A video put on You Tube showing police beating a suspect has embroiled the LAPD (again) in charges of police brutality — leading to investigations by the LAPD and the FBI:
The FBI and the Los Angeles Police Department are investigating two officers for allegedly beating a man during an arrest last summer that was captured on video and posted on the popular YouTube website.
The video of the Aug. 11 arrest in Hollywood shows an officer sitting on 23-year-old William Cardenas as a second officer places his knee on the man’s neck and punches him six times. Cardenas is lying on his back, waving his arms and yelling, “I can’t breathe!” Cardenas’ attorney, B. Kwaku Duren, said his client was treated at a hospital for black eyes, a split lip and facial bruises.
Police Chief William J. Bratton identified the first officer as Alexander Schlegel and the second officer, who struck Cardenas, as Patrick Farrell.
The chief called the video “disturbing,” but noted it captured only part of the event. Cardenas was charged with resisting officers, and a court commissioner in September found sufficient evidence to try him.
“It is very graphic video,” Bratton said Thursday. “But as to whether the actions of the officers were appropriate in light of what they were experiencing and the totality of the circumstances is what the investigation will determine.”
Bratton added, “It is quite clear while struggling, one of the officers struck the individual in the face … but that is not life-threatening.”
The American Civil Liberties Union denounced the officers’ use of force and said it was particularly troubling that the incident came to light only because of the Internet.
“Californians are entitled to more transparency than a chance video,” said Ramona Ripston, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California. “YouTube is not an acceptable substitute for accountability.”
The LAPD is under a federal consent degree that has since 2001 required it to investigate all allegations of police brutality.
Read the rest of the story for the particulars, but police basically say he ran after being recognized as someone who had an outstanding warrant for receiving stolen property. Officers say he resisted arrest while on the ground and tried to grab one of the officer’s gun belts. They reported using pepper spray and calling for backup. Cardena’s lawyer calls allegations his client was a gang member and resisted arrest were “ridiculous.”
It is totally fabrication that he is gang member or resisted arrest,” Duren said. The attorney said Cardenas was employed as a mover and lives with his daughter, mother and sisters in Hollywood.
Commissioner Ronald Rose, in ordering Cardenas to trial, found that “the response of the officers was more than reasonable under the circumstances.”
Rose acknowledged the video was violent, but said, “The issue here is not whether the officers had to use force. The question is whether or not the defendant used force in resisting the lawful arrest, and I find that he did resist, using force.”
Rose went on, “The obligation of citizens is to stop and allow themselves to be arrested and not use force against the officers. And when a citizen chooses to use force against the officers, they are entitled to use force in return.”
So the stage is set for a massive confrontation between officialdom, the question of what kind of force is allowable and when and the old debate over when police procedures veer into excess. It’ll be a political hornet’s nest for City Hall in LA — and almost certainly spark a big, fat civil lawsuit.
Meanwhile, the controversy sparked by the video is yet another sign of You Tube’s new role as both a news source for Internet surfers, as a mover and shaker in shaping public reactions to videos posted on it, and as a news source for the mainstream media. The AP:
In recent months, videos posted on YouTube have rocked political campaigns, brought fame _ or infamy _ to previously unknown talents and cast unwanted attention on the gaffes of the famous. YouTube and similar video sites are also increasingly becoming repositories for videos that purport to detail wrongdoing by police.
Such amateur clips help cast a spotlight on police wrongdoing that could otherwise go unreported, said Ramona Ripston, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California.
“Unless we throw light onto activities of government, all activities, you never find out what happened,” Ripston said. “This video is an example.”
….As of Friday, the clip had received more than 155,000 views on YouTube. It was posted on Oct. 18.
A search on YouTube for the terms “police brutality” found more than 500 videos, including ones that claim to show police violence in the U.S. and as far away as Egypt and Hungary. A search of Google’s video site also yielded hundreds of videos.
The key question in this instance will be whether it police brutality or just the police doing their job?
Here’s the video:
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.