Stifling Free Speech -- Your Tax Dollars at Work

Protest and Pushback on Campus

by RYAN GRIM
[posted online on October 12, 2005]

As a campus police officer put Tariq Khan in a chokehold, a lunchtime crowd at George Mason University began egging the officer on. Chants of "Kick his ass! Kick his ass!" were intermingled with cries of "Punch him!" "Kick him!" and "Take him down!" Two students--one had earlier ripped a sign off Khan's chest, the other had repeatedly called him a "pussy"--and a computer-lab staff member assisted the officer in "apprehending" Khan, as university spokesperson Dan Walsch put it, by piling on top of him and twisting his body until he cried out in pain.

Khan, 27, a four-year Air Force veteran and a junior at GMU, had been walking through the Johnson Center on September 29 when he saw a Marine recruiter. He made up a sign, "Recruiters lie. Don't be deceived," and silently stood next to the recruiter's table. Less than thirty minutes later he found himself in the chokehold. Backup police dragged Khan from the building, and one of them pulled out pepper spray. "I'm being nonviolent, and this officer is going to pepper-spray me! If you have a cell phone, please take a picture," Khan says he shouted. Aimee Wells, a junior and a library staffer, says she pulled out her camera-phone and the officer put away the canister, saying, "Don't worry. Nobody's getting pepper-sprayed today."

Khan, a sociology major, was taken to the Fairfax County jail and charged with disorderly conduct and trespassing. While there, he says, one officer told him, "You people are the most dangerous people in the world." Another officer, he says, warned him that if he didn't behave, "They'll hang you up by your feet." Police photographs show a bruised and bloodied Khan. A campus investigation is under way into the actions of the police, the staff member and the students, but no charges have yet been brought. "Buz" Grover, the balding, gray-ponytailed computer lab staffer who jumped on Khan and pulled his arm back, looks about six-foot-six and weighs maybe 280 pounds. "I assisted the officer," he said, "but beyond saying anything else I think I should consult with the university first.... Basically, someone doesn't want to take responsibility for his actions, and I'm not inclined to help them do that."

For the rest of the story . . .