Atlanta Police Help Fight American War on Terror
Maybe Americans are getting a little sour...and maybe they aren't. This war against terror seems to put a strain on their sense of humor. They can't seem to help themselves; they want to take it seriously.
But we found this little item in the British press yesterday:
"I used an excessive amount of discretion," a police officer explained to the Atlanta newspaper. At least he must still have a sense of humor. For it wasn't an excessive amount of discretion that was the problem, but too little discretion and too much brute force.
Poor Felipe Fernandez-Arnesto was the object of the flat-foot's force. The U.K. history professor was crossing the street in Atlanta, whereupon he discovered the keen desire of the city police to protect U.S. citizens from foreign jaywalkers. The professor either didn't understand what the policeman was saying to him... or simply ignored him... but a few seconds later the middle-aged scholar was on the pavement... his hands wrenched behind his back, with cuffs on. Five cops wrestled the bespectacled intellectual to the ground... and locked him up for eight hours.
Thank God for the vigilance of the Atlanta police.
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About the Author
Best-selling investment author Bill Bonner is the founder and president of Agora Publishing, one of the world's most successful consumer newsletter companies. Owner of both Fleet Street Publications and MoneyWeek magazine in the UK, he is also author of the free daily e-mail The Daily Reckoning.
Comment by novosonic on 15 January 2007:
i never been to atlanta, but in los angeles the police department budget in the early ninties was 17 million one year to settle 'excessive force' lawsuits. sadly, not all cops are professional and a few take advantage of their shield.
Comment by A Random Person on 16 January 2007:
I think the salient point here is that although he was not being threatening or resisting he was violently subdued only after he asked to see the officer's police ID as he wasn't displaying any. So essentially he was being punished for daring to verify the stranger asking for his wallet had a right to do so.