[News] Unedited tape of LA cop beating

[News at freedomarchives.org]

NEW AFRIKAN MILLENNIUM
16 JULY 2004


Tape Releases Today

Posted by Top News on 7/16/2004, 7:39 am, in reply to "Top News"
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Breaking News
Message modified by board administrator 7/16/2004, 7:58 am

LOS ANGELES ­ The complete and unedited nine-minute tape of the June 23 
pursuit and arrest of Stanley Miller by LAPD officers shows that he took a 
beating from the cops ­ after receiving the 11 flashlight blows ­ so severe 
that it caused the news reporter who taped the incident to exclaim, 
“They’re slapping the crap out of him!”

The world was shown only a one-minute portion of the tape as early morning 
TV news footage of Miller, 36, being pursued by Southeast Division police 
in a reportedly stolen car, jumping from the car, leading a foot chase 
along a Compton grassy strip, putting up his hands and lying face down on 
the ground in surrender, then being swarmed by police, kicked once and 
struck 11 times with a large flashlight by Officer John J. Hatfield.

No one except LAPD higher-ups has seen what happens after that. KABC-TV 
news reporter Scott Reiff, in the Air 7 helicopter, continued to tape the 
incident until Miller was placed into police car number 569. The Wave 
obtained exclusive possession of the complete tape, which vividly depicts 
the following:

After Miller is on the ground, subdued, kicked and hit 11 times by 
Hatfield, most of the swarming cops get off him. But the prone, handcuffed 
man is inexplicably jumped on again, like a loose football, by seven of the 
eight officers present, and kicked again by another one. At this point, 
Reiff can be heard on the tape yelling, “This guy must be resisting, 
they’re slapping the crap out of him!”

Then the cop that kicked him the second time hauls a visibly dazed Miller 
up from the ground, kicks his legs apart and pats him down, obviously 
looking for weapons. The officer completes the pat-down and retrieves 
nothing from Miller. The cop came away from the pat-down empty handed.

In the meantime, Sgt. Angela McGee is standing behind and to the left of 
Miller and the kicking cop, busily counting and pocketing some dollar 
bills. She is preoccupied with the money in her hands and is not looking at 
what is happening with Miller nor at what the other officers are doing. If 
she had looked up, she would have seen her officers celebrating their 
capture of Miller with back pats, handshakes and high fives. Reporter Reiff 
saw it and commented incredulously, “They’re all high-fiving each other!”

At this point, a bald-headed sheriff’s deputy walks into the picture and 
exchanges words with Sgt. McGee and another officer, while the kicking cop 
takes a wobbly Miller by his right arm and begins leading him back down the 
grassy strip to the patrol car.

During his lengthy walk to the car, a second officer takes Miller by his 
left shoulder and joins the kicking cop in propelling him down the grassy 
strip. While this is going on, Reiff maintains a constant conversation with 
someone named “Kevin” in the KABC newsroom. Reiff, unsure of the weapon 
Hatfield used on Miller, asked Kevin: “Is that a flashlight? Looks like one 
of those flap things. What do you call those things? A persuader? A 
pursuit-end persuader?”

As the police parade to the patrol car continues, Miller begins to stagger 
and his gait becomes unsteady, prompting Reiff to ask, “Need an RA (rescue 
ambulance) for this guy, or what?”

Reiff had some jocular final words on the incident as Miller was hustled to 
the patrol car by satisfied officers. “We got that bad guy! Let’s go get a 
donut!” he quipped.
LAPD Chief William Bratton announced the day after Miller’s beating that 
all eight of the officers shown on the tape had been put on administrative 
leave, pending the outcome of several investigations into their televised 
use of force.

Those officers are Sgt. McGee, a 40-year-old African American; Hispanic 
officers Hatfield, 35, and Peter Bueno, 29, and white officers David Hale, 
31; Michael O’Connor, 33; Todd Behrens, 37; Phillip Watson, 33 and Andrew 
Moody, 41.

Najee Ali, executive director of Project Islamic Hope, convened a group of 
community activists in the Wave’s conference room Monday for whom the full 
tape was premiered. Ali described the additional footage of Miller’s 
beating as “very disturbing and troubling to me.”

He will hold a community showing of the complete tape Saturday at 10 a.m. 
in Leimert Park, “Because I think it is important for the community to know 
the full story.”
Sandra Moore, outreach director for the Compton NAACP, said, “The community 
deserves to see this tape in its entirety because it shows the lynch-mob 
mentality of the LAPD. The LAPD has no credibility and its time to stop 
covering up.”

Erica Teasley, western regional counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense and 
Educational Fund, who was among the group to see the tape Monday, said she 
was most troubled by the fact that Miller appeared to be in custody when he 
was subjected to even more kicks and blows.

The Rev. William Smart said the complete tape is important because “it was 
shot by the news media, not by some amateur community person, but by an 
entity that often colludes with and enables the police to cover up their 
activities.”

Activist “Big Money” Griff said he was particularly disturbed by the 
officers’ high fiving each other after the beating. “And Reiff’s comment 
about ‘let’s go get a donut’ is especially telling and ties into something 
I’ve always questioned: Cops’ high consumption of coffee. I believe they 
work while high on caffeine,” Griff said.

“I think the beating we saw was totally unwarranted, and I want to thank 
the anonymous person for coming forth with this tape so we can see the 
whole truth.”

The Rev. Jarvis Johnson asked the group, “Now that we’ve seen the truth, 
what are we going to do about it?”


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