Police heavy-handed, party organizers say
"We've had shows get shut down, but . . . (police) don't need to come in and beat people up," said Brandon Fullmer, manager of Uprok Records, the music store in Salt Lake City that sponsored the CD-release party. "What they did was wrong."
Fullmer said he is mulling a lawsuit against the officers.
After monitoring the party for a few hours, some 90 officers from the Utah County Metro and Provo SWAT teams, Department of Public Safety and Utah Department of Corrections decided to raid the event at 11:30 p.m. Saturday.
Officers, who called the party a rave, said they saw drug usage, drug sales and other illegal activities. Drugs and drug paraphernalia were also found littering the ground after partygoers left.
Police said they were only doing their jobs — to help prevent future problems and protect those who were there.
"I don't believe it was too much force," said Utah County Sheriff's Sgt. Spencer Cannon. "We try in what we do to only escalate to the level necessary to gain control of the situation or the people causing a problem."
"We went in because it was an illegal gathering," Cannon said. "They need a permit for 250-plus people — they didn't have that permit. Illegal drug activity was discovered secondary to closing down the large gathering."
However, whatever the reason, Fullmer says officers broke up the party with far too much force.
"Permit or not, the way they handled it was unjustifiable," he said. "There was no reason for this. People should not have been hurt. They could have come in and been civil with us. We're a business, we're not out there to do anything illegal."
Such a permit should have been obtained through the Utah County Commission. County code says applicants should submit a request — along with a $100 fee — to the commission 30 days prior to the event, said Utah County Commissioner Jerry Grover.
The commission reviews the application and can issue a "large gathering license." Groups must also get another mass-gathering permit through the county health department, which outlines specifics about portable bathrooms, water and trash facilities. Although Uprok had a health department permit and emergency medical personnel, Grover said they never came to the commission for a license.
"The problem is, no one is going to come in and permit it as a rave," Grover said. "So we have to handle everyone equally under the law. If they came in, we'd look at their application, we have criteria — it doesn't mean we condone selling drugs. There's a lot of problems they could face if they are selling drugs."
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