If you've never been a bike rider, then you probably don't understand the issue here. I rode motorcycles for years and the police do harass us a lot. No doubt the cop was right up the guys arse to run his plate for a reason to pull him over, and likely typing on the laptop when he gave him the love tap.

Now, if some cop smacked me like that, then came up being a jerk like this guy. We'd have had his supervisor and likely the captain and lieutenant out there to sort it out and find out how the city would pay for any damage to my bike and time off work to have it repaired.

When he threatened to write me a "load of tickets" I would have told him to go ahead and we would work out the details of the issue in court. I've been around the block a few times with LEO and have no problem going to court to argue cases. Some folks are intimidated by that process. It doesn't bother me one bit.

The cop knew he was in the wrong and used his position to intimidate the rider. That is an abuse of position of you ask me.

My Dad was a LEO so I can speak from both sides of the fence intelligently and with some experience.

Yep. There doesn't appear to be any damage done so if the cop had been apologetic, I would be willing to to shrug it off with a few choice words about his driving abilities - no-harm-no-foul, being a cop isn't always an easy job, and I'll be late for work if this escalates to an official accident. But when he starting talking about writing tickets, I think I would have insisted that we fill out the required accident report first. What happened is on at least one camera and probably two.

I guess it's like any profession, a few bad ones reflect badly on the rest. Most cops I run into are pretty good ppl just trying to do a job and feed their families. Maybe his wife ran off with a motorcyclist - still no excuse to act like that.

Police officer in YouTube video placed on paid leave - www.ktnv.com