The PreCrime Unit determined that she would be guilty of resisting arrest so she was preemptively arrested for resisting.
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As background for folks who arenât in Pittsburgh, and relevant to the (reasonable) tone of cynicism about investigations, etc. in some of the comments: this event comes at a tender time for our new mayor, who has done one thing after another to signal a change in both approach and personnel. Sometimes dramatically so. There is currently a nationwide job search for a new chief of police, and the process has included things like the mayor interviewing high school students of various classes and ethnicities about their views on the police and its leadership.
My outsider, uninformed guess is that Mayor Peduto and his staff will be extremely aware of the difficulties of this situation, not only in reality, but in perception.
Should be an interesting one to watch. At the very least, I understand this administration to be listening in a way I havenât seen in local government before.
Pittsburgh announces public forums for new police chief search: http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2014/06/11/Peduto-announces-major-public-input-for-police-chief-search/stories/201406110147
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Fighting or arguing? There is a difference.
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Your information is more detailed than what I read to base my post upon, and the cop comes across as even more an authoritarian scumbag.
Basically, the only âfightâ was what the officer started⌠
Such an exemplar of the police state.
Though it is ugly information, I am grateful for the update.
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Indeed, and Catgrin, above, has corrected the language.
I did read the word âfightâ in an earlier account, but that appears to have been an inaccurate description.
Still, even if an actual fight is in progress, if a police officer chooses to âbreak upâ that fight, by subjecting one of the combatants to a more vigorous beating than they were receiving from the other party to the affray, the cop is in the wrong.
Again, Iâm not hewing to my original words, I accept the account offered by the eyewitnesses.
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PSA: Remember, Happy Mutants, please do not feed the trolls.
Thank you 
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Will try my best. I guess BB has really passed some critical mark, it seems like every post that involves something outside the rightwing Xian mainstream is accompanied by lots of new signups just to troll.
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This cop will cost the city tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands in lawsuits and internal investigations. Yet, he will likely keep his job for no good reason. No matter how you land on the sides of supporting the obvious (this was absurdly over the line no matter what) or not, there must still be some robotic part of people that canât stand the idea of someone getting paid by their tax dollars to assault a girl who will then eat up more of your tax dollars in paying her off and saving his ass. It just makes no sense on any level, yet there are so many goddamn people who would so rather blindly support what is essentially a douchebag high schooler.
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The troll in question has been sorted.
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But why did you assume it was a fight? Thatâs important. Did you not read the account carefully enough before making assumptions?
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I did not assume.
I read early reports, and posted with the most generous assumptions (based on actual words in the article) for the copâs behavior.
I have been a teacher in a rough middle school. I have had to break up way more than my share of fights. While I acknowledge that, as an adult, I had a huge advantage in size and presence, I hope the following description affords some credit to my response.
When I did break up fights, it always followed this pattern:
- Bear hug the combatant nearest me, without impairing their arms.
- Bodily lift them and turn, shielding their body with my own from the other combatant.
- Accept that an adrenaline charged teen/pre-teen wonât necessarily cease combat at my convenience.
- Allow other teachers to help control the situation.
- Ignore random blows that land on my person. Itâs all chaos at this point.
The cop broke every rule I imposed upon myself, but I didnât want to put those actions in his hands based on the first reading(s) I had of the account.
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Most Departments only hire honorably-discharged veterans. Until the very recent repeal of DADT, this effectively banned gay men and women from working as Police Officers.
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In case anyone didnât see the video attached to the Gaily Grind article, it has the full thing. Thereâs no indication whatsoever that Ariel Lawther and Eric Moore (the protester) ever physically touched. Thereâs a few moments where you canât see Ariel or the police officer so the video doesnât help there.
But multiple witnesses say she didnât touch the cop either.
So, unless all the witnesses are lying, this had better turn into an assault and battery charge for the cop along with a few other charges and an early retirement without the retirement fund.
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Ugh. Moore. What an asshole.
When you actually listen to what heâs saying it pretty much directly translates into: âI was bored today. I have nothing better to do than harass people who donât affect me. I want people to feel bad. Everyone should feel bad. I hate everyone. I hate myself.â
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There were a fair number of people cheering on Dorner if I recall correctly. Particularly after the local po-po decided it would be a great idea to shoot up a couple of ladies delivering papers in a truck that looked nothing like DornerâsâŚ
That is assuming that they currently have a significant degree of the above (which pending your locale may be a bit of a stretch). And as others have noted, itâs not that these things are happening, but that they are now easily recorded and distributed for all to see. What previously was easily dismissed as âfriend of a friendâ type information is now available on the internet for everyone to view directly and assess.
Hmm⌠todayâs news may make you want to change the âIraqâ part of that statementâŚ
But yeah, there needs to be a massive cultural shift in the police forces from an âUs vs themâ mentality where youâre either on one side of the blue line or youâre on the other to a more community/collaborative effort. Iâm not even going to get into how much more efficient (and hopefully pleasant) law enforcement could be if the average citizen on the street actually trusted and had the will to assist law enforcement officers.
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You sir, have done a much better job of âpolicingâ than this policeman.
In the veterinary world we have a similar approach/mindset that if you decide to break up a dog/cat fight, expect to get bitten or clawed.
In this case, it sounds like the âfightâ was not so much a fight as it was a verbal altercation, and the cop decided to make it a fight.
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When I read about how it used to be routine for cops to turn a blind eye to crimes against gay men, and even sometimes express satisfaction at deaths, I think about how far weâve come. And then I read something like this and it reminds me how far we still have to go.
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Since when is it OK for a cop to break up an argument by laying hands upon a citizen? It sounds like assault to me and the courts have repeatedly ruled that you have no obligation to follow unlawful orders and that you have a right to defend yourself from police abusing their power.
Yet, the victim of this assault under color of authority has been jailed while the attacker remains free. Despite the fine and flowery words of the mayor, justice has already been denied and the guilty protected so that we may all understand our place in society - a few steps below cops.
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You assumed. It wasnât a fight. It was a verbal interaction. And your comments arenât really relevant to this discussion at hand, about a verbal interaction (which was obvious to me, and I read the same reports you did).
Language matters.
Choosing âfightâ over âargumentâ is very telling.
The full video shows that the cop tossed the girl to the ground. She was on the ground! THEN he picks her up by the hair and starts punching. Even if he was justified by âsafetyâ to separate the girl from the protestor, once she was down the cop has no basis to pick her up and start punching.
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