A Northern California hitchhiker died Thursday evening after he was restrained by law enforcement officers who zapped him with a Taser, used pepper spray and held him down on his stomach as they struggled to place him under arrest, according to the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office.
The confrontation between law enforcement and the 36-year-old hitchhiker occurred in Willits (Mendocino County) after officers received a complaint that the hitchhiker had “brutally assaulted” a driver who had picked him up.
The incident began at 7:02 p.m. when the California Highway Patrol notified the sheriff’s office of an altercation between a driver and the hitchhiker in the 2000 block of Hearst Willits Road…