Iranian-American Student Tasered at UCLA Library

It's tough to tell from the video exactly how it started, but it looks to me like both were a bit at fault. The student seemed really out of control and refusing to cooperate, but the police were using too much force in my opinion. I've seen footage of police moving individuals who refuse to go limp at protests or whatever, and they were able to successfully able to do so without tasers. I would questions whether they would have used tasers if it had been a white student or a female student. It was also clear that the responding officers' emotions were running way too high to be effective, when one turned to the bystanders and told them they would get tasered too if they didn't back up. I think that UCLA is lucky that this didn't escalate into a riot on the spot, with the bystanders going after the police.

Great post Arielle.

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Ok, it is a link to the new Robyn Hitchcock music Video.

I don't know why the police used their tasers and I don't know how this started, BUT when a student or any other citizen is going to be belligerant, uncooperative and disrespectful of people who are doing their job then he/she is going to face the consequences of their actions.
Listen to the dialogue, I don't hear the police losing their cool, but I hear some smart ass kid telling the police they are being abusive, I want you badge number blah blah blah.... THis kid's accent doesn't sound foreign, I don't even see the kid in the video, I just hear a bunch of bull coming from students about you can do this , stop ....
How about showing some respect for the police. How about stop living in this fantasy land of we are all living in a police state and we are revolting or whatever it the stupid mindset that exists in California.
A few years back I was in Berkely and I was walking down Telelgraph Ave ,checking out the shops and the street vendors.
I came across this one street vendor outside Ameoba Records, he had music blaring as loud as he could and his major t-shirt for sale, which he was also wearing had one sentence on it
"Fuck the Police", not even and asterisk in place of the U. So when you walk around with this anti-social attitude and you are asking for a confrontation, you are going to find it.
What if that street vendor were to be robbed in broad daylight, who is he going to call for help? Who? And Why, because apparently to someone like this the police are the enemy.
Getting back to this student, I have no doubt he brought a lot of this on himself. I am sure the police didn't whip out billyclubs and demand an ID, they probably asked for an ID and said since you don't have one you have to leave, whereupon this student decided he was going to get offended and demanding and loud and stupid...

John - GREAT comment.

Keith - I have to wonder if you watched the video with the witness accounts. According to witnesses, although the student originally didn't want to leave, he ended up getting up and as he was walking towards the door the police tasered him. Completely unnecessary in my opinion. I don't think these students have a "Fuck the polic" attitude. I think these students were standing up for thier peers in this case. I think the police used excessive force. And I also think that police threatening students who ask for badge numbers is way out of line. I think the police were on a power trip in this case. I agree with John...would they have tasered the same student had he been white, or a female? I also don't think you can assume this kid had an anti-social attitude either. Maybe the kid just wanted to study and forgot his ID in his dorm?!?!? I know at my university, if you forget your ID, you can still get into the library but there is a seperate sign in process. I think shocking the kid 5 times AFTER he was being handcuffed is ridiculous. AND on top of that, tasers can debilitate a person for up to 15 minutes after the initial shock so it is very possible the student couldn't physically get up!

Hi Arielle,

I caught this on the news the other day. John is right, it is kind of hard to tell from the video. But I do think the force on the side of the school police was excessive.

Arielle
I watched the first video. I don't condone police brutality, I also don't condone stupid behaviour. This apparently began with the student not having his ID. THe student had a militant chip on his shoulder attitude right from the beginning I know from my own expericence that if you are courteous and cooperative you won't have a problem, even if you are faced with an over the top officer.
Years ago I was stopped and accused of being driving under the influence. I didn't get all belligerant or loud, I just quietly performed the tests asked of me and I passed them, I wasn't under the inflluence. This wasn't good enough for one of the officers, he decided he had to start shouting in my face that I was borderline I was this I was that..... I said not a word and went on my way, not stupid enough to be goaded into something just to satisfy this officer's need to make something of nothing.
I'll bet this student still doesn't accept a bit of responsiblity for creating the situation that got out of control.

I'm not saying the student isn't at all responsible but I am saying that according to witnesses, the student was leaving the library when he was tasered. So, Keith, please explain why he was tasered if witnesses say he was leaving? The first taser-ing on the video was actually the second taser-ing the student received. So there is a whole portion of incident missing and I can only go by witness accounts of the incident and based on witness accounts and what I know from the videos I linked to above, I have to say that I think the police were way out of line. Keith, I think you need to watch the other videos as well in order to make a clear opinion. This is the reason I asked in my article for people to watch each video. Because if you only watch the first, you would clearly think it's the students own fault however once you watch other videos with witness accounts, you might think otherwise. This was the case with me. You need to hear what the witnesses had to say, as well as others from the school and representatives from the police. Go watch and then get back to me.

Candace - Thanks for the comment. When you come back, please be sure to watch each video so you can get all the facts before making a judgement on the incident.

Tamara - Agreed.

Joe - My opinion on the incident is based on what I see in the video as well as the witness accounts on the videos that follow the original. I am completely aware that by the first video, you could never know what happened however at least witness accounts have allowed us some sort of insight.

I don't know why or even if the student should have been tasered. It seems to me that in Calilfornia the police whip out those taser guns pretty quick, at least that is how it appears, seeing as we hear of tasers being used out there more often than anywhere else.
Just Joe has a good point, we only see this in the midst of events. We don't know what this student's body language was, maybe he decided he was going to be physical and brush past the police in defiance, it seems he was already in the library , so what was he doing that brought attention to his actions.
The overwhelmming majority of police are just trying to get through a wqork day like everybody else, they aren't looking to stir up trouble or had out beat downs for the fun of it. THey have procedures to follow, they also have to not only worry about the safety of themselves, those around them and the person they are engaged with, whether they be criminal or not.
Try putting yourself in the shoes of the police. They have a job to do, they have to ask for proper ID, they expect to see it and if you don't have it, they have to ask you to leave. Now what happens when the person refuses to comply and is aggressively uncooperative? I guess we know, it should be a lesson learned .THere is no reason to be belligerant when all the police are doing is trying to do their jobs.

Well, we can't see the start of it all, but he sure made some stupid moves afterwards. He just made things worse. I found it interesting that right at the beginning he started yelling about the Patriot Act, and was perhaps looking for a fight? The newscaster said the rules were well known and posted.
I would think in the future they should have a way to tie a guy up in a manner to carry him out instead of using those tasers so much. I know you wouldn't have had to ask me twice...
I don't know if the cops violated any procedures for a case like this either though. I guess we will find out soon enough.

John - You are right. We will find out soon enough as I'm sure the outcome of this will be all over the news at some point in the future. I will do my best to follow the story from the East Coast and continue to post update article regarding it as I did with another case here on Long Island.

Many comments here are on the mark. We don't know what behaviors this student showed leading up to the tasing. We don't know the exchanges made between PD and student, we only here him screaming and sounding rather entitled (my opinion) when he could have complied with PD requests. Also, PD was rather thick-headed to think that after tasing him that said student could just stand up and walk out with them. Lots of aggressive students there, they are lucky a riot didn't occur.

Todd is right on the mark here. We don't know what led up to this, and the liberal California media wouldn't have shown us, even if they had it. They want to stir the pot, it seems.

Both parties could have handled this better. The confrontational attitudes of the students seem to be a real problem, however. The police seem to be on the defensive from very early on.

Arielle,
Don't mess with the Po-Lice!

Some of those guys have a huge chip on their shoulder too, some of the police officers that work out at the Gold's gym admit to using steroids because in hand to hand combat with a perp, they have to be on top of their game, that means extra testosterone in the system, which means a tendency to anger quickly and illogically.
The kid did bring this upon him self though, you want to be a jack ass, then your going to be treated like an animal. Although, I think once is enough, to continue to shock him was excessive force and cruel and unusual.

"Look at the other side. What if that kid was a terroist, suicide bomber and then killed all those other kids. It is horrible to think that way but today we have no other choice." -Mary Hanna.
I think you are quite right that that is horrible to think. The chance the student is a terrorist is probably more unlikely than getting hit by lightning. Furthermore, though he was responding in an outrageous manner, his outrage comes from feelings of oppression and racism. He is simply articulating what many minorities must deal with on a daily account. I'm sure as a woman you probably have felt at some point in your life sexism, and you are annoyed that it is so pervasive in our society. It's unfair for the actions of so few to represent a vast majority. It'd be like saying the actions of the KKK should represent all white people.

Also, in response to the conduct of the police, I'm going to restate what many others have said. The police used excessive force. I'm stating it as fact. The student never attacked the police. He fell on the ground. That was his resistance, or you might even call it his protest. If you look at old videos of college protests, the Third World Liberation Front comes to mind, then you would see that many students protesting refused to move. They were lifted up by two policemen as they sat crosslegged. The police used no force as they detained the protestors. The fact that four officers were unable to pick up the UCLA student and throw him into the back of their car is absurd. Of course, this is all from what I've seen in the video. I don't know what happened in the beginning. It says he was tasered, cuffed, and then tasered four more times. I could understand perhaps the first taser if he was resisting getting cuffed, but after that the police should never had to of tasered again. And on the flip side of everyone saying he was refusing to follow rules, the reaction of the policemen was over the refusal to show something as little as an ID card. I don't know how UCLA works, but the few college libraries I've gone to you need to present some form of ID to get into the library via electronic gates or receptionists. If UCLA doesn't have that system imposed, than they should really work on creating a better system besides cops roaming the libraries hoping to find people who aren't students.

Everyone - Thank you for your comments on the article.

Matt - You bring up some great points about students protests over time. And you are right in saying that those police officers should have been able to pick up a student and throw him in the back of a car. All you need for that is 2 cops, and there were 4 at the scene.

Here are some updates on this article from cnn.com

UCLA students and civil rights activists on Friday demanded an independent investigation into a campus police officer's use of a Taser gun on an Iranian-American student.

Speakers at a news conference and subsequent rally said the shocking of Mostafa Tabatabainejad, 23, sent a chill across the campus.

"As students we feel our safety is endangered, and we do not feel safe on campus," said Sabiha Ameen, president of the Muslim Students Association.

Students at the news conference said there was no sign that Tabatabainejad was targeted because of his ethnicity. But his lawyer disagreed.

Civil rights attorney Stephen Yagman announced separately that he plans to file a lawsuit charging that the American-born Tabatabainejad was singled out because of his Middle Eastern appearance.

UCLA's interim chancellor, Norman Abrams, cautioned the public against jumping to conclusions before a university investigation is completed.

"It would be best if everyone, within and without the university, would withhold judgment pending review of the matter," Abrams said in a written statement.

Student Combiz Abdolrahimi, chairman of UCLA's chapter of the National Iranian American Council, said he's unsatisfied with the university's conduct of the investigation so far. He said the incident would likely have been ignored if it hadn't been taped and made public.

"There were incidents before and you read about them in the paper, but it doesn't register until you actually see the reaction, hear the screams," he said.

_______________________________________

It will be interesting to see where this goes now.

John -
Thanks so much for posting the update. Very interesting to read about what a couple of the students think as well as the action being taken thus far! I am going to try and keep everyone updated but it seems like you are also keeping up on the story! If I miss something, please post the update here!

University cops......most of them are jokes...in some places they are not. In Florida they are all REAL cops who have been through the4 academy, are members of the sate police & are seruious cops. they are also very well accustomed to dealing with students & their hijinks...withut reacting as these university cops did. Excessive force & poor judgement on these cops part!

I think the student made the same mistake Rodney King did, and paid a similar price at the hands of overzealous security forces. I do hope he sues and gets the force to change policy.