POINT - COUNTER POINT: Jun 16, 2010

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Police Brutality or Resisting arrest you decide

Police in Seattle are under scrutiny after an officer was caught on camera punching a 17-year-old girl in the face during a jaywalking stop. Now I've watch the tape and from what I can see the police was within his rights to act the way he did. I know many might disagree with me on this but it things like this that have cause the moral decline of our society. People not having respect for authority and thinking that they can just step up on cops and hit them. I'm even shocked by the people with the cameras and cell phones who were witnessing the event yet calling the policeman unfair. To quote one of them "are you kidding me?" Where were you raised? The girl not only lashed out at a police officer she resisted arrest.

Some rights groups said the jaywalking incident was another clear example of police brutality.

"This is another case where we are standing here, saying 'Shame on you' to the Seattle police," James Kelly, head of the Urban League of Metropolitan Seattle, said at a news conference Tuesday.

But Kelly also said Rosenthal was wrong to resist the officer and told reporters that the teenager's behavior "only helped escalate an already tense situation." Still, he said, "two wrongs don't make a right."

Rich O'Neill, president of the Seattle Police Officers' Guild, said the officer was in the right. "He did nothing wrong," O'Neill told The Seattle Post-Intelligencer. "Let's put the accountability where it needs to be: They escalated the situation."

O'Neill also dismissed claims that the incident was racially charged.

"The race issue gets old after a while; it really does," he said.

Rosenthal and Levias are expected to be charged today in Seattle, Levias with obstructing an officer and Rosenthal with third-degree assault of an officer, which is a felony.

Both teenagers have criminal records. Last year, Rosenthal was charged with second-degree robbery when a 15-year-old boy said his cell phone and $20 were stolen after he was punched in the face; and in 2008 she was charged with theft of a motor vehicle. The robbery charges were later dismissed,The Seattle Times reported.

Levias was charged with third-degree assault in 2009 after pushing a sheriff's deputy and was given probation.

Pictures from the DRAKE & HANSON Concert that wasn't

By 7:30pm, Drake already knew this thing wasn't happening, though he came through anyway. That was right around the time the cops began to show up en masse at the South Street Seaport, wading into the throngs of people who had come to see Paper Magazine's potentially ill-advised free summer show featuring Ninjasonik, Hanson, and, of course, the most popular rapper in the country, Drake. On the day of his record release date. It was a recipe for a riot, and the Seaport got one--or something that pretty closely resembled one, anyway. By the time we rolled up, a bit past 7pm, cops already had the outdoor venue surrounded; fights were breaking out all over the tightly packed crowd, and as we made our way toward the stage, a guy came past us running the other way, shouting "I don't want to hurt nobody, so I'm out!" Good advice.

Update: Sources later told the Voice that the riot apparently started when a couple started simulating sex in the middle of the crowd. Though the crowd was into it, a plainclothes cop moved to intervene. A civilian then attempted to stop the plainclothes cop from getting involved, at which point a uniformed cop spotted the civilian accosting the plainclothes cop, and grabbed him. At which point the crowd went nuts. Ultimately, the riot became so severe that Police Commissioner Ray Kelly was called to the scene. Said the Seaport's official statement: "Unfortunately, by the announced showtime, both the Seaport management and NYPD estimated that the on-site crowd had greatly exceeded this safe capacity, was still rising, and the show could no longer be presented in a safe atmosphere."

Yanchay

Certainly by the time openers Ninjasonik--who, after playing for just a few minutes, were given the unenviable task of informing the crowd the show was canceled--walked off the stage, pandemonium was already beginning to break loose.

Photo by Rebecca Smeyne.

The primary theater of battle? The northern side of the Seaport, where fans standing on the balcony in front of shops and restaurants began raining bottles down on the crowd below, who promptly returned fire. As things escalated, the bottles turned from plastic to glass. Then, at the peak of the fight, kids on the upper level began tossing steel chairs off the balcony. That was when people really started to run. It was also about at that moment that the police finally broke through the crowd and stormed the second level, where they too were momentarily pelted with bottles. We watched a few kids on the deck attempt to shove or otherwise assault the cops who were trying desperately to clear them out. In turn, more than one officer took out her baton, though the police had the situation in hand relatively quickly.

Right before that chair went airborne. Photo by Rebecca Smeyne.

After that, it was mostly crowd dispersal, and stray fights. Helicopters buzzed overhead. Standing across from the Seaport, we watched as hundreds of kids suddenly went scrambling away from the stage area in terror. We asked one why he was running. "Mace," he said.