Public defender calls for probe after receiving video of police beating
As sirens sound in the background, two California lawmen can be seen striking a man on the ground with their batons, dozens of times.
Shown on a YouTube video provided to the Alameda County public defender’s office by someone who had a security camera in the area, the Thursday incident in San Francisco followed a traffic chase that ended there with the suspect sprinting down an alley on foot, the Los Angeles Times (sub. req.) reports.
The office put the video on YouTube, and public defender Brendon Woods is now calling upon multiple agencies to investigate what he alleges is an excessive use of force akin to the Rodney King beating by Los Angeles police that was captured on video by a observer in 1991.
“Those deputies viciously attacked a man who appeared to be surrendering. They beat him with their batons even though he was not resisting. This is clearly excessive force,” Woods said in a written statement provided to the newspaper.
Woods is calling for a federal civil rights investigation as well as investigations by the San Francisco district attorney’s office and state attorney general’s office into criminal charges against the officers, who he says should also be immediately suspended, the Los Angeles Times reports. Woods also wants the officers’ names released to his office, all body and car camera footage of the incident released, and an external investigation into the use-of-force policies of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office.
An investigation by the sheriff’s office is ongoing, and the deputies involved have been placed on administrative leave. However, no substantive comment is included in the Times article.
