Moore OK man beaten to death by cops

[Battle Monkey of Zardoz]

Punished?  As is agency diciplines them. No. Criminal charges for the entire bunch.

Watched the video. Er, if you want a person to survive, it's not a wise idea to have that much force on the torso. While not guaranteed to kill someone, it's not unlikely. Grinding someone's face into the concrete is actually more healthy, unless you are putting force on their neck. I've seen videos of police putting knees on necks, which is also a good way to crush a larynx or cause other damage.

For this situation?

With five available persons, ONE person should assume command.
He or she should give all orders in a clear manner.
He or she should assign one person per limb, more or less.
Suspect should only be shoved to ground long enough to restrain
Suspect should then be sat up, stood up or turned onto side. Side is preferable if the person cannot or should not stand.
The suspect should examined medically and searched for weapons. With five persons, both can be be done simultaneously: one for medical, one for weapons, three for crowd control. If there is no extra help, medical should be done in a rapid manner (pulse and breathing), then weapon checked, and then more comprehensively medically checked.

IF suspect is not breathing or has no pulse, person in command should detail two persons to begin CPR and a third person to immediately call for medical assistance. Command person and spare should handle crowd control, ground guide medical persons and handle additional persons of interest as necessary. This should be continued until medical personnel arrive, then all five officers should go to crowd control.


Regardless of anyone's feelings on whether this homicide was criminally negligent, it was deeply and troublingly professionally negligent. Assuming there is no criminal charges, they should be yanked from service until they are retrained and certified as such. The training needs to be reviewed. If it was good and the officers negligent, they should be appropriately punished for failure to follow procedures. If it was bad, training officer and chief should be punished more than the officers.

Scout, any flaws in the above mentioned opinion?

[zxcvbob]

Punished?  As is agency diciplines them. No. Criminal charges for the entire bunch.

How about federal "Deprived of rights under color of law" charges?  (I can't remember the number)  That could carry the death penalty here.  I don't think they would actually /get/ the death penalty, but it needs to be on the table.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

She will be lucky to get anything over the sympathetic jury settlement. And that's only cause insurance companies fon't gamble

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I537 using Tapatalk

[RevDisk]

Punished?  As is agency diciplines them. No. Criminal charges for the entire bunch.

Tis why I said "assuming no criminal charges".

It was a training failure from the looks of the video. If they were subject to normal criminal proceedings and didn't have qualified immunity, they'd be charged with Involuntary manslaughter as there was no malice aforethought (ie they weren't trying to kill the guy, as opposed to killing the guy in the heat of the moment or a fit of rage).  Specifically, criminally negligent manslaughter. "omission to act when there is a duty to do so, or a failure to perform a duty owed, which leads to a death."

For the military, if you are detaining a person, you have a duty to ensure the welfare of said detainee ABOVE YOUR OWN SELF. So, if you cuff or hogtie or even sit on a person, and they suffocate to death, you committed criminally negligent manslaughter. I know civilian police are given substantial leeway, but I sincerely doubt the courts have ruled that the police have no duty to act when it comes to saving the life of a person they have detained.

Qualified immunity is a tough nut to crack. Most folks don't try. Suing the department on the other hand, while less satisfying, is substantially easier. So, yes, likely she will get a settlement from the department's insurance company. Said insurance company will be the stick that drives the reform by demanding that said department has adequate training on (amongst other things) how to detain a person without killing them. IMHO, that's probably the largest driver of training improvement of American police departments. Losing lawsuits, and insurance companies demanding SOP changes to save money on future settlements. 

It's a bad system, but it's the only common one we have. The other measures (politically imposed moderation, civilian review boards, 'reform', etc) are sporadic at best.

[Battle Monkey of Zardoz]

More reason than ever to restrict, severely restrict, civilian LE immunity and mandate DA pursuing criminal charges.