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LAPD chief Charlie Beck, on the Patt Morrison show on KPCC just now, brushed aside her questions about the videotaped arrest of a skateboarder in Venice to focus on a possibly more questionable officer use of force. That was the videotaped throw-down of a handcuffed motorist, Michelle Jordan, by two officers from the Foothill Division. Beck volunteered that he was highly disturbed by the videotape and said that both criminal and internal administrative investigations are underway. The main officer has been relieved of duty pending the outcome of the investigations, Beck said. I didn't catch whether he spoke to the status of the other officer. Channel 9 says that one officer was a veteran and the other a rookie. The tape shows them fist-bumping after Jordan was thrown to the ground, while cuffed, for a second time in the parking lot of a Del Taco on Foothill Boulevard.
Jordan's lawyers said she was originally stopped in a parking lot for talking on a cellphone, and that things escalated when she got out of her car. The incident was apparenty taped by a surveillance camera at the Del Taco.
Beck emphasized that his reactions are just preliminary and that the investigations will fill in the details of what happened. On the Venice incident, which has been getting more attention as the news media and blogs bounce it around, he said the department's investigation is continuing.
Beck was on KPCC for his regular monthly sit-down with Morrison called Ask the Chief.
Here's the KCAL report and video:
