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Orlando, FL — In May of 2019, Officer Peter Meier with the Orlando Police Department made the ridiculous and outright dangerous decision to shoot a teenager with his taser while he rode his bicycle. The Orlando Police admitted Meier’s act was dangerous and violated department police, but the only ‘discipline’ he received was a written reprimand.

Orlando policy explicitly prohibits cops from tasering people on bicycles “except in cases of aggressive resistance.” No aggressive resistance existed on that afternoon on May 5, yet Meier tasered the teen and then lied that it did.

According to police, Meier initiated the the pursuit of his 19-year-old victim after he popped a wheelie on his bicycle. Seriously. Not wanting to be extorted or kidnapped for being a kid and doing kid things on a bicycle, the teen continued to ride away despite Meier turning on his police lights.

The teen and two others who were with him “disregarded his lawful commands,” investigator Lashon Goins wrote in a summary of the investigation, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

According to Meier’s report, the officer drove his car several times in front of the teen’s bicycle in order to stop him.

“Every time I got out of my patrol vehicle and pulled in front… to stop him, [he] and the two males would ride their bicycle[s] around my patrol vehicle and at times into traffic on West Oak Ridge Road,” Meier wrote.

Knowing he couldn’t let these “dangerous” teens get away with riding their bicycles and popping wheelies, Meier called for backup. When the other officers arrived, Meier jumped from his patrol car and began a foot pursuit of the teen on his bicycle. When the cop was about ten feet away, he shot the teen in the stomach with his taser causing him to come crashing down.

As the video shows, the teen falls to the pavement, getting injured in the process. He suffered multiple contusions and puncture wounds to his abdomen. According to the Sentinel, the teen also had to undergo surgery for his shoulder.

In his report, according to the Sentinel, Meier wrote that the suspect started slowing down on his bike and stood on the pedals as the officers approached, which the officer thought indicated he “was about to get off his bike and flee further into the apartment complex on foot.”

He said he stunned the teen because he thought his “flight on foot was imminent to escape or fight.” But this was not the case at all. During the investigation, the teen told police he ran from Meier because Meier threatened that he was going to taser him. Not wanting to be tasered by this clearly unstable cop, the teen ran. “I thought he was going to Tase me right there, so I just took off,” he said. After reviewing the body camera footage, the internal investigation revealed that Meier’s description of the incident was inaccurate. The bicyclist “appeared to be in continuous motion on the bicycle when Officer Meier deployed his Taser… [and] cause[d] the subject to fall on the ground,” he said. The teen was arrested that day on charges of resisting an officer without violence. However, the judge refused to convict him for it and instead issued him a traffic citation for failing to obey a police officer. According to police, after they tasered the first teen on his bicycle, another teen was then tasered as he rode his bicycle. Officer Ahmad AbuSoud reportedly deployed his taser on the other teen further down the road. According to the Sentinel, an OPD spokesman did not immediately respond to a question about whether that use of force is being investigated. Below is an infuriating video showing what riding your bicycle in a police state looks like.

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