Seatbelt Stop Made UCLA Cops Become Forceful and Racial!
By: Angel Pink
A African American Superior Court Judge from Los Angeles was roughed up during a routine seatbelt stop in Los Angeles after leaving his Westwood LA Fitness Center within the morning hours --The victim of the law enforcement harassment is known as David S. Cunningham III , and is a prominent , extraordinarily respected judge within his area : something we take the two rookie cops that stopped him, had no idea of and would have known had they taken the time out, to do their jobs correctly.
Cunningham is the former president of the Los Angeles Police Commission, which is the civilian board that oversees the LAPD, and was a strong proponent of community policing and outspoken in such cases of excessive force. He was appointed to the Los Angeles County bench in 2009 by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
As the complaint states, as filed by your honor, the officers pulled him over only a block from his gym, immediately after he had just buckled his seat belt, and asked him for his license -- in the correct sense, he handed them his wallet with the appointed information and then was asked for his insurance and registration; here's where the story gets a little crazy, as the judge reaches for his glove compartment, an officer starts to yell for him not to move and things seem to escalate after a medication pill bottle for high blood pressure falls from the compartment . Assumptions on behalf of the officers created a statement along the lines of the judge "running drugs" and at that statement, Mr. Cunningham becomes irritated and informs the officers that he needs to look for his documents that he couldn't find within the glove department -- he proceeds to step out of the car to head towards the trunk of his Mercedes in search of the requested documents and before he could make it to the rear of the vehicle, he is slammed into the side of the automobile and restrained with handcuffs that were bond just a little too tight, in fact, so tight that he still has the marks around his wrist as evidence of the force used within this situation . After being restrained , a sergeant appeared on the scene, the superior officer of African American decent, requested for the judge to be released and was given a citation. According to Mr. Cunningham , the superior officer saw a problem being made out of something due to the only obvious reason and that's the reason he let him go.
While the judges' attorney states that the judge understood that he was asked to stay within the vehicle but the level of force is unexplainable and was definitely unneeded. UCLA police had no comments and only had a little too say and by a little I mean , they wouldn't say anything because according to them , the incident is being investigated and nothing could be said at this time.
But I want to take the time out to put my little two cent in and say that little incidents such as this one , alerts us to the ongoing pressure of the tone of skin color in the world , as far as China and as near as our next door neighbor.
As much as these officers , will plead that race had nothing to do with the arrest , we take the facts and create the only logical explanation and we look on and realize that they haven't been the only cops and will not be the last cops to use their power and their shields in the wrong manner . We as the people have to protect ourselves and we have to know what's available to us