Putting your hand on someone's shoulder is not trying to prevent an arrest...we also have a right, as citizens to defend our rights from tyrannical actions. As none of us saw what happened bore, we cannot judge whether or not the cop was just acting like an asshat or he was justified in trying to arrest this person. If you read some of the comments from people who said they were there, it sounds like this cop was just being a jackbooted asshole.
What we can see is that he used excessive force on both the woman in the booth and the woman who touched his shoulder (BS on that being assault...touching someone on the shoulder is hardly inappropriate contact...if she grabbed his genitals...assuming he actually has them...that would be assault). Slapping her and punching her was inappropriate and is considered...especially in conjunction with punching her...battery. I think you need to look up the definition of assault. It isn't just touching someone...it is touching someone in an inappropriate manner. It only grants them necessary force not all means. If someone can be restrained by holding them against the wall, tasering them would be excessive use of force and the cop would get prosecuted. Use of a taser or baton, in this situation, would get the cop a spot in the local penitentiary. Since the cop is the authority, it is up to him to control the situation and he is ultimately responsable and he let it get out of hand by not acting professionally. -----Original Message----- From: Gruss Gott [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2011 09:29 AM To: cf-community Subject: Re: IHOP Cop Punches Lady in the face Eric Roberts <[email protected]> wrote: > > If the cop is doing something wrong, I would hope people would step in > and do what is right. If the cops can't do what is right, then it is > up to the people to step in. Putting your hand on someone is not a physical assault. We have laws for a reason: to avoid a situation where everyone does whatever they think is "right". To avoid that we create legislation and then we ask police to enforce it. That legislation says you can't prevent cops from enforcing that legislation. In this case, a women was breaking a law: she was a public nuisance. An officer rightly went in to arrest her. Then another women tried to physically prevent that arrest. This is illegal and therefore the new agitator is subject to arrest. Physically assaulting an officer is illegal and resisting arrest is illegal. And, yes, physically touching anyone who doesn't want you to *is* assault. If any citizen is stupid enough to physically assault an officer, especially to interfere when they're dealing with someone else, then they are taking a big risk, because the law grants the officer the right to use all means necessary to restrain and arrest. Could the cop have done things in a more optimized way? Sure, but it could've been worse too. He could've tased her or used a baton and/or broken bones or cause permanent injury. All of which would've been perfectly legal. So let's stop whining about the cop, and ask if the lady could've done something different. YES! She could've not assaulted the co ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:337012 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
