiting to happen.<

Well, there's a big difference between an error in judgement and behavior that justifies being assaulted by the police, you know? I suspect that you know this, but it sounds like you're assuming that the person who was assaulted has the same level of awareness about the plaza that you do. (Personally, I don't know Arcata for squat, so I have no basis to comment on the specifics of what you're saying.)

Nevertheless, people gotta pay their dues, and doing a heartcheck on someone who is walking into trouble (for whatever reason) is legit in my book -- as long as you're trying to help, not harm.

I wish I had the patience to attack your argument, but something else strikes me first:

Who in there right mind calls themselves "Mr Democracy." I'm gonna pull dictionary.com on you:

de·moc·ra·cy Audio pronunciation of democracy ( P ) Pronunciation Key (d-mkr-s)
n. pl. de·moc·ra·cies

1. Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives.
2. A political or social unit that has such a government.
3. The common people, considered as the primary source of political power.
4. Majority rule.
5. The principles of social equality and respect for the individual within a community.

Note particularly intepretations 3, 4, and 5. Thereby, there can be NO SUCH THING as a Mr. Democracy - that's totalitarian, facist, (but I bet those are compliments to you.)

what the heck:
to·tal·i·tar·i·an Audio pronunciation of totalitarian ( P ) Pronunciation Key (t-tl-târ-n)
adj.

Of, relating to, being, or imposing a form of government in which the political authority exercises absolute and centralized control over all aspects of life, the individual is subordinated to the state, and opposing political and cultural expression is suppressed: “A totalitarian regime crushes all autonomous institutions in its drive to seize the human soul” (Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.)

fas·cist Audio pronunciation of fascist ( P ) Pronunciation Key (fshst)
n.

1. often Fascist An advocate or adherent of fascism.
2. A reactionary or dictatorial person.
fas·cism Audio pronunciation of fascism ( P ) Pronunciation Key (fshzm)
n.

1. often Fascism
1. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
2. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.


So know what your advocating for. Understand that your opinion is not very common place - that most people believe if you weren't causing harm to yourself or others, then the cops have no right to interfear. Recognize what your advocating by demanding your point of view over everyone elses - and please, please, please change your name.

http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf/t231.pdf

the trend actually indicates that people would refer the right to privacy over more law enforcement nationwide. There is a spike which reverses the trend around 2001 (jee, I wonder why.) However, by a small margin at the lastest statistics, people would prefer to keep their civil liberties then have more law enforcement.

So there, Mr. America.

(oh, if that doesn't work, click here: http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/tost_2.html )

It's too bad that your story is so twisted! You fail to mention that you were smoking pot and drunk in public and refused to cooperate the entire night! Poor victim!

I've been stopped by the Arcata police at night while walking. I was not drunk or stoned, I was polite, cooperative and non-confrontational, and guess what -- the Arcata cop was polite, acted reasonably and finally was even friendly.

I really suspect that a lot of these reports of police abuse are not telling the whole story.