TheeBadOne
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,104467,00.html
CINCINNATI — The mayor of Cincinnati said a videotape shows police officers were defending themselves when they used metal nightsticks to repeatedly strike a 350-pound black man, who later died after the confrontation Sunday.
The cause of the death of Nathaniel Jones, 41, was under investigation. But preliminary autopsy results showed he had an enlarged heart, and his blood contained cocaine and PCP, or "angel dust," both of which can cause bizarre or aggressive behavior, Hamilton County Coroner Carl Parrott said.
After seeing the video, which was taped by a camera on a police cruiser, Mayor Charlie Luken rejected activists' demand that he force police Chief Thomas Streicher Jr. to resign.
"What I saw was a 400-pound man violently attacking a police officer in a manner that put the lives of police officers at risk," Luken said Monday. "While the investigations will continue, there is nothing on those tapes to suggest that the police did anything wrong."
Black activists say the death was another example of brutality involving Cincinnati police. The fatal shooting of an unarmed black man by a white police officer in April 2001 prompted three nights of rioting in the city.
"How many of our people have to die before the city decides to do something about it?" said Nathaniel Livingston Jr. of the Coalition for a Just Cincinnati.
The officers who were at the scene Sunday -- five whites and one black -- were placed on administrative leave, which is policy while investigators examine any police encounter that results in a death.
Luken said he agreed with the initial police assessment that the officers who struggled with Jones defended themselves as they were trained to do when attacked.
The president of the police union said Jones threw the officers around like "rag dolls."
An employee at a fast-food restaurant called 911 early Sunday to report that a man had passed out on the grass outside. Emergency personnel arrived and reported that the man was awake and "becoming a nuisance," according to police radio transmissions.
The first two officers to arrive, Baron Osterman and James Pike, were shown on the video striking Jones after he was warned to stay back. Jones then lunged at one of the two white officers and knocked him down. The officers kept yelling "put your hands behind your back" as they struggled to handcuff him.
They called for an ambulance when Jones appeared to be in distress. He died within minutes of arriving at University Hospital, Assistant Chief Richard Janke said.
The Cincinnati chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People called for changes in police use of force.
"If proper procedure means that you can use that kind of force to clobber people repeatedly who are clearly disarmed, then there's something wrong with the policy," said Calvert Smith, chapter president.
Black activist groups staged an economic boycott of Cincinnati after the 2001 shooting of Timothy Thomas, 19, who was wanted on prior charges of fleeing police when he ran from officers. Officer Stephen Roach shot him in a dark alley and was later cleared at trial of criminal charges.
A federal investigation of that shooting, requested by the city, resulted in Cincinnati's April 2002 agreement to tighten policies regarding use of force and to improve handling of citizen complaints against the police.
Last February, a white officer chased and fatally shot a black man who was spotted running from a store that had been broken into, police said. The police, Hamilton County prosecutor and the Citizen Complaint Authority review panel concluded that the shooting was justified because the suspect was beating the officer with his nightstick.
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http://www.channelcincinnati.com/news/2673984/detail.html
CINCINNATI — The mayor of Cincinnati said a videotape shows police officers were defending themselves when they used metal nightsticks to repeatedly strike a 350-pound black man, who later died after the confrontation Sunday.
The cause of the death of Nathaniel Jones, 41, was under investigation. But preliminary autopsy results showed he had an enlarged heart, and his blood contained cocaine and PCP, or "angel dust," both of which can cause bizarre or aggressive behavior, Hamilton County Coroner Carl Parrott said.
After seeing the video, which was taped by a camera on a police cruiser, Mayor Charlie Luken rejected activists' demand that he force police Chief Thomas Streicher Jr. to resign.
"What I saw was a 400-pound man violently attacking a police officer in a manner that put the lives of police officers at risk," Luken said Monday. "While the investigations will continue, there is nothing on those tapes to suggest that the police did anything wrong."
Black activists say the death was another example of brutality involving Cincinnati police. The fatal shooting of an unarmed black man by a white police officer in April 2001 prompted three nights of rioting in the city.
"How many of our people have to die before the city decides to do something about it?" said Nathaniel Livingston Jr. of the Coalition for a Just Cincinnati.
The officers who were at the scene Sunday -- five whites and one black -- were placed on administrative leave, which is policy while investigators examine any police encounter that results in a death.
Luken said he agreed with the initial police assessment that the officers who struggled with Jones defended themselves as they were trained to do when attacked.
The president of the police union said Jones threw the officers around like "rag dolls."
An employee at a fast-food restaurant called 911 early Sunday to report that a man had passed out on the grass outside. Emergency personnel arrived and reported that the man was awake and "becoming a nuisance," according to police radio transmissions.
The first two officers to arrive, Baron Osterman and James Pike, were shown on the video striking Jones after he was warned to stay back. Jones then lunged at one of the two white officers and knocked him down. The officers kept yelling "put your hands behind your back" as they struggled to handcuff him.
They called for an ambulance when Jones appeared to be in distress. He died within minutes of arriving at University Hospital, Assistant Chief Richard Janke said.
The Cincinnati chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People called for changes in police use of force.
"If proper procedure means that you can use that kind of force to clobber people repeatedly who are clearly disarmed, then there's something wrong with the policy," said Calvert Smith, chapter president.
Black activist groups staged an economic boycott of Cincinnati after the 2001 shooting of Timothy Thomas, 19, who was wanted on prior charges of fleeing police when he ran from officers. Officer Stephen Roach shot him in a dark alley and was later cleared at trial of criminal charges.
A federal investigation of that shooting, requested by the city, resulted in Cincinnati's April 2002 agreement to tighten policies regarding use of force and to improve handling of citizen complaints against the police.
Last February, a white officer chased and fatally shot a black man who was spotted running from a store that had been broken into, police said. The police, Hamilton County prosecutor and the Citizen Complaint Authority review panel concluded that the shooting was justified because the suspect was beating the officer with his nightstick.
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http://www.channelcincinnati.com/news/2673984/detail.html
