Broward officer apologizes for behavior after 2003 trade summit

Aug 9, 2006

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) -- A high-ranking Broward Sheriff's officer apologized Wednesday for derogatory comments he and other officers made in a police-training video following the 2003 Free Trade Area of the Americas summit in Miami.

The video shows Major John Brooks and other officers praising each other for shooting protesters with rubber bullets at the convention a day earlier.

"Looking back at the tape, in hindsight, I shouldn't have said those things," Brooks said in a report published Wednesday night on The Miami Herald's Web site.

One of the protesters, Elizabeth Ritter, contends she was unjustifiably shot with rubber bullets while she stood in front of police in riot gear. A video recorded the day of the protests shows Ritter cowering under a sign while being pelted with bullets. One bullet pierced the sign and struck her in the head.

<snip>

BSO officials said no one would face disciplinary action in connection with the training video.


http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/F/FL_TRADE_TALKS_PROTESTS_FLOL-?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=STATE&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT


Gee we're sorry. Now everything is all better. :sarcasm:

Just don't cross my path during your lifetime, okay?

"I'm so sorry....I got caught."

:cry::cry::cry::cry::cry:

Those cops are really something.

All they needed was firehoses.

Rubber bullets can put out an eye. They're supposed to be aimed low, but at that protest and many others the cops aim at head height.

Hekate

I don't believe rubber bullets can be traced to the firing weapon.

Fire away, you good ol' boys.

a couple of years ago after being shot with a rubber bullet during a riot folowing some basketball or football game?

She was just a bystander as well.

But I have read that both taser and rubber bullets are marketed to police forces as virtually harmless, so a cop who wouldn't dream of drawing his weapon in a certain situation ends up using a taser to excess. I think chiefs have a similar notion of rubber bullets for crowd control.

I'm not excusing these practices at all, just trying to understand how this has come about. They are overdue for some serious regulation.

Btw, Brett Wagner of California Center for Strategic Studies has been sending postings about a new "pain ray" designed for crowd control. Now that's a scary notion.
http://www.thecaliforniacenter.org/capitolhill.php

Hekate

thats all

was the mother or father of one of the cops? They just didn't give a damn.

Fla. Police Tape Is No Laughing Matter to Protester
Police Apologize but Lawyer Plans Lawsuit for Rubber Bullet Shooting

By ARASH GHADISHAH

MIAMI, Aug. 10, 2006 —

~snip~
Before long, she was caught in a barrage of rubber-bullet fire.

Ritter said police offered no warning before firing on protesters.

"There was absolutely no indication either orally or by gesture that they wanted anyone to disperse or leave," she said. "Had the police given such an order, I would have obeyed it immediately."

Videotaped footage of the protests shows Ritter standing next to a police officer using a bullhorn to announce that the protests would be permitted to continue as long as they remained peaceful.

Ritter is later seen on the tape walking away from a line of officers when she is apparently shot in the leg with a rubber bullet.

She then turns toward the officers and asks, "Did you shoot me? A lady in a suit? Who has been walking peaceably in front of you for half an hour and you shot me when my back was turned?"
(snip/...)

http://abcnews.go.com/US/LegalCenter/story?id=2296783&page=1

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Protesters contend Miami police abused them, stepped on their civil rights

By Diana Marrero
Miami Bureau
Posted November 28 2003

~snip~
The video also captured footage of Miami lawyer Elizabeth Ritter, who stood
peacefully in front of a row of officers in black riot gear with a sign
meant to protest what she saw as the creation of a police state in her
hometown, not the trade talks. The sign read: "Fear Totalitarianism."

A short time later, Ritter was hit by at least five rubber bullets as she
walked away from officers. One hit her in the back of the head while she
crouched behind her sign.

"Never in a million years did it occur to me that my police department would
hurt me or much less shoot me in the back," Ritter said.
(snip/...)

http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:nC3XWthyWWEJ:listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu/cgi-bin/wa%3FA2%3Dind0311%26L%3Dpoetics%26D%3D1%26O%3DD%26P%3D87526+%22Elizabeth+Ritter%22+Miami+protest&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=3

real consequences for their violence?

Why does our legal system lock people up for years for a single MJ seed, but let this guy get off.

Not only isn't he being punished, but he still works in law enforcement. That's just irresponsible!
:grr:

with every possible advantage. As each avenue for recourse to abuse was utilized by citizens whose rights have been violated, a means to neutralize that recourse was put in place over the years until we find ourselves today, without recourse. You just have to hope the cop you meet is an honest person. If he's not, you're screwed. It's that simple.

And never, ever expect any reform to come the the bottom up. It's so hopelessly skewed at this point that reform would need to take place from the top down, and likely forced onto an unwilling and hostile police/security industry.

Attorney General's office? Aren't they the top cop in the state?

These so-called police officers are a disgrace to their profession.
They should be sued both in their government capacity and personally.
There is ample evidence to show they were acting far beyond their duties
as police officers and should thus be held personally responsible for
their actions.

She's bringing suit based on the post-demonstration video of Captain Pindick and his Yuk-it-up brownshirts. I hope a substantial portion of the 2007 Broward County budget finds its way into the pockets of her and her lawyer.

It's astonishing to me that no one was disciplined, nobody was suspended, nobody was even reprimanded for this. At least nobody so far.