Opinion ID: 772158
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Speedy Arrests

Text: 57 The evidence in the record strongly suggests that the officers' decisions to use pepper spray during each protest had nothing to do with the government's purported interest in quickly removing the trespassing plaintiffs.  During the Scotia protest, the deputies allowed the threeprotesters who had complied with the police as soon as the pepper spray warnings were given to remain on site -and to continue to cheer on their still-resisting cohorts. If the officers used the pepper spray to hasten the removal of the protesters from private property, failing to remove the protesters who had released from the black bears belied this intent. Moreover, the repeated applications of pepper spray actually prolonged the incident for over an hour. Once the decision was made to remove the protesters physically, all were out of the building and in custody within six minutes. Ten minutes later, all were safely ground-out of the lock-down devices. 58 During the Bear Creek incident, the officers delayed using the pepper spray for half an hour until the sheriff's video grapher arrived. In addition, one of the officers was heard to say on the videotape that they have all day to do this. At Congressman Riggs' office, after the initial applications of pepper spray, two of the protesters voluntarily released themselves from the lock-down devices, but they were not immediately removed from the premises. Nor did the officers physically remove the remaining two female protesters still in the lock-down devices, despite their youth and diminutive size. Instead, the officers chose to reapply the pepper spray in short full bursts into their faces. The evidence suggests that full blast sprays of pepper spray actually delayed the protesters' arrests and prolonged the incident. 59 Thus, the evidence simply does not support the district court's conclusion that the use of pepper spray was needed to remove the protesters from the premises quickly. 60