FanPost

(video) UCPD Shoots at UCLA Student Inside the Powell Lib.

UPDATE: Here is the video via KNBC. Amazing and surreal. I could never imagine this happening in the library while I was a student.

This is an amazing story. From the Daily Bruin (emphasis mine throughout):

UCPD officers shot a student several times with a Taser inside the Powell Library CLICC computer lab late Tuesday night before taking him into custody.

No university police officers were available to comment further about the incident as of 3 a.m. Wednesday, and no Community Service Officers who were on duty at the time could be reached.

At around 11:30 p.m., CSOs asked a male student using a computer in the back of the room to leave when he was unable to produce a BruinCard during a random check. The student did not exit the building immediately.

The CSOs left, returning minutes later, and police officers arrived to escort the student out. By this time the student had begun to walk toward the door with his backpack when an officer approached him and grabbed his arm, at which point the student told the officer to let him go. A second officer then approached the student as well.

The student began to yell "get off me," repeating himself several times.

It was at this point that the officers shot the student with a Taser for the first time, causing him to fall to the floor and cry out in pain. The student also told the officers he had a medical condition. First of all I cannot imagine being shot at by UCPD inside Powell Library.  And then you have shooting at someone who had already said he had a "medical condition"?

Check out some of disturbing quotes from students who were reportedly at the scene: "It was the most disgusting and vile act I had ever seen in my life," said David Remesnitsky, a 2006 UCLA alumnus who witnessed the incident.

As the student and the officers were struggling, bystanders repeatedly asked the police officers to stop, and at one point officers told the gathered crowd to stand back and threatened to use a Taser on anyone who got too close. And this: Laila Gordy, a fourth-year economics student who was present in the library during the incident, said police officers threatened to shoot her with a Taser when she asked an officer for his name and his badge number.

Gordy was visibly upset by the incident and said other students were also disturbed.

"It's a shock that something like this can happen at UCLA," she said. "It was unnecessary what they did." Holy crap. What is going on here? FWIW here is UCPD's side of the story reported in the DB article: As the student was screaming, UCPD officers repeatedly told him to stand up and said "stop fighting us." The student did not stand up as the officers requested and they shot him with the Taser at least once more. It'd be interesting to see if someone has a video of this incident up on YouTube.  Apparently per DB's report a student's camera phone may have recorded the incident. I sure hope someone gets a hold of that video.

At least based on the report the UCPD doesn't come off looking very good. Shooting taser gun at our students inside the Powell Library? That is insane

What is even more disturbing is some of the reactions I read on message boards in which some posters were outright gleeful about UCLA students being shot up on campus.

If any students are reading BN, please let us know what is going on around campus. This just sounds crazy. There better be a good explanation on the part of UCPD.

GO BRUINS.

This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of BruinsNation's (BN) editors. It does reflect the views of this particular fan though, which is as important as the views of BN's editors.

Trending Discussions