The latest chapter in Police State America:
I saw about 7 people attacked (before being forced to leave). I saw two of them right in front of me. One was a guy who was walking around with a camcorder stunned at what was happening. A soldier told him to give him the camera now. The raver said no it is my camera. The soldier then proceeded to grab the camera, throw it to the ground and then began beating the kid. In the end they threw him to the ground violently an put their knee into his back while handcuffing him. All for wanting to keep his property. When I last saw him he was knocked out and unmoving.
Another girl next to me said to one of the soldiers that she didn’t know how to get home as they had just arrested her friend. The soldier told her to walk home. My friend tried to grab her to bring her with us, but the soldier began yelling that she had touched him (which she hadn’t). WIthin seconds, five soldiers had jumped on her and were literally beating the crap out of this innocent women. She was punched in the face, thrown to the ground, and kicked while down. All for worrying how to get home safely. She is now suing.
The soldiers proceeded to attack anyone with cameras or camcorders, obviously wanting to restrict the film that got out about it. This was not a legal attack, it was a blatant violation on our rights as American citizens. And the swat, police, politicians who authorized this, and the national guard knew this. That is why they were removing potential evidence.
As usual: “The Utah County Sheriff says he was there when the arrests occurred and that no excessive force was used by any officer.” Perish the thought.
Two laws are required to end this sort of jackboot paramilitary BS. One, police officers should not be permitted to cover their faces and should have named IDs visible at all times. Two, a police officer seizing video or audio recording equipment should be punished by immediate dismissal from the force and a few months in jail. There is no justifiable excuse for such police theft and most of the time, such actions are nothing more than attempting to hide the evidence of police crimes.
So, N.W.A. had it right. And spare me the usual “oh, there are lots of good police” defense. I’m sure there are, but until they lock up the bad ones, how is anyone supposed to know the difference? All we know is that some cretin with a badge and a gun is beating up a defenseless girl or lying about how our car swerved off the road so he can try to take a peek inside. I’ve been told that many police believe it’s an “us or them” world, but they might want to reconsider the wisdom of that approach. There’s a lot more of them, after all.