Police officer found not guilty after tasering race relations advisor.

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what?!

Reply 2

Andrew97

OP

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Original post by quasa

what?!

Not guilty of assault.

Reply 3

quasa

Original post by Andrew97

Not guilty of assault.

i know, the what?! was my expression of my shock at the verdict

Reply 4

Original post by quasa

i know, the what?! was my expression of my shock at the verdict

Sounds fair enough to me.

Acted like a prick, looked like the suspect. The court saw the BWC footage. What more is there to know?

Reply 5

Saoirse:3

19

Original post by Trinculo

Sounds fair enough to me.

Acted like a prick, looked like the suspect. The court saw the BWC footage. What more is there to know?

"Acting like a prick" is not sufficient reason to taser someone. If you have evidence that he's a suspect, arrest him. If you're just going around the streets of Bristol confronting any black man of roughly the right age, stop.

Reply 6

Original post by Saoirse:3

"Acting like a prick" is not sufficient reason to taser someone. If you have evidence that he's a suspect, arrest him. If you're just going around the streets of Bristol confronting any black man of roughly the right age, stop.

What action precisely would you like the officers to have taken?

The man matched the description of the suspect, and when approached would not identify himself. The suspect was known to be armed.

So what exactly would you do?

Try and arrest him manually? Given that this person was not co-operating and was being abusive. He would not say who he was. So you think put themselves at risk and also start a wrestling match with this person?

Approach him with batons? You think that's the better approach?

CS him? We don't even know if the officers had CS - but you think that's a better idea?

Let him go? A man who you think might be an armed criminal?

In all of this - ask yourself who is most at fault here? The police officers, or a man who is supposed to be working with the police as his job refusing to identify himself and putting them in a position where they had to make the arrest?

Reply 7

nulli tertius

Not an ordinary magistrates court though.

The powers that be sent the Deputy Chief Magistrate down from Westminster to Salisbury to try it

Reply 8

oneocean

6

As a police officer, I've recently been issued with a Body Worn Camera and I absolutely love it.

The whole incident can be recorded in its entirety, rather than a small snippet uploaded with absolutely no context.

Great piece of kit.

Reply 9

Original post by Trinculo

Sounds fair enough to me.

Acted like a prick, looked like the suspect. The court saw the BWC footage. What more is there to know?

"Acted like a prick". Lol.

I guess black people just have to put up with being confused with each other and randomly harassed by police for it. Being annoyed about it means they are acting like pricks.

Reply 10

Original post by Trinculo

In all of this - ask yourself who is most at fault here? The police officers, or a man who is supposed to be working with the police as his job refusing to identify himself and putting them in a position where they had to make the arrest?

Yes. It was the police's fault. They mistook the guy for someone else. Their fault.

Reply 11

Original post by yudothis

Yes. It was the police's fault. They mistook the guy for someone else. Their fault.

How would you establish the identity of the person from a description only, if the person you have in front of you refuses to co-operate?

Reply 12

Original post by yudothis

"Acted like a prick". Lol.

I guess black people just have to put up with being confused with each other and randomly harassed by police for it. Being annoyed about it means they are acting like pricks.

Simple question then - what would you have had them do?

Reply 13

Original post by Trinculo

How would you establish the identity of the person from a description only, if the person you have in front of you refuses to co-operate?

What is the need for cooperation? Doesn't someone have the right to not be harassed by police simply because "they look like our guy"?

Reply 14

Original post by Trinculo

Simple question then - what would you have had them do?

If they were that worried, gotten ahold of a photo of the suspect.

Reply 15

Original post by yudothis

What is the need for cooperation? Doesn't someone have the right to not be harassed by police simply because "they look like our guy"?

Original post by yudothis

If they were that worried, gotten ahold of a photo of the suspect.

He was hiding his face. He was swearing at them. He was refusing to co-operate. The police just asked him questions and he went into a race-baiting rant.

How would the police get a photo of their suspect? You don't know what the situation was - it may have been a description.

These hypothetical scenarios of "better ways of dealing with" are in the realm of fantasy.

Reply 16

Saoirse:3

19

Original post by Trinculo

What action precisely would you like the officers to have taken?

The man matched the description of the suspect, and when approached would not identify himself. The suspect was known to be armed.

So what exactly would you do?

Try and arrest him manually? Given that this person was not co-operating and was being abusive. He would not say who he was. So you think put themselves at risk and also start a wrestling match with this person?

Approach him with batons? You think that's the better approach?

CS him? We don't even know if the officers had CS - but you think that's a better idea?

Let him go? A man who you think might be an armed criminal?

In all of this - ask yourself who is most at fault here? The police officers, or a man who is supposed to be working with the police as his job refusing to identify himself and putting them in a position where they had to make the arrest?

If the original suspect was deemed to be at continued risk to the public due to his violence, he should not have been bailed in the first place which he evidently was if he failed to appear in court. Doing so would have been an obvious risk to the public. If the risk to the public from having this guy on the loose was deemed acceptable, then it is certainly acceptable to police officers who both have the training to handle these people and accept some level of risk as part of their job. Note that the article states he "had warnings for violence and weapons on his file". Not convictions. So whatever happened in his past we're clearly not talking firearms or serious assault, but more along the lines of a minor punch-up at the pub.

The other part I'd question is how they came to think this man was the suspect. They obviously had photos of the suspect since he'd been previously and recently arrested, so they weren't stuck with a vague description. The gentleman tasered clearly has a distinctive appearance. The suspicion of course is that the main part of the description he matched was "black", which clearly does not meet the threshold of reasonable suspicion alone.

Apart from the swearing, which is extremely minor, the man did not do anything wrong. He was under no obligation to identify himself. He was not under arrest (because they had no grounds to arrest him). He had not threatened them. He had not acted violently. He was moving away from the officers. I can see zero reason they needed to taser him.

It becomes a matter of civil liberties. If we were to accept that your legal rights become meaningless the moment a police officer claims that you look similar to a suspect, then they were meaningless to begin with.

Reply 17

Original post by Saoirse:3

The other part I'd question is how they came to think this man was the suspect. They obviously had photos of the suspect since he'd been previously and recently arrested, so they weren't stuck with a vague description. The gentleman tasered clearly has a distinctive appearance. The suspicion of course is that the main part of the description he matched was "black", which clearly does not meet the threshold of reasonable suspicion alone.

Abundi was hiding his face and evading the officers. Trying to push past them. How do you compare a person to a photo under those circumstances? Where do you get the photo from? Ask someone who is not co-operating with you to stand still while you put a tablet next to them for comparison? Or ask them politely if they can show you some ID and it's all over?

Apart from the swearing, which is extremely minor, the man did not do anything wrong. He was under no obligation to identify himself. He was not under arrest (because they had no grounds to arrest him). He had not threatened them. He had not acted violently. He was moving away from the officers. I can see zero reason they needed to taser him.

He fought with them. There weren't any punches, but there was definitely confrontation, pushing and aggression from Abundi.

It becomes a matter of civil liberties. If we were to accept that your legal rights become meaningless the moment a police officer claims that you look similar to a suspect, then they were meaningless to begin with.

Then all that is necessary for criminals to do to evade ever being caught is to simply turn their heads and refuse to ever co-operate. Under your system, no-one would ever be arrested again.

At the end of all this, a judge thought the police acted reasonably.

For the situation to be over, all that Abundi had to do was show them he wasn't who they thought he was. Instead, he tried to escape, fought with them, got tasered, ran crying to the press and lost in court.

Reply 18

Saoirse:3

19

Original post by Trinculo

Abundi was hiding his face and evading the officers. Trying to push past them. How do you compare a person to a photo under those circumstances? Where do you get the photo from? Ask someone who is not co-operating with you to stand still while you put a tablet next to them for comparison? Or ask them politely if they can show you some ID and it's all over?

He fought with them. There weren't any punches, but there was definitely confrontation, pushing and aggression from Abundi.

Then all that is necessary for criminals to do to evade ever being caught is to simply turn their heads and refuse to ever co-operate. Under your system, no-one would ever be arrested again.

At the end of all this, a judge thought the police acted reasonably.

For the situation to be over, all that Abundi had to do was show them he wasn't who they thought he was. Instead, he tried to escape, fought with them, got tasered, ran crying to the press and lost in court.

Clearly they had already seen the picture in order to know that this man looked similar to the suspect. And in this day and age, yes, double-checking the image on a smart device would seem very simple. As for the rest of what you've posted about pushing, fighting etc, that isn't reported in the Sky article - do you have any source for it?

Very few wanted criminals are actually caught by being recognised by a copper on the streets. Generally you have some intelligence on places they are likely to frequent, such as known addresses or areas of the city where police have previously dealt with them, which you can monitor, or they pop up when they try to find work, move house, go to the doctor, or commit another crime - you really have to cut yourself off from society to evade capture successfully.

Reply 19