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| NEWS > 25 January 2009 |
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Miami Police Taped Roughing Up
A robbery suspect led police on a car chase Wednesday before crashing and taking off on foot, then was swarmed by officers who were videotaped kicking and punching him.
The Miami-Dade Police Department is reviewing the response, said Cmdr. Linda O'Brien.
"We are looking at this frame by frame," she said. "The initial assessment is that the officer acted inappropriately."
It was not clear which officer O'Brien was referring to, and the responding officers were not identified.
Police said that when officers tried to pull over a car matching the descrip... Read more
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 Article sourced from
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San Francisco Chronicle - CA,
25 January 2009
This article appeared in the above title/site.
To view it in its entirity click this link.
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EiP
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Video shows a police punch bef
OAKLAND -- BART officials said tonight that they would investigate the actions of one of the transit agency's police officers after a new video surfaced showing the officer striking a passenger - apparently Oscar Grant - minutes before the unarmed young man was fatally shot by another police officer early on New Year's Day.
The cell phone video, one of a handful that has surfaced, aired Friday night on KTVU-TV. It shows a male BART police officer walking over to three men lined up against a wall near a female officer, and then striking one in the face.
The victim of the punch - identified by Channel 2 as 22-year-old Grant - slides to the ground. The video then shows the moments preceding the shooting and then the shooting itself is shown. It appears that the officer who punches the man is the same person who later is seen kneeling on Grant's head when he was shot.
Sources have identified that officer as Tony Pirone. He and the other officers present at the time of Grant's shooting all remain on paid administrative leave while the investigation continues, but until Saturday BART was not investigating the conduct of anyone besides Johannes Mehserle, 27, who shot Grant.
Mehserle later resigned from the force and was charged with murder. He pleaded not guilty and is being held without bail.
Police investigators have said that Grant put up a brief struggle with officers but was restrained and had both arms behind his back when he was shot. It was not clear whether the struggle investigators referred to was the same incident caught on the new video.
But Peter Keane, a professor at Golden Gate University Law School and police expert, said tonight he video shows a "vicious, unprovoked and inexcusable assault" by the other police officer that should be prosecuted, and which seems to have set off events that led to the shooting. He also argued that the video is damning to Mehserle, too.
"With that powerful punch he slams Mr. Grant in the side of his head and knocks him down even though it doesn't appear Grant is doing anything but talking - maybe he is mouthing off but there was no physical provocation," Keane said. "Why is the other officer not being prosecuted? It was a clearly a deliberate, abusive use of force."
In a written statement released tonight, BART General Manager Dorothy Dugger said she takes the "new allegation of police use of unreasonable force extremely seriously," and has directed BART Police Chief Gary Gee to conduct an internal affairs investigation. The officer was not identified.
Noting that the investigation into Grant's shooting is ongoing, Dugger vowed to "fully examine" any new evidence and urged KTVU to provide the agency and Alameda District Attorney's office - which is prosecuting Mehserle - with the video.
BART's board of directors voted unanimously on Jan. 12 to create a special committee that will provide additional oversight of the agency's police department.
In the same statement released Saturday, BART board director Carole Ward Allen - who chairs the committee - insisted that the agency does not tolerate police misconduct and will hold its police force to the "highest standards of professionalism and ethical conduct."
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