No ID, Taser Me

The video first told the story. YouTube made sure everyone quickly saw and heard the story. Then the story was blogged about by the Guardian's Comment is free, Candid cameras (among others):

Could YouTube, the internet, online video and all that malarkey actually make a difference? That is the question police and public must be asking themselves . . . .YouTube is up and running faster than a cop with a primed Taser, and it makes embarrassing viewing for Los Angeles law enforcement in all its guises.

What's the story? As the LAist reports (and has the video):

On Tuesday night around 11pm, Mostafa Tabatabainejad, a UCLA student, was stunned several times with a Taser after he wasn't able to produce his anti-Taser device (his Bruin card) and did not leave the CLICC Lab in Powell Library in a timely manner, the Daily Bruin reports.

Comment is Free describes the incident and its impact:

The latest case involves a young man, a university library and a Taser. Posted on YouTube on Wednesday, the video was shot on a mobile phone. It opens with a shaky moving shot of a computer keyboard and voice in the background shouting "Don't touch me".

Shot at 11.30pm at University of California Los Angeles's Powell Library, the camera wobbles and jinks around as the shouting continues. Bemused students look up from their keyboards as the tumult grows. But this is no everyday incident of restless academia.

Thirty seconds into the clip, the man screams. Another voice tells him to "Get up" as his screams continue.

The camera weaves its way to the action, catching a gaggle of onlookers gathered around the library entrance.

"Here's your Patriot Act. Here's your fucking abuse of power," says the man as the other voice - presumably a University of California Police Department officer - continues to tell him to get up.
"Stop fighting us," says the officer.

"I'm not fighting you," says the man. "I said I was leaving. I got Tasered for no reason. I was leaving this god-forsaken place."

An onlooker asks the officer for his badge number, but receives no response.

Several officers now stand around the man. "Stand up or you'll get Tasered again," they tell him. They haul him to his feet and administer another charge. The man again screams.

And so it goes on. The officers repeatedly Tasering the man, the soundtrack dominated by his screams and the persistent mechanical voice of the police telling him to stand up even as they administer more charges.

As the growing crowd of onlookers gets closer, the officers warn them to stay away or risk being Tasered themselves.

Subsequent enquiries reveal that a community service officer approached the man in the library asking for his student identification. He refused to show it. When the officer returned with campus police the man, according to witnesses, was leaving the library. An officer allegedly grabbed his arm at which point he began saying "Don't touch me."

The man, who was identified as a 23-year-old Iranian-American student named Mostafa Tabatabainejad, was arrested and cited for resisting arrest and obstructing a police officer.

If it weren't for the video this might be another humdrum case of a rowdy student. But the video and the way it is distributed make it far more disturbing. Although the picture is incomplete, it is hard to characterise the officers' actions as reasonable. But much more interesting is that we get to see the video.

I watched the video, which was extremely disturbing. The LA Times, which also reported the story, notes:

"It was beyond grotesque," said UCLA graduate David Remesnitsky of Los Angeles, who witnessed the incident. "By the end they took him over the stairs, lifted him up and Tasered him on his rear end. It seemed like it was inappropriately placed. The Tasering was so unnecessary and they just kept doing it."

Campus police confirmed that Tabatabainejad was stunned "multiple" times.

By then, Remesnitsky said, a crowd of 50 or 60 had gathered and were shouting at the officers to stop and demanding their names and badge numbers.

Remesnitsky said officers told him to leave or he would be Tasered.

I first saw the video on YouTube before I read the news reports and wondered who the young man was (that is, whether he was black, brown or Middle Eastern). In a follow up article, UCLA student stunned by Taser plans suit, the LA Times reports that the student is planning a lawsuit over the incident:

Attorney Stephen Yagman said he plans to file a federal civil rights lawsuit accusing the UCLA police of "brutal excessive force," as well as false arrest. The lawyer also provided the first public account of the Tuesday night incident at UCLA's Powell Library from the student, Mostafa Tabatabainejad, a 23-year-old senior.

He said that Tabatabainejad, when asked for his ID after 11 p.m. Tuesday, declined because he thought he was being singled out because of his Middle Eastern appearance. Yagman said Tabatabainejad is of Iranian descent but is a U.S.-born resident of Los Angeles.

The articles do not mention whether any other students were approached in the library and asked to show ID or whether Tabatabainejad was the only one singled out. Of course, in any event, the manner in which the incident was handled was abhorrent and unwarranted.

The only good news related to this story is that UCLA students protested by staging a major demonstration on campus. According to LAist:

Students descended . . . in droves . . . chanting against excessive force, and the need to police the police. Protest leaders demanded that an independent investigation take place instead of one by the campus authorities, and also that the officers in question be suspended during the investigation.

UPDATE: If this post offends you, please consider signing this petition: Petition to Ban the Use of Taser Guns by UCPD.

UPDATE #2: See also, Americablog's query on who should be subjected to the Taser, Would UCLA have tasered Rosa Parks?

Tags: News, Civil Liberties, Law, Racial Profiling, Racism, Taser