“I’ll keep on doing it until I run out of batteries!” – Cheatham County Torturer
(Editor’s Note: History shows over and over again that the weapons and cruelty of empire are always brought home to subdue and destroy the citizens who protest their impoverishment for empire. What happens to one of us can happen to all, and not just in Cheat-ham County, Tennessee. – Mark L. Taylor)
By Bob Brigham
The Raw Story (8/1/17)
Three Cheatham County Sheriff’s deputies have been placed on administrative leave after multiple videos emerged showing the officers using tasers to torture an 18-year-old inmate.
“Jordan Elias Norris, 19, has filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court accusing the deputies of deprivation of civil rights, citing the use of excessive force and failure to protect after he was repeatedly stunned with Tasers in the jail in November 2016,” The Tennessean reports. “He suffered more than 40 pairs of Taser burns, many of which are unaccounted for by authorities, the lawsuit states.”
The incidents – while the victim was bound in a restraint chair – were documented by jail surveillance video and by video cameras on the Tasers. Pictures after Norris was released show extensive burn scaring across his body.
“I’ll keep doing that until I run out of batteries,” one deputy is heard saying.
Cheatham County Sheriff Mike Breedlove has contacted District Attorney General Ray Crouch Jr. to request the Tennessee Bureau of Investigations conduct an independent investigation.
“As Sheriff, I want our citizens to know that any inappropriate behavior that may have violated an individual’s rights will not be tolerated,” Sheriff Breedlove wrote in a statement. “I have placed the employees involved on administrative leave while the investigation is conducted.”
Norris was being held on marijuana and weapons charges and was publicly taunted by Sheriff Breedlove upon being arrested. Tennessee is not among the eight states that have legalized the plant.
Rotten apples never fall from rotten trees
“On the sheriff office’s Facebook page from the week Norris was arrested — the sheriff himself seemed to taunt Norris. He wrote that Norris ‘peed a little bit’ when he was first arrested by the SWAT Team,” News Channel 5 reported. “The sheriff called Norris ‘a drug dealer by trade and on the fast track to live the thug Life.’” …
Read the Rest and 4-Minute Video [Warning: Video is graphic.]
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Death At The Border: How US Border Agents Urged Mexican Teen To Drink The Liquid Meth That Killed Him
The latest example of rampant abuse and mistreatment by border agents.
Democracy Now! (8/2/17)
Newly released video footage shows U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents telling 16-year-old Mexican teenager Cruz Velazquez to drink from a bottle of liquid methamphetamine at a border checkpoint in San Diego, causing him to die from an acute drug overdose. In 2013, the teenager was crossing from Tijuana to California with two bottles of what he claimed was apple juice. The video shows the border agents, who suspected the liquid was liquid meth, repeatedly encouraging the teenager to drink from it and prove he wasn’t lying. Minutes after the teenager sipped on the liquid, his body began convulsing, and he began shouting “my heart” in Spanish. He passed away shortly after.
“How can government
The agents only tested the liquid after Cruz took several sips and began overdosing. The officers were never disciplined. Critics say Velazquez’s case is just the latest example of rampant abuse and mistreatment by border agents. We speak with John Carlos Frey, two-time Emmy Award-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker. His new investigation is titled “Life and Death at the Border.” The project was conducted in partnership with ABC’s “20/20.”