Calm tactics urged with Davis group
The following is a copy of a letter to the Davis City Council:
Please instruct the Davis police chief to use calm, deliberate tactics in any confrontation with unarmed demonstrators, particularly the Occupy Davis camp in the Davis Central Park.
It is possible to be forceful without inflicting bodily harm. In the early 1970s the city demonstrated moral leadership in peacefully defusing a sit-in on the downtown Davis railroad tracks, which was blocking an oncoming train loaded with materiel destined for use in Vietnam.
Certainly, we may reasonably ask for such an enlightened approach in the bucolic setting of a park, where demonstrators are impeding no one and the issue is economics, not war.
Video taken Friday shows city of Davis police (at least one Davis officer can be clearly identified) participating in the forceful removal of a student sit-in on campus. The group of police, militarily outfitted as though they are ready to invade Iraq, can be seen spraying the unarmed, seated students with noxious pepper spray.
What happened here in handling a student sit-in appears to have been a significant police overreaction. I have witnessed the Davis police deal effectively with crowds of rowdy students partying in the city streets, without recourse to riot gear or pepper spray.
I urge the council to immediately confer with the city manager and chief of police to review the crowd dispersal tactics that are being planned. Please ensure that the city’s peace officers approach the current situation with a calm, nonviolent attitude.
The park demonstrators intend no harm and present no public threat.
Ken Wagstaff
Davis
Short URL: http://www.davisenterprise.com/?p=106732
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Posted by Letters to the Editor
on Nov 19 2011.
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