What began as a routine band performance of Talkin’ Out the Side of Your Neck by Cameo at an Alabama high school football game ended in a troubling confrontation when a police officer tased the marching band director for refusing to stop the music.

The altercation occurred Thursday around 9 p.m. local time after a game at Jackson-Olin High School in Birmingham, Ala.

Minor High School band director Johnny Mims, 39, and his ensemble of 145 students were about a minute away from being done with their final song when a police officer approached the podium. According to both Mims and the Birmingham Police Department, officers asked Mims to stop the performance so they could clear out the stadium. Mims responded that the song was about to end and the performance was agreed on by both schools.

“Nothing we were doing at the time was being a danger to the community, fans or the school,” Mims told NPR on Monday. “Everyone was enjoying themselves. That’s the part I’m having a hard time grappling with.”

As the students finished their performance, officers attempted to arrest Mims for not complying. Police said the band director “refused” to place his hands behind his back and allegedly pushed an arresting officer.

  • evatronic@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    This becomes suddenly far more understandable when you open the article and notice the band director isn’t white.

  • originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com
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    1 year ago

    arrested not for breaking any law, but for ‘not complying’ where the office had no real reason to order anyone to do anything… and then charged with resisting.

    the usa sucks.

    • Wrench@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      The officer captured on his own camera that his reason for the arrest was “he was disrespectful”

      Yep. Says it all.

      • jonne@infosec.pub
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        Hey now, at least he didn’t say uppity. Because you know that’s what he wanted to say.

    • Neato@kbin.social
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      I don’t think that was a lawful order, anyways. And police have absolutely no authority to command citizens for anything but lawful orders.

      • Aidinthel@reddthat.com
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        Except in the sense that they have weapons and are rarely punished for using them. There’s what the law says and then there’s the reality that if some cop gives you an order you have to choose between obeying and betting your life he’s not going to escalate.

              • Chocrates@lemmy.world
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                Me too friend. I feel like the only way to make them reform without disbanding and rebuilding them would be to hit them in the capitalism. Right now they don’t risk anything. The absolute worst case is getting fired and then just getting a new job in the next suburb over, but usually they just get a paid vacation.

    • treefrog@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      He was black, in public, and not licking a pigs boot. In Alabama.

      Racist cop tazes black teacher. Would have been my pick for a headline.

    • Th4tGuyII@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Of course he broke the law - he hurt the officer’s feelings. That’s the worst law you can possibly break! /s

      But seriously though. Cops got butthurt, and so they aggravated the situation, and used the fact that the poor man panicked when being manhandled as the reason to arrest him in the first place. What kind of circular reasoning bullshit is that??

      • originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com
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        the poor man panicked when being manhandled as the reason to arrest him in the first place

        this is a primary tactic of all police in the united states. all of them.

        i would assume its part of the pathetic training they receive which includes things like ‘most cops will die on the job, the public is trying to kill you 100% of the time’

  • reagansrottencorpse@lemmy.world
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    I see a few jerk offs from protect and serve are here valiantly down voting anti cop sentiment. Don’t you have a dog to shoot ?

  • Knusper@feddit.de
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    Can someone explain to me

    1. why the police is at that stadium to begin with?
    2. why that stadium needed to be cleared out?

    The bodycam footage looks like everyone was having a good time. So, I’d consider it the duty of police officers to enable everyone to continue having a good time. Asking a band director to cut off a song when there’s no emergency is completely ridiculous.

    • Isthisreddit@lemmy.world
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      Simple, the cops job is absolutely not to enable everyone to continue having a good time. Their job is to protect capital and the ruling class, usually with impunity. Unfortunately that sort of power corrupts, and this cop probably had somewhere to go and wanted to hurry things up (with impunity)

    • ryathal@sh.itjust.works
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      Police were at the stadium because they were likely required to be. Very often if you have a large gathering you are required to have Police present, often paying for it. It’s largely a racket to get officers easy overtime.

      • Knusper@feddit.de
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        Since posting that, I thought about it myself. Over here in Germany, we have similar laws, but it’s specifically securities, not police. The massive difference being that those securities don’t have guns.

        And yeah, that was basically my thinking. Why would you send people with guns to such an event? It just causes everyone to feel uneasy. And unarmed securities can break apart brawls much more aggressively.

        …but yeah, I forgot that everyone and their mother has a gun in the US. Unarmed securities would be on a suicide mission. So, yeah, I do understand now, why police is present…

        • ryathal@sh.itjust.works
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          It’s not really about guns. They are already illegal on school property and large event venues. Unarmed security is also common in the US, but it’s growing to require police specifically.

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      Probably nothing. They may have just been there working security. It’s certainly very easy to assume they were just power tripping- because let’s be honest, ACAB.

      But, it could also have been a bomb threat, active shooter threat or something to that effect.

      Which might end with people not having a very good time.

      • Knusper@feddit.de
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        Well, if there was an emergency, I’d have expected them to at least drop the word “emergency” when talking to the band director. That would have side-stepped that whole discussion of how, when and why the band should stop playing.

        And then, yeah, them focussing entirely on the arrest rather than actually clearing the stadium when the band did stop, doesn’t speak in their favor either.

        • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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          Me too. I’m assuming the cops are (yet again) assholes.

          That said, they could have been wanting people out with out making too big of a scene. (With such threats, sometimes the panic is worse than the threat. Also, the person making it- it’s legitimate- could go active if they make it obviously an emergency.)

      • catreadingabook@kbin.social
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        Yeah I was scratching my head at this one. Cop had better have a really good reason here because otherwise, have fun getting Section 1983’d. I am not sure qualified immunity would apply against the right to peacefully assemble, unless either there was reasonably a threat of danger, or some legal authority made the assembly or its actions illegal (e.g. no one allowed on school campuses after 9pm, a citywide noise ordinance on weekdays, etc).

        • am not a licensed lawyer and this is neither advice nor guaranteed correct analysis… just in case.
    • ArmokGoB@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      I’ll just wait here while you organize burning down a police department without the FBI kicking down your door and shooting your dog. The guillotines should have been rolled out a long time ago, but it’s impossible to organize in this day and age.

      • Asafum@feddit.nl
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        Every time I see “eat the rich” and something about guillotines I just laugh, and then sigh because I know it will literally never happen. Social media is a relief valve, we all bitch about it here and then go on doing absolutely nothing about it.

        • JudCrandall@lemmy.world
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          Not everyone is doing nothing. Some people are doing something. You can do something today, too, even if it’s small.

            • Asafum@feddit.nl
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              I wish I was getting paid.

              When the fuck did exasperation become propaganda meant to dissuade people from taking action?

              This is like the third time I’ve seen someone comment about my comment being intentional propaganda… We’ve really become a paranoid bunch haven’t we?

              • Leviathan@lemmy.world
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                If you’re not creating the propaganda then you’re sharing it. Unless you think “might as well not do anything because it’s pointless” is an original thought you had.

                • Asafum@feddit.nl
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                  I never said “might as well not do anything.” I was expressing exasperation with the fact that no one ever does anything but talk, “laughing” at the guillotines and eat the rich talk because thats all it ever is, and stating my opinion that when we bitch about it on social media we are letting off steam that would have possibly been the motivation that moved us in years past.

                  I want us to do something, but most people realistically won’t go and start a bloody revolution because I think deep down we do all want a peaceful way to fix our problems.

    • Th4tGuyII@kbin.social
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      Literally by the time they went to arrest him the band had finished their set and were ready to go. All they had to do was wait 2 minutes and they would’ve got what they wanted.

      Sure, a majority of the initial conversation is unintelligible because of the band, but I seriously doubt the director said anything that provocative… if anything the officers are the ones trying to provoke a reaction out of him, and he’s just asking them to stay out of his face.

      I remember back when it was just a “couple” of rotten apples, but just like in the phrase, it seems they’ve ruined the whole damn batch. Remember kids, A.C.A.B.

      • thelastknowngod@lemm.ee
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        I seriously doubt the director said anything that provocative

        Even if he did, not illegal.

        ACAB indeed…

        • Th4tGuyII@kbin.social
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          Of course, but the fact he wasn’t even being aggressive/provocative towards them makes it all the more worse

      • Chocrates@lemmy.world
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        We have given the police decades to reform themselves and they have refused. It doesn’t matter at this point if any are good, the entire concept needs to be rebuilt

    • Sharkwellington@lemmy.one
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      Holy crap I’ve never seen such an unnecessarily escalated situation in my life. Just look at all the chaos going on by the end of that video, and for what, because the band needed 2 extra minutes to finish their set?

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    This is outrageous. They better be putting this officer on paid leave for two weeks to think about what he’s done.

  • evidences@lemmy.world
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    Based on the video looks like they were the away school I bet these cops walked over when they started playing neck because “that song is disgusting and disrespectful” or some shit. Bet the cops were home fans and mad their team just lost so they “had to” shut that down.

    • thefartographer@lemm.ee
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      The cop gave exactly his reason to arrest the band director: he didn’t respect his [unintelligible]. That was disrespectful.

      You can’t go around being disrespectful to cops! They’re people, too. People with tasers, handcuffs, guns, and have used straight-up corruption to get the rights to stomp all over your constitutional rights or just murder you.

      C’mon you guys, we need to have more compassion for these poor cops. They were disrespected by a not-yet-tased high school band director: the most dangerous of all band directors.

    • bobman@unilem.org
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      Yeah. Nobody expects alabamians to be above this kind of high school drama behavior.

      They really haven’t grown up as a society.

    • orclev@lemmy.world
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      Yes, they’re police. You can tell by the uniforms and the blatant human and civil rights violations that they will receive no repercussions over.

  • n0m4n@lemmy.world
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    Many have commented on why police were there. In events that I have hosted in the past, security is demanded for safety reasons, AND often, it is spelled out that people trained in handling emergency situations (police) are required. It is in the contract, and if they are not there, you do not get the keys to open it.

    The band director’s best response would have been to tell the police that he was responsible for the entire group of students and had the responsibility to get each and every single student safely home. If the police take control, they are taking that responsibility upon themselves. And remind them that that action would be without consent of the parents.

  • bobman@unilem.org
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    I’m never surprised at the lengths people are willing to go to stop listening to music they don’t like.