In a dangerous world full of potential evildoers hidden under every blanket, police officers have a right to employ Tasers when suddenly tangled in a mess of fabric.
One courageous Eugene police officer was unafraid to protect his city from a cloth-covered hand, attached to a incompliant student who refused to explain why he was sleeping on his bedroom floor hours after procuring a new apartment. When the officer tried to pry the covers from this presumed vagrant, some force of nature tried to interfere with his peacekeeping efforts.
Officer Judd Warden — the 2008 Officer of the Year for his efforts to preserve order by firing some 50,000 volts into the back of local ne’er-do-well Ian Van Ornum — wrote in a report that he did not know whether he had “tripped on (the student’s) legs, the blankets, my own feet, or slipped. I don’t know if (the student) swept my feet with his legs. I know I was pulling (the student’s) blanket back to see his hands and the next thing I know I am on the ground on my right side.”
Any reasonable person would tase the bejesus out of a blanket-wielding floor sleeper who can magically topple an officer of the law.
Some may say the student could not answer questions because he did not speak English. A Chinese exchange student, he is enrolled in basic English courses at the University.
Maybe the University should learn to teach these students common phrases such as, “Police — drop the comforter!” or “I’m falling; I’m gonna tase you.”
Warden offers this gripping account of his struggle after he hit the sparse bedroom floor: “I was now tangled in the blanket and (the student’s) legs. While I was on the ground, (he) turned toward me. I thought (he) was coming at me to potentially hurt me and told him to get back. He continued toward me ignoring my commands to now get back. I stood quickly and deployed my Taser, striking (the student) on the right side of his chest. (He) was still sitting on the ground. (He) rolled to his stomach and was taken into custody.”
This student just wouldn’t quit. First he rented an apartment, different from the one he was supposed to occupy, and was so unremarkable in doing so that management forgot him and called police when he was found inside. Then he dared to occupy the space without a bed — a sure sign of skullduggery in the Craigslist era. Then he ignored a policeman’s call to remove his hand from under the covers.
“He was lying on the floor and would not show me his hands when ordered to. I continued to yell at him to show me his hands and got negative results,” Warden wrote. “(He) just stared at me and did not say anything to me. (He) sat up but still had his right hand hidden under the blanket. I continued to tell him to show me his hand. I attempted to push (him) over with my foot. He just leaned against the wall while now sitting and still had his hand hidden under the blanket.”
Who did this guy think he was? Casually leaning against a wall with his hand under a blanket, groggily staring at a man who entered his bedroom to yell and brandish a peace wand. One must assume he did not know where he was. He surely would have thought twice about his actions if he realized how such intransigence is handled in the city of Eugene.
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The officer and the Taser: A likely story
Daily Emerald
November 16, 2009
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