Sources
- Here’s the story on Boing Boing
- The original story at UCLA’s Daily Bruin
- Video footage taken by a student on their cellphone (youtube, runtime 6:53)
- Direct download link (here’s an *.FLV player)
[Update 2006-11-21]
Boing Boing follows up with a post sourcing an LAist article. It turns out that one of the police officers who tased the UCLA student was previously fired from the Long Beach PD for having being trigger-happy with his cattle prod. Big surprise!
[Update 2006-11-18]
The Daily Bruin has published a follow-up article that describes in more detail what exactly happened on Nov. 14 at 11:30 PM. Most other articles online seem to be sourcing their information from the Bruin articles.
Ironically, a lot of the commercial news sites are taking the cell footage and putting it on their own webpage, without telling us where they got it, not to mention that several of the TV news sites have clipped the footage down to 1-2 minutes, instead of the full 6.
Isn’t this a copyright violation? Did they ask the Daily Bruin or the student for permission to re-publish that video? I’m not sure, but I would think the student wouldn’t be too worried about the video getting spread about, since this needs as much press as possible.
[/update]
From the “Breaking News” Daily Bruin article referenced at top:
“At around 11:30 p.m., CSOs asked a male student using a computer in the back of the room to leave when he was unable to produce a BruinCard during a random check. The student did not exit the building immediately.
The CSOs left, returning minutes later, and police officers arrived to escort the student out. By this time the student had begun to walk toward the door with his backpack when an officer approached him and grabbed his arm, at which point the student told the officer to let him go. A second officer then approached the student as well.
The student began to yell “get off me,” repeating himself several times.
It was at this point that the officers shot the student with a Taser for the first time, causing him to fall to the floor and cry out in pain. The student also told the officers he had a medical condition.
UCPD officers confirmed that the man involved in the incident was a student, but did not give a name or any additional information about his identity.
Video shot from a student’s camera phone captured the student yelling, “Here’s your Patriot Act, here’s your fucking abuse of power,” while he struggled with the officers.”
The cellphone footage of this is some of the most chilling I have ever seen. It never actually seems to get a direct shot of the student being detained, but from side angles, and you can hear him crying out in pain several times when he gets tasered.
