Maplewood Police Brutality?

About a year ago St. Louis appeared in a shocking national news story. Maplewood Police Officers had run down an African-American and beat him within an inch of his life. It was disgusting. It was revolting. It was the next Rodney King.

Here's a link to the video of the arrest.

The victim, Edmon Burns, filed a lawsuit on Tuesday claiming that his civil rights were violated by the police when they attacked him.

According to the report Burns, 34, was sitting in his car at a gas station in Maplewood around 7 a.m. on January 30, 2006 when police officers approached his van, called him a racial slur and demanded that he get out of the vehicle. Burns was filled with terror and took off towards his home. His van was stopped when a police car rammed the back of it. He then took off on foot, was chased down by four police officers and beaten.

The suit says that his fear of police officers comes from a long line of police abuse towards him and his family.

I watched the video when it first came out. I've watched it probably about a hundred times since then and it is terrible. It is the definition of excessive use of force. The officers involved deserved to be punished and they were.

There were three officers from Maplewood and one from St. Louis.

The Maplewood officers, Adam McIntyre, John DeBisschop and David Arnett, each had different punishments. One resigned, one was forced to retire and the other still works for the MPD but is no longer an officer.

Ray Knight, the St. Louis officer, was suspended, disciplined and then returned to the force and has had no other complaints to this day.

Burns is filing suit against everyone remotely involved. This list includes all four officers, Maplewood Police Chief James White, St. Louis Police Chief Joe Mokwa, Maplewood Police Department, St. Louis Police Department and the St. Louis Board of Police Commissioners. He wants money for damages, punitive damages and attorney's fees.

Here's where it gets interesting.

I talked to a lot of police officers about this last summer. In the last two days I've talked to a total of 9 police officers about this lawsuit from several different counties and ethnicities. I even got a chance to talk to a sergeant and a detective.

The List includes:
Maplewood
Richmond Heights
Brentwood
Clayton
St. Louis
University City

Needless to say the officers did not speak highly of Mister Burns. I also heard a few details to the story that were left out by the news.

Apparently when Burns left the gas station he hit a parked car and then floored it into reverse and hit a parked cop car at a high speed. A police officer had to dive out of the way to avoid being run over.

Legally if a police officer is being attacked with a vehicle they have the power to shoot to kill in self defense.

The unanimous decision of the cops I talked to, both black and white, was that Burns was lucky to be alive at all. Many of them felt that if Burns was shot at the gas station it would have only been a news story for about two days.

I also found out that the reason Burns waited an entire year to file suit. He was busted for a parole violation and went back to jail for a couple months.

Alright as I said before I know a lot of cops and I still don't like the profession on the whole. Some of the ones I know are just flat out insane and are the exact kind of people that would beat the shit out of you for going five over the limit.

But in this case I have to agree with them.

Burns got the shit beat out of him.
The men that did it lost their jobs or were severely punished as they deserved to be.

However Burns is in a questionable position too. He's an ex-con who tried to run over an officer and then proceeded to start a dangerous high speed car chase through morning rush hour and it was all because he was "afraid".

Yeah right.

I know this is a stretch but I've been illegally searched by police officers. I've been a victim of a sloppy police report that cost me about $800 even after it was thrown out of court.

I didn't get any money for my damages and I didn't even do anything criminal in those cases.

Bottom line opinion, Burns shouldn't get a dime.
Given our legal system he'll probably get a lot of money but he doesn't deserve it.

What do you think?