POLICE STATE: University of California at Davis cop John Pike pepper-sprays Occupy Wall Street protesters in November 2011. (
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DAVIS, Calif. — A former police officer who pepper-sprayed students during an Occupy Wall Street protest at the University of California at Davis is appealing for worker’s compensation, claiming he suffered psychiatric injury from the 2011 confrontation.
John Pike has a settlement conference set for Aug. 13 in Sacramento, according to the state Department of Industrial Relations’ Web site.
He was fired in July 2012, eight months after a task-force investigation found that his action was unwarranted.
Online videos of him and another officer casually dousing demonstrators with pepper spray went viral, sparking outrage at UC Davis leaders.
The images became a rallying symbol for the Occupy Wall Street movement.
Hackers posted Pike’s information online. He received scores of threats that led an Alameda County Court judge to rule against releasing the names of other officers at the scene.
This week, a state appeals court ruled that news organizations are entitled to know the names of a dozen campus police officers who were interviewed about the use of pepper spray on the demonstrators at UC Davis.
The Los Angeles Times and The Sacramento Bee are seeking the officers’ identities, which were redacted from two reports on the incident.
In the aftermath, the University of California agreed to pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit filed by demonstrators and the chief of the UC Davis Police Department resigned.