"No name given" wrote: "Have any of you ever witnessed someone either on drugs or mentally ill? (The police have no idea if this guy is altered, either mentally or chemically.) It's not unheard of for them to not feel pain or to not be immobilized by it. They can still be a danger to those around them, even if cuffed."

Uh, the mentally ill do feel pain, just like you and me.

The police should subdue every suspect as if he could be mentally ill or intoxicated. I'm a psychiatrist, and I agree with a psychiatry resident wrote earlier: On psychiatric wards, the staff routinely subdue aggressive mentally ill patients without use of tasers or other weapons. All police officers should have the training to manage non-cooperative people with only the force necessary.

Once the suspect has been handcuffed, the officers should have been able to remove him from the library without inflicting needless pain. A suspect might refuse to cooperate with police because of paranoia, or the confusion of drug intoxication. A patient of mine was severely beaten for refusing arrest, when in fact, he was just confused due to his mental illness. He needed hospitalization for his injuries, and won a substantial legal settlement.

The police should not rely on suspects doing what is rational, and should not punish them for acting irrationally. They should simply subdue the suspect with the least force necessary, then handcuff him and carry him to the car. Repeatedly tasering someone who is already handcuffed and on the ground is cruel, and should not be permitted in civilized society.

No Name Given--

If that actually is your name ...

Your reasoning reveals large gaps in critical thinking. As everyone else here with half a brain has pointed out to you and those like you, whether the guy was compliant about showing his id or not, yelled or not, was leaving or not, when he was ON THE GROUND, HANDCUFFED, AND SUBDUED, the FOUR POSSIBLY FIVE additional electric shocks that he received were not necessary.

It was police brutality. It's on tape. The police who did that should be fired. They are not worthy to wear the uniform. Their behavior was vile and disgusting, and it was not at all about protecting other people. Who would they have been protecting? The kid on the ground who was handcuffed and in pain from electic shocks? The witnesses who asked them to stop? Themselves, with weapons, standing above him and shocking him repeatedly?

Plus, the police officer who threatened the other student who requested his badge number was in the wrong as well.

Period. That's it.

All this so much bullshit (I'm sorry but it is) in blaming the victim is not just disgusting but highly, well, stupid as well.

I get it. Many people like to follow others blindly, without question. It makes them feel safe. I'm not sure why because it makes them, and everyone else, less safe. But, in this case, when you've actually been shown a tape and heard this man beg for mercy, where they gave him more electic shocks after he was subdued, and you still continue to claim that sort of behavior is for the common good, I have to wonder about your reasoning skills.

I don't see where the 4th Amendment enters into it--unless you left out the part that said "the right of the people to ignore the police shall not be infringed". The guy was not out on the public street; he was in a library with restricted access, a place that neither you or I could enter without permission. Back in my college library, there were problems with crime--everything from stolen purses, to flashers, to people razoring artwork out of books. I don't think terrorism had anything to do with the ID policy. And I doubt the guy's race had anything to do with it, except that he may have felt entitled to claim persecution every time he felt imposed upon.

That said, the cops were brutal, incredibly brutal. I can understand the impulse to taze him once, given that the choices seem to have been either to haul him out bodily--in which case he'd probably sue you for a ruptured disc and permanent nerve damage to his arms--or spend your whole shift waiting around while a snot-nosed brat indulged himself in civil disobedience. But what does it take to see someone incapaciated, screaming to obvious pain, and then to inflict more pain on him? I don't know but I'm glad I don't have it.

This is what America has come to. The obsession with machismo, showboating, guns, "security", "patriotism; it all leads to this.

With every Patriot Act and similar legislation, with every posturing politican trying to prove himself a leader by demanding yet more stringent oversight and punishment, the net result on the ground is yet another sub-normal IQ pinhead being given a uniform and a gun, and hitting the streets to emulate whichever macho cop who is this week's TV star. The tipping point is long gone now. You have created a monster in the "security" industry, and it will only grow. The net result is more ordinary people being treated like dirt for no reason other than to satisfy the bloodlust of some loser who thinks the uniform validates his existence.

And I'm ashamed of what college students have become. Standing there, letting that guy be abused by those campus swine, standing there like it was a sporting event, a few people yelling "Thtop! Thtop!", no one intervening, daring to risk their own precious safety for a fellow under duress. Very sad.

"plus, where were you, lady justice? why didn't you call the police? why didn't you go talk to this girlfriend and help her go to an abuse counseilling center? Or you prefer to send the angry men to dole out justice, while you sit back and watch?"

Where was our heroine? I demand to know! Didn't even bother to call the police. Either time. The first time, she just "watched" her roomates go and heard about it afterwards and the second time she was watched period.

Now here she is on the internet going on with the fantasies about attacking some guy over nothing but when she had a chance to be brave and put her ass on the line for real, well......"

truly, kate's bloodlust is at once terrifying and somehow hilarious, too. what a lunatic. i'm still trying to figure out if she'd hit the kid with her textbook while he was lying prone on the ground, or maybe when he was sitting at his computer, all obviously and rebelliously not having his i.d.?? anyway, thanks, guys both for calling her out as well you have! :-)