Couple Claims New Orleans Police Beat Suspect
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Posted By: Siebra Muhammad on March 06, 2009 The young couple huddled Friday night behind the security bars of their apartment window, their attention fixed on the screams of a desperate young man in a desolate neighborhood. Garth Kiser and Sarah Handyside said they saw the man knelt on the ground in the middle of the street, hands behind his back, asking for mercy. The couple claims the men hitting the subject were New Orleans Police Department officers. As the incident unfurled at about 10 p.m. Friday, the young couple, both recent transplants to New Orleans, grabbed a handheld digital camera and pointed it down from their apartment toward the corner of South Roman and Second streets. The resulting grainy video depicts little other than silhouettes of men in front of police vehicle lights. At one point, a person picks a seemingly docile man up from the ground. The accompanying audio is more suggestive: Slaps and screams are audible, along with the voice of a young man wailing, "Don't hit me please. Please don't hit me no more. Please. Please don't hit me." Police officials did not respond Tuesday to a request for comment. The New Orleans Times-Picayune Newspaper showed the video Tuesday afternoon to NOPD spokesman Bob Young, who said he would consult Superintendent Warren Riley and issue a statement. Neither Young or Riley did so by Tuesday night. According to public records, the man arrested at that intersection at that time is Leroy Allen, 26, a New Orleans resident who complained to jail employees that he had been beaten. The NOPD's report says Allen ran when police approached him, then pointed a gun and tried unsuccessfully to fire at officers during the chase. He was arrested and booked early Saturday with attempted first-degree murder, being a felon in possession of a firearm, illegal carrying of a weapon and resisting arrest. Later that day, a magistrate judge ordered Allen, who has a prior conviction for cocaine possession, held on $273,500 bond. When he was booked into jail, Allen told the sheriff's deputy working the receiving area he was kicked and hit in the mouth with a closed fist by the arresting officer, according to the remarks noted at the bottom of the arrest register filed in magistrate court. The NOPD's initial report -- filed at the time of the arrest and signed by police supervisors -- notes that two officers saw Allen run when he spotted them. The officers followed him, the report states, and they saw him remove a handgun from his waistband and run down an alley in the 3200 block of First Street. Officer John Barbetti stopped his marked police car at the mouth of the alley and Allen pointed his gun at him and "attempted to fire, " the report states. When the gun didn't go off, it continues, "he continued to run." Police apprehended Allen nearby. "A search incidental to arrest revealed one 9 mm bullet in his right rear pants pocket, " the report says. The report does not say if officers recovered the weapon. NOPD spokesman Bob Young did say Tuesday evening that a 9 mm gun was recovered, but was unable to elaborate or provide further details. Also, the police gist sheet does not note to what extent Allen resisted officers. The couple who shot the video said they don't know what preceded the man's apprehension, but they say they saw police hit the man at least 20 times. They believe he was in handcuffs during the beating. Six police vehicles eventually arrived, they said. And at one point, the couple claims, officers positioned the man in the street and a police vehicle sped up aside the man, its door swinging open and slamming into the man's body. "He kept yelling, please don't hit me anymore, " said Handyside, who is 26. "But they kept hitting him in the back of the head. They beat the hell out of that guy. You could hear the hits." The alleged beating lasted five minutes and the man was placed in the back of a police car, the couple said. The officers gathered around and chatted. Kiser said an officer yelled into the car minutes later: "You want another five minutes?" "Then they stood in a circle and had a casual conversation, like they were at a bar, like they were in high school, " Kiser said. "We were surprised at the language they were using." Kiser put the video on his computer and wrote about the incident on his Weblog. Kiser said he had not filed a formal complaint with police because he thought it ineffective to complain about the police to the police. The couple said they don't know the officers, nor the suspect, but felt the beating they witnessed was way out of bounds. "They were unprofessional, swearing every other word, taunting the guy, " Kiser said, adding that some officers mocked the man's screams. Handyside called the incident unnecessary, a "blatant misuse of force." Their neighborhood -- a swath of Central City on the lake side of South Claiborne Avenue, between Washington Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard -- is one of abandoned cars, trash-strewn streets and unoccupied homes. The confluence of blight, poverty and crime make it one of the most desolate sections of the city. Word of Allen's interaction with the police spread quickly among neighborhood men, some of them familiar with the city's criminal justice system. Associates of his hanging around at the corner of First and South Prieur streets said that "Leroy got his teeth knocked out" for running from the police. Allen's mother said she couldn't fathom why Allen would try and shoot a police officer. Allen was on probation for a drug violation, "and he done some dirt, " but he didn't carry a gun, said his mother, Gwendolyn Allen. "If he would have pointed a gun, they would have killed him, " Gwendolyn Allen said. "Simple as that." "They can charge him with drugs, " she said, noting his criminal history. "That I understand. But they charged my child with attempted first-degree murder. C'mon." She said Allen recently moved in with her, following a spat with his children's mother. She said he was working full-time for a temporary placement agency. Gwendolyn Allen said there is no chance she'll be able to raise the portion of her son's bond required to release him from jail. His next court date is scheduled for April 29. If you enjoyed this article, Join HBCU CONNECT today for similar content and opportunities via email! |
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Siebra Muhammad
A Registration Clerk/Specialist, New Orleans Public Schools Other College... class of 2001 Member Since November 2008 |
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