Alabama Police Officer Arrested Over Severe Injuries To Indian Man

The police chief in Madison, Ala., says that an officer who threw a man to the ground faces assault charges and dismissal. Sureshbhai Patel, 57, was stopped last week as he walked in his son's new neighborhood. Patel remains hospitalized after surgery to fuse bones in his neck; his son says he now has limited mobility.

"I found that Officer Eric Parker's actions did not meet the high standards and expectations of the Madison City Police Department," Chief of Police Larry Muncey said after an investigation. He added that he is recommending Parker be fired.

Parker, who the department says is a training officer who had a trainee riding with him at the time of last week's incident, turned himself in to police yesterday; he faces a charge of third-degree assault, Muncey, said, adding that the FBI is conducting a parallel inquiry into any possible federal infractions.

The case has drawn attention both because of the circumstances and due to video footage of the incident captured by a dashboard camera. That footage, released Thursday, shows that Parker sent Patel to the ground in such a way that for a brief instant, Patel was completely airborne — until his head and upper body hit the ground.

Patel had recently come from India to help care for his infant grandson; he was stopped by police on the morning of Feb. 6, after a neighbor called to report what they saw as a suspicious figure. When police approached Patel, who speaks little English, he was unable to answer their questions about what he was doing in the area.

According to local news site AL.com, Patel's son, Chirag, is an engineer who recently bought a home in Madison, a town about 10 miles west of Huntsville. The family has filed a federal lawsuit over the incident, saying police used excessive force and had no reason to stop the elder Patel.

"This is a good neighborhood. I didn't expect anything to happen," Chirag Patel told AL.com earlier this week.

In a statement released Thursday, Muncey said, "I sincerely apologize to Mr. Patel, his family and our community...our desire is to exceed everyone's expectations."

A GoFundMe account set up in Patel's name has raised more than $50,000 since it was created two days ago. The call for help notes the family's lawsuit and medical bills.

Audio released by the police department includes the phone call that sent officers to check on Patel. In it, the caller says he's seen the same man walking in the neighborhood for a second day.

Describing him, the caller says, "He's a skinny black guy, he's got a toboggan on; he's really skinny. And I've lived here four years. I've never seen him before."

The man adds that he's on his way to work and is nervous about leaving his wife at home with the man standing across the street.

"I'd like somebody to talk to him," he says.

Parker then responded to the police dispatcher's call.

Reading these comments, how can believers chalk up something tragic to being part of "God's Plan", if mankind having free will means the deity doesn't necessarily know what is going to happen?

Maybe on my deathbed I will grasp at straws and wish for everlasting life but in my daily life it just sounds like a Hallmark sentiment that people use to comfort themselves and others. There’s not enough pixie dust in the universe for me to snort to get me to believe in everlasting anything, much less shout it from the rooftops. (my essence/soul/personality/memories will be around long after our sun collapses, just because I accepted a deity "into my heart"?).

Some child rapist/murderer repents on his deathbed with seconds to go, and St Peter throws the switch on his soul train to where he now has eternal life instead of eternal damnation. Again, not enough pixie dust.

Thank you @shinyblurry for the contribution. Even if I disagree on the basic message, it was interesting input that this discussion was IMO lacking so far. Now somebody's might post something dismissive now (I have to admit, asshole that I am, my fingers are actually itching in way trolls know too well) but I found that worth reading. Which brings me back to the point Mitchell made.
The issue is dialogue and how disruptive the selfrighteousness of those who found their definitive answer can be. We can argue semantics even further than already done here but it doesn't matter how gnostic or theistic one is. There is a silent majority consisting of various levels of belief and disbelief and at the fringes of both sides people tend to get loud, sometimes unbearably so.
What the screaming people at the edge like to do is to get bogged down into dogmas and discussions of detail but in the end both kind of extremists would like to force their worldviews on everyone else. I think it is certainly not acceptable to insist that people seeking solace in religion must be idiots who don't know how the world works. If a woman who just lost her child wants to tell herself that this is part of gods plan then I have no right to walk up to her and tell her she's full of shit. Even though I know this to be true. We all live in a world we're poorly equipped to understand and have to make sense of it somehow.
The problem starts once you force yourself onto somebody. The point I made before is that one side's extremists is assholes who walk up to grieving women and tell them their full of shit, the other side is people executing that woman for praying to the wrong god. It's easy for me to pick a side here.
However, most people aren't that extreme. Most people are more civil than that and I believe/know that a more civil and understanding approach is better. It necessary to push back against those who are harmful in executing their beliefs, be it Osama Bin Laden or Rick Santorum (Santorum he he) but everyone else is better dealt with in a respectful manner. Antagonism doesn't feed dialogue well.
That is why I resisted my urge to make fun of the deeply religious guy posting here. I really wanted to because I disagree with his worldview so strongly but all he did was stating his journey to where he now in his life and on top of that, he did it without telling anybody else here off. I would be the asshole if I would react like a Hitchens. I'd rather behave like a Tyson (not the rapey one). LIke most humans, I want to be one of the good guys. It's just not that easy to figure out how to be one.
In the end it all boils down to this (and several posts in this thread truly showed it): Why can't we be friends? Why can't we get along?
Because we're humans. That's how we roll.

The Agony of Defeat Guy - Where Is He Now? has been added as a related post - related requested by eric3579.

I use to love me some Wide World of Sports.
*related=http://videosift.com/video/The-Agony-of-Defeat-Guy-Where-Is-He-Now

shill for Obama, where is he now? AWOL

...Was that supposed to be poignant, or just an extremely obscure inside joke?

Anyway, this "debate" was a bit ridiculous. Howard Samuels was, as others have already pointed out, very clearly straw manning - at no point was it suggested that opposing party thought marijuana should be legalized for recreational use by big companies.

It should also be noted that while Samuels runs a rehab center and in fact has a personal history of fighting addiction, this also has a negative effect on his ability to form an opinion on this situation. For him, extreme vulnerability to addiction is the norm. He himself is probably very prone to addiction, and he exclusively works with other individuals who are also extremely prone to addiction. I would say that the only people for whom marijuana can be seen as a gateway drug is the sort of people for whom alchohol, caffeine, nicotine, adrenaline or really anything that could possibly be abused could be seen as a "gateway drug."

These are the sort of people who always go too far. They drink too much coffee, they take too many risks, they smoke too much and they are always that one guy who gets embarrassingly drunk at parties because he just doesn't know how to limit himself.

But these people shouldn't be seen as the norm because honestly, they simply aren't.

And because Samuels apparently does think that these people define the norm, his view cannot be seen as being comprehensive. He's only looking at the extreme ends of the spectrum, and even then, he's really only looking at the potential negative extremes, because that is where he used to be, and it's where the people he now tries to heal are stuck.

He used to be DJ. He now has 2 tables as well but he may get rid of the rythm now!!!

Sounds like the rampage ended when his gun jammed. The CC was fortunate. Right place, right time. But I wonder if our hero would have pulled his gun and saved the day had the shooter continued to fire unhindered. Your "real story" is a product of your imagination. Our hero still allowed two people to die, didn't he? Now, many people would the shooter have killed if he didn't have a gun, or even access to a gun?

Apologies to the CC. I'm sure he did what he could, when he could. My point is that having CC around doesn't ensure jack shit, except that there may be more bullets flying around a crowded area, if they even stick around and shoot. I don't believe people CC primarily to protect other people. I think the mindset is largely self-preservation.

Back in 1993, I remember this guy with a bad leg, living in a slum in Freetown (Sierra Leone's capital), in a tiny room plastered with Bollywood and Hong Kong B-movie posters, and whose door was made of pieces of cardboard glued together. He didn't have much.
He was called "Prof" Abubakar and made a living creating and selling steel wire sculptures from stuff he was scavenging off the streets. You're probably thinking of African steel wire toys, but his were crazy, there was nothing like it. They were incredibly complex, animated, spring-loaded, or with some sparkling devices.

Some years later, someone I knew came across him. He was exposing at the Pompidou centre in Paris.

Two decades later, it's like Kelvin Doe is his Internet-era spiritual son. I hope he does as well.

[EDIT]
Correct name: Abu Bakarr Mansaray (bio | one of his contraptions). He now lives in the Netherlands.

I was going to say something about how thanks to that helmet he now has a second-chance to do something clever with that brain of his,

... but then the lens flare and 'rate comment subscribe!' promotion came up and I realized the best I should hope for is he won't follow trucks as closely.

>> ^xxovercastxx:

>> ^Yogi:
it is THE stance you have to take if you want funding to get elected.

Many of the stances he took to get elected have turned out to be just that. Gitmo is open; the wars continue on Bush's schedule; the MCA is in effect; minimum wage is $7.25; he now supports gay marriage; he sang the praises of "prolonged detention" not 3 months into his term. He can't change his position on drug laws because...?


He can't if he wants the support of the pharmaceutical industry.

>> ^Yogi:

it is THE stance you have to take if you want funding to get elected.


Many of the stances he took to get elected have turned out to be just that. Gitmo is open; the wars continue on Bush's schedule; the MCA is in effect; minimum wage is $7.25; he now supports gay marriage; he sang the praises of "prolonged detention" not 3 months into his term. He can't change his position on drug laws because...?

>> ^longde:

Read the book Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea to see how these bastards fubar'd their country.
I think the dynasty just ended. The son has nowhere near the devotion his father garnered.


Well, technically Kim-il Sung's preserved corpse was still the President, right? Now that Kim Jong-il is dead, does he now succeed him in that post?

Kim Jong-un could possibly keep the charade going as long as he claims a direct line of communication to the spirit of his father/grand-pappy, no? Jong-il wasn't nearly as popular as his father when he died either (though probably much more so than Jong-un at the time of his father's death, as he was publicly groomed for future leadership for, what, 15 years prior?).

I'll check for that book next time I'm at the library. It's a shame Hitchens had to go right before this arshole, I would've loved to hear his opinion on this entire situation. Prolific as he was, it's likely there are some articles/videos out there concerning Jong-un's suitability/future as heir presumptive.

Like Matthews in this interview, I don't think it is necessary to get into those questionable incidents to that speak to Paul's motives. His policies in this area speak for themselves, and can't stand the light of day.

It is so striking how this man, who is so clear and succinct on matters of foreign policy and even some domestic issues (like drug laws in the beginning of the clip), can lapse into an indecipherable mess when confronted by his own positions on civil rights.

And I think that those particular views on civil rights have a huge following. Clearly it didn't hurt his son to have them.
>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

Now that Ron Paul has gone mainstream, he's no longer able to hide behind his popular foreign policy views. He has already flip flopped on border fences (he now supports them), DADT (he now opposes) and evolution (he now supports).
He has had a long and troubled history with race. He was against the civil rights act, he was the only senator that voted against recognizing Brown vs the Board of Education (http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2004/roll176.xml), he accepted campaign donations from a white supremacist and did not give the money back (http://www.chron.com/news/politics/articl
e/Ron-Paul-keeps-500-from-white-supremacist-aide-1805505.php), his official newsletter had a number of racist statements - which he initially said were taken out of context before he changed his story and blamed the quotes on an editor - he never ran a retraction, he called Abraham Lincoln a tyrant and he suggested the North should have paid the South for the slaves instead of going to war.
Getting national media attention comes at the cost of more scrutiny and criticism. The libertarian movement is all growed up.