Just before a passerby captured the video, Mossberg’s attorney said he saw Detective Archer beating a young girl, Megan Adamescu. “I see someone beat the hell out and brutalizing the woman, punching her in the face. A defenseless woman, who is clearly not a threat to anyone,” said Attorney for Adamescu, Menachem Mayberg
The concierge at the South Bay Club where Adamescu was staying called police to get her to leave because she was allegedly intoxicated. It was detective Archer who responded to the scene without a uniform and in his personal car after an undercover narcotics sting a few blocks away. “She remembers the officer not identifying himself. She remembers all she wanted was her purse back to find out who it was that was looking through her purse and taking her passport,” said Mayberg.
via WSVN-TV – Good Samaritan and woman claim police brutally attacked for no wrongdoing.
Let’s keep the “who is at fault here” part out of the discussion and analyze the worst case scenario for a Good Samaritan: Things ain’t what they seem and you may get yourself in a mess of trouble for trying to do what you perceive is the right thing.
I admit my own ideas on this subject change every day: one day I get skimpy and I tell myself that I will take action only if I see a child being hurt (and with my luck the child will be a serial arsonist/killer midget dressed as a toddler) and other days I widen my field to include the weak” and the handicapped.
I am afraid that other than total abstinence in intervention, there is no good solution. Do I make a costly mistake and possibly hurt somebody who does not deserve it and end up in handcuffs or do I learn to live with the remorse of not doing something it was in my hands and capability to do and save a life?
Gun Zen is a bitch.
That’s a tough one. On the one hand, I just say don’t get involved, but of course there is the what if. It’s complicated and I think each individual has to decide where their lines are.
Only one thing I can think to do, and I’m offering it half tongue-in-cheek (only half).
Call 9-1-1 and say, “There’s a guy here beating the crap out of a drunk woman and before I do anything, I wanted to call to make sure he’s not one of yours.”
If he is a cop, ask the dispatch to send a uniformed officer. Be a “good witness” (read: start taking cell phone video – preferably from concealment).
If he’s not a cop, ask them to send one. And an ambulance. Then make the highly-personal decision between being a “good witness” (see above) or physically intervening.
“I am afraid that other than total abstinence in intervention, there is no good solution.”
I think total abstinence isn’t a good solution either. If you could have saved a life, but didn’t, how is that any better?
Its all a judgement call.
That’s what makes this issue so prickly…
I think I’d stick with keeping my distance, contacting dispatch to see if either subject is one of theirs, and giving a loud “Hey, WTF?!”
After that, just gonna have to play it by ear.