WARNING: Not for the squeamish. This is a human being in terrific pain.
In an effort to show you that it isn't only us that pay vile thugs in uniform, take a look at this video, courtesy of our Antipodean pal. You should read his take on it too. I am not even going to try to emulate him.
I spent some time in Western Australia in the late nineties. Perth, to be exact. I do not even recall seeing a copper, let alone having any bother with one. I did have a fight, and I mean a real toe-to-toe punch up, with a kangaroo at Fremantle Zoo, but that is a story for another day.
If you ever have the misfortune to get zapped by one of these freaks in uniform, comfort yourself with the fact that you are paying his fucking wages.
"Serve and protect" my arse.
It is becoming increasingly clear to me that these savages only wear a uniform to veil their sadistic tendencies. They imagine that they are above the law. They aren't. They imagine they have more "powers" than you. They don't.
And please, don't be telling me that these situations are rare.
They aren't. Not anymore.
They have no problem treating us all like criminals. We should have no qualms treating them all like vicious, bullying, mentally unstable thugs. When they stop tasing us, we will start trusting them again.
Over a thousand deaths here in the UK in police custody over the last ten years and not one single copper charged.
How many of you still think that there is no such thing as a death penalty in the United Kingdom?
Think again.
CR.
I didn't know whether to scream or cry.
ReplyDeleteMy first thought was why is it taking so many of them to subdue a seated and cowed man? Then I realised, they were enjoying it. Free entertainment, kicks for all, an ego boosting power trip. Such utter scum.
"Police said he had previously been convicted of a number of offences including assaulting police officers, resisting arrest and common assault."
So he was probably stopped for some minor misdemeanour, said no, thereby "resisted" arrest and tried to defend himself from these thugs who subsequently fit him up with these charges.
Pity the poor lawyer who was publicly executed in London recently, it took 51 of the mets finest, all armed, to deal with one pissed and upset individual.
They are state enforcers, revelling in the shaven headed machismo para-military uniform legalised thuggery that they are now deploying against us.
I now the police have a job to do, trouble is they've forgotten what it is.
Thanks for the link Captain, nice to know we've got like minded sorts down under!
It's time we got shut of these horrible weapons. They're just turning into convenient torture devices.
ReplyDeleteStraying from the topic, I'll have to ask, did you win the fight with the kangaroo? They are supposed to be excellent boxers.
1000 deaths in custody? Is that just in police cells or does that include prison, because it would be misleading to attribute prison deaths to the cops.
ReplyDeleteAnd for fucks sake what is it about the drunk madman with his shotgun that appeals to you all so much? Does buckshot become benign if its a middle class guy firing it at you?
Fireball,
ReplyDeleteIt messed me up too.
I just cringed. That poor man.
And, I know some will say we don't know the whole story but the eye sees what the eye sees: NINE fully grown men attacking a defenceless man on their home turf.
A nasty, nasty business.
CR.
My own experiences have taught me the true nature of the police. I was once a respectable businessman, but all that was stolen from me. The police are vicious, corrupt liars. There are no exceptions; there is only variation in degree.
ReplyDeleteThe day is sometime off, but I can see an event that will end in the police, or their families, being specifically targeted in a revenge action. For example, police surrounded and attacked during a demonstration.
It is a horrid thing to say, but I would delight in seeing the heads of policemen being on pikes and rows of bodies of dead policemen.
A decade ago I would never have believed I would say or think that.
Bucko,
ReplyDeleteIf it wasn't tasers it would be something else. I am starting to feel that I should go about armed. Not to defend myself from criminals, but from the boys in blue serge.
The kangaroo thing?
I'd have to say it was a draw. He got a few good punches in but I didn't hold back either. The zoo keeper broke us up.
CR.
Kitler,
ReplyDeleteIt's around 1100 deaths in police custody in the last nine years. I have a link somewhere. I'll dig it out. I have no idea how many die in gaol. (Never prisons: prisons can only be found on ships).
The lawyer?
I watched it (the footage) on Sky news when I was in Ghana. The ending was inevitable. They may have made a few mistakes in the handling but, if I were them I'd have shot the bugger as well.
CR.
FTAC,
ReplyDeleteI agree. I think a decade ago we weren't doing too badly.
It's the new recruits. I have it on good authority that they are trained using NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming, for the unknowing) and that any empathy they may once have felt for humans is switched off in certain situations.
Seemingly, those "certain situations" now last for the whole duration of their shift.
CR.
Captain, you're right. They give the game away when they call us "civilians". They ARE civilians, or supposed to be. If they go on duty with a "them and us" attitude, it's probably because they're dressed as Robocop, and armed with machine-guns. Empathy is difficult when it's a two-way street.
ReplyDeleteBye bye PC Friendly, hello Judge Dredd.
"And for fucks sake what is it about the drunk madman with his shotgun that appeals to you all so much? Does buckshot become benign if its a middle class guy firing it at you?"
ReplyDeleteA shotgun is a short range weapon, from where he was there was no-one in range of him, even if he'd fired it from the window he wouldn't have harmed anyone. The cops were fully armoured up and in possession of high powered accurate weaponry as well as supposedly trained negotiators.
The lawyer wasn't exactly in the Raul Moat category and the situation could have been resolved without loss of life. They have form - remember the bloke who was shot dead carrying a table leg?
Nothing to do with him being middle class, mind if he'd been a banker I might be thinking differently ...
This situation immediately brought back the police tasering the drunk in the streets of Nottingham, nearly getting the public about to beat their heads in.
ReplyDeleteCR, the is torture and they are enjoying it. There's only one punishment for these bastards and that's the same back.
Having worked in restraint techniques (doorman for a considerable time) you have to be able to subdue people quickly and get them out of the nightclub fast as. There are no tasers, batons, handcuffs or CS gases to use. Worse still there are now many areas upon a human you cannot touch, for if you do it will be the end of your door license that cost you £350 or so. I could easily disable and put someone in a lock within a second, regardless of size.
It fucking sickens me, that these cunts (excuse the language but this really incenses me) are policemen when they are torturing this young man, who could easily be put in a lock. They don't realise it but the pigs are merely tallying up the crimes against them with the public until one day boom, it kicks off and police find themselves, hugely outnumbered by the public, who will advance upon them and give them no quarter whatsoever.
Were we to have any PM with balls, they'd remove all the tools police have at their protection, apart from keeping their truncheon and handcuffs and train them in martial arts to subdue people, who should need it done.
The police are digging a huge hole for themselves and really, its coming the time now that I really don't think I'd go to the aid of a policman in trouble with the public. I would stand, probably film it and laugh I have to say. Callous? Vindictive? One may say so, but I just can't help but think of the many police murders/brutalities and no convictions.
I've lost complete faith in them and the only way public confidence can be restored is to remove all the above officers from their jobs forthwith, with no trial. They don't deserve it, that is unless the victim wished to sue for damages.
Raoul Moat was killed by a shot-gun at close range, fired by the police. The gun was adapted to shoot a self-contained electrical stun projectile, manufactured by the Taser company. It was designed to be used at a distance, but it behaves like any solid projectile when fired at close range into someone's skull. Well done, Dibble. They should have called for a Vet, they tranquillise escaped lions with more success than Plod has when he's dealing with human beings.
ReplyDeleteH,
ReplyDeleteI have mixed feelings on arming the police. Batons may have worked 30/40 years ago but they are ineffective in a place like Moss Side where the bad lads pack Uzi's and MP-5's. And that's just for popping to the Spar for a pint of milk. When they are out and about doing their "thing", they tool up properly.
The police, if they ever dared go in there (they don't, it's a no-go area), would need to be suitably tooled up.
Now, if we were ALL to get guns, then that would be fine. I'm jiggy wid dat.
An armed society is a polite society.
Crime rates plummet when everyone in the neighbourhood has protection.
"Gimme your fucking wallet!"
"Let's just ask Mr Glock what he thinks, shall we?".
I have a white paper on the subject. It's full of facts and figures. No idea how to share it with you lot though.
CR.
Richard,
ReplyDeleteI am still amazed that they plugged that mad fucker.
Remember that story from a couple of weeks back? Took about twenty of them and a thousand rounds to shoot a runaway horse. Poor bastard looked like a sieve before it keeled over. I think it died from infection, not from bullet wounds received.
Seems to me the only people they can hit, first time every time, are the bloody innocent. Like the chair leg guy mentioned above.
CR.
This is in the MSM now, one bloke tazered to death in Oz.
ReplyDeleteDidn't realise the bloke in your vid Capt. was mentally disturbed, makes it even more reprehensible.
Thanks for the link, Cap'n. And yes, that is some of the most disturbing shit I've seen on the interwebs. The initial clip I saw on the newspaper's website had no sound and wasn't nearly so bad, and it makes me wonder about those muted sections here and there in this clip. Maybe there was some swearing that the ABC felt a bit on the strong side for broadcasting, though why the fuck they'd think that's worse than a man lying in a twitching heap on the floor screaming over and over again as electricity courses through him I have no idea. But maybe the screaming is particularly bad at that point. I'm in two minds as to whether to contact the ABC and ask because frankly I'm in no hurry to watch and listen to that again anyway, and if it's even worse screaming I'm not sure I want to hear it.
ReplyDeletePS, any chance you could change the link to http://angryexile.blogspot.com/2010/10/tourist-advice-for-travellers-to.html as I'm about to put another post up and push the taser one off of the top.
ReplyDeleteCheers, AE.
AE,
ReplyDeleteTo hear is to obey.
Tis done.
CR.
PS-I don't want to hear another poor bastard screaming like that ever again. It was horrible.
Tend to agree with Harbinger (but then, as another ex-doorman, perhaps I would).
ReplyDeleteThe only note of caution I would sound is training the fucking idiots in the police in martial arts. A true Martial Art is about defence - you learn a technique against an attack, you do not initiate an attack. I can just imagine a gym full of shaven-headed fuckwits being taught to initiate some painful locks, holds and striking techniques by a more proficient shaven-headed fuckwit at the front.
It's about power. Give a wise man power and he will let it fall. Give a weak man power and as sure as eggs is eggs he will have to play with it.
Christ I detest bullies....
Saw guy put ib poLICE van.
ReplyDeleteVan zoomed off fast.
Brakes slammed on.
Result one poor guy bashed head against van wall.
Cheers, CR. And no, I don't much want to hear that again either. There's worse screaming in movies but you always know that it's acting. This wasn't particularly blood curdling or anything, but because we know it's real screaming by a real person in real fucking pain it becomes very hard watching. You'd need a heart of fucking stone not to empathise with the poor bugger. Presumably the cops get theirs issued with their guns, cuffs and tasers at the start of each shift.
ReplyDeleteCaptain,
ReplyDeleteI'm a regular reader of your blog and agree with you 90%+ of the time.
But in this case I'm going to dissent. The fellow tasered (from many credible accounts - including his family) has an extensive criminal record for violent crime.
You have to work in and know, the Perth CBD to formulate an understanding of just how bad our urban Aboriginals are (and for that matter - the low-lifes of the Anglo, Middle Eastern, African and Asian communities). Inner-Perth has a terrible reputation for violent drug, alcohol and gang-oriented violence.
Regrettably, urban Aboriginals have a well-known reputation for more personal violence, but are massively protected by the legal system and dedicated social and justice services.
There are certain urban Aboriginal family names that crop up on an almost daily basis in media reports and court proceedings concerning violent criminality. Some of the younger ones have criminal records in the hundreds without ever having served time.
I do not condone police brutality, but to work in a pressure cooker environment of dealing with a violent, lawless and nearly untouchable criminal underclass is going to have some unintended and unfortunate consequences.
I know people in the the WA Police - and I know that the choice between getting your teeth kicked in and the perp getting a suspended sentence, or the over zealous use of a taser is not a hard one to make.
Pundit,
ReplyDeleteGood to have you as a regular reader. Even better to read your thoughts.
I like everything you wrote but I am struggling with this line:
"The fellow tasered (from many credible accounts - including his family) has an extensive criminal record for violent crime."
I have watched the video a couple of times. (Only once with the sound on). Try as I might, I simply cannot see the guy presenting a threat at any time. His history is redundant in this film. The law says that policemen (actually, anyone) can defend themselves if attacked/assaulted. Chappy on the bench offered no such threat before the tasing began, nor at any other time during his ordeal. (He was incapable).
I know that we do not have all the facts. But what we see in the video (unless it has been doctored) is blatantly obvious: laddie was getting a kicking whatever happened. And, he did.
CR.
Bugger!
ReplyDeleteI missed that Snakey. I have changed it to sadistic.
Your last paragraph is spot on.
In whose world is nine against one fair?
(Apart from the rozzers, that is).
CR.
Hello again Captain,
ReplyDeleteGood to be on board!
Yes, I have to concede from the available video evidence, that he appears to be not threatening at the time - but simply belligerent. It also deserves note however that 'Mr Spratt' had, just prior to the incident, punched-out a police officer. Further to that he was again arrested a week later on another charge and actually placed in prison. In that instance, he became violent in his cell and after attempts by 6 prison guards to subdue him, required tasering 11 times to get him under control.
But all that said, it's going to be a hard one to call as the events occurred 2 years ago and came to light only as a complaint to the Anti-Corruption Commission.
As I observe from the comments on the topic so far, and your observations from Perth in the 90's, the modern police officer has evolved in some ways unsatisfactorily from the beat cops of old. At the same time, the law has evolved unsatisfactorily from that of days gone - where the disincentives to criminality occurred well before the police became involved.
I think there's no doubt that the modern police officer is not always up to the job - it's plain to see in this city that the 6-foot-plus burly plod has been, in large part, replaced by diminutive women and some men, who's policing credentials start with what is almost an undergraduate's degree in policing theory. No wonder then that tasers are viewed as a convenient 'arms length' tool of detention without the psychological barrier of lethality (usually).
Notwithstanding, the policing job is a hard one and hardly satisfying when up against a legal system that persecutes minor infringers, whilst being lenient on the truly criminal. On that, Western Australia's draconian anti-smoking laws are a case in-point. The fines for such evils as smoking within 10 metres of a playground are truly jaw-dropping.
Pundit, to expand on the Captain's point, this is not an issue over whether or not they sometimes need tasers to bring someone in (although even that is speculative without a comparison of arrest rates before and after issuing tasers) but an issue over whether the taser should be used as a cattle prod for human beings. They outnumbered him 9 to 1, so even assuming the initial tasering was justified that leaves 8 left over, or two per limb. And since he was doing nothing worse than sitting there refusing to let go of the bench I'd say it's far from clear that the original tasering was justifed. That he was tasered again and again and again makes it seem awfully like the police were just using the taser as a means of inflicting pain until he obeyed their instructions. I don't care about his criminal record, I don't care if he'd rogered the Commissioner, this is uncomfortably close to the use of electroshock devices in some of the world's shittier regimes. I'm not saying the cops actually intended it as a torture session (I'm sure they just wanted to get him locked up) but the practice of shocking a suspect into compliance is not on.
ReplyDeleteThe thought occurs to me that I'd be a lot happier about police taser use if what I'm coming to think of as the cattle prod function was removed. If it was a one or two shot device that really had little or no scope for use as a cattle prod on prisoners already held in the cop shop I'd be fine with it being used as a less lethal device to make arrests.
For comparison this incident caused some controversy because the Nottingham police tasered a guy three times, but initially there were only two cops and the guy was fighty - they felt the taser necessary to make the arrest. Maybe that's debatable but I'm not going to second guess them. So if two, later four, cops only need to taser a violent drunk three times to nick him how come nine cops need to taser a passive (albeit previously violent) and already arrested prisoner 13 times?
ReplyDeleteOf course, for all we know the guy in Nottingham got a few shocks to the bollocks once he was away from the cameras. ;-)
Hi Angry,
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree with you more. However I've been trying to apply a contextual aspect to the matter. The 'cattle prod' argument is a very good one and I can't fault it.
My point lies in the notion that it's Constable Brutus versus Joe Citizen - when in fact it's actually the notion of a failed 'Nanny state' that has lost all perspective of up and down, right and wrong.
I don't see the police (at least at present) as tools of the state, rather - fools of the state. They operate in an atmosphere of poor law to start with. The state doesn't properly punish the guilty, therefore the police are open to potentially extrajudicial behavior that does what the state doesn't do.
I'm not sure if you're in Perth Angry, or elsewhere in Oz. But here at least, the public perception is one of weakness by the state to properly and judiciously apply law and order - much the same as the copious opinion emanating from Britain of a state that has utterly deserted the law-abiding. You will know as well as I do that the UK police forces are seen as tin-pot sheriffs looking for an excuse just to bust a tail-light for an easy conviction. Real policing be damned.
Got to cook dinner now, but it's an interesting paradigm... more soon!
I worked with an ex Western Australian copper, he reckoned 60% of them were bent. If you tried to do something about it a stash of class A drugs would be found in your house or car.
ReplyDeleteSomething is seriously rotten!
Pundit, I do agree with a lot of that, especially the bit about a poor legal environment. I feel there are too many statutory offences, too much summary justice and too many victimless crimes. Not in WA or any other part of Oz in particular but in western nations generally. And there probably is an element of fools rather than tools of the state (good expression, that - I hope remember to credit you when I eventually nick it for a blog :-) ), though I wouldn't say none are tools (in either sense).
ReplyDeleteI'm over the other side in Mellie, and yes there's certainly a touch of that attitude here as well. My personal experience of the Victorian Police is that they're okay, but then I've barely had any dealings with them. Still, a few people I know say that they're the most trigger happy police force in Oz and I think that for police forces in most western nations external political forces have driven them to going for the low hanging fruit first, which means nabbing the naturally law abiding for trivial technical infringements because you get dozens, maybe hundreds, for the same effort needed for a single burglary investigation.
Ideally you'd want to move the location of the low hanging fruit by eliminating many technical offences altogether, which would force the police to concentrate on the next lowest tier. Drug laws, gun laws, traffic offences, all this stuff could go. At the moment it's as likely to be used to put away a middle aged guy who has to live in a bad neighbourhood who was followed home over a vehicle defect and found with a spliff and unlicensed shottie. Number of victims of this criminal mastermind = 0 ... but he's likely to do time.
Unfortunately most people believe such laws are necessary even if they are mostly used against people just like themselves, and sadly I doubt they'll vote for it until long after the relationship between police and citizens has broken down.
I left this comment over at The Angry Exile's place:
ReplyDeleteI'm a retired police officer, I served for nearly thirty years in an armed Police Force. In that time I drew my weapon twice but presented at the target only once. I never fired my gun.
The use of a fire-arm in a law enforcement situation requires that an investigation into the rectitude or otherwise of the discharge of the arm was warranted. This procedure tends to keep officers on the straight and narrow as far as fire-arm usage is concerned.
Usage of the Taser, classified as 'non-lethal' appears to have escaped the investigative net thus allowing officers to use the weapon indiscriminately. This is manifestly wrong. Each discharge of a Taser must be investigated with the same rigour as the discharging of a fire-arm.
The Custody Sergeant, present in the movie-clip, has an an awful lot to answer for. Why on Earth did he permit that many officers to be present? The maximum number of officers present is no more than three. Any more requires the recorded assent of the Custody Sergeant. Any usage of force MUST be recorded.
The Custody Sergeant should be facing prosecution, as should ALL of the officers involved in this disgraceful scene.
And I'm a retired police officer. I have NO sympathy for the thugs shown in this movie-clip.
Anon,
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting, and thanks for keeping us straight on the procedures.
I didn't know what the procedures were but something smelled funny when the baseball team showed up.
I slate coppers on here. The bad ones. In the UK the number of bad apples seems to be growing.
As has also been said, laddie boy is no angel and there may have been one or two (or seven or eight) revenge zaps. But the boys in blue haven't exactly covered themselves in glory.
AE provides a follow up on his blog in which we learn that two officers were fined a total of $1950. Another is under investigation. Let's hope that it's the Custody Sergeant.
We also learn that boyo got zapped another eleven times in pokey for not doing what the wardens wanted him to do.
So far I have seen officers tase children of nine, mothers by the roadside, and people in custody, none of whom offered violence in any way shape or form.
We should be grateful, I suppose, that the aforementioned thugs weren't carrying Glocks.
Thanks again for your insights.
CR.
"We should be grateful, I suppose, that the aforementioned thugs weren't carrying Glocks."
ReplyDeleteI think they do use Glocks over in WA, though I imagine they don't go tooled up around the station. But I'm not sure I agree. As Anon the retired police officer pointed out investigations are the routine when guns are used and every cop knows that they will be looked at very closely if they have to pull the trigger. Not necessarily so with tasers, on top of which pulling the trigger on a taser is for much lower stakes than pulling the trigger of a Glock. I believe those two factors combine to make the psychological barrier to using the taser a vastly smaller step than drawing a gun. In the mind of a copper faced with some awkward bugger resisting arrest or being a bit difficult in custody pointing a gun, and knowing that by firing it they may end a human life, is going to be their last resort. With the taser the thought process is probably closer to, 'Meh, it's just a taser, it shouldn't do him any harm'.