Daughter of Cincinnati City Councilman Gets Tased During Traffic Stop

Celeste Thomas, daughter of Cincinnati City Councilman Cecil Thomas, was tased last night by Cincinnati Police during a traffic stop. From the Cincinnati Enquirer:

The incident involving Celeste Thomas began unfolding just after midnight Saturday when Officer Stephanie Glueck and Jennifer Myers were driving on West McMillan in Clifton Heights when they saw a 2004 Toyota Corolla hit a city garbage truck at 73 West McMillan.

When it seemed the driver, Demetri Washington, was not going to stop, the officers initiated a traffic stop.

A video of the arrest of Washington, 33, on charges of resisting arrest, drunken driving, driving without a license and a burglary warrant and of Celeste Thomas, 26, on charges of obstructing official business and open container, shows what happened next.

Washington pulled over and Glueck walked up to the driver’s side window and asked Washington for his license and proof of insurance. He didn’t immediately comply. When officers found Washington was wanted on a warrant for burglary, he was arrested and handcuffed.

Here is video of the incident:



The officer who tased Thomas is Anthony Plummer who has had his police powers revoked and is currently being investigated for using excessive force. Police Chief Thomas Streicher has already stated publicly that Plummer did not follow proper police procedures and that improper force was used. In addition, it appears that Plummer has a past history of using excessive force. Again from the Enquirer:

Plummer joined the force in 2001 and his personnel file shows a suspension for use of force, two reprimands and an incident that led to his being fired.

Plummer was fired in August of 2006 for violating procedure during an arrest in which he used a Taser. An arbitrator reinstated Plummer in September of 2007.

If Plummer is found to have violated department policy in Celeste Thomas’ arrest, he will face a disciplinary hearing. A hearing officer will make a disciplinary recommendation to Streicher, who in turn will make one to Cincinnati City Manager Milton Dohoney.

If disciplinary action is taken, it cannot be based on that prior incident because as per police contract, incidents are cleared for an officer’s record after three years.

While the quick response and candid reaction of Chief Streicher is rare, it is has drawn praise from Christopher Smitherman, the local President of the NAACP:

“I give them an A-plus to this stage,” Smitherman said. “The collaborative agreement was about trying to change the police culture, and we’re seeing here that that’s happening.

“When the police chief feels comfortable enough at this early point in an investigation to say publicly that he thinks the officer was wrong and used excessive force, that shows me we’re getting closer to where we all want to be in terms of police-community relations,” Smitherman added.

This recent local situation is only one in a long series of police actions from across the country that have resulted in children, the elderly, and the handicapped being subdued by the use of tasers.

digby writes often about civil liberties and tasers and recently wrote the following:

Tasers were sold to the public as a tool for law enforcement to be used in lieu of deadly force. Presumably, this means situations in which officers would have previously had to use their firearms. It's hard to argue with that, and I can't think of a single civil libertarian who would say that this would be a truly civilized advance in policing. Nobody wants to see more death and if police have a weapon they can employ instead of a gun, in self defense or to stop someone from hurting others, I think we all can agree that's a good thing.

But that's not what's happening. Tasers are routinely used by police to torture innocent people who have not broken any law and whose only crime is being disrespectful toward their authority or failing to understand their "orders." There is ample evidence that police often take no more than 30 seconds to talk to citizens before employing the taser, they use them while people are already handcuffed and thus present no danger, and are used often against the mentally ill and handicapped. It is becoming a barbaric tool of authoritarian, social control.

This is a pattern that we have seen time and time again and in case after case. Tasers are not always substituted for the use of lethal force, but rather for the use of dialogue. People are tased not always for posing a danger to the safety of the police officer, but for mouthing off to the police or not fully complying with commands. This is a dangerous path to continue down with a device that has proven itself capable of causing death.

In this most recent local case, the police admit that Celeste Thomas was on her knees with her hands in the air when she was tased in the back. Regardless of the fact that she got out of the car against the commands of the police, she was not posing a danger to the officers who were on the scene as she was on her knees with her hands in the air. If tasers are to be used in place of lethal force, are we to believe that Officer Plummer would have shot Thomas? I have seen many comments on local news websites that have been posted by users suggesting that Thomas got what she had coming because one should expect these consequences if one does not comply with the commands of the police. I think we are better than that as a society.

We should expect citizens to have a certain level of earned respect for law enforcement officers, but we should also expect these same officers to use force sparingly when other tactics are exhausted. We should expect that tools of force should not be used simply because they are easier and create a sense of fear within the public, especially with a tool that has been known to have deadly effects. As a society we should continue to examine tools such as the taser as it is used more liberally during situations that once seemed routine and ask ourselves if this is truly an effective tool, or if it is exerting more authoritarian controls over the greater population.



This is crossposted here.

How Does Accountability to Law Turn into Giving Terrorists "New Rights"?

Rachel Alexander, co-editor of the "Intellectual Conservative" website, has written a new piece entitled "Terrorists' Rights Versus Crime Prevention". Considering I have written about the issue of torture and the treatment of detainees quite a bit recently, the topic of Alexander's piece intrigued me, but as I continued to read further, the vague language and broad characterizations that Alexander uses in her source-free piece only worked to confuse many issues that have become hot topics over the last few years.

Alexander begins her piece:

Civil libertarians, including prominent conservatives like Rep. Ron Paul and former Rep. Bob Barr, have made loud objections to the U.S. government’s efforts to counteract terrorism in the wake of 9-11. In particular, they have protested the detainment and interrogation methods used on suspected terrorists at Gitmo, wiretapping, and other methods of surveillance. They don’t represent the majority of Americans, many who privately say anyone involved with terrorism should be executed. They don’t dare say this publically since the law has evolved over time to provide those accused of crimes certain privileges, labeling them “rights.”

She claims that the majority of Americans privately say that anyone involved with terrorism should be executed, but provides no source for this claim. By her own reasoning, a source wouldn't even exist for this claim because as she states, this is a feeling that Americans privately hold. This leads to the question of why Americans are hiding their "true" feelings. Why won't Americans say this publically? Alexander says that this is because the law has evolved over time to provide "those accused of crimes" privileges that have been labeled "rights" (quotes are hers). If that reasoning didn't make one bit of sense, then take a number.

Alexander continues that some of these "rights" (again, the quotes are hers) make sense in order to make sure that the United States doesn't imprison the wrong people, but that there is a "line where these specified additional 'rights' for suspected terrorists begin to infringe upon the rights of innocent Americans. " At this point you may be wondering what additional "rights" Alexander keeps citing and how they specifically infringe upon the rights of Americans. It is a puzzling question because Alexander does not lay out a clear example of these new rights to which she refers, but she does give some hints at what she views as a problem.

She blames "liberal activist judges" since the 1960's for creating new "rights" for criminals that make it very difficult to interrogate terrorists and get information out of them or "detain them for very long." She complains that we have to "coddle them", "read them their right to remain silent" and "supply them with a U.S. taxpayer-funded attorney to represent them". She goes on:

Without the ability to obtain any information from them, it becomes difficult to justify detaining them without violating their (new) “rights.” So even though we all know the Guantanamo detainees have been aiding and abetting terrorists whose sole goal in life is to kill U.S. citizens, we pretend that the U.S. Constitution includes all these additional “rights” for terrorists and their aiders and abettors, ultimately enabling them to continue their attacks upon U.S. citizens.

Again, without any specifics as to what she means by "new rights", Alexander makes the very false and very misleading argument that the prisoners at Guantanamo have been aiding and abetting terrorists and that since "liberal activist judges" afford ambiguous new "rights" to terrorists, they are able to continue their attacks upon U.S. citizens. This flies in the face of the fact that a majority of the detainees at Guantanamo have never been charged with a crime nor have then been subjected to any sort of open or speedy trial at which any evidence can be presented. Assuming that those held at Guantanamo were all aiding and abetting terrorists is simply false and claiming that releasing detainees enables them "to continue their attacks upon U.S. citizens" is blatantly false. In fact, this study that was done by a Professor at Seton Hall found that a very few number of released detainees fought against Americans.

In addition to Alexander's opinion that "liberal activist judges" are giving terrorists new "rights" at Guantanamo, she also points out that civil liberties activists are also trying to take away the governments ability to wiretap and spy on terrorists within the United States:

Another criticism of left wing civil liberties activists is that the surveillance is authorized to search communications within the U.S., not just overseas. Again, this doesn’t take into account reality, which is that many terrorists are now operating within the U.S. as sleeper cells, and others have friendly enablers in the U.S. helping them coordinate their attacks. All of the 9-11 hijackers were in the U.S.

I wonder if Ms. Alexander has heard of the term "probable cause" which is something that allows law enforcement to obtain a warrant if they would like to monitor potential illegal activity within the United States. I also wonder if Ms. Alexander remembers the protections that were once issued by the FISA legislation of 1978 which made it a crime to spy on American citizens without a warrant. Amazingly enough, Alexander proposes a "better approach" rather than try and "proactively restrict" the power of the government. Alexander proposes:

...give the laws on terrorism as drafted by Congress a chance, and then if an abuse does occur, where the government spies on someone with no connections
to terrorism, revisit the law and determine what changes should be made to
prevent those abuses.

The ignorance of this statement is astounding. The FISA legislation of 1978 was enacted by Congress and was violated by the Bush Administration after September 11th when the New York Times uncovered that the Government had been secretly spying on U.S. citizens. In order to remedy this situation, the Bush Administration pushed for (and received) a revision of the FISA legislation that would not only expand their eavesdropping powers, but effectively grant retroactive immunity to telecom giants that participated in the program. In other words, we gave the laws drafted by Congress a chance, abuses that Alexander specifically describes occurred, the law was revisited, and changes were made that allowed the Administration and telecom companies to avoid accountability to the original law. This scenario already happened, yet Alexander pretends like civil liberties advocates are unfairly and proactively restricting governmental ability to "keep us safe". Not only that but she states:

As long as the U.S. is the freest democracy in the world, there is little chance that our government is going to turn against its citizens and spy on them. As long as we have free elections and are electing free market, pro-democracy leaders, these kinds of abuses are unlikely and would be an exception should they occur.

In Rachel Alexander's world, there is little chance that the government would spy on its own citizens, but in the real world, it has already happened. Alexander even calls spying on Americans "abuses", but what she thinks is an exception, was enacted into law. Instead of condemning these abuses becoming law, she justifies them on the grounds that these laws are needed so that they can be applied to "new technology"; this is something which Glenn Greenwald did an excellent job of examining and shooting down in posts like this one.

It is embarrassing that so many mistakes, misleading, and outright false statements are circulated daily in order to attempt to justify such obvious law breaking by the Bush Administration. Whether we are discussing the FISA legislation or basic adherence to rules of internationally recognized law that surround the treatment of prisoners, the theme is the same. This theme of the last eight years, is that elected officials are perceived to be above the law. They are able to act with impunity without fear of prosecution, even when it is painfully obvious that serious crimes have been committed. These lawbreakers must be quite proud when they see pieces like the one by Ms. Alexander which imply that those who do not endorse policies which result in the torture of prisoners and spying on Americans, are somehow affording "special rights" to dangerous terrorists. This type of discourse is perverted and indicative of how backward this country has slid. It seems strange that we are debating whether prisoners should be tortured or whether the government can listen in to our phone conversations, but in Ms. Alexander's post 9/11 world, adhering to the basic rules of law are translated into infringing on the government's ability to keep us safe. How Orwellian.

This article can also be found at: http://www.cincinnatibeacon.com

The (Great?) FISA Compromise

After much rhetoric from members of Congress on both sides of the aisle, the legislative body is set to pass the FISA Amendments Act of 2008. President Bush and supporters have argued for quite some time that immunity needs to be granted to large telecommunications companies that actively spied on Americans in 2001-2005 without warrants. Shortly after the New York Times initially broke the story, Bush and Administration officials began to publicly push for Congress to grant these companies retroactive immunity so that they could not be sued for spying on Americans without warrants.

Advocates of civil liberties argued that the telecommunications companies should not be granted retroactive immunity for violating the Constitution and other protections granted by civil liberties legislation. President Bush argued that listening to conversations is a valuable tool in the so-called "War on Terror" and that NOT giving these companies immunity would discourage them from turning over records of phone calls in the future which would, in turn, hamper America's ability to protect its citizens.

This FISA Amendments Act of 2008 has been touted in the media as a "compromise" of an earlier Protect America Act. This is viewed as a compromise because immunity is not simply granted for all telecoms, but judges can examine whether or not the telecoms in question deserve immunity from specific lawsuits. Judges will look to see if the telecoms acted within the authorization of the President by providing a written directive which can be written by numerous government officials, stating their actions were legal. If the telecoms can provide this, then the lawsuits can be dismissed. As quoted from this article in The Nation:

"The bill, in short, is worse than granting absolute immunity: it is an effort to suborn the legitimacy of the federal courts by having a judge rubber-stamp the dismissal of cases against the telecoms without looking at the substance of what, in fact, was done. It reduces the separation of powers to a check-the-box exercise."

The bill also allows the government to create new surveillance programs that last a year apiece which focus on people who are "reasonably believed" to be outside the U.S. borders. It also provides that as long as the government doesn't intentionally target someone who is known to be in the United States, they can collect as much data as they would like. The process of data collection is also to be reviewed by judges however as stated in the previously referenced article in The Nation:

"Specifically, the role of judges is limited to ascertaining whether the Attorney General has completed a certification promising that either he has followed the law, or that he will follow the law soon. If the Attorney General cannot meet even this spectacularly low bar, the bill gives the government time to amend and to re-file the certificate."

It seems that we have gone backwards with our collective thought on this matter. Whereas the original FISA bill was enacted after the Watergate scandal in 1978 to protect American's privacy, as a country we now have retroactively given a pass to telecom companies that broke the law and illegally turned over recorded phone calls to our government. This was the type of action that the original law sought to protect us from. Now, upon learning of these actions by the telecom giants, instead of upholding the law, our elected leaders have legislatively gone back in time to pardon these companies in the name of national security. This is further example of the collective shift in thought which has continued to erode our civil liberties and rights in this so-called "Post 9/11 era". The Democratic Party continues to show its cowardice on such issues and continues to show no real alternative to the Republicans on some of the most important issues of our times. In a more drastic move, Barack Obama showed a reversal in language. Last year Obama said that he would support a filibuster of any bill that would give retroactive immunity to telecom companies, but this week he has stated the following:

"Given the legitimate threats we face, providing effective intelligence collection tools with appropriate safeguards is too important to delay. So I support the compromise, but do so with a firm pledge that as president, I will carefully monitor the program."

Obama now supports the so-called "compromise" and he also uses language similar to the current Administration when describing the telecoms actions as an important and effective intelligence collecting tool.

We certainly deserve better on this issue.