NPF torture

The Nigerian Police Force routinely tortures inmates and suspects. Quelle surprise...

Once again

We have yet another incident of police brutality making headlines in the US. This isn't explicitly brutal in that the usual police brutality tactics of pummelling someone into the ground, or battering people with batons, but this is negligence at its worst. In November, it was the shooting of the UCLA student with a taser gun, and the killing of a black guy in New York on his bachelor's eve do. So what do we have this time.

We have a woman, Sofia Salva, whose car is stopped by Kansas City police officers, Melody Spencer and Kevin Schnell. She's wanted on a variety of minor charges. When the police start questioning her, she tells them she's bleeding and she's on her way to the hospital. Basically, she's three months pregnant, and she thinks she's about to have a miscarriage. So do the boys in blue call an ambulance? No siree, they take her into custody. The next day, she has a miscarriage.

It's not just the fact that a woman who desperately needed medical attention was locked up, but the disdain with which she was treated. Sofia Salva did not matter to these officers. The woman was just another statistic to be locked up, another notch to be added to the department's belt. The whole thing was recorded on the squad car camera, and Kansas City Star got a copy of the tape under freedom of information laws, and have a harrowing transcript of the encounter. It's distressing to watch. To serve and to protect?

LA bloody PD

If you haven't seen the LAPD taser video, it isn't for the faint hearted. It's the second time in the space of a few weeks that LAPD have been in the news for brutalising Angelenos. Basically, a UCLA student, Mostafa Tabatabainejad, is shot with a taser gun repeatedly, including when he was handcuffed. When I saw the video, I didn't know what he did, nor did I care after seeing it. I'm not interested in excuses, because that's all they'll be. Even caged animals wouldn't be treated with such disregard. Simply put, the guy was tortured. Of course America doesn't practise torture, apart from waterboarding which VP Dick Cheney thinks is a no-brainer.

A taser gun is a cattle prod for human beings, so imagine how it must feel being electrocuted repeatedly. The Observer did a piece on it a few years ago, and a US journo got a taste of it for a news report. The way things stand, LAPD chief, Will Bratton hasn't made any silly statements like the last time when one of his officers punched William Cardenas in the face as if he was trying to knock him out. According to Bratton, "as to whether the actions of the officers were appropriate in light of what they were experiencing and the totality of the circumstances is what the investigation will determine." That's a cop out, if you'll excuse the pun.

Watch the videos and squirm in disgust:





If you're interested in his "crime", he refused to show the campus police his ID.