25 year old male arrested by the Utah Highway Patrol

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Actually the guy was a threat - at the point where he refused to sign the ticket he was obstructing an officer. The officer is then required by law in most states to place the individual in custody. When he is told to turn around and place his hands behind his back and he starts to move to his car the officer had every right to give the idiot a jolt. By doing so he could have saved innocent lives that could have been involved in a vehicle persuit.

This idiot clearly deserved to ride the juice and this trooper should be commended - not scruitinized.

From what I see of the situation a couple things happen. First of all, to a degree cops need to be dicks right up front - anyone is likeable, anyone can talk their way out of a ticket, and if communication were on equal rapport or really two sided then people could just about do whatever they want on the road. Not that all cops need to be dicks, some can be nice and at the same time be able to switch right over to authoritative mode when social courtesy becomes a liability for them - not everyone though has that sort of talent or that sort of personality

This kid was being really flippant though and a lot of people are like that (especially the entitlists of my generation as well as other generations). Unfortunately the officer didn't seem like he was in control of the situation at all - so things just got weirder while he tried to rather clumsily explain away the guy's arguments. My take, the cop just wasn't particularly good at controlling situations, dealing with people's games, and it really showed. Because he didn't do a good job of keeping their heads in perspective that they were for one getting a ticket and two, there were no ifs, ands buts, or challenges, he was forced to get the guy out of the car and ask him to put his hands on the hood. When he refused to do that, things got a lot worse and he ended up needing to do something even more drastic to reassert his authority over the situation. Luckily it could have even been worse than that, I was really worried that the guy's girlfriend would have attacked the cop - that would have even looked better for him, two people in the car tased and handcuffed.

So right now, while I'd hope that officer's not in too much trouble he probably has the rest of the department laughing their asses off at him regarding that video tape and I'd really hope they send him for more training - whether that's military communications training, or whatever, just so he can crush the static when their attitudes kick up just with words and psychology long before it takes hitting people with a taser to get their heads around the fact that they've broken the speeding laws and will be paying a ticket.

TheZach,
I really wish you would stop saying.."most" and "many" since I doubt you are conversant on the laws of every state in this country.

I hear this sort of thing all the time from people who over-state their knowledge of laws in this country. It just passes on erroneous
information.

Several people here are reading much more into what information is available to us about this situation.

Until you have the full manuscripts from the incident, you do not know...

1. If the officer perceived the man's actions as a threat to the officer, other motorists or the occupants inside the vehicle.

2. Whether the officer had 'control' of the situation or not. Some people obey, some do not.

3. Exactly what transpired between the two... the officer, and the driver.


What is clear to me is that as the officer walks back the cruiser and places his clipboard on the hood, the driver comes back to meet the officer.
The driver then does not stop but proceeds onward almost alongside the cruiser and the officer gives his order to stop.
The man does not seem to comply immediately with the officer's orders and the officer immediately draws his taser.
The driver then turns away from the officer with his fingers/hand fidgeting in his pants pocket walks back towards the driver's side of his vehicle and disregards the officer's orders.

At this point the officer tasers the driver and issues further commands.

Then another occupant of the vehicle exits from out-of-view of the officer and charges around the back of the vehicle screaming out loud.
The officer is now between the driver he tasered and this screaming woman.

She's lucky he did not take action to subdue her and instead ordered her back into the vehicle.

I think those who are crying foul against the officer are not attempting to understand how it feels to be in the officer's position.

It's not just that the guy was speeding.
It's not just that the guy was being noncompliant.

There's also the factor of being on the side of an active highway (cars pass during the filming), the officer probably not having backup for sometime... I think another estimate given here of 5 minutes might have been VERY generous... I don't know where they were located so perhaps not.

Does anyone know if prior to the stop there was any incident elsewhere that might have the officer on edge?
I can tell you that when there's been an earlier incident such as a robbery, assault, fatal traffic accident, officer assaulted, etc... then for a time afterwards EVERYONE working the streets may be a bit on edge... it's part of the job... it's part of the stress of the job... it's human nature.

Again, on the surface of this film it appears the man was harmless... to some... the officer didn't know if the driver might have a weapon in the vehicle (or his pocket) and attempt to use it on the officer.
The officer could have just kept giving orders which the driver was disobeying and allow the driver to enter the vehicle, start it up, and drive away. Would you all have jumped the officer's case if this driver had done such a thing, while all pumped up on adrenaline himself, and had an accident injuring or killing the occupants of his vehicle as well as any other vehicle they may strike?

You are letting your emotions override your intellect.

I certainly believe any use of a taser, baton, firearm, or vehicle (as in forcing a car to spin out of control), should be immediately reviewed.
That's best left to those who have access to all the facts.

That's my opinion

well, almost sure that if the guy turned out to be autistic, everybody would be singing the same song.

and I agree with the thing that if the guy would have had heart problems, then what?

wsmac, you make it seem like the woman shouldn't have reacted that way, well, what would you expect if her husband was hurt?

They could have sued, couldn't they?

There's what I said. I see nothing in there that has me suggesting she shouldn't have reacted in the manner she did.

What I say there is that the officer, at the moment she exited the car, found himself inbetween two people who's next actions he could not foresee.
This ramps up a person's fight-or-flight system fairly well, when you are positioned between two people you are trying to control, on the side of a busy highway, and possibly trying to quickly figure out what the hell you're going to do next.

I did say she was lucky he didn't tase her also or subdue her in another manner. That's all. My words mean what they say. There's nothing hidden in them.


The fact is... it doesn't matter if he turned out to be autistic. The officer tazed a person who was not only disobeying his orders, but continuing to walk away, while playing with his pocket (could have thought the driver had a weapon in the pocket), and acting like a jerk... based upon what he was doing and what he was saying as he walked away from the officer.

You folks here are looking at a tape from the comfort of your keyboard.
You can pass judgement REALLY easy this way... nothing hard at all about it.
Being on the scene of something like this is a wholly different matter. You should experience something like this once so you can better understand human psyche, and human physiology.
It's not that people necessarily want to behave the way the driver, his wife, and the officer acted... there's also our biology/physiology at play here. When an officer or other worker on the street gets pumped up on adrenaline, it is not too hard to lose a little... or a lot of control of your emotions and resulting physical actions.

I think the use of the tazer here was appropriate, and also unfortunate.
I certainly would rather see things work out peacefully every time.
I do think this sort of incident needs to be investigated not just to see if the officer was wrong.. but also to try and learn from the experience.
I do hope the driver learns something too. Unfortunately, I suspect he has many supportive people building up his personal image of being a victim and not a willing participant in this. Supportive people like some here who allow their emotions to override their ability to look at the incident in a fair and sensible manner.

I do not wish a police state upon any of us, anywhere in the world.
I believe we have too many SWAT teams in this country and NONE of them should cover their faces when the protection is not warranted for physical injury, and they should not wear black.

Having said that, I do believe that if we say we want 'Police Protection' (which by the way we can't really ever have... that's why it's called Law enforcement, not Law Protection), then we do have to allow that those officers might use force in the moment that they believe is correct.
Abuse should not be tolerated.

Anyway... I wanna get off this soapbox.

Okay, I'm back! steps back up on the box

Concerning some people's worries that the guy 'could have been' autistic...

If any of you who believe yourselves to be, or have been diagnosed as, Aspy, then you should do some serious thinking about how you might respond to a Law Enforcement Officer.

Perhaps contact the PR person at the local police department or sheriff's office or state troopers office.
They do have someone who is responsible for dealing with the public, even if it's the top person themselves.

You need to express your concerns in a polite and intelligent manner and seek answers from these people so you know what you should do in the event you have an encounter with an officer.

It is YOUR responsibility to think about this and prepare for it.
The Law Enforcement agencies all over the U.S. do take into consideration the possibility of an encounter with someone who, because of mental illness or bona fide medications/medical emergency or other condition such as AS, might not respond to their demands/commands in the manner expected and often received by the general population.

But, you are dealing with humans here. Just because they have gone through an academy, put on a uniform and accouterments, carry dangerous weapons does not mean they shed their human nature.
There is NO special training that will make a person into the perfect officer/soldier that so many people seem to cry for and measure these professionals against.

Yes... it would be nice if every officer controlled every encounter with friendliness and without using force... but it will never happen all the time.

If you are worried that because of your AS, you may react like the driver in the film and consequently/possibly be subdued as he was... just for speeding (oh, and his other actions don't forget), you need to take some action now and work to prevent that.

You are aware of your condition.
You are aware of right and wrong (I'm just guessing here ).
You are responsible for your actions, just as I am.

All's good... right?

I myself an an Aspie and I did have a rather similar event with law enforcement. I had an officer get all up in my face once right away yelling and hollering because I was pissed because my old case management kept screwing up my medications.

I picked him up, and he didn't take kindly to that, nor did 5 of his buddies. The only reason I was not tased I believe is because I knew one of the officers there and he deescalated the situation.

I consider myself lucky that I was not tazed, but I think it would of been an acceptable use of force if I was.

welp no, because ive never shot anyone but i'd imagine getting shot in the knees would take someone down. there are two knees so maybe being shot twice will do it. regaurdless i think once you give a person a bage and a gun they think its aok to kill, or taser to death. arent there non leathal points on the body that you can shoot someone to incapasitate them? im shure there are

One rule when pointing a loaded gun at someone.... you SHOOT TO KILL!

That BS about shooting to wound is all fine in hollywood, but it doesn't work the same in real life.

The handgun has a short barrel. so the distance between your front and rear sights is very short and your accuracy is not so great that most people could aim for a knee and hit it.
Believe me Richard, aiming for a small part of the body only invites a missed shot which is going to go somewhere other than where you hoped it would go.
This could be a bystander, another officer, etc.

It's not just about you aiming the firearm and pulling the trigger and having the bullet hit where you aimed it.
You move... even slightly... when you breath, your heartbeats (which it will do quite rapidly in shooting situations), your hands shake.
The 'target' moves... for a variety of reasons and usually without telling you ahead of time where they are going to move to.
You can shoot for the right lateral abdominal wall... if you hit that soft tissue without shooting a kidney, or perforating an intesting... good for you (as your scenario would seem to suggest). If the target moves a slight bit as you pull the trigger, perhaps you hit the liver instead, or hit a rib which deflect the bullet sending it into a lung, the inferior vena cava, the heart, etc.

The ONLY reason to pull the trigger on a gun pointing at anything live is to kill it. That should be clear to everyone!
This is serious s**t... not Bruce Willis Cowboying it up in his make-believe cop movies, folks!

I take my firearms seriously. I train with them so I can handle them to the best of my ability.

I know what I am talking about here so please heed my words.
Guns are not to show someone how tough you are,
they are not for intimidating people,
they DO NOT MAKE YOU A MAN!

Not that I was thinking you, Richard were saying that.

Sorry, but I take firearms very seriously.

As for cops getting their badge and a gun... or as you put it...


I'm not here to convince you otherwise, but I do know that this is the same old stereotyping people use to justify bitching at 'the man'.

There are plenty of good officers out there... always has been, always will be.

If you believe your statement above, perhaps you should start a campaign to disarm law enforcement.
Either you give them dangerous tools to do their job with, or you don't.
It's not like on Mayberry...
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLsg0EvZozI[/youtube]

I liked that illegal search of the vehicle at the end. There was no RAS or PC to search the vehicle.

When your arrested the officer is allowed to search the immediate area around the subject. It was not illegal.

To add to what TheZach pointed out above...

When you are acting suspicious, the officer may very well have cause to search.

Again, you are looking at a video clip. You are missing a lot of detail.

It's quite easy to bash the officer because you didn't like/approve of what he did with his taser.

It's another thing to try and understand the job and what else may have transpired during the incident that you can't tell from watching a poor quality video.

I think when I pointed out number 2, its more a matter of practicality regarding the job. They run into people like that all the time who are just as arrogant, have just as much of that "I'm never wrong" attitude, and media circuses over incidents like that are something that rarely does happen. Just saying, I don't blame the officer in this video for what he did, but I'm pretty certain that the department he works for would have been furious that he hadn't asserted himself better off the start.

Yep, you did mention it earlier.

And yes, I do believe you could be correct about some people in the department questioning how he let the situation get out of hand.

Hopefully this will be used as a good lesson for the whole force and others as well.

its too hard to tell what they are saying because of the road noise, and this video has been cut so many times who knows whats been left out to make it bias towards the officer or towards the citizen. If this is taken to court than we have nothing to worry about.

I think the taser was a bit over the top. But maybe the cop was afraid the guy was going to drive off. I don't think the driver should be driving, because he asked the cop, repeatedly, "How fast was I going? I don't know how fast I was going." and What is the speed limit."

To me, that indicates that he was driving around, not paying attention to what he was doing and how fast he was going, that indicates to me he was a dangerously inattentive driver.

I believe, however, that situation could have been handled with a little more diplomacy and tact.