I came across this news story, thought I'd share it: Colorado Police Pepper Spray 8-Year Old Kid Eight-year-old pepper sprayed by cops: Officers made "great" choice, says police spokesman "The story comes to us courtesy of 9News, which obtained a police report on a February 22 incident at Glennon Heights Elementary, presumably from Aidan's mom, who appears with her son in a segment on view below. Davis emphasizes that the document isn't publicly available due to the subject's age. Although [Lakewood Police spokesman Steve Davis] can't talk about the report's specifics, including the 9News assertion that police had been called to deal with Aidan on two previous occasions, he offers additional details about what took place, and the risks involved. "You had people in danger," he emphasizes. "You had teachers who had barricaded themselves into an office because they were so frightened of this child. The child was making threats that he was going to kill them and he was ramming the door of the office they were in with a push cart, trying to get to them. And as we were responding, the information we got clearly indicated that there were people who were very fearful of him, and they wanted us to get there in a hurry to take care of the situation." By the way, the cart to which Davis refers previously held a television, which Aidan allegedly tossed to the ground. He is also said to have been throwing chairs before the teachers took refuge in the office and called police. When officers arrived at the school, Davis continues, "the child was armed with a piece of wood described as being twelve to fifteen inches in length and sharpened to a point, and he was using it as a weapon. The officers told him they were there because of what was going on and to drop the piece of wood -- I've heard it described as either a piece of trim or a piece of paneling -- and he didn't. He held it up to the officers and was threatening them with it." In response, Davis goes on, "one of the officers pulled out the pepper spray and tried to squirt it, and the child blocked it with a cardboard box. So the officer reached around the box and squirted once -- and the child dropped the long piece of wood and the cardboard box and the situation was defused." Was this the only alternative? No, Davis concedes -- but in his view, it was the best one." Viral Player Okay, so, let me get this right? Full grown adult policemen were so scared of an 8 year old child, they had to pepper spray him? And these are the same cops that are supposed to protect us from actual dangerous criminals? Holy crap, I think I'll go get a guard bunny then, if an 8 year old boy can scare them, obviously they'd be shitting bricks at the sight of a big scary bunny! (Think Monty Python and The Holy Grail: Tim: There he is! King Arthur: Where? Tim: There! King Arthur: What? Behind the rabbit? Tim: It *is* the rabbit! King Arthur: You silly sod! Tim: What? King Arthur: You got us all worked up! Tim: Well, that's no ordinary rabbit. King Arthur: Ohh. Tim: That's the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent you ever set eyes on! Sir Robin: You tit! I soiled my armor I was so scared! Tim: Look, that rabbit's got a vicious streak a mile wide! It's a killer! ) But seriously, a cop can pepper spray an 8 year old child and get away with it? WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH OUR SOCIETY?????????????
Its too bad the 8 year old boy who wanted to kill cops with a stick got pepper sprayed instead of his parents.
All of this because of an eight year old kid? You can literally subdue the kid with his arm, what the fuck? Cop should be fired and teachers should be ashamed of themselves to allow it to get to that degree. The kid is like 3 1/2 feet tall and 70 pounds if that.
they can't grab a stick from a child... ever thought of throwing candy on the floor? cops and the masterminds they deal with.
I wish i saw this barricade. Teachers These days must be getting soft. When i was in grade school, if you tried something like this you would be picked up by the arm, and you would never forget the consequences of those actions.
True, his mother obviously needs to actually use discipline on him, but regardless, he's a freaking 8 year old kid, when I was 8, I'm sure I threw temper tantrums where I threatened bodily harm towards my parents (behind their backs of course, if I'd done it in front of them I'd have gotten the belt). It still didn't mean anything when I said it, I was a kid, same way my first thought when being cut off by the asshole in the other lane is "I shoulda just hit you instead of braking and killed you in the wreck that ensued". It's meaningless, just something said out of frustration. Besides he's a kid, if he comes at you, you put your palm up to his forehead and hold him at arms length while he flails his arms uselessly. Or else you just pick him up and hold him over your head. What's next? Use of a weapon on a child is just that, use of a weapon, whether it's pepper spray, a taser, a nightstick, or a gun. A cop does not have justification to use them unless he is beaing threatened. Unless he's got a gun, an 8 year old child is not a threat against a full grown man. Whats next, pepperspraying a toddler? "He was going to throw playdough at me, I felt threatened"
Lee County inmate dies after pepper spray incident; death ruled homicide » Naples Daily News Pepper spray has killed people before, and the thing to remember with something like that is, it's those who are very young or very old that it would effect alot worse than say someone in their 20's or 30's. In the cases where it has killed people they had asthma, and they were also adults. So, what if the kid had had asthma? Who knows, the cop sure as hell didn't know, would the cop have been justified if the boy had asthma and died? No way in hell would the state have had his back in that case. So what happenes when another cop somewhere else is called out for an unruly child, decides "if they did it and it was okay in CO no reason we can't do it here", then this child does have a severe asthma attack and dies from it? Or maybe they dont have pepper spray and decide to taser a child instead? Sure a full grown man can live through the shock, but what would happen with a child? It's unknown, and those unknowns are WAY too shaky a bridge to cross. Not when childrens lives may be at stake.
I think they probably overreacted, but I don't really think this compares to the kind of crap police do to adults on a daily basis.
Kid got what he deserved in my opinion. I don't know about you guys, but with my temperament, he would've gotten far worse than that.
Can you imagine the uproar if the cops had tried to get the stick away from him and subdue him manually and the kid ended up getting hurt? Mom would be throwing even more of a fit. This was probably the safest way for everybody, truth be told. Short of maybe a tranquilizer dart. Third time having the cops called on him at school? That's pretty impressive for an 8 year old.
And maybe the kid is a hemophiliac and would bleed to death if the cops just grabbed him. And maybe [insert other rare instance where someone can get hurt or die] etc.... We can play "what if" all day, the fact is that deaths from pepper spray are rare. A quick search shows, at most, 61 deaths in 21 years. By comparison, pedestrians are killed at a rate of about 5,000 a year. So that's 105,000 deaths just walking down the street, and 61 deaths from pepper spray. If you're worried about a kid dying from pepper spray, you should probably just lock em all up in a bubble and never let em play outside. Maybe when kids learn they'll get a faceful of OMG SO DEADLY DANGEROUS LOOK OUT IT WILL MURDER YOU pepper spray they'll quit being little fucks... I mean hell, what if the little shit just squirmed in the arms of a cop who just decided to go straight hands-on, fell on his head and died? You gonna raise a stink over that too? I bet it's as common as people dying from pepper spray, but I guess we gotta outlaw that cuz sweet merciful lord THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!
Oh okay, so in that case, they could have just shot him too, I mean, some people do survive being shot by a gun, what if they just shot him in the arm since he was holding up a sharp piece of wood? BULLSHIT! They are police and he is a child they have no business being called in the first place, and they have no business disciplining a child, the school needs to handle the situation, it is a school and that is their job. He's just a kid not some out of control prison inmate. Oh hes mad now, run away! WTF kind of teachers are they?
Way to make the slippery slope fallacy, you OWNED that shit! When the school tries to discipline children, they get sued by the parents. I guaran-fuckin-tee you there have been more lawsuits filed by parents for their snotnosed prick children being disciplined (rightfully so, usually) than have been deaths from pepper spray. So, no, it's not the job of the school to "discipline" a little psycho. They did the right thing and taught the kid that there are real consequences to fucking off like that. What if the school officials used the pepper spray instead? Would that be OK since it was the school who did it and not the police? Get your arguments in order.
...did you read the article? He was throwing chairs around the room, threw a TV on the ground, was ramming the TV cart into the door of the office the teachers were in, and then was trying to use a foot long sharpened stick as a weapon. How exactly is the school supposed to deal with that? Just because he's 8 doesn't mean it isn't going to hurt like hell when he hits you with a chair. Do you not agree that trying to wrestle a violent 8 year old to the ground is potentially more dangerous to the kid than pepper spraying him?
I agree, way over the line, how can an 8yr old with a stick require pepper spray to the face? Stupid judgement call. I wonder if he was on Ritalin or Adderall or something similar. My nephew used to get violent on certain meds and threaten teachers.