Cop’s lawyer claims hitting an Iraq veteran 20 times was ‘too little’ force

Cop’s lawyer claims hitting an Iraq veteran 20 times was ‘too little’ force
By Stephen C. Webster
Saturday, June 26th, 2010 -- 3:45 pm

An attorney representing a police officer caught on tape almost two years ago viciously assaulting an Iraq war veteran suggested in court recently that his client had, perhaps out of "compassion," used "too little" force against the unarmed man lying on the ground before him in video released online.

The officer had alleged that Iraq veteran Walter Harvin was acting in an aggressive manner while trying to enter his mother's building on 93rd Street in Manhattan. Surveillance footage released by the district attorney's office shows Officer David London attack the man with his baton, hitting him repeatedly until he falls, then continuing to strike blows to Harvin's face, head and upper-body. By most media estimates, the unarmed war vet was struck some 20 times while on the ground.

Harvin's most aggressive action in the recording is to shove London away at one point. Officers claimed he was shouting threats and cursing at them while laying on the ground in handcuffs, which attorneys suggest justifies the continued beating Harvin received even as he lay restrained on the ground.

According to The New York Post, lawyer Stephen Worth asked the jury if the officer's level of force was excessive, to which he added:

isn't all of the footage. It certainly does appear to be excessive and should result in the cop being fired and held civilly responsible for any damages. Has the cop been fired?

"Was this too little?"

obviously, any affront to his authority is to be severely punished. After all, they get to act in a moral vacuum and anything is permissible if the officer's safety is threatened.

"officer safety" has been trumping our civil rights for many years now. in fact, it's largely responsible for the detoothing of the 4th amendment.