A police officer was relieved of duty after he was caught on video kicking a man"s head like a soccer ball, while the man was handcuffed and being restrained on the ground.
The post Cop Fired After Video Shows Him Kick Handcuffed Man’s Head Like a Soccer Ball appeared first on The Free Thought Project.
A video was posted online that showed police officers repeatedly hitting and punching a homeless man after they found him sleeping under a bridge.
The post Residents Outraged As Video Shows Cops Hold Homeless Man Down, Savagely Beat Him appeared first on The Free Thought Project.
Police were caught on surveillance camera dragging an elderly, disabled man from his home and then beating him with a baton, taunting him, and covering his face with pepper spray.
The post Video Catches Cops Drag Innocent Disabled Man From Home, Torture Him in His Front Yard appeared first on The Free Thought Project.
When a female police officer confronted her colleague about strangling and raping her, he admitted to the attack and bragged about the bursts of anger that gave him the nickname "The Hulk."
A sheriff’s deputy has been charged with first-degree rape for sexually assaulting a person who was physically helpless, in his home.
A video is going viral that shows masked officers leading a handcuffed man around the side of a building where they hit and Taser him away from the public.
Surveillance footage shows a police sergeant lying about why he was reserving a hotel room for a mentally ill woman, before using it to sexually assault her.
Haywood County, TN — A sheriff’s deputy was reportedly fired after he was charged with domestic assault. But this is not the first time he has had a run-in with the law over domestic assault allegations, and this is not the first department in the county that has fired him as a result.
Adrian Perkins was first arrested in September 2016, while working as a corporal at the Brownsville Police Department. The 29-year-old officer was charged with domestic assault with battery and was immediately placed on administrative leave with pay.
Perkins was released from custody the next morning on $2,500 bond. The Brownsville Police Department released a statement on the incident:
“As soon as Brownsville Police Department became aware of the allegations, Chief Barry Diebold immediately contacted District Attorney Garry Brown and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. The Brownsville Police Department takes allegations of domestic violence in the community, especially among its officers, very seriously.”
Perkins was eventually fired from the department, but that did not stop him from pursuing another job in law enforcement. While that is not uncommon for police officers who are fired, Perkins’ case is unique, because he did not leave the state, or even the city—he found another job in the same county.
Advertisment
The Haywood County Sheriff’s Department claims that Perkins has been employed as a sheriff’s deputy “for a few months,” but he was fired last week after he was arrested once again for domestic assault.
Perkins was arrested for the second time after police reviewed “video from a surveillance camera” outside the New Revelation Missionary Baptist Church in Brownsville, and determined that he was a suspect.
READ MORE: VIDEO: Innocent Man"s Dashcam Exonerates Him After Exposing the Cop as the One Who Broke the Law
While police did not specify as to who the victim was, a family member told WBBJ 7 Eyewitness News, “He is supposed to protect the citizens of Haywood County and he can’t even protect the people in his household.”
Perkins pleaded guilty to the charge of domestic assault and will complete one year of supervised probation as a result. An anonymous family member of the victim told WBBJ 7 that the sentence is not nearly enough.
“He needs to be in jail for a long period of time, not probation, because he [does] not need to be in law enforcement at all, no kind of way,” the family member said.
In a statement, Brownsville Mayor Bill Rawls confirmed that this is the second time Perkins has been fired for domestic violence, but also said that because Perkins filed a grievance lawsuit against the city after the first termination, Rawls was not able to comment on it.
“Officer Perkins was a former Brownsville police department officer. He was terminated Sept. 27, 2016, for a domestic violence charge … It’s just not acceptable in our community. We’re all human beings, we all deserve to be treated with respect, whether we’re in our home or in the streets or in the police department or in the police car or wherever you are.”
As The Free Thought Project has reported, this is not the first time this has happened. In fact, it occurs so often that officers who are fired from one department and then go on to join another—despite existing charges that should interfere with their employment—are referred to as “Gypsy Cops.”
READ MORE: Man Illustrates the Need to Film Police, Catches the "Cop From Hell" on a Hidden Camera
In one case, a police officer in Texas was responsible for three officer-involved shootings in two different departments, all in one year. Chase Welch was first suspended three times in two years for questionable cases that showed he was aggressive and displayed poor judgment. He then shot and killed two men in two separate incidents, and after leaving the department, he went to work as a sheriff’s deputy where he shot a man during his second day on the job.
In another case, a police officer in Ohio got his job back after he participated in the execution of an unarmed couple over a traffic violation. And in yet another case, a police officer in Florida killed a pedestrian with his squad car, punched a child, and spat on a mentally ill man—all in a 3-month time period—and he still has a job as a police officer.
While Adrian Perkins was fired from the Haywood County Sheriff’s Department, it remains to be seen whether the multiple domestic violence charges on his record, along with the extremely light sentence, will stop him from continuing to be a textbook “Gypsy Cop” and going on to work at another police department.
After Body Camera footage was released that showed a 14-year-old boy with autism being assaulted by police in Arizona, his story went viral, and the public was reminded that individuals with disabilities are often targeted by police, no matter their race, age or gender.
As The Free Thought Project reported, Grossman took the boy, Connor Leibel to the ground after attempting to place the 14-year-old in handcuffs, arguably for being “jumpy”—as many autistic individuals are. Grossman claimed that because Leibel was “stimming,” or playing with a string to help calm his nerves, that the young man must have been under the influence of some sort of drug and this gave him reasonable suspicion to act in the manner that he did.
Grossman, reportedly a drug recognition expert, could not tell the difference between an autistic individual and someone who is on drugs. Now, Connor is speaking out about his frightful interaction. He told AZFamily in Phoenix:
“He pushed me down on the grass and he just hit me on the tree and tackled me and then he didn’t stop, It made me feel sad.”
As the video, which has now gone viral, demonstrates, Leibel was minding his own business on the corner of a city park when he was approached by the officer. Reporters at a press conference with the Buckeye PD, asked how a reported drug recognition expert couldn’t tell the difference between a drug user and a person with special needs.
Advertisment
Connor’s mother, Diane Leibel, can hardly watch the bodycam footage, which has now been made public. “It was really hard to watch that, that’s my, that’s my baby,” she told AZFamily.
READ MORE: Police State America: Two Children Charged With Felonies For Peeling Bark From a Tree
Tamela Skaggs, spokesperson for the Buckey Police Department made a statement on behalf of their officer as well as the department:
“I hope the family sees that we will learn from this incident. We are human and things are constantly evolving and changing and it’s almost impossible to know and understand every single little piece of every single disorder.”
Grossman was cleared of any wrongdoing in the violent takedown that left Connor cut, bruised, scraped and emotionally traumatized. The department also claimed there was “no use of force” implemented in the contact with the autistic child. One might be hard-pressed to find very many who would agree with the department’s explanation or resulting investigation.
In fact, Danielle (Conor’s mom) seems perplexed by Skagg’s comments, and she said they are conflicting.
“They say nothing was wrong, he (Grossman) didn’t do anything wrong, but ‘we’re going to make sure we handle it differently.’ Why would you need to ‘handle it differently’ if everything was done correctly the first time,” Danielle Liebel said.
The interaction with Grossman, the resulting takedown of a young teenage boy with special needs, and the head in the sand denial by the police department has left many people scratching their heads in bewilderment, wondering how an autistic boy can be violently assault, and how the officer’s actions can be justified by the police department.
As TFTP has consistently and faithfully reported, few police departments will every acknowledge responsibility, yet they are in the business of keeping citizens accountable for their actions. All of which has led many to conclude there’s a double standard at work for police.
READ MORE: After They Convicted Her of Assault on Police, 2 Years Later, New Video Shows Cops Attacked HER
Flipping the script may help the average police apologist understand why so many are outraged. If Grossman had been standing on a street corner, and Leibel had approached him, attempted to place him in handcuffs, and then thrown him to the ground when the officer pulled away, the young autistic boy would more than likely be facing assault charges. That is, of course, if he lived through the beat down Grossman and his fellow officers would dish out for laying a hand on a boy in blue.
Connor now knows the difference between an officer he can trust and one like Grossman, who injured him. “A different kind of police officer makes me feel happy…The one police officer was mean to me and made me feel sad…He pushed me down on the grass and he just hit me on the tree and tackled me and then he didn’t stop. It made me feel sad,” He said.
Now, Connor Leibel’s family has stated they only wants three things: They want a personal apology from Buckeye police officer David Grossman, they want him to help serve the autistic community, and they want the entire department to receive training on how to deal with autistic individuals.
However, in true obstinate fashion, the police department has acknowledged receipt of the requests but said they can’t say when, if at all, they will even respond.
A trial on the use of excessive force during a violent arrest in the city of Calgary has included a number of revelations as one officer admits he intentionally turned off his Dash Cam, and another officer admits he yelled “YouTube alert!” to encourage his fellow officers to stop recording a brutal beating that was sure to go viral.
Clayton Prince, 35, suffered multiple broken ribs and a collapsed lung on July 30, 2016, after a traffic stop led to a violent arrest. Prince testified that he was on his way home from a summer music festival when he was pulled over, and because he was paranoid that he still had marijuana and cocaine in his system from the event, he fled the scene.
When officers caught up to Prince, he was lying face-down on the grass, in the position to surrender for an arrest—the only thing the officers had to do was to put him in handcuffs. However, that is when the violence began.
Constable Chris Harris testified that the officers on the scene made “no meaningful attempts” to actually put Prince in handcuffs, and they resorted to mercilessly beating him with their fists and knees instead, as he lay helpless on the ground with no way to defend himself.
Advertisment
“It was clear that Mr. Prince’s reaction was one of pain. It appeared he wasn’t resisting the officers; he was attempting to move away from the pain,” Harris said, in response to a video played for the court, which showed Prince screaming in pain as the beating took place.
READ MORE: On-Duty Cop Rapes, Beats, Urinates on Woman, Pleads Guilty — NO JAIL
Harris said the violence became so “out of control” that he began yelling “YouTube alert” at his fellow officers, hoping it would encourage them to stop the beating, for fear that members of the public were recording the incident.
As a result of the violent assault, Prince spent five days in the hospital recovering, and Calgary Police Officers James Othen, Kevin Humfrey and Michael Sandalack, are now on trial for charges of assault causing bodily harm.
While there is Dash Cam footage that shows Prince lying face down on the ground as Othen jumps on his back, and Humfrey punches him, Constable D’Arcy Oakes admitted that he turned off the camera moments after he arrived at the scene, leaving out crucial footage.
“I hit the button,” Oakes told Crown Prosecutor Jim Stewart when asked why he ended the video when he did.
“Why did you do that?” Stewart asked.
“I did not do it on purpose,” Oakes replied, claiming it was “a combination of adrenalin, trying to turn the vehicle off and turning the (flashing) lights off.”
Oakes testified that he watched Othen jump and kick his knee into Prince’s ribs, and then as Othen and Humfrey held Prince down, Sandalack began striking Prince in the face with his knee. Oakes said that both Othen and Humfrey were yelling at Prince to stop resisting.
Othen is also charged with assault with a weapon for digging a key into Prince’s neck behind his ear—a claim that Constable Ryan MacPherson testified to witnessing after Prince was finally handcuffed and placed in a police truck, and Othen opened up the backdoor and confronted him.
READ MORE: Family of Toddler Whose Baby Was Severely Injured by Police Demand Justice
Both Humfrey and Othen have also been charged with public mischief for filing false reports, after footage from a police Dash Cam contradicted their accounts of the incident, and prompted an investigation by the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team.
“In an effort to change the narrative from the truth, both James Othen and Kevin Humfrey made false statements to [a constable], who they knew was in charge of writing up the report,” Stewart said during the trial.
Othen and Humphrey are currently suspended without pay, and Sandalack is on “administrative duties.” The trial is set to resume on Nov. 6.
Agawam, MA — Three police officers so horrifically beat a man in custody, all of them — a sergeant and to veteran patrolmen — were fired. Now, Police Chief Eric Gillis has released video footage of the brutal attack — and what it shows makes shockingly clear why they lost their jobs.
On June 19, 2016, David Desjardins, Jr., became too inebriated at a bar in the Six Flags New England amusement park; but when a bartender cut him off, he acted belligerently and began arguing. Park security called the police, MassLive reports, who confronted Desjardins and had to use pepper spray several times before they were able to make the arrest.
Agawam Police Officers John P. Moccio and Edward B. Connor, and Sergeant Anthony Grasso, then dealt with Desjardins during the booking process, but claimed in reports the man was drunk and unruly — thus their use of force had been justified. Desjardins was charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and assault and battery on a police officer.
“Under the policies and procedures, the use of the force was authorized,” said Attorney John Connor, who represents the officers, reports 22News, “They may disagree with that, but that doesn’t mean that these officer didn’t act in accordance with the policies and their training.”
However, video shows Desjardins stripped down to his underwear and seemingly — despite the lack of audio recording — only vaguely disruptive and certainly not deserving of the beating he then receives.
As footage begins, the man sits on a bench in the station and appears to receive a stern talking-to by one officer. Suddenly the officer gestures to another and the pair, along with two others, violently grab Desjardins and force him into a holding cell, containing the typical metal toilet and a concrete slab without any padding.
Desjardins weakly attempts to wriggle free from one officer’s grip and is then roughly forced down onto the concrete slab with three of the four officers holding him down — as one of them uses a baton to beat his back. When that seems not to satisfy the officer, he takes a step back and — as the other two lie on top of the drunken man, holding him down — begins pummeling Desjardins’ kneecaps and ankles with the baton.
Video shows the cops clearly have control of the situation and resistance from Desjardins, if any, is both minimal and likely in self-defense.
As the two officers grip the man’s wrists and head, the third then proceeds to smash the baton against Desjardins’ shins — worse, footage seems to show the tip of the baton being used to jab him in the abdomen or groin.
In obvious pain from this, Desjardins smacks his foot against the concrete slab.
When the officers seem to relent to leave the cell, it becomes apparent one had been using two hands to press the man’s face onto the slab — but even as they move to leave, and he slowly sits up, one officer still casually hits him with the baton.
As Desjardins stands, the verbal altercation continues — but one of the officers then shoves him into the corner of the slab, smashing his head on the concrete and cinder block wall. One officer puts his hands on Desjardins face as if to poke him in the eye or smother him — and though it looks like the beating will begin again, officers cuff his wrists and ankles.
Fully two minutes elapse from the time Moccio, Connor, and Grasso forced Desjardins into the cell until they finally stopped the brutal assault.
Chief Gillis has come under fire for his decision to terminate the officers’ employment — but he has no doubt the firings were justified.
“When I saw the video I was shocked by it,” he told MassLive. “I knew that it was very serious and as the investigation proceeded it became more and more clear to me how serious it really was.
“As chief of police it’s my job to make sure that our officers conduct themselves appropriately at all times and deal with the people we come into contact with appropriately at all times.”
Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni informed Gillis recently there would be no charges filed against any of the officers over the barbarous beating.
Moccio, Connor, and Grasso have all appealed their terminations.
