Thread: At what point, if any, does police violence against minors become okay?

Well... here's my two cents. There was a situation like this when I was in high school years ago. A kid, a tenth grader if I remember correctly, was told to leave the room for some infraction but did not leave, even after the assistant principal came into the class, so they called in one of the sheriffs who was working at the school. He asked the kid to leave but the kid kept refusing and got a little belligerent when the officer tried to speak with him about why he wouldnt leave. It was nothing like striking the officer or getting verbally abusive, but he was cussing and getting loud. Officer ultimately made the decision to remove the kid from the room and he got resistance the kid was pulling away, trying to resist being put in the cuffs I believe they were just doing it to keep everyone safe, prevent him from running away while they called his parents but they could have actually been detaining him. However. The officer never struck him or threw him to the ground. He, and by this time the assistant principal was helping physically control the student, was keeping him upright and still talking very calmly, explaining what he was doing every step of the way. The kid was walked out on his own two feet. Was the girl disobeying the officer? Yes. Did she deserve to be yanked out of a desk and thrown to the ground? No. Did the officer involved deserve to be fired from his position at the school? Yes. Using physical force of that magnitude is only necessary when the officers life is in immediate danger. A girl slapping or hitting an officer is not that kind of danger. A police officer should know that. Does that mean he should have let her hit him? No. The whole absorbing thing No. An officer should not have to put up with being hit or kicked. Thats assaulting an officer and resisting arrest, and you go to jail for it. Still, she should not have been treated that way. She is a child. Whether you think she was raised right or not, whether she was grieving for a loss or not, science has proven that childrens brains are not finished developing. They are prone to more instinctive and irrational thoughts and actions than adults. Its a fact of life. So, they are generally treated differently than adult counterparts. And since this officer was working in a school environment, he would have known that. It would have been a part of his training. When she started resisting, he should have called for backup immediately for assistance. He should have restrained her in the desk, not thrown her to the ground. He should have put her in cuffs, waited until backup arrived, and then either get her to walk out on her own or they could carry her out in a safe and secure position so no one was hurt. An officer causing intentional physical harm to ANYONE is inexcusable. They are trained to use only the force necessary to complete the taskarrestwhatever and no more. In that video, the officer used the kind of force on that girl that I would only expect see the police use on a knife wielding crackhead under the influence of PCP that was actively attacking them. It was wrong. It was plain disgusting. I support the police. I admire them for taking on a job that is dangerous. I know that out of the dozens of horror stories in the news there are thousands of officers that do wonderful and kind things every day. But this officer, this ONE in particular, deserved to be fired from his position at the school. If he hasnt been cut from the force, he needs to be. Ultimately, while the girl should have listened hindsight is a bitch, her behavior did not warrant that reaction. Period.