The strip search lasted just six minutes, but when it ended, Jarius Brown had a broken nose, fractured eye socket, and badly swollen face. Never-before-published footage now shows why: Two Louisiana sheriff's deputies pummeled the naked 25-year-old, flinging him around the DeSoto Parish Detention Center laundry room while landing dozens of punches. In the aftermath of the 2019 assault, one of the deputies resigned and the other was suspended. Meanwhile, internal records show the sheriff's office concluded "there was no way of defending" the deputies' actions—yet that's just what the Louisiana State Police did, an AP investigation has found.
After waiting months to analyze the video and more than a year to interview Brown, the agency cleared the deputies of wrongdoing. The state police ultimately supported the deputies' claims that Brown had been the "aggressor" in an altercation that took place after his arrest on charges of stealing a car. The case might have ended there had federal prosecutors not eventually gotten involved and come to the opposite conclusion: Brown had been the victim of excessive force. The graphic footage remained under wraps for six years but recently emerged in Brown's long-running lawsuit seeking damages.
"I don't know how any objective evaluator of this incident could determine this was anything but excessive," said Charles "Joe" Key, an ex-Baltimore police lieutenant who typically testifies in defense of police and reviewed the footage. "This was a great miscarriage of justice at the state level, and it shows the system has broken down and doesn't protect citizens," added Gary Evans, a former DeSoto Parish DA. A state police spokesperson declined to explain his agency's conclusion that there "was not sufficient evidence" the deputies in Brown's case committed a crime. He attributed delays in the investigation to the COVID pandemic.
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Javarrea Pouncy, one of the former deputies, pleaded guilty to using excessive force and was sentenced last year to serve about three years in federal prison. The other deputy, DeMarkes Grant, who pleaded guilty to obstructing justice, was released from prison in April after serving a 10-month sentence. Brown's father, Derek Washington, said the attack sent his son's already unstable mental capacity "into a more severe case of schizophrenia and anxiety." Today, Brown is fearful of crowds and closed-in spaces, he said, and "cannot function in society." Brown, now 32, has declined to comment. More here.
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