LA police officer faces assault charges
A white police officer videotaped punching a black teenager during an arrest in Los Angeles has been charged with assault.
Inglewood officer Jeremy Morse was today due to surrender to face a charge of assault under colour of authority, said his lawyer, John Barnett.
An amateur cameraman taped Morse slamming 16-year-old Donovan Jackson on to the boot of a police car and then punching him in the head, on July 7.
Morse has been placed on paid leave pending the outcome of investigations.
‘‘My client believes that an impartial jury will find that the use of force was necessary and he will be acquitted,’’ Barnett said.
The incident has sparked protests by civil rights activists and prompted comparisons to the 1992 Rodney King beating, which led to deadly race riots when the white Los Angeles police officers who beat him were acquitted of most charges.
The videotape was made by bystander Mitchell Crooks. The tape shows Morse lifting a handcuffed Jackson to his feet and slamming the teenager’s face into a car. Morse, who has a streak of blood next to his ear, then strikes Jackson on the face with his fist.
Crooks was staying in a motel across the street from a petrol station where Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies had stopped Jackson and his father, Coby Chavis, because the car they were in had expired vehicle tags.
Inglewood officers had arrived to aid the deputies as Chavis was being questioned in the city on the edge of Los Angeles.
Morse said in a police report that Jackson was arrested after he struggled with officers, scratched Morse above his ear and grabbed the officer’s testicles after being handcuffed. Morse was in ‘‘extreme pain’’ and punched Jackson to make him let go, according to the report.
Barnett said Morse will turn himself in Thursday morning at the downtown Criminal Courts Building.
Civil rights activists have called for sweeping changes within the Inglewood Police Department, tougher legislation addressing police misconduct and harsher penalties for officers convicted of abuse.
Jackson has sued the city of Inglewood, four of its officers, Los Angeles County and three sheriff’s deputies. His federal lawsuit seeks unspecified damages.
Crooks was arrested last week on an unrelated warrant after prosecutors sought his testimony before a grand jury investigating the Inglewood arrest.
Prosecutors refused to say if Crooks testified before he was flown to northern California to serve a seven-month sentence for driving under the influence, hit and run, and petty theft.
