Chinese Police Beat Monk to Death Over Banned Cassettes

[Peter Terpstra]

Chinese Police Beat Monk to Death Over Banned Cassettes
2013-05-14

A Tibetan monk found in possession of recordings of speeches by exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has been beaten to
death by Chinese police, according to Tibetan sources.

Kardo, formerly of the Champa Ling monastery in Chamdo prefecture of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), was taken into
custody on April 21 at his home in Dzogang (in Chinese, Zuogong) county by county police, a Tibetan living in India told RFA’s
Tibetan Service on Monday.

“Two cassettes of the Dalai Lama’s speeches were discovered in his room,” the source said, speaking on condition of
anonymity and citing contacts in the region.

“After he was detained, he was severely beaten by police, and he died on April 28,” the source said.

Kardo’s parents had died some time before, and he is survived only by a sister, the source said.

“Chamdo police called Kardo’s sister and told her to claim the body.”

Police decline comment

Called on Tuesday for comment, a police officer in Dzogang referred an RFA reporter to the county’s criminal investigation
division, saying, “They are in charge,” but declined to provide a number for the office.

“The Chinese say that [Tibetans] enjoy freedom of religion, but that is not implemented in practice,” RFA’s source said.

“Tibetans are not allowed even to save the lives of animals in order to gain merit, and the Chinese also prevent monks from
going to conduct prayers in Tibetan homes,” he said.

Kardo had studied for a long time at the Champa Ling monastery in Chamdo and was known to be good in his studies, but had
left the monastery at an unknown date, the source said.

“He left because of the monastery’s worship of the Shugden deity.”

Shugden worship is a religious practice regarded as sectarian and discouraged by the Dalai Lama—a restriction that has led to
divisions and ill feeling within the Tibetan exile community in India and elsewhere.

Harsh action

Dzogang county authorities have been known in recent years to take harsh action against Tibetan protesters who assert
Tibetan national identity or otherwise challenge Beijing’s rule in the region.

On Feb. 10, Chinese police in Dzogang rounded up and brutally beat a group of Tibetans following a protest at the start of the
Lunar New Year, leaving two with broken bones and taking at least six into custody, sources said.

The protest in the county’s Meyul township came after authorities insisted that area residents fly the Chinese national flag
from the roofs of their homes, a local source told RFA’s Tibetan Service.

“But the Tibetans refused to fly the flags from their roofs,” the man said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Instead, they
tore them down and stamped on them,” he said.

And in January 2009, a young Tibetan living in Dzogang’s Punda township was reported beaten to death by police.

Pema Tsepak, 24, had been detained for taking part in a demonstration against Chinese rule, sources said.

“Chinese officials said he jumped off a building,” a Punda resident told RFA. “But we believe that he was beaten to death and
then thrown off,” he said.

Reported by Soepa Gyaltso and Lobsang Choephel for RFA’s Tibetan Service. Translated by Dorjee Damdul. Written in English by
Richard Finney.

http://www.rfa.org/english/news/tibet/cassettes-05142013132742.html

[rst9]

On May 14, 2:07 pm, Peter Terpstra <peter.terpst...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Chinese Police Beat Monk to Death Over Banned Cassettes
> 2013-05-14
>
> A Tibetan monk found in possession of recordings of speeches by exiled
> spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has been beaten to death by Chinese police,
> according to Tibetan sources.

As bad as this man in Bakersfield?

Kern County man dies after alleged beating by deputies
Sheriff seizes witnesses' phones with video of the incident, bringing
accusations of a coverup as Bakersfield police take over
investigation.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0514-kern-beating-20130514,0,...
Deadly sheriff's beating prompts charges of coverup
By Paul Pringle and Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times
May 13, 2013, 8:51 p.m.

The sharp cracks echoing from the East Bakersfield street were loud
enough to jolt Ruben Ceballos from a midnight slumber. Then he heard
screams.

The 19-year-old jumped from his living room sofa and hurried to the
kitchen door, which offered a view of the violent scene outside —
Kern
County sheriff's deputies repeatedly striking a man in the head with
batons as he lay on the pavement.

"I saw two sheriff's deputies on top of this guy, just beating him,"
Ceballos said in an interview Monday. "He was screaming in pain …
asking for help. He was incapable of fighting back — he was
outnumbered, on the ground. They just beat him up."

LIVE CHAT: Discuss the case at 9 a.m.

The man was David Sal Silva, 33, a father of four, and he was
pronounced dead less than an hour later. The altercation last week
was
videotaped by witnesses and has roiled the Central Valley city for
days.

One woman frantically called 911, telling the operator: "The guy was
laying on the floor and eight sheriffs ran up and started beating him
up with sticks. The man is dead laying right here, right now. I got
it
all on video camera and I'm sending it to the news. These cops have
no
reason to do this to this man."

In an unusual move, sheriff's officials later detained for several
hours two witnesses who had videotaped the incident on their phones.
They were released only after they surrendered their phones to
deputies.

"It makes it look like a coverup," said David Cohn, a lawyer for
Silva's children and parents, adding that he has not been able to see
the footage. "What we're all concerned about is, 'Are these videos
going to be altered? Are they going to be deleted?' "

Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said in an interview Monday that
it was too early in the investigation to reach any conclusions about
Silva's death. But he defended the decision to take custody of the
phones as a way of preserving possible evidence. The sheriff said his
office obtained a search warrant for the phones.

"We still have to secure the evidence, especially when the evidence
can tell us whether we did it right or wrong," Youngblood said.

He said his agency, to remove the appearance of any conflict, has
asked the Bakersfield Police Department to analyze the phone videos.
KERO-TV Channel 23 in Bakersfield broadcast a security camera video
from the scene showing grainy images of figures pummeling someone on
the ground, with about 20 swings of what appear to be batons or
sticks. It's difficult to see Silva in the seven-minute video or how
many of those swings connected.

A earlier statement by the Sheriff's Office said Silva might have
been
intoxicated and resisted the deputies' efforts to restrain him,
forcing them to use their batons. It said six deputies, a sergeant
and
two California Highway Patrol officers were at the scene. One deputy
had a K-9 dog.

Silva stopped breathing and was taken to the hospital, where he was
pronounced dead at 12:44 a.m. Wednesday, the statement said.
Youngblood said it could take the coroner's office up to four months
to complete toxicology tests and determine a cause of death.

In an email to The Times on Monday, the CHP said it "is deeply
sympathetic" to the Silva family and "takes seriously all incidents
where an individual dies while in custody." The agency said it could
not discuss the matter further because of the investigation.

The Silva episode follows several high-profile brutality cases
involving the Kern County Sheriff's Office in recent years.

One led to criminal convictions of three deputies and a $6-million
civil judgment in the 2005 death of a jail inmate, according to
attorneys. Another resulted in a $4.5-million court award for the
family of a man who died in 2010 after being struck 33 times with
batons and Tasered 29 times, attorneys said.

A deputy accused in the civil lawsuit over the 2010 death has the
same
name as one of those who confronted Silva. Youngblood would not
confirm that it was the same deputy, however.

According to Cohn, Silva became upset Tuesday morning and abruptly
left the home he shared with his girlfriend and their children. He
later visited his mother's house before turning up at Kern Medical
Center seeking help for some sort of emotional trouble. He left the
hospital when a security officer told him he could not sleep there,
Cohn said.

Silva fell asleep in front of a house across the street, the spot
where the deputies confronted him, the attorney said. He said he did
not know if Silva had been drinking. Court databases show that Silva
pleaded no contest in 2008 to a misdemeanor charge of disturbing the
peace. He was charged with being drunk and disorderly two years
later,
but the case was dismissed.

Cohn represented the son of the inmate killed in 2005, an offshore
oil
field worker who was arrested after behaving erratically. "They don't
seem to have any training when it comes to people with a mental
illness," Cohn said of the Sheriff's Office "There seems to be a
culture of striking first and asking questions later."

Legal experts were surprised that deputies detained the witnesses for
the purpose of seizing their phones.

Laurie Levenson, a Loyola law professor and former federal
prosecutor,
said the department's tactics were "very heavy-handed, but
technically
may have been legal because the 911 call created a probable cause to
obtain the videos."

But she said law enforcement officers "cannot detain people for hours
on end, and if they did here that would be problem."

Dmitry Gorin, a Los Angeles defense attorney, said: "The deputies
could secure the house, but they cannot detain the people. The
argument here would have to be they would not let them leave because
they could take the cellphone with them. This is very unusual. I have
never had a client detained in this way."
richard.win...@latimes.com
paul.prin...@latimes.com