Video shows Manteca cop drinking, shoving at party

The Manteca Bulletin and the Sun Post both viewed the video from the party a few weeks ago where a fight broke out that involved an off-duty Manteca policeman and his son. The Bulletin article stresses that the video showed officer Kirk Doty only "shoved" a party-goer but didn't hit anyone with his fists. An opinion piece by Bulletin editor Dennis Wyatt yesterday defends Doty, again stressing that he didn't "hit" anyone, just some shoving or pushing. The focus of the article is on the underage drinking that apparently went on at the party and Wyatt places blame equally on everyone 21 or over who was at the party for allowing it and says that Doty was probably guilty of "bad judgment." At least one person had to go to the hospital and have reconstructive dental surgery as a result of events at the party, but the Bulletin thinks that's a minor incident...heck, boys will be boys.

The Sun Post article is more objective and provides an interesting time-line of events. According to the video, Doty arrived at the party around 1:45am. The Sun Post says Doty was called to the party by his daughter to "regulate" things. At 2:06am the video shows Doty shoving a young man to the floor. What I find most interesting about the time-line is that the really big fight where someone was beaten unconscious didn't occur until 2:53am when the Manteca police were called "about a large fight in the street." Doty was at the party for an hour before things got really ugly. I thought he was there to make sure things didn't get out of hand? What happened?