Usually right up there with deadly force, or last resort before deadly force...Some agencies explicitly forbid it, like NYPD, Miami, Atlanta, Boston, Cleveland, Corpus Christi, Denver, Ft. Worth,Los Angeles, New Orleans, Philly, D.C., and Seattle.

Edit 1 - IIRC, this is also the same agency that shot and killed a 6 y/o sitting in the seat of a car.....
Edit 2 - Yup.... Cop sentenced to 40 years for shooting 6 y/o autistic boy.

You can beat the rap (the charge) but you can't beat the ride (to the station)

Which is why qualified immunity needs to go.

A cop arrests you on a warrant that doesn't exist, and you lose your job, your car, and your house, and if you resist, you lose even more, and the courts say 'meh, shit happens'.

No, that's kidnapping...

What was he doing on a tractor in a Walmart parking lot?

You're really going to sit here and tell me that you've never driven your tractor to Walmart?

We didn’t have Walmart’s when I worked in the fields. To town yes.

As evidenced by his posture when the first officer arrived....chillin.

In all seriousness...I never heard either of the officers actually tell him he was under arrest. (If I’m wrong and someone else heard it, please speak up) They argued that they COULD, but I never heard ‘em say it as a statement of fact. As I see it, that muddies the waters quite a bit. Refusing to comply with an officers instructions during the course of an investigation is one thing, but they never stated that they were investigating anything.

Lots of folks (myself included) are pretty indignant about the police giving orders, when it isn’t clear that they are lawful demands. Obviously the guy was mistaken about the necessity of a physical warrant, but without the words “you are under arrest”, than as far as I understand the law, you aren’t under arrest...and therefor under no obligation to physically subjugate, or allow yourself to be physically dominated. Guess I’d have to agree with what someone else said earlier. Without following procedure of law, it’s kidnapping.

The guy acted a fool, no argument from me...but I still believe that more steps of communication should have been taken prior to peeling him off the tractor. I’ll leave the armchair quarterbacking of the legality and moral issue of the outcome up to others.

My issue with it stems from the lack of effort in communication. Sure, he was argumentative, but it doesn’t hurt anybody to take more than 2 minutes to try a new tact at talking someone into compliance. The trouble didn’t really start until the other officer decided it was time to “make it happen”, and climb up there.

His poor attitude, and lack of professionalism were immediately on display, because he immediately started dropping the f bomb. Breaking the character of professional calm, seems to me to be a sure sign of his lack of self control, and need to have his authority recognized definitely contributed to the outcome more than just the guys refusal to dismount. Damn, that mofo could hang on! Wonder if he had any rodeo experience?

Mr Fank was a total ass. And he fought. But that doesn't warrant a death penalty.

That said...

Shoulda got off the tractor, Mr Frank.

What did he think was going to happen? He was going to sit up there and play king of the hill until the cops got tired and gave up and went away?

The operative word there is "think". All brutality aside, apparently Mr Frank wasn't doing any thinking...

,

Unable to watch the video, but have the gist of it.

Cops see Mr. Frank on a tractor in public, and claim they have a warrant for his arrest in a separate trespass action. They confront him, and he is resistant to lawful commands to get down and be placed under arrest? Is that the gist of it?

Naturally, the cops aren't just gonna go away. Don't we all essentially know this by now?

So they apply some force. Some force becomes some more force. More force becomes lethal force, and the suspect dies. Terrible result, avoidable by all parties. I do think there's probably some liability on the cops here. A misdemeanor, even resisting, does not seem to justify application of lethal force, if that's indeed what occurred.

Learning points:
* Lethal force should never be used for misdemeanors and warrants for misdemeanors absent a cop needing to defend himself from lethal force. Let the perp walk if you can get him another day. We wouldn't advise shooting petty shoplifters in the back. This type of take down and restraint seems needlessly risky. It's like shooting at a target - know your backstop. Here the "backstop" is a lethal fall from a tractor or a lethal fight over a misdemeanor warrant arrest.

* Better communication. Someone said the cops didn't communicate well. Improve that area.

* I recall this guy might have been diagnosed with mental problems or PTS. If so, more deference should have been given. Better strategy employed.

* We need to start teaching kids in school to stop resisting lawful arrests. For real. This resisting stuff is out of hand. Cops on a lawful arrest have you, so just comply and deal with it later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvKW8B_otxs



I don't know about that. I think an emphasis on that in particular, could lead to unintended consequences. One being a further tendency to give up liberty for safety. More than people already do.

I think we should be teaching common sense. Common sense in this case would have been exactly as you state. Get down off the dang tractor, go with the officers peacefully. And deal with the legal consequences once you have a chance to do so, safely.

Common sense would also tell you that these officers went too far. They couldn't control their own anger, and their 'need' to be in control. If enough people had common sense, there would be more pressure to stop this kind of conduct. At the same time that there would be more people thinking about the consequences of resisting arrest.

We should be teaching the commons again. They were taught when I was a kid. Common sense. Common courtesy. Etc.

We were also taught to think. To think for ourselves. To think far enough ahead to see consequences. Etc.

We were not sat down, and given a thousand things to memorize and regurgitate onto a test paper, until I was a sophomore in high school. Up to then, we were taught how to learn. Ask questions. Research. Find the answer for ourselves. THEN given problems to solve.


~~~

Having watched the video, I don't think Mr Frank was strangled. I think they broke his neck. Same as hanging him.

Watch how long they have him in a choke hold, and he is still breathing well enough to talk back at them.

The time between the last time he talked, and when he was dead, is simply not long enough for strangulation.

I think the cop who had him around the neck just got over exuberant. Trying to move him via the only hold he had. And simply broke his neck.

Pretty sure they probably did an autopsy. If they found a broken neck, it probably wasn't mentioned. But I'd be interested in finding that out, if I was family.

Just thinking of something my Dad used to tell me (before he died when I was 19) when talking about dealing with Police Officers. He used to say that "you can be right, but sometimes you end up Dead Right".

I seriously doubt that any of the officers intended to kill the individual but when he failed to comply with lawful orders they escalated. From verbal to physical which resulted in his demise.

I seriously doubt that qualified immunity will go anywhere. Without it we would have ZERO police officers and it's not to hard to visualize what would happen then. All of our cities would resemble "Escape from New York", not just Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, etc.
For me? I'll be happy to comply with a LEO's commands. If they are out of line I'll let my attorney(s) handle the issue including civil action. By doing so I have preserved both my life and my right to bring a complaint against the officers in both criminal and civil arena's. Refuse and the law is NOT on my side.

Yeah, that's how I see it. I don't think they meant to kill him, and I didn't see anything in the video that I thought was inappropriately severe.

While it's unfortunate that he died, what's the alternative? What should the cops have done differently? It appears that they were legally trying to arrest him, so if he refuses to comply, what SHOULD they do?

They chose to manhandle him off of the tractor. I suppose they could have whacked him on the head with a baton and knocked him out, which could have killed him. They could have tazed him into unconsciousness, which could have killed him. They could have hit him with an elephant tranquilizer dart, and he might have fallen off the tractor and split his skull.

What's the magic method to force compliance that has zero chance of killing him?

I agree. Seems like an example of the "Play stupid games, win stupid prizes" rule.

Well ol' Frank chose the path for them all to go down, didn't work out well for any of them. As supposedly animals of higher intelligence we should be able to reason out what our actions may lead to. Hang off a sky scraper by your finger tips, jump in a tiger cage, fawk married women , look down the barrel of a gun that just misfired, ignore a handful of cops....all stupid crap with the potential for a bad ending.