Posted on 07/28/2004 4:43:05 AM PDT by Mulder
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- A college student who took a cell phone call from her mother in a movie theater was pepper sprayed by an officer and charged with disorderly conduct, along with her boyfriend.
Warronnica Harris, 23, was at the Muvico theater at BayWalk Saturday night, watching the opening credits to Catwoman when her cell phone rang.
"It was my mom calling me," Harris said. "It was a family emergency."
Harris said she spoke so quietly that her mother couldn't hear her. Then Officer John Douglas shone a flashlight in her eyes.
He asked Harris and her boyfriend, Terrell "KC" Tolson, 25, to leave. He pushed Harris in the hallway, then pepper sprayed both of them in the lobby, the couple said. Neither Harris nor Tolson has a criminal record.
Police denied their account, saying Harris refused to end her cell phone conversation, yelled at the Douglas and refused to leave the theater. Her boyfriend also refused to leave and threatened the officer, police said.
Witnesses said the pair did nothing wrong.
Marcia Gray, a 49-year-old Tampa accountant, was in the lobby when the couple were pepper sprayed.
"The man turned and asked the officer why he was making them leave and the cop just maced him in the face," Gray said. "They weren't yelling or touching him. The man bent over and the girl asked why he maced her boyfriend. Then the cop maced her, and she dropped her soda."
Wow, the jogger is pretty lucky. Mace doesn't affect animals the same as humans. Could have made the owner lose control of the dog, without affecting the dogs ability to attack. Hope the jogger was arrested and/or sued if it happened as you say.
The Warronnicas & Terrell "KC"s of this society....are the very reasons there need to be armed PO' Leece at the movie theater..probably the same reason all other citizens at the theater ought also to be armed...
imo
He didn't pepper spray them for being a smart ass. He pepper sprayed them because they treatened him and hit him with a soda.
BTW, I am aware that mace, CS and pepper spray are all different. But the effect of each is often unpredictable, depending on the target and concentration.
All movie theaters show a cartoon whereby anyone using a cell phone in a movie theater is quickly drawn and quartered and their carcass fed to hogs.
What's the problem?
Thou has hit the proverbial(if that is the word) nail on its poverbial head. It is a total lack of manners. Same thing with driving while, talking, eating, or cell phoning. Normal people can do things like that and still drive, ignorant people cannot and should not.
From the link in post #3.
this line:
" When Tolson came at Douglas with a clenched fist, the officer wrote, he used his pepper spray."
Don't you think the office is justified if someone takes a swing at him?
But Tolson, 25, was convicted of petty theft and resisting arrest in Hillsborough County in 1999, both misdemeanors.I believe Douglas' version of the events:He also has a juvenile record that includes convictions for assault on a school employee in 1996, and grand theft and battery on a law enforcement officer in 1995.
Douglas, a 14-year veteran of the police department, has no formal disciplinary actions in his personnel file.
As Douglas was escorting the couple into the hallway, Harris and Tolson "were yelling the entire time. (Tolson) kept escalating the situation."When Tolson came at Douglas with a clenched fist, the officer wrote, he used his pepper spray. "Then (Harris) said she was going to "hit this cracker upside his head', and she swung her drink at my head."
Douglas said he then used his pepper spray on Harris.
Ray Weil, named as a witness in the report, was working as an usher in the theater that night. He entered the hallway just as Douglas, Harris and Tolson were walking by.
"As the cop was trying to get the guy to calm down," Weil, 20, told the Times, "the woman hit the officer in the back of the head with the soda. Then he (Douglas) maced her."
The dog was an elderly arthritic cocker spaniel who would never attack, he only barked. My friend had never seen the jogger before or since. He jogged away while my friend was hauled off to the emergency room with severe breathing distress. As far as I know, the dog was not harmed.
I think you're on to something.
Yes. For clarification.... already moved out of where the movie was playing... Thus not disturbing anyone watching the movie.
Maybe trespassing, depending on what was said etc.
But any cop who cannot remove a couple of teens from the lobby of a movie theater without pepper spray should be fired for being a 'girlie man.'
This is what you call being threatened?
The cop sounds like he was on an ego trip.
See post 49.
So clubbing them with a night stick would be preferable? Did you know that mace does less harm and is required to be the first physical response?
That is what I call a damned lie. Why did they make such a point of the fact that she dropped her soda?!! Because she knows she hit the cop with the soda!
If post #49 is correct, I am on your side.
If the original article is correct, I am not.
If this is correct...the policman had to defend himself, but how can we know the truth. We have no independent witnesses which strikes me as odd.
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