Brickbat: Getting Hands-On

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond has intervened to dismiss a felony assault charge against an Oklahoma City police officer who slammed a 71-year-old man to the ground, breaking his neck and causing a brain bleed, during an argument over a traffic ticket. Video shows Sgt. Joseph Gibson  telling Lich Vu that he was being issued a ticket for an improper U-turn. Vu, who appears not to understand English very well, refuses to sign the ticket. Gibson says he'll take Vu to jail if he doesn't sign the ticket. Vu gets out of the car and the two continue to argue. At one point, Vu appears to tell Gibson to "shut up" and taps the officer's chest with the back of his fingers, which prompts Gibson to slam him to the ground. "As attorney general, I will not permit Oklahoma police officers to face criminal prosecution for conduct adhering to their training," Drummond said in a statement. But Oklahoma County District Attorney Vicki Behenna said she was "surprised and disappointed that Attorney General Gentner Drummond took this case away from my office and the citizens of Oklahoma County."

Comments

[AT]

Ahh, it took me a minute, but there it is.

Oklahoma County is the weak tit on that mama cat. Kinda like Broward County or Blaine County or Shelby County. That growing and festering cancer in an otherwise healthy place, which any smart state will try to keep from spreading.

In other words, the Okies are fighting off an Austin.

I can appreciate that. Gotta snip that blue nonsense before it takes root. I don't think this is the correct hill to fight it on (and I'm willing to bet I explained why once already, because if memory serves this is a recycled article that Reason already "reported" (LoL JoUrNaLiSm!) - but to Chezzy's credit, at least he's not citing himself like most Reason "JoUrNaLiSts" do).

But I get why Drummond felt compelled to do it. Not sure I agree with it. But I get it.

[sarcasmic]

"As attorney general, I will not permit Oklahoma police officers to face criminal prosecution for conduct adhering to their training," Drummond said in a statement.

Maybe they shouldn't be trained to feel so threatened by frail old men that they feel the need to try to kill them by dropping them onto their head.

Oh, and cue the usual idiots to cry about Saint Babbitt. Fucking morons.

[markm23]

I agree with the AG. If the cops were trained to do that, those who designed the training program should be imprisoned, if not executed.

[Fist of Etiquette]

As attorney general, I will not permit Oklahoma police officers to face criminal prosecution for conduct adhering to their training...

Oklahoma police scramble to add "wetting ourselves and shooting everyone on sight" to their training programs.

[Chipper Chunked Chile Con Congress (ex NCW)]

Do they really need "training" in something they're already so naturally talented at?

[Livemike]

They do if they want to get exonerated when they do it. Plus more training = more pay for the same amount of productive work.

[mad.casual]

breaking his neck and causing a brain bleed

Weird. The inability of parents shaking a 7 lb. infant hard enough to induce this trauma is junk science. Violation of a fundamentally immutable law of physics, like travelling faster than the speed of light. But one adult male doing it to another 100-150 lb. adult male in less than a second is just a given because one of them is wearing a badge.

It's almost like there are overarching laws of physics and Reason is whimsically choosing to ignore them and decide what is and is not The Science based on which attorney's narrative fits their desired political outcomes.

I remain unconvinced of the wisdom of striving to overturn the laws of man and nature based on the point of someone, seemingly, brilliant enough to get tough with the bouncers and getting tossed out on his head.

[mad.casual]

Er... The inability of parents shaking a 7 lb. infant hard enough to induce this trauma is junk science.

[MatthewSlyfield]

" The inability of parents shaking a 7 lb. infant hard enough to induce this trauma is junk science."
Shaking is not equal to slamming someone against a hard surface. I don't see why you have a problem comprehending this.

[mad.casual]

Shaking is not equal to slamming someone against a hard surface.

Because:
1. Gs are Gs and torque is torque whether something else stops you or not and/or whether the something that stops you is made of concrete or asphalt or hardwood or flesh or bone...
2. I've spent a lot of time killing lots of things and hurting people with my bare hands without striking them and seeing other people do similarly...
3. Reason has a proven track record of not just taking one side of the story to support a horribly political narrative, but even outright lying on behalf of people who knowingly and intentionally harming children.

The question isn't me understanding how easy or not it is to kill things via shaking and/or with one's bare hands. The question is why you and Reason continue to pretend that it's not.

[sarcasmic]

Your defense for the police slamming an old man head-first onto the pavement is to attack Reason for reporting on a couple investigations into shaken baby syndrome?

[mad.casual]

The question isn't me understanding how easy or not it is to kill things via shaking and/or with one's bare hands. The question is why you and Reason continue to pretend that it's not... except when it's convenient.

[See.More]

The issue is that, here, we have an apparently clear cause and effect.

Whereas in the shaken baby syndrome cases, the effect is used, without any other evidence, to assume the cause, and, as often as not, without any effort to objectively eliminate or establish alternate explanations.

[mad.casual]

Whereas in the shaken baby syndrome cases, the effect is used, without any other evidence, to assume the cause, and, as often as not, without any effort to objectively eliminate or establish alternate explanations.

Despite its cartoonish falseness, this clearly demonstrates that you, directly or subordinate to Reason, don't distinguish between a failure of science and a failure of the courts.

Once again, this is Reason Magazine that will tell you that Childhood Abuse Pediatrics is a nascent and unreliable field, like people haven't been studying (e.g.) head trauma in children for 50+ yrs., and then overwhelmingly back Chase "I support the chemical castration of minors." Oliver for POTUS.

The US, and the US isn't alone, hears some 1,500 shaken baby syndrome cases every year. The National Exoneration Registry, that Reason cites, counts some 35 in its records back to 1989. Assuming all of them in the current year, that's a 2% false conviction rating. Even if you triple the number of false convictions *under the single-year assumption* it *still* abides Blackstone's Ratio. And, again, that's just the US but not in any way exceptional throughout Western medicine.

This isn't some principled stance in favor of physics or morality or ethics or objectivity or policy or law on their part. It's generating controversy to attract eyeballs, drum up clicks, and signal virtue.

[mad.casual]

Assuming all of them in the current year, that's a 2% false conviction rating.

And that assumes, conforming to your cartoon, that a case automatically converts to a conviction "without any other evidence".

Rather than a much more typical case where emergency responders and primary care physicians report broken bones, other bruising, signs of neglect and/or abuse, squalid conditions, and other witness testimony that Reason will frequently downplay or omit to bolster their narrative.

FFS, this is Reason Magazine that breathlessly reported about a 10 yr. old girl in Ohio who got pregnant entirely out of the blue and couldn't get an abortion (she could) without notifying the authorities (because it was her father/Mom's boyfriend who raped her).

This is the American center-left (at best) media. I can't fathom why any of you are giving them this much credit. They themselves complain about getting stabbed in the back by each other for doing so.

[Rossami]

The argument against shaken baby syndrome is not that shaking never causes injury but that injury (more specifically, that particular set of symptoms) is not proof of having been shaken.

[Livemike]

There's a difference between shaking and slamming someone to the ground. If you can't tell the difference between the force of falling at least 5 feet and the force of being moved back and forth, you don't know physics. I suspect you know no science at all.

[KiwiDude]

If a police officer touches you during a chat, is that assault and they can therefore be slammed head first onto the ground?

[TLoro]

One would hope. but it never is.

[diver64]

Anyone standing up for the cop in this should go online and watch the video. It's obvious the older guy didn't understand what the cop was saying or why he was getting a ticket. The slam on the ground was brutal and uncalled for.

[Liberty_Belle]

What about discretion ? How was the correct response to being tapped lightly by a 100ish lb , 80+ year old cancer patient to perform a full takedown ? Let alone one that dumped him face first on the asphalt ?