As I said yesterday, I was a bouncer and bartender at a bar right off of the University of Oklahoma campus (the Deli, for any locals) in the late 80s and early 90s. I have seen all sorts of crowds of unruly people be contained without security or cops freaking out and escalating the situation.
I’m a huge supporter of cops that do their job well. I think some people who want to be cops don’t have what it takes to be an effective cop and when they are put to a pressure test, they don’t pass it.
The fact that 11 out of 12 officers on that scene still have their jobs and no one is accusing them of any sort of misbehavior only highlights how out of control this person was.
He’s probably not a bad guy, and it has now been reported that he had to deal with two really stressful suicide cases earlier in the day. In all likelihood, he probably should have been sent home to recuperate rather than been sent out on a call to an unruly crowd.
“.....he probably should have been sent home to recuperate rather than been sent out on a call to an unruly crowd.”
Nobody gets sent home to recuperate. You suck ‘em up and move on to the next call.