Remember Officer John Pike? He’s the UC Davis police officer who decided to shoot pepper spray point-blank in the faces of student protesters who were unarmed, seated, and not committing any crimes. Even the variety of memes based around the now-iconic photograph could not take away the sense of what a chilling moment it was. According to Conor Friedersdorf at The Atlantic, an independent review panel found Office Pike culpable in the incident, the students were not breaking any laws, and Officer Pike was not authorized even to be carrying the pepper spray device that he used that day. It seems like it would be a slam dunk case for Pike’s dismissal and more.
Except it’s not, because screw you, civilian.
The official investigation concluded that Pike’s use of force was reasonable. Pike should have kept his job, but the UC Davis police chief overruled the investigative findings and fired him anyway. The only reason we even know about any of this is because someone leaked the confidential internal affairs investigation report to the Sacramento Bee, which has not published the 74-page document but has reported on it. To summarize, Pike told them to disperse, they didn’t, then he felt threatened, so he pepper sprayed them at point-blank range with an unapproved dispersal device. He explained his calm, seemingly aloof demeanor as the product of him being a “professional.”
Officer Pike no longer has a job, and he hasn’t been working since UC Davis suspended him with pay last November. So yes, he has been drawing a paycheck from California taxpayers for at least eight months.
Whether or not this means that it is open season on America’s university campuses remains to be seen. Friedersdorf interprets the internal affairs report as a “scandalous footnote” to the story, and concludes that:
Lt. Pike was caught on video pepper-spraying seated, non-violent protesters in the face, using a device he was not authorized to carry and that he held closer to their bodies than is recommended. Those viewing his actions on the Internet regarded them as needless and abusive in sufficient numbers that he became a figure of national attention. Two independent reports commissioned by UC Davis concluded that he had acted unacceptably that day in numerous ways.
But the internal affairs process used to discipline police officers concluded that he acted reasonably. It is only because new Police Chief Matthew Carmichael overruled its findings, possibly opening UC Davis up to a wrongful termination suit, that Lt. Pike was reportedly terminated. So I ask again. Can there be any doubt that this system prioritizes the job security of campus police officers above the safety and well being of students? Yet there is no move among the Democrats who run the California legislature to reform this state of affairs, because they are allied with the state’s public employee unions, who understandably prefer the status quo.
So for those of you who wonder why I only criticize “the right,” I now criticize California Democrats. Don’t let this go to your head.
At any rate, I am criticizing California Democrats for their role in enabling the brutalizing of campus protesters by police. There, I lost everyone on the right again. I feel better now.
Consider this: it took someone (presumably illegally) leaking the IA report to the Sacramento newspaper for us to even know that the powers that be in Davis think Officer Pike’s actions were hunky-dory. Ponder what that means the next time a police officer has even an inkling of a feeling that he or she could justifiably claim to be fearful for his or her own safety. Whatever damage this will do to the credibility of police in general is certainly offset by the fact that they have pepper spray, so screw you.
I guess we should at least be grateful that Officer Pike didn’t taze or shoot anybody, right?
(Also, this whole situation, and the era of police brutality it may augur, is only news to affluent white people. People of color have known this about police since the dawn of the Republic.)
