Fort Worth police are being accused of harassment and brutality on the 40th anniversary of Stonewall.
The raid on the Rainbow Lounge bar in Fort Worth, Texas resulted in seven arrests for "public intoxication" and a massive head injury to one of the patrons of the bar.Tonight, there is a candlelight vigil at 8:30 pm at the Rainbow Lounge (651 South Jennings Ave), where the raid occurred, in honor of injured victim Chad Gibson.
"Monday, police chief Jeff Halstead said the officers' actions are being investigated. However, he also said that officers that entered the bar during the scheduled inspection were touched inappropriately. 'You're touched and advanced in certain ways by people inside the bar, that's offensive,' he said. 'I'm happy with the restraint used when they were contacted like that" (Towleroad).
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6 comments:
The Police chief did say at a police forum that the TABC was the one that arrested chad and was the TABC that had control of chad when he was injuried . He read a statement the TABC put out.
But the question cam up WHY did the FTW police dept not say something if something was wrong?
I see it the both FTW and TABC have to take full blame in this matter.
Look, they knew they were going into a gay bar. If they'd gone into a het bar with drunken women, it's possible/probable they would have been made advances on and/or touched in "offensive" ways. If you know you're going into a gay bar, prep your officers. Overreacting to being "offended" does not really paint your officers in a good light, Mr. Police Chief. It just means they've got more brawn than brains.
Do they do massive head trauma to everyone who calls them anything offensive or brushes up against them? If I cracked people in the head multiple times for calling me fag or grabbing at me, they'd hardly say I handled it with restraint.
Regardless of what behavior was displayed at the bar, the violent force the police used was completely out of order.
This is just the same old nonsense bigots trot out to use against gay people. This is 2009, not 1949. Get with it.
Can we just build a wall around Texas?
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