Freedom Fighter Radio

Moments before he was killed, Oscar Grant was punched in the face — but not by the BART officer who shot him.

The grainy video raises new questions about what role BART officers played in escalating the scene, which began when Grant was pulled off a San Fransisco Bay Area Rapid Transit Authority train on New Year’s Day. Six days letter, protests turned to riots in Oakland, Ca.

The officer who punched Grant in the face is the same officer who investigators say had his knee on Grant’s neck when the 22-year-old man was shot. Aside from Mehserle, no BART officers have been charged with wrongdoings.

“There’s no question in my mind that that’s vivid powerful evidence that he committed a vicious physical assualt, unprovoked on a citizen, for absolutely no reason,” said UC Hastings and Golden Gate law professor Peter Keane, who believes the officer should be fired and charged with assault. “That punch was totally unjustified… That officer is committing a crime.”

BART General Manager Dorothy Dugger has pledged to investigate the officer’s actions in the new video.

“I take this new allegation of police use of unreasonable force extremely seriously,” Dugger said in a prepared statement released Saturday night, KTVU.com reported. “I have directed (BART) Police Chief Gary Gee to conduct a rigorous internal affairs investigation into this officer’s actions.”

U.C. Berkeley law school professor Franklin Zimring said the district attorney must charge another BART officer with a crime. “If the district attorney is saying he’s not going to charge any officer except Mehserle in my opinion, he’s not doing his job,” Zimring says in the video below. “Police officers are not…immunized from the normal laws that govern when assault is criminal conduct.”

Alameda County District Attorney Tom Orloff would not comment on the possibility of charging a second BART police officer, KTVU.com reported.

Although unmentioned in the KTVU report, the video could potentially incriminate another BART officer. Since the female officer is shown in the video observing her colleague punching Grant, she would have been required to report what she saw to authorities.

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Pastor Dave was giving Nathaniel Partee, 47, a ride to a scheduled appointment at a detox center, a place that would help Nathaniel stay off of his addiction. A short distance on route, he stopped at a Burger King to get something to eat for the both of them. He went through the drive-through. While waiting for their fish sandwiches in a parking space close to the building, Pastor Dave saw two teen boys skating in the parking lot. Thinking about the event that was just a little over a day away, Pastor Dave called out the window, “Hey kids, come here.” He wanted to tell them about Jesus and invite them to the event. The boys, one thirteen-and-a-half, the other turning fourteen that month, did not go over to the truck. They instead called the police. A police report shows that officers were dispatched on a call for a white man and black man trying to coerce two juvenile males into a truck. Click Here

Source: Tampa Tribune

TAMPA - If an officer asks if you need help on Super Bowl Sunday, he might be more than just gracious.

For the first time, the Transportation Security Administration’s “Behavior Detection Officers” are enhancing security at the championship event by watching people for combination’s of suspicious behavior.

“They’re trained to do exactly that – pick people out of a crowd,” Gary Milano, federal security director for the TSA’s Tampa office, said today.

These officers don’t have the power to arrest but are uniformed behavioral experts, Milano said.

The TSA and the U.S. Secret Service trained about 70 Tampa police officers and Hillsborough County sheriff’s deputies working the event in their techniques. Milano described them as “telltale signs of people about to engage in wrongdoing” based on the Israeli security system.

Each behavior, such as profuse sweating, could be innocent on its own but raises eyebrows when coupled with other behaviors, Milano said. He declined to elaborate.

The officers evaluate the behaviors on a point system and approach a person for a chat to determine whether there’s a need for concern, said Tampa police Maj. John Bennett, who was familiar with the TSA program and invited the agency to participate.

“Legally, you can walk up and just have a conversation,” Bennett said, noting that the officers aim to keep the contact friendly.

Bennett said he asked for the TSA’s help about a month ago, after he realized the “secure footprint” around the venue was similar to the security at a port or airport. “If you’re inside the secure footprint, you either have a credential or a ticket,” he said.

Bennett added that he had visited previous Super Bowls looking for ways to mirror or improve upon security. After a man was found armed with a rifle last year in a parking lot near the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, he saw the need for this layer of expertise.

“Our mission is to make a safe event,” Bennett said. “If we can ask a few more questions … that’s reasonable.”