Tuesday night the UCLA library was anything but a quiet place to study when Mostafa Tabatabainejad, 23 was questioned by a university cop and asked for a student ID card. After a refusal the student was asked to leave the library. That escalated into an arrest situation. The library was filled with other students at the time.Tabatabainejad was eventually zapped by a Taser Gun and began screaming. Other students began screaming too, and it quickly became a scene of chaos and bedlam. Another student captured six minutes of the circus on a cell phone camera.
The video shows no acts of anything more some students trying to hold court on the incident right then and there instead of the courtroom. Tempers were out of control and the cops sounded really officious and loud. Instead of the cops carrying their prisoner out they apparently kept shocking him demanding he get up and walk.
Had Tabatabainejad simply submitted to the arrest and fought for his rights in the courtroom he’d be in a much better position today. Resisting and obstruction of even an unlawful arrest is a crime and now Tabatabainejad is charged with both.
Campus police written response to the Taser controversy
The official Taser use policy at UCLA
Sit back and watch the video…
Comments
What a dope.
You comply with the officer and complain afterwards. It's not like he asked you to rob a bank. All he did was ask for your ID.
Who the phuc do you think you are ?? These guys have sworn to defend you if you are ever getting shot at, robbed, or your a$$ kicked.
And your going to give them a hard time over a simple question ? If you feel that strongly, and really hate the way things work here, too bad. Go somewhere else.
What he needs is a good a$$ kicking from his parents.
If they are not available, I am.
LOLOL
The other issue was the cell phone camera video exploiting the situation. Get the perp out of there before that tape captures something really stupid. Remember those civil case juries are loaded up with cop haters. We’d have never known the name Rodney King but for that video tape.
The john Wayne tough guy shouting by the cops will be called a police temper tantrum in court. Controlled verbal commands using the voice of reason always is a better choice.
There's no question in my mind that the kid was a total jerk and deserved some serious bitch slapping, but please, not on camera! Today everyone has a cell phone camera.
While the use of the taser may not have been illegal, the use of the device to obtain compliance seems slightly overreaching. Given the nature of the instant job, large potentially violent response from growing crowd and that several officers were present, physical force, in the form of dragging, arm-bar would have been better alternative.
A civil jury, assuming a lawsuit will be filed, could find the use of force (taser) excessive. Irony is that then the jerk will be attending a public college for free while having been provided compensation from the public coffers.
Too bad the cops couldn't have just tasered him twice and walked away...he probably would have learned a lesson
God Bless the POLICE !!!!!
We live in a country that has a social contract, we all agree to live by it, part of that contract is that we hire police officers to enforce laws which we all have agreed on. If we don't, we take the chance that we'll be questioned and/or arrested. There are law enforcement people who abuse their power, as their are in every occupation. Obviously, with law enforcement, it is a different type of power abuse and must be dealt with. In this case, on the surface, it appears the student was being uncooperative, arrogant and sadly, potentially dangerous not to just the officers but to others in the room. I know civilians won't understand this: What if he had a gun, what if he had a knife, what if he simply became extremely violent before being subdued and attacked the officers and/or the students. Parents would have filed lawsuits, the negligence of the officers would have come into question, etc. It happens all the time: damned if you do, damned if you don't. He simply should have stood up and supplied his ID. At that point, we were paying the officers to ask for ID, that was there job. If he nothing to worry about, he would have been back at the table and continued on with his work. He created the situation himself. If the officers had anything to hide or felt they were abusing their authority, they would not have done it in front of a large group knowing full well that anyone could be taping it. I believe they responded the way they were trained to and in that situation, had to. It could have easily turned ugly within a few minutes, we've all seen it happen. In that situation, you must try and establish control as soon as possible or it can get out of hand. When officers do that, it appears they are being overly aggresive. Did they go too far? An investigation will reveal that. I say that knowing full well that their are those who will question any investigation as being biased. It's not a perfect world, therefore not a perfect system. It's real simple folks, we asked "them" to ask "us" for our ID, when they do, we should comply, if they're wrong in doing so, we have a million ways to complain and get results. I know I'm being reasonable, but work with me on this... And keep in mind, this is coming from a die hard liberal. The guy brought it on himself.
going through a few of the posts I realized it's new to
me. Nonetheless, I'm definitely pleased I came
across it and I'll be bookmarking it and checking back often!