Tasered Student Filing Federal Suit: Claims Racial Profiling

Yes, it was all because he looks like he's from the Middle East, you see. It couldn't possibly be because he refused to leave the library. Mostafa Tabatabainejad was born in the US. And now he believes his civil rights were violated. Video of original incident here.

As if you couldn't see this one coming. Funny, I don't believe a suit was filed in New York when Columbia students actually did violate Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist's civil rights.

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- A student who was shocked by a campus police officer's Taser gun after he refused to show ID at a UCLA library thought he was being singled out by the officer because of his Middle Eastern appearance, his lawyer said.

Attorney Stephen Yagman said he plans to file a federal civil rights lawsuit on behalf of the U.S.- born student, Mostafa Tabatabainejad.

Tabatabainejad, 23, was shocked Tuesday night after arguing with a campus police officer who was conducting a routine check of student IDs at the University of California, Los Angeles Powell Library computer lab.

Yagman said his client declined to show his school ID because he thought he was being targeted for his appearance. His family is of Iranian descent.
 
Police have said Tabatabainejad encouraged others at the library to join his resistance, and when a crowd gathered, the officer used the stun gun on him.

Yagman disputed that, saying Tabatabainejad started yelling to draw attention after the police officer pulled out the Taser.

Tabatabainejad was arrested for resisting and obstructing a police officer and later released on his own recognizance.

The incident, recorded on another student's camera phone, showed Tabatabainejad screaming while on the floor of the computer lab. It was the third time in a month in which police behavior in the city was criticized after amateur video surfaced.

Comments

[Phoenix]

So, I'm wondering if the cop was of middle eastern countenance, if this whiner would have pulled the 'target' card. This ass was looking for trouble. The cop was doing his job.

McKinneyism - the desire to make others recognize that you are, indeed, a minority so you can make it their problem when it wasn't one before and you haven't had your addiction to offense fed lately.

[Simple Simon]

It's really so simple. Do what police tell you.

[Simple Simon]

After watching the video I am even more angry. This little terrorist bastard verbally abused officers and refused to follow the officers' directives. They should have dragged him out by his skull. He needs to be lobotomized.

[splashtc]

Not supporting Mostafas' behavior-but I lived in LA for 7 yrs and the cops there are mean- and the people are anal nerds. C'mon what was the big crime in the first place that they had to call the cops-no ID ? The library handled the situation badly.

[Sue]

splashtc: remember your post when you need 'em. This little idjit just to make money, what a better way than to sue for your own imbiclic behaviour!!

[yyy]

My viewing of the video is that if the cop had taken his hands off the student and let him leave then nothing more would have happened.

It was the police who escalated the situation, not the student.

Being an argumentative nocooperative asshole is not grounds for getting tasered MULTIPLE times.

Also, the cops threatened to taser the OTHER student witnesses and you can bet your ass if they had seen the cell phone recording the whole thing that student would have been relieved of his phone on national security grounds.

What is the point of defending indefensible behavior? There are plenty of times when the police are actually in a dangerous situation and sometimes they do overreact but it is more understandible, even Rodney King while clearly abuse is understandible given that they had a huge man who had been fighting them with they said superhuman strenght...so, it isn't acceptable but it is understandible how that type of situation could get out of hand.

This is a scrawny Arab kid trying to make a point and he ends up screaming on the floor getting tasered repeatedly as cops keep telling him to stand up and then taser him so he falls down, his original crime, failing to have his UCLA ID on him?

Please.

[splashtc]

No worries Sue-brother is swat-grandpas' a judge-uncle is a priest. The adults/cops should have acted more responsibly.

[Lara]

Simple Simon you are downright racist and should be kicked out of this country. How dare you call someone a terrorist from middle eastern descent!! all those supporting the police in the situation should just go back to their KKK meetings and burn in hell.

[Simple Simon]

This is MY country, bitch. The people who need to be kicked out are those who have come here in the sick interest of making it part of the dar-al-Islam. If I had been the officer on duty that son of a bitch would not have been screaming at me for more than 10 seconds before I knocked him out. You people have no right to be here. We will deal with you how we wish until you are forced out.

[Jetzt Kommt die Ende]

Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Führer... eh Simple Simon 88 ?

[Simple Simon]

No, asshole, that would be the rule in Islamic societies, who actively aided and abetted Nazis before, during and after the war. We will not allow Muslim filth to destroy civilization.

[Dubya Tee Eff Mate]

I rather doubt that, Simpleton. Sounds like it is time for your handlers to take you back to your cage and give you the happy-happy juice.

While Islamist societies are certainly no fun, and they would certainly enjoy dragging you and yours out behind the tool shed to sink a machete in the back of your necks (not before having delighted themselves with your women before your eyes...)

Yet shall we also become like the enemy that so despises us? Your very language:

"You people have no right to be here. We will deal with you how we wish until you are forced out."

and this choice nugget:

"We will not allow _Muslim filth_ to destroy civilization."

...is not a far cry from the tone of that of the whackjobs over on Stormfront (yeah, *that* "white nationalist/supremacist" web portal Stormfront) who want to massacre every brown man between Portland ME to Portland OR.

And it is NOT just YOUR country, "bitch". It is also my country, and the country of all who were born here, or lawfully immigrated here.

Change our laws to restrict immigration (esp. from the M.E. and Islamist hotspots)... yes.

Cancel spurious visas and arrest visa violators, yes.

Profile people who show signs of affiliation with Islamism at airports and other mass transit hubs, yes.

Murder Muslims in cold blood? Or harrass Muslims who are otherwise peacable, "just because..." ?

Bad idea. Notwithstanding the potential Godwin's Law violation... genocide and police-state barbarism have never really washed well in America. The Americans (of Japanese ancestry) who were interned in the outbreak of WWII might take issue with that kind of thinking.

[Taser-Boy] may be an idiot for resisting the order to present ID on demand (arguably an ACLU minefield in itself) and a bigger dolt for resisting arrest and inciting people to riot... had he sheepishly apologized to the security guard for forgetting his ID card and left, this article wouldn't even have seen light of day.

[Trigger-Happy Security Goon] probably should not be let out of his cage often as well, at least not without understanding how to and when to properly apply the use of Near Lethal Force to a subject. Application of the nightstick to restrain the subject, cuff him (and if a cop, a reading of Arrest and Miranda) followed by removal to a squad car or detention cell should have sufficed.

Instead, we have a spectacle, further reduced respect for the law (these guys made the Keystone Kops look like accomplished lawmen) and a ear riot to contend with. And our own garden variety wannabe brownshirts raising up a stink in the backyard as well.

Yeah, police brutality is the answer *snark*.

I disagree. A measured and calculated response is always better than a knee-jerk reaction.

[Simple Simon]

THERE WAS NO POLICE BRUTALITY. Offender failed to comply with officer's directive. Offender was subdued. Offender was arrested. No one else cares about your hippy whining. Freedom has a price; the price is behaving responsibly. When one fails to behave responsibly, law and order must be maintained.

The filth got exactly what he deserved. Next time maybe he'll keep his dirty Muslim mouth shut.

[Dubya Tee Eff Mate]

Hippy whinging?

No thanks, I shower on a daily basis.

As for caring, ...oh, I'd say a lot of people care. Particularly certain high-powered lawyers, and liberal judges, and the ACLU care.

"Offender failed to comply with officer's directive. Offender was subdued. Offender was arrested."

Indeed? The conclusion of the matter will likely read:

Offender sues UCPD officer(s). Judge awards several million dollars to offender. Officer surrenders badge as directed by UCLA authorities for being a trigger-happy goon. Ex-Officer finds a job pumping gas for a Muslim 7-11 owner."

Simpleton, I think you'd probably be happier in Soviet Russia or perhaps Red China, with the way you seem to be in love with power abusing authoritarian figures.

And again with the "dirty Muslim" talk. Guilty until proven innocent, eh?

You sound no better than the Islamists who want to kill Christians for simply believing that God (not Allah) had a Son.

Muslim ≠ Islamist. There is a difference.

[Simple Simon]

Try reading the Kor'an. Muslim = murderer. Mohomod = schizophrenic child rapist. Islam = terror. FACTS ARE FACTS. You can use all the useless comparisons to Nazis and Stalinists you wish; the fact of the matter is that Islam is brutal murder and repression, and the only way to fight against it is to FIGHT AGAINST IT. We are not to blame for your attacking us; we are also not to blame for the ferocity of our response to you.

Muslims will at last be punished for their crimes against humanity. Their rude, insistently hateful mouths, their aggressive ignorance in the face of civility and reason, their rapist mentality of forcing others to do what they do not want... all of this will be harshly punished until the problem is solved.

You can piss and moan here all you like. Your kind will be punished for its transgressions.

[Dubya Tee Eff Mate]

O-----kay. Let us try this one more time, but from a different direction.

You seem willing to stab the first Muslim you see (hope you don't drive a car, because you will likely see six of them the next time you stop for gas) square in the eyes.

Such will be the Heavenly Punishment that you visit upon those poor degenerate sons of Allah... while you twirl your Ksier Bill mustach and cackle maliciously.

Erm. You're the Punisher? Yikes... well, golly gee, mister!

And I realize you are probably speaking generically of Muslims... but as for my transgressions... no thanks, I'll pass on that. My sins have already been forgiven by someone quite a ways above up the chain of command from you.

Probably not you... unless you would rather sign up for a tour in the USMC or the Army and go fight the Muslims over there.

The thing is, even as a Marine or Soldier... you just couldn't be a "kill crazy mad dog" even over there. This nasty little thing called the Law of War and the Geneva convention restrains US Forces (in theory, if not in practice) from brutalizing the enemy.

Now if you say that God and His Christ will have the last laugh, and will he smite them... then according to Psalm 2:

1. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?
2. The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying,
3. Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
4. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the LORD shall have them in derision.
5. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.
6. Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.
7. I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.
8. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.
9. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel.
10. Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth.
11. Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
12. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.

But note carefully: this is King David speking of God's divine wrath, and not the wrath of some beer-wizened guy who can talk bravely from behind the safety of the Internet.

And as for the Koran, I've read that too - can't say that it will be replacing Calvin & Hobbes in my bathroom library anytime soon.

Sure, it has some bits in it that don't wash well with modern Western civilization. But it isn't a work of Western literature either. So long as the adherents of Islam are participating n our country as productive citizens, I've no prolem with them. Act like an idiot while using "religion" as a cover.... and like anyone else that acts idiotic, I'm prone to take issue with it.