"No Officer, I'm not High"

[ARFlyer]

Anyone ever been asked if you were high after visiting your eye doctor?

Today I was standing in line, at a local sub shop, behind a police officer and got asked that question. It surprised me and the people standing in line.

My reply was that I just got done with an eye appt. Thankfully the guy had a sense of humor as he replied with "That explains why your face is in your phone like your 80".

 

[Jim Logajan]

Anyone ever been asked if you were high after visiting your eye doctor?

Today I was standing in line, at a local sub shop, behind a police officer and got asked that question. It surprised me and the people standing in line.

My reply was that I just got done with an eye appt. Thankfully the guy had a sense of humor as he replied with "That explains why your face is in your phone like your 80".

What color is your skin?

http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/..._arrest_black_man_sitting_in_skyway_video.php
A cell phone video posted to YouTube this week shows a St. Paul police officer roughing up a black man who was apparently doing nothing more than sitting in the skyway, waiting to pick up his kids.

At 9:43 a.m. on January 31, police were summoned to the skyway in downtown St. Paul's First National Bank Building on a report of a man loitering. The video footage shows an officer asking the then-27-year-old man to provide his name.

"Why do I have to let you know who I am? Who I am isn't the problem," the man calmly replies.

"Because that's what police do when they get called," the officer responds.

The man explains he was sitting in the skyway waiting to pick up his kids at 10 o'clock from the New Horizon Academy school. He says he had gotten off work at Cossetta at 9 a.m.

He tells the officer, "First off, that's a public area. And if there's no sign that [says], 'This is a private area, you can't sit here,' no one can tell me I can't sit here."

"The problem is..." the officer says, before she's cut off.

"The problem is I'm black. That's the problem," the man interjects. "It really is because I didn't do anything wrong."

Though that exchange was more conversational than confrontational, things escalate when another officer, Bruce Schmidt, arrives on the scene.

"What's up brother?" the man says to him.

"You're going to jail. You're not my brother," Schmidt replies.

At that point, the officers force the man to put his hands behind his back. A struggle ensues, during which he's tased.

"Can somebody help me?" he screams. "That's my kids right there, my kids are right there!"

After he's restrained, the man, understandably upset, calls the officers "racist mother****ers" and says, "I didn't do anything wrong, I didn't break any laws and you tase me? That's assault."

 

[Jim Logajan]

It is interesting how the UK press comes here and looks for the best in America to report on, while our own press looks for the worst.

Do a net search for "Deon Joseph," the officer named in that story and you will discover that his work is covered in U.S. media like NPR, Huffington Post, LA Weekly, Newday, CNN, and a bunch of others.