Police mistake man for fleeing drug suspect, beat him silly

[Dominus Atheos]

Three San Antonio Police officers are being investigated for possibly using excessive force, after a May 20 incident in west San Antonio left a man with injuries to his face, skull and neck.

Roger Carlos was in the 10600 block of Westover Hills Boulevard taking photos of a building that will soon be home to his wife’s medical practice, when he was approached by three officers around 2:30 p.m.

The officers were identified as an undercover drug task force officer and two SAPD SWAT members.

According to an SAPD incident report released to the I-Team, the officers had been pursuing a suspect nearby who was wanted on a felony warrant.

Josue Gonzalez, 27, fled from police away from Loop 410 along the Highway 151 access road before he exited at Westover Hills and ditched his car in the parking lot of a restaurant. The restaurant is a few hundred feet from where Carlos was standing.

“All three of them started beating me on the head,” said Carlos, who still showed visible signs of the beating when he spoke with KENS 5 weeks after the incident.

“It was unbelievable. I couldn’t believe it was happening to me.”

Carlos said he was struck about 50 times, even though he complied with the officers’ instructions and did not fight back.

Shortly after being handcuffed and explaining to officers that he owned the property, a fourth officer approached and said the suspect was in custody nearby.

Serves him right for standing there looking all Hispanic and stuff.

San Antonio Police Chief William McManus says it was a case of “mistaken identity,” which I suppose is pretty obvious. But what if they’d had the right guy? Would that have justified 50 blows to a suspect who wasn’t fighting back? McManus told KENS TV, “From the report that I’ve read, from the photo that I saw and from your description, I’ve not seen anything at this point that would indicate to me that anything out of order happened.”

McManus said the blows were necessary because upon being tackled, Carlos laid on his hands, which made the officers unable to determine if he was clutching a weapon. McManus is right. When unexpectedly and unjustly tackled and beaten by the police, all innocent people have the presence of mind to fall flat on their face, arms and legs splayed wide open. As he was getting beaten, Carlos should have been considerate enough to see the police point of view here. What about their safety? Obviously, only guilty people attempt to break the fall with their hands, or clutch at the places on their bodies that have just been struck with blows.

Sure, the police made a mistake. But Carlos’ suspicious behavior — being Hispanic, standing near where a drug dealer fled, breaking his fall, curling up to protect his vital organs from the fists and feet that were striking him — clearly makes him a good 80-90 percent culpable for his beating.

[Dominus Atheos]

Forgot the link.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the- ... him-silly/

[Ziggy Stardust]

Those poor police officers must have been so scared. Thank god they took measures to ensure their own safety.

[Simon_Jester]

This ties into what I was saying recently in another thread- that the entire engine of state bureaucracy, including but not limited to the police, is more and more acting as if low-status people (conspicuously minorities, but increasingly poor whites as well) just don't have rights. Or have less rights. This is exactly the sort of thing that is supposed to be prevented by people having rights: arbitrary, random beatings because you look vaguely like a person who is suspected of committing a crime.

[TheFeniX]

It doesn't help that a byproduct of the war on drugs has had the police trained in much more military style enforcement nor that the current administration has been dumping millions of dollar of used (and unused) military hardware on local municipalities. I mean, you may not need a grenade launcher today, but criminals might escalate... even though violent crime is at it's lowest.... since ever. Whatever, drug dealers aren't people, we all know that, so beat away. If it turns out the suspect isn't guilty, make sure he's a poor minority, or both. Both is much better.

Also, we all need to remember, when police are beating you for no good reason, ignore all your instincts to go into the fetal position to protect your vital parts and just splay out flat. We should all know this as untrained civilians. I mean, that's if they haven't pinned you down, stopping you from doing so. It won't stop the beating, but it might at least make the department come up with some other line of stupid bullshit like "well, you see the suspect was still breathing and the officers might have been exposed to some second-hand smoke, because only bad people smoke, and we only arrest bad people, and well.... so... well, I mean he wasn't going to beat his own ass. Procedure, right that's it: procedure. No more questions."

[Elheru Aran]

Also, we all need to remember, when police are beating you for no good reason, ignore all your instincts to go into the fetal position to protect your vital parts and just splay out flat. We should all know this as untrained civilians. I mean, that's if they haven't pinned you down, stopping you from doing so.

Uh... what? I agree with the rest of your post, but is there any good reason why you shouldn't take measures to protect your vitals? It's a purely defensive action and generally reflexive in nature. It's certainly better than ruptured organs.

Or is that some kind of 'peaceful protest' bullshit? "Well hey, the cops tore up my liver and bruised my kidneys while they kicked my ass, they're even worse now"?

Serious question. It just doesn't seem logical to allow police officers to beat you even worse than they would otherwise.

[slebetman]

Also, we all need to remember, when police are beating you for no good reason, ignore all your instincts to go into the fetal position to protect your vital parts and just splay out flat. We should all know this as untrained civilians. I mean, that's if they haven't pinned you down, stopping you from doing so.

Uh... what? I agree with the rest of your post, but is there any good reason why you shouldn't take measures to protect your vitals? It's a purely defensive action and generally reflexive in nature. It's certainly better than ruptured organs.

Or is that some kind of 'peaceful protest' bullshit? "Well hey, the cops tore up my liver and bruised my kidneys while they kicked my ass, they're even worse now"?

Serious question. It just doesn't seem logical to allow police officers to beat you even worse than they would otherwise.

Your sarcasm detector is broken

[Mr Bean]

It doesn't help that a byproduct of the war on drugs has had the police trained in much more military style enforcement nor that the current administration has been dumping millions of dollar of used (and unused) military hardware on local municipalities. I mean, you may not need a grenade launcher today, but criminals might escalate... even though violent crime is at it's lowest.... since ever. Whatever, drug dealers aren't people, we all know that, so beat away. If it turns out the suspect isn't guilty, make sure he's a poor minority, or both. Both is much better.

It's been covered before, police need grenade launchers it what they use for teargas and some beanbag rounds. Cops are not exactly using high explosive rounds.

But yes this is another case of a real WTF in procedure. Okay you jumped a guy, beat him down, cuffed him but turns out he's not the guy so... you let him go and walk away? Why is there no "we fucked up" call to make?

[TheFeniX]

Uh... what? I agree with the rest of your post, but is there any good reason why you shouldn't take measures to protect your vitals? It's a purely defensive action and generally reflexive in nature. It's certainly better than ruptured organs.

Pfft, look. Cops know best. It's like that one who kept yelling at a downed woman to put her arms behind her back while he continuously tasers her. If you can't move your body while being shocked by a device designed specifically to stop you from moving your body, you obviously deserve what you get.

The real kicker is if she had been able to do that, the cops might have charged her with breaking ohms law or some shit.

Serious question. It just doesn't seem logical to allow police officers to beat you even worse than they would otherwise.

Instinctively defending yourself? What are you, some kind of criminal? What do you have to hide, citizen?

On a serious note: 3 attackers beating 1 downed man in the face and head would easily constitute deadly force used in response based on Texas defense laws. But in San Antonio, they'll probably give the cops leave for "emotional trauma."

It's been covered before, police need grenade launchers it what they use for teargas and some beanbag rounds. Cops are not exactly using high explosive rounds.

Fair enough. I still don't agree with million of dollars in military hardware being dumped into the department of chuckle-fucks. Seriously, throw me a few M16s: I'll injure/kill far less innocent people.

[Elheru Aran]

Sarcasm detector is actually broken, apparently. Too many people with weird views lately. I need to take a break from Facebook.

Carry on...

[Mr Bean]

It's been covered before, police need grenade launchers it what they use for teargas and some beanbag rounds. Cops are not exactly using high explosive rounds.

Fair enough. I still don't agree with million of dollars in military hardware being dumped into the department of chuckle-fucks. Seriously, throw me a few M16s: I'll injure/kill far less innocent people.

Thing is when you say millions it was the military who spent millions. Are options for old military equipment is as thus

1. Sell it to civilians (Nope in today's political climate)
2. Sell it to big dealers who will resell in the 3rd world (Nope in today's political climate)
3. Maintain it and stockpile it indefinitely (That costs money)
4. Destroy it (That costs money)
5. Let police departments take it off our hands for the cost of shipping (That saves money)
6. Give it away to allied countries like the Soviets did and the Russians still do (And we used to do)

You can argue we should do 4 instead of 5 or 6 but 5 has been the cheapest as the police take control over it, and either maintain it or let it rust and dispose of it. Either way so far 5 has been a big win. The only problem is we are still handing out millions to individual departments to fight the war on terror, year after year we keep handing out crates of cash to places that would not be attacked even if Iran switched places with Texas the week of the international we hate America conference in Tehran.