Another out-of-control cop was caught on video viciously attacking a jubilant teenager celebrating a high school football victory Friday in Alabama.
The incident took place during the final minutes of the Pratville High School playoff victory over Central-Phenix City High.
The video shows a group of students celebrating in the stands until just before the :40 mark when a Phenix City cop comes into the frame shoving the student back against the railing, pepper spraying him at close range, even though the student was not fighting back.
The cop appears to be wearing a ski mask as if his actions weren’t thuggish as it is.
The cop apparently was reacting to being inadvertently touched by the student.
According to the Montgomery Advertiser:
Cameron Rader, a 17-year-old senior at PHS, said the officer claimed that Rader had pushed him. Rader said when he denied touching the officer, the man shoved him backward into a walkway.
“I had my back to this officer talking to a girl who was standing behind me,” Rader said. “The cop yells at me — ‘Hey son’ — and tells me, ‘Push me one more time.’ I told him I didn’t push him, and he like freaked out.”
A video of the incident, filmed by another student standing behind Rader in the stands, was sent to Rader — and shared among several Prattville students — and provided to the Montgomery Advertiser by Rader’s attorney.
That video picks up just as Rader is being shoved back through the crowd. Rader can be seen briefly trying to get out of the officer’s grasp — he says he pushed the officer to get him away from his throat and to defend himself.
After a brief pause in which the two are separated, the officer comes back at Rader, shoves him back through a crowd of students to a railing, and as the teen is standing with his hands by his sides, the officer sprays something into his face.
“I was telling him to get his hands off me, to stop touching me, and then I asked what I did,” Rader said. “You can see that on the video. I have my hands by my side. I’m being compliant and he keeps pushing me. That’s when he maces me. I couldn’t breathe. It was in my throat and nose and the fumes were burning my eyes. And it hurt for a long time.”
Several attempts to reach the Phenix City Police Department’s public relations officer on Tuesday were unsuccessful. A message left after hours wasn’t returned.
Leave a comment on the department’s Facebook page and be sure to save a screenshot in case they delete it, which can lead to further legal action to what they will probably be facing. Or call them at (334) 298-0611.
