[DerbyX]

Dayseed Dayseed:

If you think the jay-walking escalation was 4 pages of comment-worthy, then just wait for the absolute shitstorm that the G20 in Toronto will be.

It'll be a team of Confrontation-Junkies hiding behind Legitimate Protestors getting legal advice from Never-Been-To-Law-School Friends versus Big Mean Cops as refereed by News-Hungry Journalists.

Anybody who owns a shop or lives down by the MTCC, hope your insurance is paid up.

Want me to pick you up anything when I go lootin ... er protesting? I plan on protesting near any electronics store or store that sells video games. Perhaps a trendy clothing store if I have time.

[Khar]

In our defense, a page was about what happened in Montreal a while back and a page was on crazily slanted websites, so it's not like we managed a full four pages about cops and jaywalking.

[jason700]

Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:

2Cdo 2Cdo:

Took a look over at Babble and my the tolerance and respect for others over their is amazing. The nicest thing the police officer is called is pig, and some moron is talking about something called a "de-arrest". Apparantly you have the "right" to de-arrest" your friend if you don't agree with them being arrested.

But the first poster in the thread was the most tolerant, who seemed genuinely pissed off that the mob didn't turn on the officer and beat him to death.

A bastion of left-wing tolerance over at Babble.

WTF kind of website is that?

Judging from the posts, the entire forum must be made up of John Howard Society graduates with extreme anger issues who'd like nothing more than to partake in their own form of anarchy, complete with the murdering of authority figures.

I guess these are the same people who keep showing up at the G8 and G20 meetings while claiming to be exercising their right to free speech.

I would assume that most of the people on that site never graduated from anything. I mean "de-arrest"? Really?

[EyeBrock]

Ok, I’ve read some of the comments on here and a few are quite disappointing.
We should remember that this was a US police officer using a level of force that would not be recommended or be supported in any Canadian jurisdiction. The referred to Montreal incident was Montreal Transit Police aka barely trained security guards.

I’ll have that it was a video of a small portion of the event but using a closed hand technique, i.e. punching somebody with a closed fist for an original offence that would be a provincial offence in Ontario, is not showing good tactical communications or judgement.

We are taught another use-of-force option, dis-engage until back-up arrives.

A lone cop surrounded by belligerent people and arresting a young female with her friends for a very minor offence is a dangerous situation. Punching another female after a minor assault ( a push) is never going to look good.

Was the force used necessary? It doesn’t look like it was.

Was the force used reasonable? It doesn’t appear so.

Was the use of force authorised? Barely, the officer escalated the situation to a point where the use of force was highly likely.

This was a very minor offence that now reflects badly on the Seattle Police. It also provides fodder for the cop-haters in Canada, despite it happening in another country.

As my old Sergeant in Manchester said “Any minor offence can be turned into a breach of the peace if handled correctly.”
It looks like this Seattle cop got the breach of the peace he was looking for.

I predict a short career path for him.

[Khar]

$1:

The referred to Montreal incident was Montreal Transit Police aka barely trained security guards.

Laval police officer, ie trained officer of the law, not part of the transit policing force as employed by the Montreal transit system, from what I remember reading in those articles. In no article supplied in this thread does it say the officer was anything other than an officer of the Laval Police Department.

As with before, not really arguing, just bugging about keeping the details right.

[EyeBrock]

I always thought they were some kind of transit cop like we have in Ontario. Them being actual constables makes that incident look even worse.

I stand corrected Khar. And as usual you have very pertinent input into the threads I've seen you post on. Good stuff!

That aside, several witnesses came forward to say how rude and belligerent this chick became when she was stopped. It looks like she talked herself into a very silly ticket then refused to identify herself.

When you commit a bullshit by-law or provincial offence in Canada (save for a couple of motoring/licence/insurance offences), you can't be arrested for it.

However, you can be arrested for failing to identify yourself for the service of a fine or a summons. As in 'prove your identity so you can pay this fine or be summonsed to court.'

The media span this whole thing into a civil liberties thing because fuck-all else interesting was going on.

This chick may have been breaking a stupid by-law, but when approached by police, she kicked off at them and once informed that she would be charged for the stupid by-law offence, refused to give them i.d.

The arrest, although optically crappy, was lawful and reasonable given the offender's behaviour.

It sounds, from some the media reported witness statements, people were getting alarmed by the offender's shouting. That's Crim Code 'Cause distrurbance'. That charge looks like it would have had merit in a criminal court.

[Public_Domain]

[EyeBrock]

But why will they throw rocks at our cops? Tell me why?

[ShepherdsDog]

Because you're all a bunch of jack booted fascists who only want to oppress the 'people' and their right to forment chaos and engage in looting and vandalism....you're likely a Christian and a conservative too....wait a sec I called you a fascist, so that already covers the Christian and conservative parts.

[Thanos]

Anyone who'd throw a rock at a Canadian cop is a 100% d-bag anyway.

[Pseudonym]

Benn Benn:

This is getting off topic of course but..

I would not even say hard line but I agree with the fact that I like that other spectrum of thought are allowed their voice and not trounced for it here.

If you want hard line and even extremist the country has Freedominion. I was one of the first 10 members there and watched it go from a place of good ideas and debate to a lot of angry people. I stopped posting there years ago and got to the point I couldn't even read most of the stuff anymore. Looked around awhile and found CKA thankfully.

Maybe this is a good topic for a new thread though.

Maybe we should thank the mods, as well as one another, for generally keeping it civil.

Also, from what I see, I can understand why the officer might have responded as he did, but it looks to me like an disproportionate response. I wasn't there and can't read what was going through his head, but I would have recommended taking a deep breath and backing up first. It's a shame that what should have been a stern reminder about safety and following the law escalated to a physical confrontation.

[stokes]

I watched the video a few times and if you look these girls were the same height and taller than the officer, take training into account and various other things but I think it comes down to the officer suffering from small man syndrome and that he absolutely escalated the situation.

On the other hand these young ladies should also have respect for the authority of law and not assume they can just walk a way from an authority figure who is initially in the right.

[themasta]

Personally, I'm impressed at how professionally the officer conducted himself given the obvious difficulties of the situation. As a member of law enforcement, I know first-hand how much a pain-in-the-ass people can be, especially with a crowd chipping in their two cents and the fact that race (and gender) are /always/ an issue. I hope this officer receives a commendation for his behaviour, though I know political correctness won't allow that to be the case.

[ShepherdsDog]

stokes stokes:

I watched the video a few times and if you look these girls were the same height and taller than the officer, take training into account and various other things but I think it comes down to the officer suffering from small man syndrome and that he absolutely escalated the situation.

On the other hand these young ladies should also have respect for the authority of law and not assume they can just walk a way from an authority figure who is initially in the right.

You're really stretching the term 'ladies'.

[EyeBrock]

The masta,

Give me a break.

He handled the situation badly. There were many better options and this was just bad all around.

Come on. Punching her? It looks awful. A shove could have achieved the same objective in gaining distance.