Investigate MBTA Practices on Use of Force and Deadly Weapons
- by: Susan V
- recipient: US Attorney General Loretta Lynch
In 1985 the US Supreme Court ruled (Tennessee v Garner) that it’s unconstitutional for a police officer to use deadly force to stop or prevent the escape of an unarmed, nonviolent suspect. But it appears that a Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority officer attempted to do just that.
Fortunately other occupants on the bus where the MBTA officer was beating an unarmed woman intervened. A witness video shows that while the woman tried to ward off the officer’s assault by holding on to his baton, he drew his gun. Eventually the other passengers were able to talk him into holstering it.
While watching the video of this altercation, keep in mind that, according to the Boston Globe, the officer admits he knew the woman was suspected only of stealing a bar of soap. Nevertheless he reportedly admits he “sprayed her in the face,” with pepper spray, before she sprayed back with “possibly” rubbing alcohol and that he “struck her in the legs twice with his baton.” Even though the officer claims that he “at no time” pointed his gun “towards Bittle or other passengers,” the video shows passengers quickly retreating as he drew it and then held it rather recklessly in one hand as he continued to struggle with the other.
A spokesman for Coalition for Police Accountability told the Globe that either the officer had forgotten his training or had not been properly trained in the first place.
Sign this petition to ask the Department of Justice to investigate MBTA practices regarding use of force and brandishing weapons.
We, the undersigned, say that the video of this incident, along with the report of the alleged crime, raises a reasonable doubt about whether the officer acted appropriately or legally in drawing his gun and his use of other weapons.
The Globe report includes a statement by the suspect, Shelisa Bittle, given at the courthouse on the Monday after her arrest apologizing for her “behavior," but adding that if the officer “had done [his] job properly,“ the situation “would not have escalated that far. . . I would have given him my bag. I would have let him search it. . . But he was way too aggressive, way too aggressive,” Bittle is quoted as saying..
It would not be unreasonable to assume that Bittle had been afraid of the officer - too afraid to comply with his reported demand to “get off the bus.” Based on many reports of police violence against women, it would not have been unreasonable for her to want to remain where witnesses might protect her from brutality.
If police officers are not currently being trained to understand this concern, then they should be. Furthermore they should be trained to find a better way to deal with suspects of petty crime. For example, knowing that it was just a bar of soap in question, couldn’t the officer simply have asked the woman to pay for it and write a citation and a warning? Was that bar of soap in any way worth beating a woman with a baton and possibly killing her and others on a crowded bus?
In a world where white collar crimes are killing many people every day, can’t police officers be taught to put things into perspective?
Even though shoplifting is a crime that should not be condoned, beating a woman, spraying her face with mace, pulling her hair and putting her and passengers on a bus at risk of their lives over a stolen bar of soap should not be condoned either.
We request an investigation of MBTA by the Department of Justice.

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