Free Republic

FULLERTON – The hacker group Anonymous is threatening to disrupt the Fullerton Police Department's website and email after the death of a mentally ill homeless man last month following a confrontation with police officers. The group is demanding the resignation of Police Chief Michael Sellers, the prosecution of the officers involved and the city to pay out $5 million to the family of Kelly Thomas, 37, who died July 10. Police said Thomas resisted while officers were investigating reports of an attempted car burglary. Six officers responded to subdue him, and a bloody photo showing Thomas' fatal head and neck...

Fullerton's acting police chief acknowledged Thursday that the department had allowed police officers involved in a deadly encounter with a homeless man to watch a video that captures the incident before writing their reports about it. Acting Chief Kevin Hamilton said supervisors allowed the review so that the officers would have a chance to refresh their memory and write an accurate account of the incident involving Kelly Thomas. But the practice is at odds with the way many other police departments deal with serious use-of-force cases. The LAPD's former inspector general, Jeffrey Eglash, said that allowing police to look at...

Six police officers in California were placed on leave Wednesday after surveillance video surfaced showing witnesses describe how cops fatally beat a mentally ill homeless man. Kelly Thomas, 37, died July 10, five days after a confrontation with Fullerton police investigating reports of an attempted car burglary. Surveillance video taken on an Orange County Transportation Authority bus showed passengers describing the alleged assault. "They beat him up, and then all the cops came and they hogtied him, and he was like, 'Please God, Please Dad!'" said one witness. Another video, taken by a bystander on his cell phone, shows the...

FULLERTON – Surveillance video surfaced Monday of two witnesses describing a fatal confrontation between a homeless man and six police officers. The video from an Orange County Transportation Authority bus shows a woman and a man getting on the bus shortly after the July 5 incident between the officers and Kelly Thomas, 37, a homeless man who suffered from schizophrenia. The woman, who appears agitated, gets on the bus at the Fullerton Transportation Center and tells the driver "the cops are kicking this poor guy over there. ... He's almost halfway dead." The male witness tells the driver that...

<p>A shocking video has been released allegedly showing police officers tasering and beating a homeless man to death who they claim was resisting arrest. Though the video is not clear, eye witnesses say the homeless man - Kelly Thomas, 37 - was unable to put up any resistance and was lying on the ground on his front when the attack took place on July 5. His screams and cries for his father can be heard amid the tasering noises.</p>