Posted on 11/14/2012 8:00:59 PM PST by Altariel
PINELLAS PARK -- The fire was all around Dan Jensen.
He could see it. He could smell it. He could hear it.
It was close enough to touch. It was burning down his neighbor's house. It was creeping toward Jensen's own fence 10 feet away, and he started spraying the fire with his hose.
Police ordered Jensen to get back, and he complied.
But after a few minutes passed without firefighters arriving, a frustrated Jensen stepped forward and leaned down to grab the skinny gray garden hose once again.
That's when he heard the order.
"Hit 'em! Take him down! Tase him!"
Within moments, Jensen was on the ground. He felt electric.
"It was all over me," Jensen said. "Crawling all over me."
The 42-year-old commercial fisherman is still struggling to comprehend exactly how things deteriorated so quickly Thursday. He said he doesn't understand why police shot him with a Taser that night as he tried to battle a house fire at 3420 Beechwood Ter. N.
Jensen's family, friends and neighbors have been quick to defend him and accuse police of crossing a line.
"It was wrong," he said. "There's no way around it. … I was fighting a fire. I wasn't fighting police. I thought they were here to help me. Instead, they hurt me."
Police said they can sympathize with the stress Jensen was under. But they said he put himself and officers in danger when he refused to back down from fighting the fire.
Pinellas Park Capt. Sanfield Forseth told the Tampa Bay Times authorities could have even charged Jensen with obstruction, but decided against it.
Jensen's attorney, Heidi Imhof, said she believes authorities are trying to deflect attention from their actions that night. She called the Taser use "excessive force."
"They can't just Taser anyone," she said. "He's an unarmed person on his private property trying to fight a fire."
Imhof said the officers had other options. They could have yanked Jensen away, she said, or just turned off the water.
The agency's policy says officers must issue a warning before using a Taser, "except when such warning could provide a tactical advantage to the subject."
Imhof said her client was never warned.
Jensen said he's "disappointed" in police.
He said that when they arrived on the scene, they told him to back off and let insurance take care of it. He did for a few minutes but grew impatient and irate. He picked up the hose again because he thought firefighters weren't getting there soon enough.
Officials told the Times it took six minutes for fire fighters to respond.
"That's my home," Jensen said Monday, his voice breaking. "That's my family."
“He said he doesn’t understand why police shot him with a Taser that night...”
Uh...because they’re a bunch of ignorant a-holes in uniforms with guns pretending to be cops - and not succeeding very well.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of dumb buttheads like this around these days.
Were I on a grand jury I’d refuse toindict.Were I on a jury I’d vote to acquit.
Give ya a medal for punching out the bastard.
That was my thought. Why weren't these tough men helping save residents' property???? Not in their union contract?
Did you really think we want those laws observed? said Dr. Ferris. We
want them to be broken. You'd better get it straight that it's not a bunch
of boy scouts you're up against... We're after power and we mean it...
There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is
the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough
criminals one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that
it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a
nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just
pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced or
objectively interpreted and you create a nation of law-breakers and then
you cash in on guilt. Now that's the system, Mr. Reardon, that's the game,
and once you understand it, you'll be much easier to deal with.
- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged 1957
Apparently not. Heck, even “Barney Fife” would haven’t been standing around waiting for the “appropriate government employees” in event of a fire, especially not one in real danger of spreading to other houses.
Anarcho-tyranny is the best concept I’ve seen to cover what you are describing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_T._Francis#Anarcho-tyranny
Threatening this homeowner with prosecution for obstruction is a great example of the general concept.
Why did they taze him? They could have just shot his dog like most wannabe police seem to do these days.
This is BS - the man was on private property, they had no right to stop him, let alone assault him.
I think it means six minutes after the tasing.
"There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws." Ayn Rand, ATLAS SHRUGGED
The nerve of some people. While they try to save the house from burning down the cops do NOTHING except wait to taser the guy because he chose to do something like saving the house.
I suppose the cop was pissed that there was no dog to shoot.
“The 42-year-old commercial fisherman....”
“he put himself and officers in danger when he refused to back down from fighting the fire.”
Amazingly, the homeowner is in a profession that is much more dangerous than the police....Yet, we are supposed to feel continually sorry for the poor police officers putting themselves in danger.....
One that particularly has annoyed me recently is this: There is a federal law against transferring (especially prescription) medication from the labelled bottles they come in to other, unlabelled containers.
What this essentially means is that just about every person who has to take medications at various times during the day is a potential felon if they have one of those mtwtfss boxes that keeps pills separated by day so they can make sure they take their medication properly. This is one of the (allegedly) unintentional consequences of our insane war on drugs. The government needs to be informed that you simply can't legislate everything.
Indeed, unfortunately, much of the populace is distracted and they do not realize the vast extant of the problem.
Peace officers are decreasing in number, as LEOs increase.
This shift is a bad one for liberty.”
I am employed by the fire department of a larger municipality, but I work in a smaller surrounding community which contracts for their fire protection. They still have their own police department and jail. Their police chief is an amazing guy. He sets the tone for the department.
I wouldn't say that everything is perfect all of the time, but I do admire the work that the officers do and the way that they treat the public. When someone is in trouble I have seen almost all of them go out of their way to find a way to help. A few times we have gone so far out of our way to help that I was afraid that we might get in trouble. Fortunately, the police chief of their department administration of our fire department is tolerant of us stepping a little outside of our normal roles as long as they can see that we were motivated by kindness.
That is pretty sad. Really, the changes since 9/11/2001 have been just stunning. We have lost a ton of freedoms since 9/11 which is why I keep saying “the terrorists won”. They made us change every level of our lives from children’s schools right up to our military.
We would have won if we had just nuked a terrorist capital and then ignored them and went about our lives unchanged. Instead, they caused a loss of freedom in every aspect of our lives.
I can see how a person born as late as the 80s could see a dramatic change in the USA — so much freedom lost so rapidly.
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