The blatantly excessive nature of some university police actions during the protests on and around Nov. 19 not only deserves the swift condemnation of any responsible Regents and University President, it demands it.
All offices of the university, including that of the chancellor, must warn the UCPD for its abuses of students who were protesting nonviolently (loudly, but nonviolently).
YouTube video clearly depicts at least one UCPD officer reaching over barricades (lines that are undoubtedly secure) to grab a student.
Jim Lafferty, executive director of the National Lawyers Guild of Los Angeles, described what he observed to be clear instances of “unnecessary and excessive force, especially with respect to the use of the Tasers.”
Lafferty said that it was the opinion of not only himself but a number of UCLA Law students who were sent to the protests as “legal observers” that “on a number of occasions the police behaved in a way which was wrong, unnecessary and constituted excessive use of force and a violation of the First Amendment.”
Lafferty said he saw UCPD officers point and “click” Tasers (i.e. not fully activating them but issuing a sort of passive-aggressive threat) at students’ faces (as well as at Lafferty himself, a mere bystander).
He said he also saw officers point “less lethal weapons” ““ rubber bullet and beanbag guns ““ at eye level, sometimes at students mere feet away. According to Lafferty, these actions are serious breaches of policy, and they could have cost lives.
A “less lethal” rubber bullet or beanbag that is fired point-blank at someone’s face could kill.
Lafferty noted that, after he spoke with UCPD Capt. John Adams, the captain told his officers to stop doing so, which they did for a brief period before returning to the policy-breaching actions.
AP photos show UCPD officers using Tasers on fourth-year political science student Rusten O’Neil at the lower left chest, despite a missive from Taser (the company that makes the devices) that warned police departments that their weapons should not be pointed at the chest and that such uses would probably invite police brutality lawsuits.
It should be noted that this column ““ as well as most condemnations of the actions described here ““ points criticism at the individuals that perpetrated the vile acts. Some officers certainly held their ground (an unpleasant ground to be sure, with students chanting and yelling) with the professionalism that citizens are right to expect from their police.
In an unsettling twist, the aforementioned YouTube video also shows officers holding back at least one of their colleagues who attempted to strike students with a metal baton. Those who attempted to restrain their colleagues should be commended for their temperance.
The UCPD is still completing its customary investigation into the use of force (an investigation that UCPD spokeswoman Nancy Greenstein said occurs after every instance of police force).
Greenstein also asked that any videos or testimony from witnesses or suspected victims of police force be sent to the department immediately.
With respect to questions regarding the pointing of less lethal weapons at face level, Greenstein said that the department was not prepared to comment until all evidence had been reviewed.
However, multiple acts of individual abuse ultimately reflect deficiencies in department standards. This is something Bruins have heard before ““ while an external investigation found multiple points of policy breach, a UCPD investigation concurred that its officers had not acted wrongly in their use of Tasers in the infamous library incident in 2006.
The mistake that both Regents and the UCPD have made is to consider their customers and constituents rowdy teenagers. Whether the protesters were students or not, certain individuals within the police department took steps that amount to violations of civil rights.
Lafferty and everyone consulted in research for this column noted that at no point during the protests did UC President Mark Yudof or any Regent address the crowd of students. Instead, they ran from building to courtesy van as university police maced students in the face in their wake.
By not condemning this action, the university, the Regents and the Office of the President allow such crimes to become unofficial policy.
If students at the nation’s premier public school system cannot protest without facing violence at the hands of police that are either inadequately trained or just ill-suited to their choice of career, there is little to be said for the state of free speech in this country.
On Nov. 18, Yudof tweeted a link to a column that praised his efforts to get the federal government on board with the UC. Yudof tweeted that the columnist “hits (the) nail on the head,” and that the “protestors’ problems not with me or Regents, but with Sacramento and even voters.”
Though his amazingly self-congratulatory tweets are meant to deflect disgust with his office, Yudof can be sure that students have great “problems” with his silence and cowardice as his police department may have brutalized his students.
It is time Yudof and the leaders of this university system strive for decency and support their students by condemning this sad moment in UC history.
E-mail Makarechi at kmakarechi@media.ucla.edu.
Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.