Luke Thomas <\/a><\/strong><\/p>\nAugust 14, 2009<\/p>\n
A San Francisco Police Department sergeant today threatened to inflict bodily harm on a member of the public for expressing his opinion during a protest against healthcare reform.<\/p>\n
Organized by the Bay Area Patriots, the rally was held at Justin Herman Plaza to protest America’s Affordable Health Choices Act.<\/p>\n
During the rally, French-born rally participant Daniel Cohen was discussing healthcare reform with two anti-reformists when Sgt. J.S. Colla intervened and told Cohen to leave.<\/p>\n
“I was talking to two ladies about socialized medicine and the cops came with another guy and said I could not be there,” Cohen said, adding that Colla told him that “he was going to kick my arse if I didn’t get out of there, like I have never had my arse kicked before.”<\/p>\n
“He was very, very aggressive,” Cohen said. “I couldn’t believe how aggressive he was.”<\/p>\n
About five minutes later, according to Cohen, Colla returned to apologize for his threats but then asked Cohen if he was “in this country illegally.”<\/p>\n
Cohen, who works in a hotel at Justin Herman Plaza and speaks English with a slight French accent, is a 30-year US resident and was shocked to find himself being physically threatened by a police officer for holding a first-amendment right to an opinion not shared by the Bay Area Patriots, but even more dismayed by Colla’s questioning about his legal status.<\/p>\n
“I said I have a right to be here,” Cohen told Colla. “I am not screaming at anybody. I have a different opinion than you.”<\/p>\n
For his part, Colla told Fog City Journal that he had received a complaint alleging Cohen was “inciting the crowd.” He denied threatening Cohen with physical harm or that he apologized to Cohen for his threats.<\/p>\n
Colla then left the scene after Officer T. Cunnane motioned to Colla to extricate himself from the rally in an apparent attempt at damage control.<\/p>\n
Officer C. Payne, who was not involved in the altercation, apologized to Cohen after Colla left, telling Cohen that police policy is to separate protesters at rallies.<\/p>\n
“If someone complains, we have to do something,” Payne said.<\/p>\n
“The world has gone upside down,” Payne added. “All the problems we have in America come down to greed, hatred, prejudice and selfishness.”<\/p>\n
Elizabeth Rauber contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"During the rally, French-born rally participant Daniel Cohen was discussing healthcare reform with two anti-reformists when Sgt. J.S. Colla intervened and told Cohen to leave.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I was talking to two ladies about socialized medicine and the cops came with another guy and said I could not be there,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Cohen said, adding that Colla told him that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153he was going to kick my arse if I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get out of there, like I have never had my arse kicked before.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1394","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"\n
SFPD Officer Threatens Healthcare Reformist With Bodily Harm - Fog City Journal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"SFPD Officer Threatens Healthcare Reformist With Bodily Harm - Fog City Journal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"During the rally, French-born rally participant Daniel Cohen was discussing healthcare reform with two anti-reformists when Sgt. J.S. Colla intervened and told Cohen to leave. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I was talking to two ladies about socialized medicine and the cops came with another guy and said I could not be there,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Cohen said, adding that Colla told him that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153he was going to kick my arse if I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get out of there, like I have never had my arse kicked before.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Fog City Journal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/fogcityjournal\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-08-15T04:07:46+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-07-22T08:01:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Luke Thomas\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@https:\/\/twitter.com\/#!\/fogcityjournal\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@fogcityjournal\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Luke Thomas\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Luke Thomas\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/#\/schema\/person\/1a7952ea8bdeecb3a82f4b9d2ac302ab\"},\"headline\":\"SFPD Officer Threatens Healthcare Reformist With Bodily Harm\",\"datePublished\":\"2009-08-15T04:07:46+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-07-22T08:01:54+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/\"},\"wordCount\":423,\"commentCount\":12,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":[\"News\",\"Politics\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.fogcityjournal.com\/wordpress\/1394\/sfpd-officer-threatens-healthcare-reformist-with-bodily-harm\/\",\"name\":\"SFPD Officer Threatens Healthcare Reformist With Bodily Harm - 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