A few months ago, I wrote a post about the kid who was suing the police (or the city or whoever it was that caused him emotional damage by being rude to him in public) for millions. Well, that's it. Today the case has been tossed out, and the skateboarder's family is upset. Maybe because they believe the sanctity of justice should supersede sticking to mere technicalities in order to dismiss the case, or maybe they're upset because they were close to being millionaires.
Well, Dude (you don't mind me calling you Dude, right?), I know your family is upset and all, but it's time for you to be a skateboarding punk again, and leave this lawsuit business behind.
You ride a skateboard in the inner harbor with the expectation--even the hope--of getting stopped by a cop. A few years ago, when I was still playing Tony Hawk on PS2, there was a cop chasing me practically on every level.
Now, I know that the law says you were allowed to skate there, but really, you weren't in the Inner Harbor because you wanted to feel the breeze-you were there because you're a skateboarding punk.
And there's nothing wrong with that. Most of my best friends and family were skateboarding punks at some point. But skateboarding punks look for trouble, and sometimes they find it. You found trouble, and then you put your trouble on YouTube, which eventually made you leave your skateboard and grab a lawyer instead.
Well, Skateboarding Punk, it's time to move on. Break into a school at some point during the weekend. Skate on some benches there. Maybe even smoke a cigarette in the school yard!
But leave those $10M lawsuits for others. After all, you have a reputation to uphold. Good luck, Skateboarding Punk. And may this whole episode be immortalized on the next version of the Tony Hawk video game.
9 comments:
I think I need to sue someone? I washed out at making millions, I need to spill something hot on my crotch to make it!
awb
You're not wrong, the kid didn't deserve a million dollar settlement, but the video did go a long way to making cops think long and hard about whether people around them have a video camera before they start breaking the law. I think having cops fear citizens ability to get them in trouble is a good thing, but young punks definitely shouldn't be rewarded with millions. A smaller settlement might have been reasonable, but they asked for way too much
its not the idea of making millions its the idea of getting cops to stop druggies and robbing's but for some reason racism,drugs,rape it just doesn't compare to a skater
AWB, good luck with that. Hey, if spilling something hot doesn't make you a millionaire, at least that's a good story to tell the grandchildren.
Ian, I'm with you. I think all over the country, in the last few years (and not just because of this video), some police officers think twice before they act like they own the laws rather than enforce them. Maybe the family fell on a lawyer who thought he had the case of a lifetime.
Anon., hmm... I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I follow you. It's not you, it's me. Maybe it's both of us.
It's one thing for a cop to give you shit for skateboarding on say private property, it's a completely different thing for an officer to instantly loose his cool, harass, & assault the teens being well..teenagers.
Sure, the kids do not deserve Millions for this, but we should at least grant these kids the respect that Officer Salvatore Rivieri did not.
I bet if those kids threw the Officer into a headlock & verbal assault there would be HELL to pay. I do not understand how people can side with Salvatore, he was %110 wrong.
Robert, I didn't mean to disrespect the skateboarder. You know when I called him a skateboarding punk I meant that in a positive way. Like I said, he was there to get in (a little) trouble like all teenagers do, pushing the limits to see how far society lets them go, although he probably didn't think he was going to get pushed around by an idiot. And there's nothing wrong with exposing the way some police officers alienate the entire idea of law and order for regular citizens.
Millions to a kid whose civil rights is better in my book than spending millions to buy more riot gear.
Erik, I guess it depends. If the riot gear is used only to fight skateboarders, then you're right.
Hey, this is my first comment on your site. I’ve been reading it for a while in my RSS reader but haven’t commented before. Anyways, thanks for the post.
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