Law enforcement and schools have a related problem, IMO. The longer we as a culture tolerate the routine violent abuse of authority, the more it becomes accepted as a norm and the more people rationalize it by blaming the victims. By this point we have a whole generation of teachers and law enforcement who, even if they’re uncomfortable with it, will simply go along with the frequent and routine abuses and the criminal impunity of school administrators, and abet criminal cops that treat the children who’s parents can’t afford to lift them out of public schools in the same manner that slaves were treated on plantations and convicts are treated in prisons. Public schools have devolved into trainer penitentiaries.
5 Likes
There’s a problem when schools call the cops before they call the parents… When i was a kid, I was way more afraid of what my parents would do to me, than any cop they could call 
11 Likes
Well, yes. Cops get off scott-free. But even if they didn’t, even if they were the peace officers serving and protecting instead of a mob of made men, they still wouldn’t belong in schools.
2 Likes
We had a cop in my high school. He was generally a nice guy and had a very non-hostile relationship with most students. The day before school started my senior year (when seniors traditionally drove around throwing toilet paper in the trees outside incoming freshmen’s homes) some friends and I coincidentally ran into him while checking out at the supermarket with all the TP we could afford. He just smiled and reminded us to be safe. And I would say he was even chummier with the “bad” kids, which IMO is exactly what you want in a police school liaison officer. There was a fair amount of gang activity in the area around my high school, and I think his presence helped keep violence out of the school most of the time, more out of respect for him than fear of him.
That said, there was one time when there was a particularly big fight in the cafeteria (multiple participants completely out of control, chairs and trays thrown) and he used pepper spray to try to control the crowd. Several bystanders inhaled the spray and much vomit (and a month later the principal’s resignation) ensued.
Good times.
8 Likes
Do these schools even HAVE more than one officer on duty? My high school didn’t have one when I was there, but if memory serves they brought one in 5 or 10 years later. But I’m pretty sure there was only ever one officer on duty at a time.
1 Like
Look at those fucking kids’ faces. I am so disgusted that there are STILL people saying “wait for the facts” or “the officer acted appropriately.” WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE?!
I can never be around this happening. I hope I never am. If I saw a cop do that, I would intervene. I would almost certainly be severely injured or killed by the cop… best case scenario I would go to jail for a long time. I know this, and yet I just don’t think I could stand there and watch and do nothing.
7 Likes
In other words, if the cop in your high school had been hired as an assistant principal, and didn’t have pepper spray or any other officially-issued weapons, and was paid out of school taxes, he would have been just like the people in charge of discipline in the days before cops in schools! 
We lived in fear of our high school assistant principal Dr. McIntosh. He was a tall, fit black man naturally equipped with the most devastating anti-teenager weapon ever devised - a sardonic rapier wit. I do believe giving him pepper spray would have made him less effective at reducing bad kids to tears. He was well-spoken and extremely polite towards anyone who was well-behaved, and never ever called anyone by their first name that I can remember. You did not want Dr. McIntosh to turn his ire on you - he could whup his weight in wolverines, and he didn’t wear a bulletproof vest or carry a taser, either, he wore a suit and tie every day.
12 Likes
Training for restraints is not limited to cops.
Typically, Admin have gone through restrain training, sometimes also the head of the guidance department. Etc etc.
Staff that deal with moderate/severe special education/alt-ed often do the training as well.
7 Likes
Someone needs to re-write the Rod Stewart classic “Infatuation” as “Indoctrination” to help people realize the symptoms. Yes, we need pop-culture props to reach even the teachers.
1 Like
I can’t imagine any teacher who would be foolish enough to lay hands on a student in America, in today’s litigation-rich culture.
4 Likes
The idea of even having police in schools still seems bizarre to me.
Really shouldn’t be necessary.
12 Likes
I’m a teacher and there is no way in hell that I’d ever touch a high school student without his/her consent. (I give hugs with one arm ONLY of the student initiates it AND only if it’s in front of other students/staff.)
5 Likes
This isn’t the first time this officer has been found to be violent and possibly racist:
The most recent, filed in November 2013 by a former Spring Valley student, Ashton Reese, charge Officer Fields and the school district of violating his civil rights. Mr. Reese was expelled in February 2013 for “unlawful assembly of gang activity and assault and battery” after an investigation by the officer concluded that he had been involved in a fight behind a store near the school, according to the complaint filed with the Columbia division of Federal District Court.
The lawsuit said Officer Fields “unfairly and recklessly targets African-American students with allegations of gang membership and criminal gang activity.” A jury trial is set to start on Jan. 27.
In 2007, Carlos Martin and his wife, Tashiana Martin, sued Officer Fields, Sheriff Lott and another deputy, Robert Clark, for violating their civil rights during a routine investigation of a noise complaint. Mr. Martin said in court papers that Officer Fields stopped him as he was getting out of his car at home and grew angry when he addressed him as “dude,” despite Mr. Martin’s assurances that he did not intend to be disrespectful. A short time later, the officer slammed Mr. Martin to the ground, handcuffed and began kicking him, according to the complaint, which also said the officer emptied a can of pepper spray that drenched Mr. Martin’s clothes.
The complaint also said a deputy confiscated a cellphone that Tashiana Martin had been using to record the encounter, threw her against a vehicle, handcuffed her, threw her to the ground and then into his police car. As she was being driven away, the complaint said, Officer Fields made lewd comments about taking her to a Motel 6.
How long does it take to empty a pepper spray can into someone? Several minutes? The man appears to be a pyscho.
8 Likes
Apparently a vice-principle also ordered the victim to leave the class, then the violent thug was called.
But even that is a fail. A class being disrupted is not a big deal compared to what did occur. If the teacher and administrator run out of options themselves, the next step, in the past, would have been to contact and demand the presence of the parent. So long as the student isn’t harming anyone or themselves there is no call for a physical intervention. Someone sitting still and refusing to cooperate doesn’t warrant violence.
And really, if the parent is called in that will settle the matter 999 times out a thousand. Follow up the incident with whatever sanctions or possibly recommendations for help from mental health professionals if the problem is ongoing.
The truth is it wouldn’t matter if the victim were a 6 foot athelete who took a plug at the cops nose, the actions of the officer were way, way out of line and indeed criminal.
7 Likes
You may be right. But I think there were kids in my school for whom the most commanding assistant principal in the world (and our assistant principal was more commanding than the cop, although not nearly as commanding as the guy you describe) wouldn’t have held as much sway as a friendly guy in a police uniform with a gun and handcuffs on his belt. There were some kids in our school from really messed up backgrounds and I think they needed to see visible symbols of authority and physical power. But I certainly could be wrong.
1 Like
Actually, the AP sent the cop, which is why this got out of hand. Our high school has security (two big, scary-looking pussycats), both of whom would never have done this.
Jesus… so they took him off the streets and put him in a school instead of firing him?
8 Likes
My older siblings had one in 1975. Someone painted his car with flat paint because he was disliked. He was gone when I arrived in 1979. Then I switched HS’s and we had one during my senior year, but I don’t know why. No one even paid attention to him.
It depends on what your priorities are - avoiding blame in the future, or teaching children in the present moment. All the best teachers I know don’t need to lay hands on anyone, but if they had to, I think they would.
BTW, have you ever seen a reliable chart of lawsuits per capita over time in the United States? Yeah, nobody else has either. Interesting that everyone seems to believe that lawsuits are increasing, yet there’s no huge ongoing boom in building courtrooms or hiring judges… and nobody I know has increased their litigiousness, quite the opposite in fact. I think what’s really happening is that the population is increasing without corresponding increases in the capacity of the judicial system (which is why you no longer have a right to a speedy arraignment and trial).
2 Likes
@Medievalist @subextraordinaire
I was a teacher. I have, on several occasions, been involved in physical restraint of high school aged students.
I continued to teach without problem after these.
A couple of things allowed that:
- I follow protocols.
- I was properly trained (and had documentation of that training).
- I did so only to prevent physical harm to the student themselves or those around them.
- I did so only with the cooperation of a similarly trained coworker that I also personally trusted.
- I took steps afterwards to carefully (and fully) document the incident.
- I met with the students involved afterward to try to reconnect with them and process.
I really, really don’t like doing that sort of stuff- but there are times when it has to be done, and if that’s the case, I’d rather it be me doing it (because I know I’ll do it by the book and carefully) than some amped up cowboy who’s going to “teach the kid a lesson.”
21 Likes
