So I don’t have a motorized transport vehicle of any kind, but I am fortunate enough to have a bright blue and white bicycle.
I biked over to the grocery store close to campus tonight, and since it is suicide to attempt being a cyclist in this town in general, let alone at night, I use the sidewalks and pedestrian crosswalks.
Like a good law-abiding citizen (more like someone who doesn’t want to die because people in cages in this city are psycho), I waited on the sidewalk for the little white man to indicate that I could bike across the intersection. A cop car without lights flashing/siren came roaring up at top speed, then screeched to a halt (behind the stop line, mind you) when realized the light was red.
Cautiously, I kicked off and started on my way behind him (as this is where the crosswalk is). Suddenly, I notice in my periphery that his backup lights were on, and he had floored it. Thankfully, I noticed this in time to use my closest leg to kick off from his bumper instead of being crushed against it, causing me to fall down right in front of another car.
The other driver quickly got out of his car, rushed to my side and helped me get up. On the other hand, the cop sticks his head out the window, and the following conversation begins:
Cop: You alright?
Me: For having just been hit by car, I’m fucking ducky.
Cop: Good.
Other driver: What’s your badge number, officer?
Cop: Don’t have time, on a call. Get out of my way, I gotta get through that parking lot.
Other driver: You just hit her.
Cop: Not my problem I didn’t see her.
Me: Asshole, I’m not even wearing all black for once.
And then the light turned green, and being first in line, the cop once again floored it and sped off into the night.
“Protecting and serving,” my ass.
(I’m peachy, by the way. It was a very controlled fall, and over the years of getting two black belts I learned how to ~properly fall~.)
Police brutality: Cop reinstated before city has completed Alex Landau inquiry
The decision of the Civil Service Commission to reinstate cops Ricky Nixon and Kevin Devine, who’d been sacked over an alleged 2009 brutality incident at the Denver Diner, is controversial in and of itself.
But this twist becomes even more incendiary considering that Nixon was also involved in the 2009 beating of Alex Landau — and a promised investigation into that incident, which prompted a $795,000 settlement, still hasn’t been completed.
According to a lawsuit filed last year, Denver Police officers Nixon and Devine collectively roughed up and maced four women at the Denver Diner in July 2009. Last September, their attorney, Siddhartha Rathod, stressed that none of the women had done anything wrong, and one had actually been the victim of an assault prior to police involvement. He also accused Nixon and Devine of falsifying reports and fabricating charges. As a result, three of the women entered guilty pleas in an effort to make the accusations go away — actions they subsequently tried to withdraw.
In April 2011, then-Manager of Safety Charles Garcia fired Nixon and Devine for the alleged falsehoods. However, as the Denver Post reports in a piece linked above, the commission determined that the inaccuracies in their reports were not submitted with “an intent to deceive or hide the truth.” As such, the officers have been reinstated and will receive back pay and benefits.
Five-year-old Stockton, California resident Michael Davis has been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, a clinical term often used to pathologize the predictable behavior of young boys. Like many other boys his age, Michael doesn’t take well to prolonged “educational” detention, and sometimes proved to be a disruptive influence in his class.
Seeking to “cure” Michael of his rambunctiousness, the commissariat in charge of Rio Calaveras Elementary School arranged a meeting with Lt. Frank Gordo, a “resource officer” assigned to the district. The “scared straight” script called for Lt. Gordo — whose surname, so appropriate for a tax-feeder, is one of God’s little jokes — to waddle menacingly into the room, reducing young Michael to a puddle of docile obedience. Michael displayed a precociously healthy disposition by being un-intimidated by the state functionary in full battle array.
At one point, according to Gordo’s account, he placed his hand on Michael. This was the very definition of a “bad touch,” and Michael quite sensibly rebelled. Gordo reported that the youngster “pushed my hand away in a batting motion, pushed papers off the table, and kicked me in the right knee” — a perfectly proportionate response to armed physical aggression by a much larger assailant (although I suspect Michael’s aim was a little low).
Rather than backing off and calming down, which is how a functioning adult would have behaved, Gordo escalated the assault and compounded it with armed abduction by hog-tying the five-year-old — zip-tying his hands and ankles and dragging him to the station, where he was charged with “battery on a police officer.” The child would remain trussed for at least two hours. During that time he was forced to undergo a psychiatric evaluation — since, as all dutiful subjects in the Soyuz understand, only someone clinically ill would display such hostility toward an agent of the State.
