Photography assault

Last night was our final class in the night photography course. People had some nice images to share and discuss, but there was one disturbing story. One of the guys in the class had been taking photos yesterday of some buildings in downtown Riverside near the jail. He had his camera on a tripod and his backpack was nearby with a can of spray mount in the outside pocket. The way he described it, three sheriffs who work in the jail completed their shifts, exited the building, and walked past him on the sidewalk. They walked a little farther, then turned around and came back and tackled him and held him on the ground. They claimed that he had tagged a building and was taking pictures of it. The problem with that idea was that he didn't have any spray paint and what they thought was spray paint was the spray mount he had with him to mount his pictures for class. He yelled at them and they threatened to handcuff him but eventually let him go. Given Riverside's dismal record when it comes to policing problems, even though these guys were not police officers, it's a very scary incident. They gave no warning and had no evidence. The guy was a photography student, not a tagger and he had done nothing wrong. He seemed willing to let it go, but if there are members of law enforcement in Riverside going around assaulting citizens on the street, someone should know about it.