Another ugly, fractious day in a falling empire.

Marion County Sheriff's deputies near Salem, Oregon

were caught on video arresting and

brutally assaulting Kevin Straw, 28, a slight, homeless, clearly mentally ill man after he kept yelling outside a

police command post where they were coordinating a search for two missing people (who turned up just fine.) Police twice told Straw, who had reportedly been walking the streets warning strangers about a cougar, that he had to leave. When he returned, in f

ootage captured by KGW-TV of Portland, Ore., four sheriffs threw him to the ground; within seconds, one beefy thug began punching him up to 20 times in the head as Straw screamed, "I

am not resisting! I am not resisting!" and "Help!" "I came to warn you about the cougar," he yelled at one point. "It's hurting people."