Another local news station has more details on the brutal racist attack by a school guard on a student, and the arrest of her, her mother, a student who filmed the guard’s attack and the photographer’s sister:
Student Gets Broken Arm in Melee with School Security Guards
PALMDALE, CA — Parents and students at Knight High School in Palmdale, California are upset over an incident in which three teenagers and a mother were arrested last Thursday after a melee with security guards, prompting an investigation into the guards’ behavior.
The incident came on the heels of a birthday celebration during the school’s lunch hour, at some point the birthday cake was dropped, spurring a domino effect of mayhem.
A cell phone video taken by a student showed a 16-year-old student arrested by campus police.
According to the student, she had dropped the cake and subsequently cleaned it up.
When the security guard told her to clean up a part of the mess that was overlooked, a verbal altercation ensued — and quickly turned physical.
The security guard then grabbed her by the arm as she was headed towards her next class, the student said.
The student said that the security guard was so overzealous in twisting her arms despite her pleas otherwise that he wound up breaking her wrist — which is cast-bound.
The security guard called her a “nappy-head,” the student said.
The student said that when the security guard realized the incident was being recorded, he tackled the student taking the video.
When that student’s sister tried to intervene, she too was injured and now has a brace on her arm.
And the plot thickens.
When the arrested student’s mother arrived at the school, she was subsequently arrested for allegedly battering the principal.
The mother has subsequently said that the incident has caused a disruption in her life, mainly as a result of explaining the issue of prejudice to her daughter.
Another parent, Serena Ochoa, said that she has complained about the guards before.
The student is currently expelled and will attend a hearing to determine her future status with the school.
Racism permeates our county’s schools, as the Jena 6 case demonstrates. Now another case from Palmdale, CA illustrates the depth of the problem. A high school girl who dropped a piece of cake was assaulted by a school guard, had her wist broken, and was called “nappyhead” by the guard. She was then arrested and suspended from school. When her mother demanded the guard be arrested, the mother was arrested and then fired from her job by the school system. Also arrested was the student who took pictures on his cell phone of the the guard’s attack, as well as his sister, were also arrested.
Here is the local news report:
If we had a decent country, Palmdale would now be flooded with Federal Marshals who arrest the school officials for their hate crimes. A decent country just would not tolerate horrifying abuses like this.
The psychology graduate student outreach initiative has created a new petition calling upon the American Psychological Association to ban all participation of psychologists in military interrogations. the Petition is very simple:
“If we lose psychologists from these facilities, people are going to die.”
-U.S. Army Col. Larry James, APA conference, August 2007
“Any interrogation system that teeters so close to atrocities needs more than a psychologist.”
-Scott Horton, “Psychologists and the Torture Question” Harpers, 8-28-07
Urge the American Psychological Association to join with the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association in banning ALL participation of its health personnel in military interrogations. Ask the APA to amend its 2007 Resolution against torture with a COMPREHENSIVE, not just SELECTIVE, ban on psychologist participation!
As noted in an email:
Although it’s a student initiative, it has been worded so that anyone, not just psychologists even, can sign it. I think it is important that we inform other groups, community and professional groups and organizations, and engage in some cross-talk about these issues; so it is worded to draw the interest of the general public.
I have no idea of the veracity, but there are reports now that troops are mutinying in Burma. That would be wonderful news:
Rangoon: ‘army mutiny’ reported
Troops refuse to fire on crowds
Reports from Rangoon suggest soldiers are mutinying. It is unclear the numbers involved. Reports cite heavy shooting in the former Burmese capital.
The organisation Helfen ohne Grenzen (Help without Frontiers) is reporting that “Soldiers from the 66th LID (Light Infantry Divison) have turned their weapons against other government troops and possibly police in North Okkalappa township in Rangoon and are defending the protesters. At present unsure how many soldiers involved.”
Soldiers in Mandalay, where unrest has spread to as we reported this morning, are also reported to have refused orders to act against protesters.
Some reports claim that many soldiers remained in their barracks. More recent reports now maintain that soldiers from the 99th LID now being sent there to confront them.
Growing numbers of protestors are gathering in Rangoon, with 10,000 reported at the Traders Hotel and 50,000 at the Thein Gyi market. The police are reported to have turned water cannons against crowds at Sule Pagoda.
Many phone lines into the Burmese state have now been cut, mobile networks have been disabled and the national internet service provider has been taken off-line.
Other sources are reporting that their are splits in the Burmese/Myanmar military, with some senior leaders opposing firing on the protesters:
Leading exile-run websites have claimed cracks have surfaced within the military junta in Myanmar with serious differences brewing between Senior General Than Shwe and his second-in-command, Vice-Senior General Maung Aye, over the brutal attacks on pro-democracy protestors.
‘Maung Aye and his loyalists are opposed to shooting into the crowd,’ the Mizzima, a leading news portal run by exiled pro-democracy journalists, said….
‘It is almost sure that there is some sort of a revolt within the army top brass and the ranks over firing on unarmed protestors,’ Min Maung, an exiled Burmese student leader and now a correspondent for the BBC (Burmese Service) in New Delhi, told IANS by telephone.
The Irrawaddy and Mizzima web sites have claimed that Than Shwe is in favour of opening fire on the demonstrators, while other commanders, including the Yangon regional commander and the northwest and northeastern regional commanders, favour restraint.
‘Very soon Myanmar could witness a mutiny of sorts with several senior commanders and soldiers not willing to attack monks,’ Kyaw Than, president of the All Burmese Students’ League, told IANS.
Further, the Guardian is reporting the existence of a letter in which a group of army officers declare support for the demonstrators:
Some Burmese troops have declared their support for the Buddhist monks who have led mass protests in the first apparent sign of disaffection in the army, exiled Burmese sources said today.
Disgruntled officers have formed a group called the Public Patriot Army Association and expressed their backing for demonstrators in a letter drafted on Tuesday.
The document - the veracity of which cannot be independently verified - was obtained by Burmese exiles in Thailand and passed to Guardian Unlimited.
“On behalf of the armed forces, we declare our support for the non-violent action of the Buddhist monks and members of the public and their peaceful expression,” it said.
“We are all encountering crisis in the economy and in society, political difficulties of various kinds of oppression. Those realities not only affect the public and Buddhist monks. We in the military are also affected.”
Burmese exiles in Thailand, who translated the letter, said it was a source of encouragement to the anti-government movement.
They claimed Burma’s military rulers were so concerned by mutiny in the army that they had ordered the arrest of the colonel in charge of governing Rangoon.
Any sign of dissent within the ranks would be a cause for alarm for the three-man military junta. The junta is led by 74-year-old General Than Shwe, who has been acting as the head of state since 1992, and the military has ruled Burma since 1962.
When he became head of state, Gen Than Shwe appeared to be more liberal than his predecessor, General Saw Maung.
He freed some political prisoners and allowed human rights groups to visit Burma. However, he remains resolutely opposed to any role for Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader who has been under arrest for more than a decade.
Gen Than Shwe’s career included a stint in the department of psychological warfare. Said to be superstitious, he reportedly consults astrologers. Generals Maung Aye and Soe Win, both hardliners, complete the triumvirate.
The junta reinforced its reputation for paranoia by moving the capital deep into the mountainous jungle at Naypyidaw, outside the town of Pyinmana and 230 miles north of Rangoon.
Activists said the move was designed to insulate the generals from decades of misrule.
