A Rhode Island Cop, Edward Krawetz, kicked a handcuffed woman in the head as she sat on the ground. (source) Naturally, he claimed “self defense.”
[His] fellow police officer … testified that Officer Krawetz never expressed concern for his own safety, never said he feared serious bodily injury, never yelled out that he was in pain and never sought medical attention.
Even his own colleague testified that Krawetz never indicated that he was in danger of serious bodily injury from the seated and handcuffed woman. As a result, the right thing happened — Krawetz was convicted of felony battery and sentenced to 10 years in prison. Then, the judge suspended the sentence. (source)
Now, this filthy pig (who has had this kind of trouble before) is fighting to keep his job (source).
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The Legal Satyricon 
Basically, as she was handcuffed she kicked him hard in the shins and he instantly kicked back (“it wasn’t a delayed, ok, I’ll kick this woman for doing this to me reaction.”)
I might have hit back also. You might want to watch the video.
Really? I have a temper too, but even I wouldn’t have kicked a handcuffed and seated woman in the head. Look at her. She weakly swipes at him with her bare feet. The matrix of options there is pretty deep: A) Step back one foot, B) Step back, charge her with assault on a police officer, C) Shackle her lets, D) Kick her over by kicking her anywhere but the head.
Oh, I agree that he should be disciplined and shouldn’t be a police officer, but this isn’t the case of some bully just pounding on a helpless person for the heck of it. I know that my shins ARE sensitive; my getting kicked there is akin to being slapped in the face.
Kicking someone in the head is arguably deadly force. You can’t shoot someone for kicking you in the shins, either. Why are you defending this behavior? I could sort of understand if you thought he should get a one-year suspended sentence instead of a ten-year suspended sentence. You’d still be wrong, but not asininely so.
If your shins are that sensitive, never give your kids tricycles.
If your shins are that sensative and you automatically have to hit back or retaliate physically, you absolutely shouldn’t be a cop. Plus, having sensative shins, even getting slapped in the face, doesn’t entitle you to commit a crime.
You might have kicked a woman in the face? Awesome.
So, if I walked up and slapped you in the face you’d do…nothing?
Jesus man, you’re trying to compare two different things – You hit me in the face, you bet I’ll hit you in the face back. If you were handcuffed , and on the ground, and THEN you kick me in the leg, I sure as hell wouldn’t kick you full force in the head with a heavy boot. Might kick you in the leg, maybe even really hard…
But not in the face, dude.
And I will remind you – not only did EVERY OTHER COP THERE testify AGAINST HIM (rare as hell to start with, cops not backing the bullshit story of another cop), but 12 people found him guilty.
Your defense of him is kind of disturbing.
No, it’s worse than disturbing trying to justify it, it’s morally disturbing. It shows a depraved indifference.
Actually it wasn’t a jury trial. Just a judge finding him guilty and then suspending the sentence.
No, it was a jury trial, best as I can tell.
The judge then decided to suspend the sentence.
I would like to remind everyone that striking a person in the face implies a wish to cause psychological harm to them. This asshat wanted to CRUSH her. He sees her as an insect that bit him, and must be disposed of accordingly.
If you were seated on a curb, with your hands cuffed behind your back and you somehow magically at the same time walked up to me and slapped me in the face, I think I’d try to get tickets to your Vegas show.
Fucking use your adult big boy discussion brain, kid.
Uh, use your reading comprehension skills where I said that he should be disciplined and shouldn’t be a cop.
Also, I never defended the action; I said that this was retaliation for getting kicked and not someone just being someone up out of the blue. The cop did wrong, but I saw it as an instant anger retaliation against someone who struck first.
If you want outrageous try this:
You are an idiot and a coward.
Police (in the US for sure) have powrs far above and beyond those of a normal citizen. They should be held to similarly high standards. 10 years of hard labour is the minimum this fucking excuse for a pig fucker deserves. Police should be trained in martial arts, ethics and law. This fat fuck has no ethics whatsoever, broke the law and is a cowardly bully who will only hit out at people weaker than him. I’d happily wear a pair of handcuffs and still be able to kick his fat arse.
If I were a cop, I would be throwing this guy under the bus. 99.999999% of citizen- police interaction is anywhere from professional to contentious- but it’s the tiny fraction like this than can ruin an entire community’s faith in the police as an instituion. Behavior like this needs to be instantly condemned, or it’s essentially approval. This isn’t to say you ALWAYS throw your bros under the bus- it’s specific, essentially unexplainable actions like this that make all cops look like barbarians unless they come out publicly condeming it.
I mean it seems like the only exceptional thing is that the guy is actually being prosecuted for this
[…] Cop kicks handcuffed woman in head. […]
Saw this via Radley’s blog. Consider yourself bookmarked. This pig needs jail time.
It comes full circle: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/235688
Whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck!?
My opinion as a private citizen, fencing instructor, and tactician. 1. If you assault a police officer, you get whatever smackdown they administer, because you deserved it. You have made yourself a combatant and they have the right to restrain you, she could have kicked him because she was on drugs, she may have been trying to pull another weapon and kicked him as a distraction. She kicked him, he responded, maybe not in the best way, but he should get a minor disciplining at worst. 2. If you kick someone while sitting down and handcuffed, you are lacking in both judgement and measure. You can’t cure stupidity, but maybe a kick to the head helped her out.
Well I am glad that “fencing instructor” and “tactician” are not job requirements for judges or constitutional scholars.
Thank you for accepting my comment on the subject. I’m not trying to be a constitutional scholar. But I don’t think there is any constitutional right to assault a police officer under any circumstances.
“You have made yourself a combatant and they have the right to restrain you, she could have kicked him because she was on drugs, she may have been trying to pull another weapon and kicked him as a distraction.”
She was already restrained, you feckless idiot. She was handcuffed (hands BEHIND her back), and sitting on the ground.
If you can pull a weapon from that position, I would love to see it.
“If you kick someone while sitting down and handcuffed, you are lacking in both judgement and measure. You can’t cure stupidity, but maybe a kick to the head helped her out.”
Oh, well, so long as you HAVE IT COMING…
Apparently she wasn’t restrained enough to keep her from kicking the officer and there many pistols on the market that shoot .22 caliber rounds that are wallet sized. I don’t think she had it coming but she was resisting arrest. You tell me, is it acceptible for her to kick the officer or pull a knife or gun on the officer? She assaulted him and he responded.
“….there many pistols on the market that shoot .22 caliber rounds that are wallet sized”
Name three.
here is one http://www.gunblast.com/NAA-BreakTop.htm
My sig sauer P238 is wallet sized and shoots a .380
Smith and Wesson’s Bodyguard is a wallet sized .380 too.
I don’t know my .22s that well, but if I can think of two .380s that fit the description, im sure that there are at least two more .22s
Which isn’t an issue anyways, since you don’t handcuff someone unless you’ve patted them down…
And I’m just gonna say it – any cop that can miss a pistol in the pocket deserves whatever he gets, because he’s clearly too stupid to do his effing job.
Don’t try to change the subject by adding guns and knives. The ultimate issue is whether the response was reasonable. Police officers have a duty to exercise only the amount of force reasonable in the circumstances. She was handcuffed, seated, and gave a week swipe with bare feet at his shin. Kicking her hard in the head with a boot was not a reasonable response. And, because he could literally step back half a foot to avoid further ‘harm,’ it was certainly not self-defense of any caliber. The law makes allowances for self-defense – it does NOT allow revenge, ESPECIALLY in a police officer.
So if the headline read “Drunk and combative woman gets kicked out of casino and assaults police officer. Officer gets suspended, loses job” you would be ok with that. If this is the first time the officer has done this, I say give him a 1-2 week suspension, psychological evaluation, and remedial training or bust him down a rank. I’d hate to see an officer lose his job over one incident. We ask police officers to do a dangerous job for us daily and we should defend their right to defend us at least as vigorously as we defend an asshole’s right to be drunk.
You’re too fucking stupid to be welcome here anymore. Go read Fox News. No more comments from you. My blog, my rules. My rules include stupid servile fucks get out.
Besides, you’re supposed to be working there at the Department of Veterans Affairs, not fucking around on the Internet.
Thank you sir for your time. Sorry you felt the need to make a personal attack against me and call out my workplace. I really hate FoxNews. You have a good day.
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Don’t feel bad Raymond, you can always go over to policeone.com. They seem to have a lot of compassion for the “assaulted” officer.
http://www.policeone.com/legal/articles/4924359-Video-RI-cops-head-kick-leads-to-assault-charge/
(My God, what an awful place. I’m still not sure it isn’t a parody site. Do you have to fail an IQ test to post there?)
While this is completely unreasonable conduct for an officer, it’s definitely predictable conduct for a human being.
This officer doesn’t belong in law enforcement, but this lady is out of control, and very naive to go about assaulting men without fear of eventual recourse. She also hit a man in the bar, on the video. I hope she learns to stop doing that. It’s not right to hit men; were she a man, an arrest and education process would have begun a lot sooner.
I’m glad the other officers stood up for what’s right, and testified that that officer was out of line. People who can’t handle any physical provocation are not suitable for law enforcement.
interesting post.