Lawyer: Video shows excessive force used during Pinellas County arrest
PINELLAS PARK (FOX 13) - Dash cam video from the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office appears to show deputies beating and choking a man.
The sheriff's office is now investigating the arrest of the 25-year-old in the footage.
The man's lawyer says the videotape clearly shows excessive force. Attorney Michele Rayner calls the video disturbing and says her client, Jimarez Reed did nothing to provoke or deserve being treated this way by the group of deputies.
The sheriff's office would only confirm there's an open and active internal affairs investigation into the incident.
The footage from 11:30 p.m. May 25 starts with a cruiser speeding to a Pinellas Park home.
A group of people were hanging out at a house and someone called the authorities on Jimarez Reed, telling officials he had a gun.
In the video, Reed ducks behind a car, seemingly panicked as deputies arrive.
"Get on the ground!" one of the deputies yells.
For the next five minutes, the audio is muted but the camera captured the struggle.
Reed lays flat and puts both hands out. A deputy gets on top of him and punches him seven times on his head.
“Don't kill me please. Let me go, let me go, bro," Reed yells.
The deputy then pulls Reed’s head up by his hair.
Other deputies join in as well as man Rayner says is a bystander. They pile on and continue hitting Reed.
"You see the video, you see the officer, the first thing he does he jumps on him and just starts wailing on him," Rayner describes.
When the audio comes back on, moaning can be heard. Rayner says it’s coming from Reed.
Witnesses tell FOX 13 Reed's face was cut and bleeding. He was taken to the hospital and needed stitches.
Rayner maintains her client didn't resist the deputies, saying he followed every command.
The 25-year-old was charged with battery of an officer and resisting with and without violence.
"It's just really interesting to me how, out of that situation, all of these charges have happened and he didn't do anything. He literally was standing there," Rayner said.
After Reed was cuffed, the footage shows the five deputies searching for the gun they thought he had.
"You physically saw a gun?” one deputy says.
“Yes, sir,” a deputy replies.
“He ain't got no gun," a deputy says.
"They have standard operating procedures to deal with people who may be armed and I don't think that was their standard operating procedure," Rayner said.
Rayner says she wants Reed's charges dropped and answers about why he was treated like this. She believes the incident was racially motivated.
"He was obviously compliant. They didn't have to do all those things that they did," she said.
Rayner says a gun was finally discovered locked in Reed's car.
According to online court records, Reed was arrested earlier this week in Hillsborough County for drug charges and resisting officers and also faces a battery on law enforcement charge in Pinellas County.