Officer said to have kicked suspect owns clothing line tailored to gang life via whittierdailynews.com
From the office of “you just can’t make this stuff up”
EL MONTE – The police officer who sources inside City Hall say kicked a gang member in the head after a long car chase Wednesday also owns a clothing company that glorifies gang and prison life.
George Fierro is listed as the owner of Torcido Clothing of El Monte, according to records at El Monte City Hall. “Torcido” is slang for being imprisoned. The Torcido Clothing company “features some of the hardest authentic jail house threads for the streets. Straight from East L.A., Califas …” according to its Web site.
On Torcido’s Web site, shoppers can buy a T-shirt emblazoned with “186.22,” the section of the state’s criminal code that gives more prison time to people who commit a crime related to street gang activity.
Another shirt has “L.A. County Jail” on the front. Another has “Dept. of Corrections P-Bay Segregated Housing Unit,” which refers to the Pelican Bay State Prison unit where leaders of the Mexican Mafia are housed.
This story underlines the economics that keep the drug war turning. George was already getting a check from the enforcement side of the drug war, but that wasn’t enough. He had to figure out how to get a slice of that juicy drug money. Besides the State was already using forfeiture laws to steal from it citizens, why shouldn’t a beat cop be able to get gangsters and wannabe gangsters to fork over some cash for authentic prison “Bling”?
When Gil Kerlikowske says we shouldn’t fight a war on Americans, it’s a nice sentiment. But it’s action that needs to be taken. Even the beat cop knows that this war is lost even as he’s kicking in a suspects head.
UPDATE – via whittierdailynews.com
Dieter Dammeier, an attorney representing the El Monte Police Officers Association, said Thursday the actions were justified.
“When you’re going to have to take a bad guy into custody physically, it is sometimes going to be aggressive and the cops are there to win,” Dammeier said.
The officer’s kick was what is called a “distraction blow,” Dammeier said, and is not designed to harm people.
So be aware that in El Monte, you can expect a swift kick in the head to ‘distract’ you from laying down on the ground spread eagle. Since absolutely no bad idea goes to waste in the drug war, look for other cops in a municipality near you to use the “I was just trying to distract him” defense when he’s caught on tape beating the crap out of somebody.
