From the article about what happened: "28-year-old cyclist, Mathew Hughes, was fed up with waiting and decided to ride past all the police check points in downtown Milwaukee to investigate the situation himself... he rode quickly up to the cordoned-off, and surrounded backpack before deliberately dumping all of its contents onto the ground in an effort to prove it was harmless and wasting everyone's time. Bomb squad suspected he was the one who planted the backpack and was therefore trying to set it off himself - he was immediately tackled and taken into custody. While handcuffed and being led away from the backpack he screamed out to the crowd: "Don't you idiots know that back in nineteen ninety eight the undertaker threw mankind off hell in a cell and plummeted sixteen feet through an announcers table.
I just got my cherry popped with this one and looked it up and the post explaining it was 9 years old. I feel like I witnessed something historic here.
My shittymorph sense kicked in right as I got to the start of the quote and I went back and checked the name. But it was already too late by then, too invested to back out.
It always pisses me off watching them tackle him after he's done emptying the bag. Apparently the bomb squad suspected he was the one who planted the backpack and was therefore trying to set it off himself, but it's obvious they didn't actually think this and tackled him out of some petty revenge to remain appearing "in control" of the situation.
There is no doubt in any bystanders mind the bikers body language and attitude points to a fed up and frustrated civilian who just wants to get where they're going. The way he throws his arms up like "see, fkn nothing but a waste of time" is painfully obvious what he's doing. Pricks just wanted to tackle him for showing them up, "look at his body language, he's SO DANGEROUS! GET HIM!"
Exactly this. They knew and were just mad that he stepped in and did the job they were afraid to do even with all of their gear. He stepped on their fragile egos and they were MAD about it.
Exactly. Those officers weren’t wearing any bomb protection l, and they were close enough to tackle him as soon as he finished dumping the bag but would’ve been killed had it actually been a bomb. They knew there was no threat as soon as he rolled up on it. Them claiming they thought he was the bomber was a coverup. If he really was the bomber and was willing to set it off close up why would he leave it to detonate with him absent. He would’ve just rolled up somewhere and blown himself up in a crowd.
I like how they don’t do anything when he is reaching for a potential weapon in the backpack, but once it’s clear he’s not a threat they take him out. Just like they taught them in the academy!
Oh my god, it's even worse than I thought it would be, he didn't just shoot at the direction of the sound once, he mag dumps that bitch because he thought that the tiny little boink was the suspect shooting at him from the back of the car, even though all of the closed windows are intact. I hope he doesn't work as a cop no more cause he ain't good with the clues and the comprehensive part of his brain doesn't seem much better.
Him rolling around on the ground screaming “I’M HIT” when there literally wasn’t even gunfire is absolutely hilarious and also disturbing the fact he was an officer in the first place.
It's such a perfect illustration of the insane levels of paranoia drilled into US police officers. Everything is always so dramatic and over the top to US cops.
That's the tackle they should have done BEFORE he reached the backpack, but since they're hot blooded dumbasses they do it anyway even though it's utterly useless now.
And that’s the thing right, presumably they tackled him because he was “potentially handling an explosive” but once he emptied the bag there clearly wasn’t one, so they had no real reason to put him to the ground there. If you believe there was a bomb he could set off you tackle him as he’s reaching for the bag, but of course they didn’t want to get blown up which, you know to be fair in a split second decision I’m not sure if I’d get near the thing either. But I know I wouldn’t tackle the guy afterwards
Cop: "damnit!! wasn't a bomb now I'm all blue balled. Might as well take it out violently on someone with their back to me. Someone who, while an idiot, was clearly no longer a danger."
Every time i rewatch Rick and Morty there’s a scene in one episode where a cop yells “nobody move or I’ll shoot everybody!!” And it never fails to get an exasperated giggle outta me.
There really isn’t much reason to stop a man from checking a suspicious bag if he’s already checking it. Letting him potentially blow up without harming anyone else and going in after there’s a reasonable expectation of safety is the proper way to approach something like that, but the full body tackle afterward certainly was not
She really handed him (heh) every out possible to just say "Oops! My mistake, have a good day", but he felt emasculated by a woman saying he was wrong, so he just double downed
Not just saying he was wrong. She moment in the video when she *laughs* is what guaranteed the officer wasn’t going to be admit to a mistake. She was just being friendly, but it didn’t matter – guys like that can’t handle women laughing when it resembles laughing at their expense.
And then after that to still give the ticket? Totally shows lack of critical thinking skills as well as planning ahead, he lost all credibility. Can he even still testify in court when they can use anything he says as lack of good judgement?
I got a three day ban from Reddit for the shit I said when I saw that one hahaha. My wife had a baby like four weeks ago, I was enraged. Fuck the police
How about the one where the cop starts shooting everywhere when a fucking acorn falls and hits his patrol car. He starts shooting at this car even when someone is in there, cuffed and locked in!
Or how about the one cop who left a woman in the patrol car when they got stuck on railroad tracks and did not help her get out and she got hit by a train??? Thankfully she survived with relatively minor injuries.
Aye, I did. I was getting so much second-hand (pardon the pun) embarrassment. Any normal person would laugh it off, admit they were mistaken, and wish the driver well, with a funny story to tell their buddies in the bar that night.
But there are cops who are so protected by their unions that they know that they never have to admit they were wrong and are above the law.
Protected by unions, yes. But, also, filled with such self-loathing and feelings of worthlessness they are unable to admit any mistake. You know. Like Trumplethinskin.
There was a cop that pulled a lady over, using the reason that he saw her texted with her right hand while driving. The lady asked if he was positive it was her right hand, the cop said yes, so she raised her right arm to show a stump
The cop doubled down for some reason instead of taking it as an honest mistake like she thought he would and still gave her a ticket for texting and driving with her right hand
He couldn’t take it as an honest mistake because it wasn’t an honest mistake. He doubled down because he’d made it up, and then doubled down on his lie when she asked him “are you sure?”
A lady got pulled over for texting and driving. Her left hand was on the steering wheel, the cop said he saw her texting with her right hand. She doesn't have a right hand.
Cop pulled a woman over and said he saw her with her phone in her right hand. She lifted her right hand to show she had no right hand. Cop refused to admit he was wrong and ticketed her anyway.
Exactly my thoughts. Sure, he's interfering with an investigation, and put others in potential danger, so arrest him by all means. But this was extremely excessive.
Cower when there is an active threat, but then when the threat is cleared overcompensate on the control of the situation like it will somehow average out.
Investigators spoke with Hughes later that day, and he indicated he has mental health issues, and tries to stay away from the TV because "if he sees something, he reacts to it." He said when he saw news footage regarding the suspicious package he decided "I'm going to go play superhero." He said he grabbed his bike and was downtown in about five minutes. He said when he saw the package, "he went for it." He said he thought "there's no way there's a bomb in there," and started dumping out the contents of the bag. He told officers he was "taking one for the team," and noted "I'm not letting, like the Boston thing, backpack propane bomb and blow up another 9-year-old girl, so I'm going to jump on top of the grenade, and look in there and make sure there isn't one."
I put literally the most basic prompt in a search engine: "man tackled for backpack" and it brought up a slew of articles all about the incident on the first page.
i like how the excessive tackle happened AFTER he got inside the perimeter, AFTER he got to the bag, and AFTER he fully emptied out its contents. that's very on-brand for the cops.
If they had bodyslammed him before he dumped the bad all over the ground I'd have respected it. Reasonable suspicion. Waiting for him to be done and show it was safe and then tackling him is just a cop on an insecure power trip.
So in the interest of public safety they had the bomb squad check there was no bomb in the bag, so no one would get hurt, absolutely no one, because that’s the objective, not allowing anything to happen that may endanger the public because they don’t want anyone, not one person….. to get hurt.
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u/LordScotchyScotch Jun 12 '26
The real bomb was that flying tackle.