[Peace-discuss] Letter to Editor

[Brian Dolinar]

Nice letter Neil. BD

[image: The News-Gazette.com] Arrest in park example of abuse Friday April
11, 2008

As an Urbana resident of seven years, I have many reasons to be proud of
this community. However, the brutality used by certain Champaign police
toward Brian Chesley and his ensuing conviction make me ashamed.

At the trial, Officer Andre Davis cited on the stand that Chesley was
trespassing in the park after dusk. If this is true, then why didn't the
word trespassing ever appear in any of the police reports about the
incident? Subsequently, as I heard testimony about the sheer brutality used
by the Champaign police officers involved, I realized that this was a savage
and disgusting abuse of authority.

When certain police officers engage in stopping citizens on dubious
suspicions, it shakes the confidence that people have in the police. When
certain police officers force a 17-year-old down into the street,
pepper-spray him as two other officers remain on top of him and then worry
about their shirt being untucked or their scuffed shoes while the young man
suffers trying to breathe, the abuses not only injure Chesley but also my
community.

There is no place for police brutality, racism or abuses of authority in
Champaign County. As author Hunter S. Thompson stated: People cannot be
expected to have respect for law and order until we teach respect to those
we have entrusted to enforce those laws.

NEIL PARTHUN

Urbana
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Find this article at:
http://www.news-gazette.com/news/opinions/letters/2008/04/11/arrest_in_park_example_of_abuse
Comments


-- 
Brian Dolinar, Ph.D.
303 W. Locust St.
Urbana, IL 61801
briandolinar at gmail.com
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