L.A. Police kick suspect in head
6:05 pm By la Macha · Drugs| Justice| Los Angeles| Violence| race
14 May 2009
The notorious L.A. police are embroiled in yet another case of caught-on-video act of police brutality. From the BBC News (which also has video):
The incident came at the end of a car chase through Los Angeles suburbs.
The footage shows the suspect, Richard Rodriguez, 23, trying to escape on foot, then lying down to surrender when he sees there is no escape.
One pursuing police officer kicks him, and another punches his side. The local police department is investigating.
The incident, in the suburb of Pico Rivera, was recorded by news helicopters and broadcast on local TV stations
Already people are justifying this by saying that the man who was kicked was a criminal and deserved it or otherwise asked for it. In reply to that, I just have to ask, have these people never watched or read any Super Hero comics? It’s not up to the police to decide what punishments people deserve for their crimes. The police are not judge, jury and executioner. We supposedly *separate* each of these entities so that even the worst of the worst criminal out there gets a fair trail and sentence that is appropriate to the crime. That’s what a *democracy* is right? That system that we are bombing others into accepting because it rocks so hard?
Good GOD, I’m glad I don’t live out in L.A.
Hola!
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9 Responses to L.A. Police kick suspect in head
mario
May 15th, 2009 at 1:28 am
I am also glad you do not live in LA, the last thing we need is more scumbag gang lovers like you around here. The maggot was involved in a car chase which could had killed innocent people, a kick to the face was not enough, I hope word gets around in jail that he has short eyes regardless if it’s true or not.
SA
May 15th, 2009 at 4:40 am
Mario, your comment is probably going to get deleted, but did you not read what La Macha wrote about fair trial?
rabilay
May 15th, 2009 at 5:35 am
Classy as always. The good God fearing people taking no notice of do onto others…. What other incidents require a kick in the face? It is especially good when done to someone who has surrendered, it shows how much the kick really matters. There is such a warped and twisted view of what civillization is in the minds of some that I am astonished that they are able to walk amongst us. Why is that man a criminal and the officer a ‘good guy?’ Just how can anyone make that distinction? What can I get for speaking out, a baton over the head? Since nobody ever taught that manouver to the officer in question, no-one empowered him to do that, and since not a single person was killed by the fleeing ’suspect’ can we not conclude that he (officer vigillance) himself took the law in to his own hands and metted out, not law enforcement, but mere revenge for something that could have happened but didn’t?
Ray
May 15th, 2009 at 6:51 am
The way I see it, there was no justifiable cause for the offiser to kick the suspect at all, he was clearly surendering and was no longer posing any threat. As the article above states, police is neither judge, jury or executioner, and there is a reason for that. Once upon a time, that most of us think we’ve come a long way from in 2009, less intelligent(?) people saw that these institutions (police, judge, jury, executioner) needed to be seperated, so to ensure that as much of the truth as possible came to light, and that the proper justice was served. I’m not saying this perticular suspect was innocent or guilty, we don’t know that, that’s up to a court of law to assess, but if we say it’s ok for police to punish suspects this way, alot of innocent people are gonna get violated. And what if the police confused a bystander with the perpetrator. The police are not infallible. Infact it’s ILLEGAL for police to harm suspects, or anyone else for that matter, and to have a fair trial is an unviolable RIGHT a suspect has, no matter what. I guess that some people can’t face up to their own hypocrisy; when it happens to a “scumbag” it’s allright, but if it happened to themselves or someone they loved it’s not. If we tolerate that the police do these things, we’re back to feudalism or at least a police state. It’s certainly not the traits of a democracy.
Mindy
May 15th, 2009 at 11:14 am
Since most of these comments have been situated off assumptions and opinions i will throw my assumptions and opinions as well. Someone claims “a lot of innocent people are going to get violated”. I have no idea where you are getting that from in this situation. Whether guitly or not, the guy was involved in a high speed pursuit. You put many lives in danger and ram your car into an oncoming car. That can pretty much be be assault with a deadly weapon. Also from another comment thata claims that the officer is the good guy: there is no one claiming that. Or the paart where who can justify the criminal?. Come on lets be realistic here he runs away after a high speed pursuit, after running into a innocent driver? And again credibility? baton? flashlight? yea different. I get where the comments are aiming at, but we do live in a society of crime and idiotic people who do such things whether that be the suspect or the officer, but we cant have to “everything is going to be ok if we understand whats going on” attitude. It wont work. Thats how soft and cute want it to be when in reality its not.
la Macha
May 15th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Mindy–even when if a man kills another man right in front of the officer’s face, the officer’s JOB–the thing he is paid to do, has an actual job description that is dictated and controlled by the government–is to *arrest* the man and turn him over to the appropriate people. What is the use of having a government if the government gets to pick and choose when it’s going to follow it’s own rules?
taxed
May 15th, 2009 at 8:41 pm
Wow, this is the behavior of police in north texas.
the 1st police officer kicked him
the 2nd hit him in the kidneys
the 3rd had his dog bite him
then they high fived.
put all three in jail 5 years as any normal person would get for aggravated assult.
Ray
May 16th, 2009 at 9:04 am
Dear Mindy. I was speaking in general, but even so, it’s illegal for anyone to punish a perpetrator for something he didn’t do. Yes, he drove like a mad-man and he might have hurt people, but he didn’t. If you went into store carrying a gun in your purse, you might have robbed the store, but let’s say you didn’t. Let’s take another example: if an idiot fires a gun randomly at his surrondings but doesn’t actually kill or hurt anyone, you can’t put him on trial for murder. You can put him away for trying to kill people maybe, but not for something he didn’t do. Do you understand the differance. And I didn’t say the suspect who got kicked in the head was innocent, but no matter what it was ILLEGAL for the cop to kick him. That’s not his job. My point is, if you’re going to crack down on criminal behaviour, the this cop should be put behind bars.
Sam DePecan
May 17th, 2009 at 7:19 pm
Why didn’t he just stop when he was summoned by the police to do so? Police are afraid of criminals now days. Even if one surrenders from a wild chase, they are still dangerous. The most important thing here is no policeman was killed or maimed in any way. I have to admit that there are just punk-boys in the city police departments now days. The days of one-cop one-car one-gun played a significan part in previous era of crime-fighting. From the looks of the way this criminal spells his name, I am pretty sure that he is about to come into several millions of dollars. That’s the LAW!