Police Powers: Tasers and Juveniles

From the moment we are brought onto this earth we are shaped, molded and formed to co-exist successfully in the prescribed circle of social structure. We are conditioned at the very start of life to hold certain values, attitudes and beliefs, carry them into our actions and choices .We are taught about authority and safety first. We understand who and what authority is.

As individuals we are expected to abide by the hierarchy of social structure, and should any of us fall short of what is acceptable and what is not, we do so knowing that there is a consequence to our actions and our decisions. If we have wronged, we will be punished, whether we own up to it willingly or not. There is a universal understanding in what is right and what is wrong, it is simply a matter of choice.

In forms of authority, we were groomed with mixed messages about Law Enforcement but we tend to evade questioning even the most overt wrongs when it comes down to it. On one hand, we are told they are the good guys – they are here to help, we will be safe and they will protect us. We can rely on them, we can trust them, it’s their job to care. Than on the other hand we learn fear. Even the simplest of things, such as a squad car following behind us is terrifying.  If we need to call for their help, we will be judged by them, by our neighbors – in some cases our family and friends. Nothing good comes from calling the police – nothing.

The theory that they are here to protect us, so far in my experience is a myth. Still we hold certain ideals of law enforcement. We expect that they are going to be good at their positions, that they can deal with a variety of people and situations, that they will try to save a life before take a life, and hold firm to every heartfelt word of their prescribed oaths….maybe a few really do, but not in my experience.

We generally like to think of police as “better” people, since they hold this privilege and power., not given to “just anyone” after all, they are trained to be good officers. Time and experience continue to show us, that when one of them makes even the most fatal mistake – we give them a little time off, make sure they don’t fall behind on their bills, and until it fades from the attention of the public they can’t go back on duty.

Martin Luther King, Jr. once said “an injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere.” Never will there be a truer statement. Every minute that passes us by someone is wounded, and re-wounded by circumstance. For anyone to believe or defend that we don’t have a very grave problem that runs up and down the branches of a system designed to serve our best interest, would be an argument of idealism.

It is always in the light of tragedy that we temporarily turn our attention to an issue, a happening, a wrong and start questioning it, even if we are silent about it. More often than not, we have no idea what is really happening anywhere – silence is still golden in certain circles – so is it not than our civic duty to call into question police officers and  police powers – along with the integrity or the lack thereof  when the situation calls for it?

In the decade since law enforcement agencies introduced the original “stun gun” as a primary weapon of choice for law enforcement – its evolution has been incomparable to any other police tool. Yet, like everything else in this world (with the inclusion of all scientific considerations) the true test of effectiveness only comes via time and experience. Experience required modifications, and so came about a more intense weapon, a widely used and highly favored “alternative to using deadly force” – the taser.

Despite certain similarities, the taser differs in deliverance and magnitude. Capable of being fired from a range of distances up to 20 feet, the 2 prongs attach to the body or clothing and transmit 50,000 volts of electricity to the body’s central nervous system, impairing brain functions instantly, incapacitating control over body just long enough for law enforcement to gain control over the person, or so is the principle.

The immediacy of the shock is known to cause heartbeats to elevate from a range of 72 bmp’s to a sudden 220 bmp’s, in short disbursements. Additional to the physiological and metabolic responses, the body itself sustains physical injuries, often multiple. To date, no studies have been conducted to evaluate any long-term effects this may have on the brain or physical health, and all evaluations so far, were bought and paid for by Taser International, Inc.  themselves, so you decide if you would be interested in their findings. I’m not.

However, it is not the weapon itself that is an issue; it’s in whose hands it is in that we should be concerned. It is in loose policies and protocols, it is in police powers and personal discretions, it is in burned out officers, or those who vibe power trip through every fiber of their being. We have a problem with abusive, inept police officers – we simply do.

An article in a Georgia newspaper first caught my eye. On the night of May 23, 2010, 18 year old Clifford Grevemberg was sitting outside of a Tybee Island bar, while his brother ran in to order food to go. Because he was underage he wasn’t allowed in, so he sat on the curb and waited. His brother had only been gone a few minutes inside. In that time, 4 Tybee Island Police officers approached him twice to ask for his identification. As he stood, he was shoved to the ground and was tasered twice.

Arrested and taken into custody although no initial reason given, later reports stated the boy was arrested and charged with drunk and disorderly.  What the officers would later learn was that Clifford is autistic, he also has a serious heart condition that has and continues to require constant monitoring, Clifford was not drunk that night or any other, he can’t drink. So, was it all in fun?

May 2010, a 94 pound, 10 year old boy was tasered by a police officer multiple times outside of the Tender Teddies daycare. He had been throwing a fit and was entangled in a physical confrontation with 2 female daycare staff. Present were the officer’s Captain and the 2 females. The officer was penalized for this in typical fashion when it was realized he failed to include the incident in his report.

In Miami Dade, 2 police officers responded to a 911 call from the Kelsey Pharr Elementary School regarding a suicidal 6 year old boy. 6! The child had cut his leg with a piece of glass he held and was threatening to do further harm to himself. There were 5 highly regaurded professional adults in that room, and the action they took was to taser the kindergartner. What is wrong with this picture?

In November of 2009, Ozark, Arkansas, Police Officer Dustin Bradshaw responded to a 911 call from an upset mother who couldn’t get her 11 year old daughter to take a shower. ( I know! Right?) Officer Bradshaw arrived to find the child throwing a tantrum on the floor and a screaming mother, who at one point told the officer to just “tase her ass”. Officer Bradshaw managed to pick up the girl and carry her to the couch, however when he put her down she let out a kick – that he took in the groin. That resulted in the child being tasered and brought to a juvenile center. I see two adults that need some serious questioning in this case.

I understand that what law enforcement officers represent and put on the line for any one of us at any given time, and that is not to be undermined. There is a debt we cannot repay to those who wake up each day, kiss their loved ones goodbye – possibly for the last time and see the worst there is to see running the risk of their own lives and not all police officers lack integrity or compassion, but could I ever trust or have faith in someone who can’t even negotiate with elementary school children – without such invasive violence?

At Our Heels: Our Kids Have Lost Protection

Curiosity led me to try to follow up on the story regarding the 15-year-old boy, Bay City, Michigan teen who died after being tazed by police during a dispute officers responded to at an apartment at 3:40 a.m. this past Sunday. Somehow, I expected to read all about what a bad kid this boy grew to be this violent out of control adjudicated offender. However, I found nothing. Not even the name of the officer, who I suspect is suspended with pay during the investigation and it will all come out he acted in accordance with his professional oath when tazing a juvenile.

 

I have no idea how many officers were present, but I am assuming more then one. I have no idea what actually happened, but I guarantee there will be a lot of C.Y.A’ing. I cant imagine with all the skill and training officers go through, how they could not, even as rough as they like to, want to, or need to get could not over power a 15 year old kid. But, I can believe that without a second thought, despite all of that officers resources, tazing the kid was the first thing that went through his mind. Grant that we have some pretty tough kids these days, but I also believe we have some pretty regardless cops who resort to aggression and have no qualms about abuse of power. I’ve seen for myself how police are teaching our kids to despise and disrespect them just in the way they talk to them. So do I have a doubt this kid would not be dead if police could more effectively execute their powers.

 

From there I drifted again in thought….

 

To a vivid and beautiful little girl, named Megan Meier, from Missouri. At 13, she by every way of manner was a typical teenager, and a harmless one at that.

 

 Betrayal and lost friendships are experiences we have in life, we live them and then let them go, but the proportion of bullying, psychological harm, fear, hurt and shame that a friend who she had simply split from, and the friends mother set a course of revenge against just shows how a perverse mind, breeds similar commonalities in their “familial village”.

 

The madness and pervasiveness of all those involved in the lies that tore a child apart until see saw no worth in herself, until she believed the embedding words of self-destruction, that upon prompting- by encouragement, this bright young child took her own life, much to young to understand that these people were sick. Although the consequences were handed down, they do not even closely equate to the loss of this precious and very loved girl.

 

Maybe somewhere there is a serious dysfunction in social functioning and it’s making it’s way in and out, live or virtual

 

This past February, an aspiring 30-year old model, Paul Zolezzi ended his life, publicly, and wrote his goodbye letter on Facebook, just before hanging himself in the park. Was it the self-medicating that got him, the mental illness that finally overtook him, or the demons that follow talent? I don’t know, he didn’t reach out, he just said his peace for the whole world to see and walked out the door and into the park and it was done. Sadly, his father had committed suicide in a public way, when he was in his forties. Paul likely had his fathers mental illness with an abetting heroin addiction, there is tragedy in life extinguished.

 

A few months ago, I came upon, by MySpace, a cry out. An intent, and inquiry as to why this man that I have never met, should want to live, he was contemplating a way out of his personal hell. As someone who witnessed a suicide at age 13, buried one uncle, and 7 friends, and seen buried 3 of my own teenage children’s friends by suicide – I would naturally respond with an absolute, “NO!” and key out some reasons. Noting that this very well drafted letter had been long thought through and even was written with an almost beautiful sense of artistic eclecticness. Reluctance in prose intermingling, I wondered, was his pain temporary or long sustained.

 

I read into some of the responses, and there was one guy that unnerved me with his ignorance. “Just quit talking about it and get it over with then.”- Comments to that posterity- I wonder, how does one, think like that? Be so conscious-less? Are we seriously these kind of people? Have we lost our senses? Would there be any remorse at all, should he have chosen to end his life. (Which by the way he did not.) What in this world could possibly make someone actually tell another to take their life? It unnerves me, that in tumultuous paths we walk amongst each other.

 

Then begot the MySpace murders…. (These vicious acts of destruction, are not solely linked to MySpace, they find their way in through all kinds of venues there is just an unfortunate sequence on MySpace that I am sure is working very diligently on it’s end)

 

The story begins with an emotionally disturbed young man by the name of Ulysses Handy the III. There are a cast of people, making the case pretty hard to follow at some of the most pivotal considerations when examining this case and at what point in time, was this kid failed- because in all his 21 years free to roam he was a danger to society, and even spent some time in jail. There were suicidal and homicidal thoughts. There were diagnosis’, which must have been the generalized popular psychological concurrent for teen psychosocial disobedience that year, and I call out the flawed outcomes this historic Forensic Psychiatric Exam. There were medications.  There was violence. He sexually assaulted a younger girl that was revealed only because he gave her herpes. He was, as self-professed- a predator.

 

In 2005, Handy met another car enthusiast, 22-year-old Daniel Varo on MySpace via someone else so the story goes. They became friends, and Varo was known to have friends with money, drugs, and goods- when Handy first met Varo his intent was to jack his friend Darren Christian. As it turned out Handy changed his mind, and the three of them began hanging out quickly becoming inseparable friends. There were disturbing elements to the friendships. The bantering between the boys on their MySpace pages seemed more ridiculous then it did invoking.

 

In February 2006, Christian got upset with Handy over a coat, drugs, money and told Handy to get out and don’t come back without it. On February 7,2006, suspected of 2 shootings already, the new molestation charges came later, Handy wild in rage, went to Christians with an intent. That night, Varo was on the computer, they had just eaten dinner, and Christian was relaxing with his 21-year-old girlfriend, Lindy Cochran playing video games when Handy knocked. Lindy got up answered the door, they hugged, and she invited him for leftovers. He then walked over to Christian, kissed and shot him in the head. He executed all three of these lives, and never showed any remorse at all.

 

At the trial, Handy stood proud to say he had no regrets. Pleading guilty to all three counts of aggravated murder, to serve consequently, Handy got life without parole. He smiled at Varo’s family. As victims tried to open pathways to healing, Hardy told them all to get over it. Some of his friends even tried to intimidate the victims after the trial. Do we want to know these kind of people? Those that laugh in the face of pain?

 

There is murder, suicide, rape, abuse, assault rampant amongst our youth- so where do we begin, without the help of law enforcement? With humane-less predators, creeping towards our heels.

Haleigh Cummings….So where is Joe?

I could spend this entire evening defining the different philosophies that theorists, criminal justice and psychological professionals use when a child is suddenly taken from her room in the middle of this night, but I beleive that the answer in the case of missing Haleigh Cummings are universally understood.

At the present time the Putnam County Police, FBI and Florida Department of Law Enforcement are…well, at work. Meanwhile, a 5 year old little girl, who was taken by a man dressed in black from her bed while asleep, as told by her 4 year old brother continues to be missing.

Living with her father, Ronald Cummings Jr., and his 17 year old girlfriend (which I find odd) Misty Croslin, Haliegh simply vanished from the trailer home where she shared sleeping space with her younger brother, Junior. There is a question about Misty being home at the time the girl was taken, and despite taking and passing a lie detector test, something here isnt adding up.

I understand that Junior would watch his sister be taken and remain silent. But, he was not the intended target. This is no stranger abduction. But I cannot understand why at some point he didnt go tell and it was not until long after she was gone that “Misty” realized it. Am I wrong in thinking that trailer homes are generally small…that if an adult was home, someone would have to be breaking in? And how about knowing in which room to go?

Now at the time of Haleigh’s disappearance, Misty’s cousin, a PEDOPHILE as has been consistently reported in multiple press updates was visiting at the time Haleigh disapeared. Joe.

Now, if I know my cousin would molest a child, they sure arent welcome to come visit my house. While neither Richard or Misty, have done anything to Haleigh- I’d say they should be at the very least be staring down the barrel of child endangerment charges.

Yes, I understand that they are secondary victims- but, yes they knowingly put their child in harms way. So where is Joe? He’s obviously back in Tennessee, where a tip came in from Knoxville just the other day about a man with a girl in a SUV, that looked like Haleigh and appeared to be veiled by the man. Ok, so there is a vehicle police have- and thats that.

Although I would generally dig into the father and mother, I dont think I need too. No need to further evaluate-Haleighs biological parents have a tumoultous history, and like things do, it all came to an end and if domestic violence was an issue it sounds like everyone was better off. Until now.

Pedophiles, true pedophiles generally have no intent on their victims. They befriend, build trust, then violate as if it were just life. They see no wrong in what they are doing and beleive wholly that it is ok. If Joe, is a pedophile and has Haleigh we need to find her now. He’ll preserve her life to a physical capacity, however, who is this man? What is his criminal history? What about his psychological status- if backed into a corner- what becomes of Joe?

Haleigh Cummings has been missing from her Satasuma, Florida trailer park for several weeks now. Please take a good look at her face and call 1-800-843-5678.