Jaywalking don hit by full force of the law

[Kiouni]

Will Pavia

A distinguished British historian who tried to cross a road in Atlanta, Georgia, has complained of being wrestled to the ground, pinioned by five police officers and incarcerated.
Felipe Fernández-Armesto, 56, visiting Professor of Global Environmental History at Queen Mary, University of London, was attending the conference of the American Historical Association last Thursday when he was caught jaywalking.

snip**

The professor said that, as an “ageing member of the bourgeoisie”, he found it all educational — and was now seen by many of his colleagues “as a combination of Rambo, because it took five cops to pin me to the ground,

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,11069-2541133,00.html

---------

All I have to say is WTF?

[mrcheerful]

1. Brown skin

[Nabia2004]

2. “I didn’t recognise him as a policeman. He was wearing . . . a bomber jacket, like a jerkin.”

“I’m a mass of contusions and grazes,” he said in an interview shown on the website YouTube.

“I come from a country where you can cross the road where you like,” he said. “It hadn’t occurred to me that I wasn’t allowed to cross the road between the two main conference venues.”

-SNIP-

The officer asked the professor for identification. The professor asked the officer for identification. Officer Leonpacher then told him that he was under arrest and, according to the professor, subjected him to “terrible, terrible violence”.

He said: “This young man kicked my legs from under me, wrenched me round, pinned me to the ground, wrenched my arms behind my back, handcuffed me.” As he bridled at this treatment, Officer Leonpacher called for help and soon “I had five burly policemen pinioning me to the ground”.

The Professor spent 8 hours in jail. Charges were dropped the next morning.