Police taser student at John Kerry Q&A

video:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2007/09/17/police-taser-florida-stud_n_64789.html

http://www.miamiherald.com/466/story/241219.html
Student Tasered after asking Kerry questions
Posted on Mon, Sep. 17, 2007Digg del.icio.us AIM reprint print email
BY DIANA MOSKOVITZ
dmoskovitz@MiamiHerald.com

ANDREW STANFILL/INDEPENDENT FLORIDA ALLIGATOR
Andrew Meyer struggles with University Police after having his question to John Kerry cut off in the University Auditorium at the University of Florida. Meyer was later tasered by police.



GAINESVILLE -- A University of Florida student from Weston was stunned with a Taser and taken to jail on Monday after police say he disrupted an event with U.S. Sen John Kerry and refused to leave.

The incident was caught on video, which has since been distributed on the Internet.

Andrew Meyer, 21, was in the Alachua County Jail Monday night, according to jail records. He faces two charges: resisting an officer with violence and disrupting a school assembly. He's scheduled to appear in court at 9 a.m. today.

Within hours of the arrest, articles about it and video of the entire incident were posted on Meyer's website, http://www.theandrewmeyer.com.

The website includes writings by Meyer, including one piece against the war in Iraq.

The news came as a shock to Meyer's grandmother, Lucy Meyer, of Pembroke Pines, who described her grandson as a hardworking journalism major with no prior run-ins with the law.

Meyer attended Cypress Bay High School in Weston, his grandmother said, where he worked at the school newspaper and was a member of the National Honor Society.

He is in his senior year at UF, she said.

''I'm just really still sort of numb, hearing that my grandson is in jail,'' Lucy Meyer said.

She added: ``He gets very, very overcome with passion for whatever he is feeling. Maybe the passion took over.''

At about 1 p.m., Kerry was nearing the end of a forum at University Auditorium, a large facility beside UF's trademark Century Tower. At that point, audience members were allowed to ask questions at a microphone, university spokesman Steve Orlando said.

The person in front of Meyer was told he would be the last person to speak, Orlando said. Meyer said he was upset with that, so Kerry gave him the OK.

When he took the mike, Meyer then asked Kerry several questions. On amateur video linked from Meyer's website, his questions included why Kerry conceded in the 2004 presidential election, why not impeach President George W. Bush now, and whether Kerry was a member of the Skull and Bones secret society at Yale University.

When reminded that he was only supposed to ask one question, Meyer responded in the video ``He's talked for two hours. I think I can have two minutes.''

Members of the student group sponsoring the event summoned UF police to escort Meyer out, according to a police statement. At first, students can be heard cheering as he is asked to leave.

But Meyer refused to leave, police said.

When officers tried escorting him, he resisted, and officers only partially got handcuffs on him, according to police.

By then, officers had moved Meyer to the back of the auditorium, where he was on the floor, Orlando said. Officers told him to stop resisting, and when he still refused, they used the stun gun, Orlando said. On the video, he can be heard screaming at that point.

Meyer was then put back on hisfeet and taken out of the auditorium, he said.

At one point in one of the videos, Meyer says, ''Why am I under arrest?'' and ``They're going to try and kill me.''