WTF -The Galveston post-wedding brawl

[malaise]

So I'm minding my own business looking for updates on the 'missing from Ike' and stumble into this.
Ooops even Brandon Backe was in the middle of this brawl.
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City officials said the bride's brother, Cole O'Balle, tried to bring a drink from elsewhere into the bar. An officer at the scene reportedly denied him entry, and a brawl broke out.

O'Bale and his father were both Tasered, and police also used pepper spray. Cole O'Balle was Life Flighted to a hospital in Houston. He was discharged Monday morning.

Officers maintain they only used enough force to gain control of the situation, but witnesses told 11 News otherwise.

“There were police officers screaming and jumping over couches and pushing people out of the way,” one witness said. “I witnessed them being kicked and hit repeatedly. I witnessed knees to a face.”

Witnesses said Backe, who was also a member of the wedding party, got involved when the younger O'Balle and the officers started fighting.
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Tasers, pepper spray - please watch the video. Police have lost it - everywhere on the planet.

http://www.khou.com/topstories/stories/khou081006_tnt_backe_brawl_wedding.e8016551.html

[OwnedByFerrets]

1. Police state....its showing up EVERYWHERE....NT

[progressivebydesign]

2. No.. sounds like a typical drunken free-for-all. "police state" a bit overdramatic. n/t

[malaise]

3. The report says no one was drunk

but assume that they were - weren't fights broken up in the past without Taser gune and pepper spray.
Why all these excesses over one drink from another bar.

[parasim]

4. Not really overdramatic... it's just that a police state is not so easily accomplished

when idiots are in charge.

[tom_paine]

5. "Typical"? Of WHO?

How does this sound like a "typical (of WHO?) drunken free for all"? And WTF is an officer doing policing who brings whats drinks in their hands from where?

Quite frankly, were I in their shoes I am not sure I wouldn't have done the same thing. I may have just starting cursing them, but you kn as well as I that would have meant little to the outcome. And given that I was going to be abused by poice ANYWAY, then I might as well get some licks in. The cops are going to lie about it on the stand, anyway. Might as well give 'em something to lie ABOUT.

Of course, it's easy to TALK about what I'd do in such a situation, but no one ever knows what they would do unless confronted by it. But I am not sure I could have held my temper, given what the cop was "policing", and that I was just at a wedding party, having fun.

I don't know that I have ever heard of officers "policing" in quite that way before. What law was the guy breaking by bringing his drink in from another room? Were they the Drink Police?

Texas is such a horrible place with so many bad people and horrible Bushies. Sorry, taht's my opinion. And yes, I have been there...sadly, more than once. How do you guys who aren't vile or Bushies stand it? If I lived there, I'd crawl on bloody stumps to get the fuck out.

[OwnedByFerrets]

6. If you dont think we are headed straight into a police state

you sure havent been paying attention. Its almost daily that we are hearing these kind of reports.