edited: Tasering at Club Nationals Afterparty

are you in denmark?

Snoochie Boochie wrote:

Remember these guys deal with these things every day. The guy was drinking and moved toward the cop after causing a fus. He is lucky he didn't get shot.

I have lived in a college town all my life. The school here has 40,000+ undergrads and a football stadium that holds 111,000 people. With all the drinking and partying that goes along with that, I have never, in all my time here, heard of anyone being tasered or shot by the cops. I don't know what was going on at this party, but I guarantee that there are quite a few parties going on in my town on any given saturday night that are more rowdy than a bunch of distance runners in a post race party, and it has never been necessary for the cops to use weapons outside of riot situations. I've seen drunk people do some crazy shit, but the cops are always able to handle it without use of weapons.

someone wrote:

What if this was letspolice.com

wow, how awesome would that site be?

poster A: did you hear about American Cop X? he beat down eight kids the other night with nothing but a night stick!

poster B: no way, he must be on something.

poster C: actually, there are african cops who take down eight kids a day on their way to work... and another eight on their way home!

poster B: point taken, but we all know african cops have a genetic predisposition towards kid-bludgeoning.

poster D: AJ nation rulz!!! fo shizzle, my nizzle!!!

poster A: speaking of which, somebody really needs to give that AJ kid a good old-fashioned ass-whoopin'.

gerber is a good guy and a good runner...he never ran in college but is just a guy who likes running who made his way on a solid atc team..it was cold up there and in ga right now it's 80 degrees..get off his back..

i decided to listen to rage against the machine as i starting reading this thread to set the atmosphere.

I was standing 5 to 10 meters away eating chicken wings from the tray throughout the incident. What I saw shocked me. Now, I realize that this is my view of what happened, but I wasn't personally involved nor did I personally know anyone involved.

People were commenting all night about how the police were stalking around looking like they wanted a fight. This was before the incident. The gentlemen involved did not once make what I would have considered an aggressive move/threat/verbal exchange. Now I wasn't close enough to hear every word. But once that guy was tasered, it was surreal. It looked to me like it was completely unprovoked. From what I observed, those who were cuffed/harrassed/physically harmed were harmlessly asking what the problem was or trying to plead a case for a friend in a completely non aggressive manner. After Nick was cuffed and they were cleaning up the tazered guy, everyone who witnessed it was so bewildered and offended by the excessive and unprovoked use of force that they were taking pictures, asking the officers for their names, and one guy by me was even video taping. Unfortunately I don't think he started until after the guy was tazed. The cops were throwing threats around to everyone even watching, harrassing the guy with the video camera. Yeah, it was their job to control the situation and an increasingly hostile crowd. But it was a situation that they alone escalated. What was so shocking about the tazing was that it looked to me like the guy didn't even step toward the cop. He stood up after being slammed into the wall with his hands in the air asking what he did wrong and if he did move forward it was negligable from my angle.

Did those guys do something stupid by going into he bathroom? Yes. Could they maybe have groveled before these cops looking to pick a fight a little more? Possibly. And I only say possibly because their body language looked unaggressive, I didn't hear every word of the verbal exchange. But it all could have been avoided if they had afforded these guys some common human decency and asked them to leave.

It is their job to uphold the law and diffuse potential conflict. These categorically incompetent cops only escalated it and made the problem worse. I've left my e-mail if anyone needs to contact me for a witness account as I would be previledged and honored to ruin these guys careers in any way I could. And I'll drop that other guy a line if that request is indeed legit.

There were 3 Sheriffs or whatever working the party (at least that I saw). There seemed to be two of them that felt being there as a "presence" was good enough, but a third was working hard looking for any little thing he could. We saw him escort "problem" people from the dance floor only to have them back at the party 5 minutes later. As the above poster mentioned, it seems there may have been some overzealous policing going on.

The party was held at a hotel across the street from Kings Island, Cincinnati's version of a Great American or Six Flags-type theme park. Also, the ATP tennis tour makes a stop in town every summer for 2 weeks. My guess is these Sheriff's have worked plenty of parties crazier than this. As a matter of fact, this party was very calm with music, beer, and lots of socializing going on. It seemed pretty tame to me.

I saw the cops later picking up peoples jackets that were against the wall and looking in the pockets without asking anyone's permission. I'm pretty sure that is not a legal search and nobody tasered their a$$es.

and this all could have been avoided if you just wouldn't have broke the law in the first place idiots. It's a good lesson to you. I have no sympathy for people who knowingly break the law and then scream about how fair something is. It wasn't fair to the women at the party that there were men standing in their bathroom, did you ever once consider that?

So, I was in the bathroom when the two guys came in with "the girl who supposedly dumped in the guys bathroom". Yes, the guys were drunk, but definately just having a good time and not acting ridiculous. They were both coherent enough to have a decent conversation with myself and two other girls in the bathroom.(yes, it was weird, but it was cooler and quieter in there so kind of nice) We were in the middle of talking about a mutual friend when the police busted in and grabbed the taller guy by the shirt. At first it looked like the cops were just going to tell them to stay out of the bathroom, but it got out of control. Neither one of the guys mouthed off to the cops from what I could here and they seemed to think the cops were joking in the way that they were being so forceful with them. I didn't see the guy mouth off to the cop before getting tased, so I'm not sure what happedned there, but that seems a little much to me. I've seen some unruly drunks at parties before and I would not put either of these guys in that category.

I would help with your case against the cops if I could. I wish I would have seen how the guy acted against the cop before getting tased, so I could give that statement.

Oh and I wasn't drinking, so I witnessed this sober.

well there ya go wrote:

and this all could have been avoided if you just wouldn't have broke the law in the first place idiots. It's a good lesson to you. I have no sympathy for people who knowingly break the law and then scream about how fair something is. It wasn't fair to the women at the party that there were men standing in their bathroom, did you ever once consider that?

People like you bring nothing to the discussion. No one is saying that they did nothing wrong. The issue is whether the cop used excessive force, which would be illegal and definitely a more serious offense than entering a woman's bathroom. That's why people are talking about the cop's behavior more than the behavior of the guy who went into the bathroom.

The fact that it wasn't fair to the women at the party does not give the police the authority to use excessive force to control the situation.

Please contact me if you were present at the party at King's Island Resort and Conference Center and witnessed the incident.

haywoodjb@hotmail.com

OK we get it.

I keep seeing these contact me posts without much info and I'm not sure how many of the people that read this board have an inkling what the charges probably would be in a case like this or the impact on someone’s life that a conviction would have. My guess is that the tasered guy’s teammates are trying to find enough witnesses that saw what actually happened to have a chance of being charged as a misdemeanor disorderly conduct, rather than as a felony. This probably wasn't just a plain old arrest and kick your butt into the slammer for the night to sober up. If an officer felt threatened enough to tase person probably will get charged with a felony assault. I'd suspect that it's not having to pay a fine that is driving the scramble and request for witnesses so much as the possibility of all the fun stuff that comes with being a convicted felon, (loss of voting rights, ineligible for a variety of jobs, and a bunch of other stuff that really wouldn't be a good way to start your life and career with) so if you saw what happened it would probably help them a lot of if you would contact the guy that posted his email. I’m sending them the video that I took, but the lobby shots were before and after the tasing, I was taping the dancing when the tasing happened, so I don’t think it will help nearly as much as witnesses would, other than showing that the crowd was pretty darned tame.

This guy needs help and people that are witness are needed badly.

Please contact the friend that is trying to gather witness' at the e-mail address in the above posts.

I have already filled out a witness statement and I was not very favorable in my comments toward the athletes involved. I will have no trouble backing the actions of the police department in a court of law. I even told the detective that when he took my statement.

The most peculiar thing was that the guys and gals that ran well and deserved to be partying were well behaved. A clown like this guy who finished well over 200th place screws it up for those of us that had a reason to celebrate.

Tme will tell wrote:

I have already filled out a witness statement and I was not very favorable in my comments toward the athletes involved. I will have no trouble backing the actions of the police department in a court of law. I even told the detective that when he took my statement.

It looks like our comments are going to offset each other.

Tme will tell wrote:

The most peculiar thing was that the guys and gals that ran well and deserved to be partying were well behaved. A clown like this guy who finished well over 200th place screws it up for those of us that had a reason to celebrate.

Youre a troll, right? If not, that is the single most asinine thing I have read on letsrun. YOU get to decide how much someone should celebrate based on their performance? Maybe only Olympic Gold medalists should REALLY be able to party.

Next time, stay home.