Pepper-Spray by a Cruel and Cowardly NYC Cop

[Unkotare]

Expect more of this. What's happening on Wall Street right now is only the beginning.

The beginning of what, drama queen?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

What's the big 'shock' here? They were probably told about a dozen times to move over so that barricade could be put in place. They didn't move and so were made to move through non-lethal means. Did these airheads imagine that they would 'occupy' part of the city (as pathetic as the attempt turned out to be) and receive hot chocolate and back rubs from the law enforcement officers there to protect ALL the people and maintain some degree of order? Just think, if that kid had stayed home she would have missed out on her dramatic crying in the streets moment. She'll be living off that story for years.

Those ladies were being DETAINED.

Did you not notice that they were being held in a holding area and surrounded by cops?

They were not.

The mesh was being deployed to keep people from blocking the street. did you not notice them calmly asking the officer where he wanted them to go?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

You can't just shut down traffic and pedestrians.
It's against the law.
Then when Police tried to pen them, to keep them on the side walks, they got violent.


Occupy Wall Street demonstrations shut down NYC streets - YouTube

Somebody got violent, but the two women who got sprayed in the OP video were on the sidewalk and being peaceful. NYPD policy says that pepper spray can only be used to subdue someone resisting arrest. Did you see them resisting arrest?

 

[Sallow]

You can't just shut down traffic and pedestrians.
It's against the law.
Then when Police tried to pen them, to keep them on the side walks, they got violent.


Occupy Wall Street demonstrations shut down NYC streets - YouTube

You ever been down there?

The NYSE effectively militarized the whole zone. You can't really get anywhere close to area. There are barriers everywhere.

That's all paid for by tax payers.

Damn right they can protest.

 

[editec]

What's the big 'shock' here? They were probably told about a dozen times to move over so that barricade could be put in place. They didn't move and so were made to move through non-lethal means. Did these airheads imagine that they would 'occupy' part of the city (as pathetic as the attempt turned out to be) and receive hot chocolate and back rubs from the law enforcement officers there to protect ALL the people and maintain some degree of order? Just think, if that kid had stayed home she would have missed out on her dramatic crying in the streets moment. She'll be living off that story for years.

Those ladies were being DETAINED.

Did you not notice that they were being held in a holding area and surrounded by cops?

They were not.

The mesh was being deployed to keep people from blocking the street. did you not notice them calmly asking the officer where he wanted them to go?

Possibly you are right. The fact that that orange mesh completely surrounded them and cops stood outside it, lead me to believe that they were in some kind of custody.

Okay they weren't in police hands. apparently they'd done nothing whatever to warrant detention.

So why the pepper spray?

What motivated that fat pig of a man to spray that women in the face and then run away like the cowardly pig piece of shit he obviously is?

Now if this criminal in uniform doesn't get caught, that's another and even worse problem, since there is no doubt whatever that his brothers in blue will know exactly who he is.

Can't wait to see if the NYPD does the right thing and hauls this puke off to prison for assualt.

AND THEN?

Then let the civil suit AGAINST HIM commence.

I hope she ends up owning his house.

 

[Unkotare]

This thread has gone full-on emo.

 

[Harry Dresden]

Boo hoo hoo, protestors breaking the law got maced, maybe next time we should just shoot them.

they were.....they were standing behind a fucking Barricade....your as about as brave as that fucking Cop....has anyone called you a Dick lately?.....

 

[George Costanza]

What's the big 'shock' here? They were probably told about a dozen times to move over so that barricade could be put in place. They didn't move and so were made to move through non-lethal means. Did these airheads imagine that they would 'occupy' part of the city (as pathetic as the attempt turned out to be) and receive hot chocolate and back rubs from the law enforcement officers there to protect ALL the people and maintain some degree of order? Just think, if that kid had stayed home she would have missed out on her dramatic crying in the streets moment. She'll be living off that story for years.

Those ladies were being DETAINED.

Did you not notice that they were being held in a holding area and surrounded by cops?

I am kind of curious as to the circumstances leading up to this. Obviouisly, the cops were trying to control a crowd. I am not sure what the red barricade was for or why the people were gathered behind it.

I would like to know more before making a judgment. My initial reaction is to not get too excited about this. It looks as though the crowd was not responding to what the police wanted them to do. If what the cops wanted them to do was reasonable, then maybe pepper spraying them when they refused to do it was not so unreasonable.

Sound reasonable?

 

[Harry Dresden]

You can't just shut down traffic and pedestrians.
It's against the law.
Then when Police tried to pen them, to keep them on the side walks, they got violent.


Occupy Wall Street demonstrations shut down NYC streets - YouTube

thats a different group of people Peach.....what does that video have to do with the video in question?

 

[Oldstyle]

As usual you've got people taking a short clip of protesters being "assaulted" by the police without showing the confrontations that went on before pepper spray was used. The police were trying to keep protesters from blocking the street, forcing them back and then arresting them if they persisted. Things were getting more and more confrontational and one of the cops pulled his pepper spray and used it to disperse the crowd. Cry me a river....

Watch the longer video to get a better idea of the scene.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/27/occupy-wall-street-reconstruct-pepper-spray

 

[Oldstyle]

Boo hoo hoo, protestors breaking the law got maced, maybe next time we should just shoot them.

they were.....they were standing behind a fucking Barricade....your as about as brave as that fucking Cop....has anyone called you a Dick lately?.....

They were part of a crowd that was repeatedly darting out from behind the barricade and trying to block the street. The situation was getting more and more out of hand. The pepper spray got things back under control. Sorry, Harry...I just don't see this as cowardly...it's just somebody doing their job. I suppose the cops could have let things escalate to the point where they had to swing night sticks...would that have made you happier?

 

[MikeK]

What comes of this issue depends entirely on the level and continuity of publicity. So far the only publicity I've seen was on MSNBC's The Last Word, with Lawrence O'Donnell. He devoted a full ten minutes to it with a lot of very explicit video. If it was covered elsewhere it must have been very brief and superficial because I tune across the news channels and I didn't see anything on that issue. But based on what I saw in the video some (not all) of the police were overly aggressive.

What stands out about the situation is police brass up to the level of Deputy Inspector (four promotional ranks up) appeared to initiate the excessively aggressive behavior, which is highly unusual. What it suggests to me is some Wall Streeter annoyed by the protest complained to NYC Mayor Bloomberg, a multi-billionaire and member of the financial aristocracy, who told the Police Commissioner to do something about it and we've seen who the police protect and serve when we protest against Wall Street.

The bottom line is if the Press doesn't keep the issue alive it will quickly die. And because the financial aristocracy includes the corporate CEOs of the broadcast industry I don't expect to see or hear much more about it.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

What's the big 'shock' here? They were probably told about a dozen times to move over so that barricade could be put in place. They didn't move and so were made to move through non-lethal means. Did these airheads imagine that they would 'occupy' part of the city (as pathetic as the attempt turned out to be) and receive hot chocolate and back rubs from the law enforcement officers there to protect ALL the people and maintain some degree of order? Just think, if that kid had stayed home she would have missed out on her dramatic crying in the streets moment. She'll be living off that story for years.

Those ladies were being DETAINED.

Did you not notice that they were being held in a holding area and surrounded by cops?

I am kind of curious as to the circumstances leading up to this. Obviouisly, the cops were trying to control a crowd. I am not sure what the red barricade was for or why the people were gathered behind it.

I would like to know more before making a judgment. My initial reaction is to not get too excited about this. It looks as though the crowd was not responding to what the police wanted them to do. If what the cops wanted them to do was reasonable, then maybe pepper spraying them when they refused to do it was not so unreasonable.

Sound reasonable?

It sounds reasonable.

This is the official NYPD version of the story.

The Police Department’s chief spokesman, Paul J. Browne, said the police had used the pepper spray “appropriately.”

“Pepper spray was used once,” he added, “after individuals confronted officers and tried to prevent them from deploying a mesh barrier — something that was edited out or otherwise not captured in the video.”

Here are a few more videos of what happened.

Simultaneous perspectives on "Occupy Wall Street" kettling and pepper spray / mace incident - YouTube

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jJyUCK0OhE]Occupy Wall Street - Police Aggression - YouTube[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD5z4x5tH1o]Occupy Wall Street September 24 - YouTube[/ame]

Doesn't seem so reasonable when you get a better view.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

As usual you've got people taking a short clip of protesters being "assaulted" by the police without showing the confrontations that went on before pepper spray was used. The police were trying to keep protesters from blocking the street, forcing them back and then arresting them if they persisted. Things were getting more and more confrontational and one of the cops pulled his pepper spray and used it to disperse the crowd. Cry me a river....

Watch the longer video to get a better idea of the scene.
Occupy Wall Street: help us reconstruct the 'pepper spray' incident | World news | guardian.co.uk

As usual, some people support the police no matter what.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Boo hoo hoo, protestors breaking the law got maced, maybe next time we should just shoot them.

they were.....they were standing behind a fucking Barricade....your as about as brave as that fucking Cop....has anyone called you a Dick lately?.....

They were part of a crowd that was repeatedly darting out from behind the barricade and trying to block the street. The situation was getting more and more out of hand. The pepper spray got things back under control. Sorry, Harry...I just don't see this as cowardly...it's just somebody doing their job. I suppose the cops could have let things escalate to the point where they had to swing night sticks...would that have made you happier?

They were not part of any crowd that was doing that.

The officer that pepper sprayed them walked up from some distance away, and had the spray in his hand before he even got there. He then sprayed without any warning at all, and actually violated NYPD guidelines that say pepper spray should only be used to on a suspect who is resisting arrest. That last part means that, even if your absurd version of the events was true, he was wrong because they were not resisting arrest.

 

[The Gadfly]

Boo hoo hoo, protestors breaking the law got maced, maybe next time we should just shoot them.

they were.....they were standing behind a fucking Barricade....your as about as brave as that fucking Cop....has anyone called you a Dick lately?.....

They were part of a crowd that was repeatedly darting out from behind the barricade and trying to block the street. The situation was getting more and more out of hand. The pepper spray got things back under control. Sorry, Harry...I just don't see this as cowardly...it's just somebody doing their job. I suppose the cops could have let things escalate to the point where they had to swing night sticks...would that have made you happier?

I don't see enough here to know what the full context was; I can't tell if the police had full control of these people or not. Maybe the use of pepper spray was justified, maybe not; but that's pretty far down the force continuum (far below swinging a riot baton), and before any of you say anything, yes, I know what pepper spray (and CS gas) feels like. It doesn't feel good, but I've yet to see it do any real damage to anyone. I can't say that for a baton, even when properly used.

 

[MikeK]

They were part of a crowd that was repeatedly darting out from behind the barricade and trying to block the street. The situation was getting more and more out of hand. The pepper spray got things back under control. Sorry, Harry...I just don't see this as cowardly...it's just somebody doing their job. I suppose the cops could have let things escalate to the point where they had to swing night sticks...would that have made you happier?

I don't know what you saw but I saw quite a bit of footage on Lawrence O'Donnell's program, none of which showed anyone doing anything that called for the kind of behavior exhibited by some of those cops. What I saw were a few cops, including brass, using excessive force against several passive individuals. I didn't see anything which actually appeared to be disorderly or even uncooperative.

For several years prior to the Rodney King incident in California LAPD's Chief, Daryl Gates, responded to charges of excessive force by referring to his cops' sometimes brutal behavior as preventive aggression, a euphemistic snow job he got away with several times. But the problem with that kind of expedient vindication is it imparted a sense of omnipotence and immunity to his cops, some of whom eventually thought it was okay to publicly administer some preventive aggression to Rodney King.

 

[CMike]

Wall Street protesters cuffed, pepper-sprayed during 'inequality' march

Scores of protesters were arrested in Manhattan Saturday as a march against social inequality turned violent.

Hundreds of people carrying banners and chanting "shame, shame" walked between Zuccotti Park, near Wall St., and Union Square calling for changes to a financial system they say unjustly benefits the rich and harms the poor.

At least 80 people were carted away in police vehicles and up to five were hit with pepper spray near 12th St. and Fifth Ave., where tensions became especially high, police and organizers said.

...Police said 80 protesters were arrested or ticketed at multiple locations for disorderly conduct, blocking traffic and failure to obey a lawful order but the number could rise.

Officials said protesters did not have a permit for the march and one demonstrator was charged with assaulting a police officer, causing a shoulder injury. The NYPD was investigating the use of pepper spray.

 

[Oldstyle]

they were.....they were standing behind a fucking Barricade....your as about as brave as that fucking Cop....has anyone called you a Dick lately?.....

They were part of a crowd that was repeatedly darting out from behind the barricade and trying to block the street. The situation was getting more and more out of hand. The pepper spray got things back under control. Sorry, Harry...I just don't see this as cowardly...it's just somebody doing their job. I suppose the cops could have let things escalate to the point where they had to swing night sticks...would that have made you happier?

They were not part of any crowd that was doing that.

The officer that pepper sprayed them walked up from some distance away, and had the spray in his hand before he even got there. He then sprayed without any warning at all, and actually violated NYPD guidelines that say pepper spray should only be used to on a suspect who is resisting arrest. That last part means that, even if your absurd version of the events was true, he was wrong because they were not resisting arrest.

If you listen to the video clips you can quite clearly identify that group of women screaming at the police as they try to get past the barriers that have been erected after the crowd had already broken through previous barriers. The fat girl who was yelling that the police were fascists repeatedly tried to break through the next barrier and was in the process of being arrested and the three girls who got pepper sprayed were screaming at the police for that. Bottom line is this...if people remained behind the barriers they were left alone. If they tried to break through the police lines they were arrested. As for where the officer came from? They were moving up and down the line trying to keep it intact. The protesters were trying to break through. The officer obviously thought the situation with those women screaming bloody murder was getting out of hand and he used his pepper spray. Sorry but I don't blame the police for what happened. They were there to do a job. The protesters were there to shut down Wall Street. Does anyone here think that protest wouldn't have continued on and gotten worse if the police backed down? I find you rather naive if you do.

 

[Oldstyle]

They were part of a crowd that was repeatedly darting out from behind the barricade and trying to block the street. The situation was getting more and more out of hand. The pepper spray got things back under control. Sorry, Harry...I just don't see this as cowardly...it's just somebody doing their job. I suppose the cops could have let things escalate to the point where they had to swing night sticks...would that have made you happier?

I don't know what you saw but I saw quite a bit of footage on Lawrence O'Donnell's program, none of which showed anyone doing anything that called for the kind of behavior exhibited by some of those cops. What I saw were a few cops, including brass, using excessive force against several passive individuals. I didn't see anything which actually appeared to be disorderly or even uncooperative.

For several years prior to the Rodney King incident in California LAPD's Chief, Daryl Gates, responded to charges of excessive force by referring to his cops' sometimes brutal behavior as preventive aggression, a euphemistic snow job he got away with several times. But the problem with that kind of expedient vindication is it imparted a sense of omnipotence and immunity to his cops, some of whom eventually thought it was okay to publicly administer some preventive aggression to Rodney King.

Gee, Mike...you watched the edited clips on MSNBC and thought you were getting an unbiased account of what actually happened? Are you REALLY that naive?