welcome i know a lot of you enjoyed watching part one
of the officer depositions in the sergeant versus bish case so this is part two if you
haven't seen part one i'll put the link in the description you have to watch that first
so this continues this is part two in the final bit of deposition for this particular officer
and part three we'll get into the other officers the use of force that you
you did engage in at this point the first 30 seconds of the video you didn't mention anything
about that in your report no melvin sergeant was handcuffed at this time yes all right let's
continue to watch the video where you can we're 32 seconds i'm going to play it a little longer
there's no fish please you're rwanda that's where he kicked when we played again yeah playing from
27 seconds and we'll play it to about 53 seconds to get him under control i know when someone comes
all right so you're saying you saw a kick yes
all right you're saying you saw a kick somewhere in the 30-second range yes so
now you're saying that melvin did try to kick you that appears so yes okay but he didn't kick you
i don't remember it right there let me continue playing it and then i'll ask you some questions
come on they got killed on 37th baby
from the 30 second range to the 53 second range would you agree with me that shows additional
uses of force by you against melvin surgeon from forcing him into the vehicle you told me yeah
from the from forcing him into the vehicle and that was it from holding his head down
and me getting out and using vocal commands all right did you use physical force on
melvin sergeant at this time to find physical force all right let's play let's play it again
for 30 seconds this time we won't stop it okay all right so watching that video it looks like
your feet are outside the police cruiser and the upper half of your body is leaning in inside the
police cruiser with melvin yes and it looks to me like your body movements are jerking in such
a way as is there's some sort of activity going on in the rear of that police piece
just me holding him back like this and as he's trying to jerk and force his way up and down
just residual movement miss chavez is taking this video yes right she's talking to you as this is
going on yes several times she says bish stop hitting him or something to that effect yes and
you deny that you were hitting him yes i never hit him in the back of the car there no when plaintiff
alleges that you struck him or you punched him in the rear of that police cruiser you deny that yes
you it's your testimony that you were just holding them down yes other than holding them down did you
do anything else physical with mr sergeant in the rear seat of the police cruiser no nothing
he didn't strike him no you didn't punch him no and this is the time period where as we can
see you were wearing those reinforced gloves padded gloves i wouldn't call them reinforced
padded gloves okay if we keep watching the video from 53 seconds on let's go 53 seconds to a minute
like that
listen
so from 53 seconds to a minute you approach the camera right yes and watching this video we can
see you walk up with your black gloves yes and we can see that those black gloves have
blood all over the knuckles yes of your right hand yes over the more of the ring looks like
the ring knuckle you're right-handed yes would it be fair to say that that's your your punching arm
if you were to punch somebody if i punch it goes with whichever one is would be more efficient all
right so we can't see exactly what's happening inside the rear seat of the police cruiser
but we can see that when you emerge and you come over to the camera you have blood all over your
knuckles correct but you don't know whether or not that's melvin sergeant's blood i'm not 100 sure
now all right so that's you talking to jerelina chavez yes so your explanation to her was quote
when i tell him to put his hands on his head and he goes to grab his back i'm going to protect me
he her or him yes what did you mean by he her i pointed around to there's there was a crowd
pointed at everybody you didn't mention at that time any allegation of melvin trying to
kick you in the chest from the rear seat of the cruiser right no isn't it true that the
the use of force incident that we see in the first minute of this video that's in response
to the earlier encounter where you say that melvin started to reach towards the small of
his back where his gun was no that used force was done and over with but that's what you were
talking about when you walked over to the camera i was explaining to her why he was under arrest
you weren't explaining to her why you were engaging in a use of force against melvin sergeant
the first use of force yes okay but she's filming she's filming you in the rear of the
police cruiser and she's she's crying [ __ ] no [ __ ] no stop hitting him honestly at that point
i didn't hear her my focus was on him and she can do whatever she wanted so you're saying you
weren't upset at all about the fact that he had a gun on him earlier no so at what point i mean
we saw on the video you closed the door yes and then you walk over and you talk to jolina chavez
at what point throughout this did you pepper spray melvin sergeant after i go back towards
the cruiser he starts kicking the door and that's where i go to the driver's side so the pepper
spraying hadn't even occurred yet correct after this conversation that you had with jolina chavez
how long after that was it that you pepper sprayed melvin
top my head i'm not sure it wasn't long maybe 10 seconds if that and then after you pepper sprayed
them you shut the door and left them in the rear seat yes did you call an ambulance for him no
why not uh he wasn't injured he didn't complain of any injuries and no need for them okay well
you knew that you would pepper spray them right yeah after we for protocol at the time if there's
no major injuries on scene we would return to the office and we decontaminate them here
well downstairs okay you could have done it at the scene though no why not he was under arrest and if
i didn't have any equipment or tools to decontaminate him all right well that would
require me to pull him out of the vehicle and put him and others back in harm's way that would make
no sense all right well let's talk about the the transport okay what happened uh after while i was
driving was on glenwood park road he continually he started cussing again uh making verbal threats
uh started kicking the door it almost he almost popped it open with one of the kicks and that's
whenever we stopped on glenwood park road right in front of some church i don't remember the church
name and what'd you do i went out got out my seat went around the front of the vehicle went to the
passenger rear callaway came up to the driver's side front and i secured his legs i was and
told callaway as he's getting in if he doesn't comply we'll we'll put a hovel restraint on him
and what'd you do callaway talked to him after while he was holding him down and
he started to comply there's no video footage of this now at this point no was the idea to
transport melvin somewhere where there was no video footage of what was happening no
isn't it true that during the transport melvin was complaining roll down the window i can't breathe
and he kept complaining to roll the window down but i never heard i can't breathe he's
rolling he's asking to roll the window down because he had pepper spraying his eyes yes
and i was driving with it and as well did you not have some sort of barrier in between you and he
you do but anytime you pepper spray with anybody you get it as well it splashes back and plus it
particles in the air it's not pleasant for anybody around did you roll your window down
yes but you didn't roll his down his was down enough to where he could receive
the brief relief from the air hitting his face it wasn't rolled down enough to where he could
stick his whole body out at some point during the transport was plaintiff told stop acting
like a little [ __ ] i never heard that you didn't say that no you didn't hear callaway say that no
and you didn't see deputy callaway strike melvin sergeant at all no throughout this whole time
period melvin was still handcuffed yes behind his back yes at no point throughout this time period
did melvin attempt to flee no after you arrived at your your destination when you're transporting him
at some point did you spray down melvin with a hose i did after we arrived here at the office
we went straight into the garage i had him kneel down and i ran a garden hose over the back of
his head allowing the water to drain from the top of his head towards the front of his eyes
so you basically washed off his entire head no the top half where the pepper spray would have made
contact with his face and eyes not only did you wipe off the get the pepper spray off of the hose
but you also washed blood off his face i didn't notice any blood you didn't notice any blood
melbourne sergeant wasn't provided any medical treatment at all other than being decontaminated
from the pepper spray now he didn't complain no he didn't ask for any medical treatment no
if he would have i would have called in fact he did ask for medical treatment and you told him
he can wait till he gets to the southern regional jail no okay so if he had any
injuries any lacerations any fractures he would deny that
i didn't see any no did you did you evaluate melvin for any injuries i looked him over
but i didn't see anything but it was more of a just glance over and i asked him if he was okay
he said i'm good [ __ ] i'm good [ __ ] off his exact works when you pepper sprayed melvin
do you believe that that was necessary yes you think you could have used any lesser amount of
force that was the lesser amount i had i had no other tools okay well he was already handcuffed in
the back of the police cruiser right yes all right so what were you trying to achieve uh compliance
for him to stop trying to kick the door and break the door open to do who knows what so that's why
you pepper spray yes because he was kicking the door attempting to kick the door open to
do whatever to cause more harm or to run away i don't know i don't know what his goals was
would you agree with me that striking an arrestee in any way for instance punching would be a use
of force yes okay and isn't it true that under your your department at the time your department
policies that any use of force that you engage in against an rsd must be documented yes must be
documented by you yes you would agree with me that your your report in this case your documentation
does not mention you striking melvin sargent in the rear of the police prison that didn't
strike him in the river cruise you did testify earlier that you did engage in a use of force
while melvin sergeant was in the rear of the police producer yes yeah but you didn't document
that either documented that i forced him into the rear of the cruiser okay you didn't document
any sort of physical violence there was no physical violence it was an escalation of i
forced him to sit and you have no idea what may have caused any injuries to melbourne sergeant no
but it wasn't you i don't know are you positive that the blood on your knuckles wasn't melvin's
um don't know you don't know acknowledging that you're saying that you didn't use you didn't
strike mr sergeant while he was in the rear of the police cruiser handcuffed would you agree with me
that it wasn't necessary for you to strike him there was no use for a strike in the back of the
cruiser so i didn't do it so you didn't strike melvin sergeant the rear of the police cruiser
because it wasn't necessary to do so correct he was pinned against the seat and couldn't move and
there was no reason so you would agree with me that
had a police officer in those circumstances struck him or punch him in the face that would have been
excessive very much yes you've had prior occasions of punching arrestees in the face before right
yes so following this incident you never did actually talk to the 911 the 911 caller right
and melvin sargent wasn't charged with anything that occurred prior to your arrival no
and you never interviewed jolina chavez no i did not
you never even asked melvin sergeant about what happened prior to your arrival did you
no so when melvin says or alleges that during his arrest processing that he
was asking for medical treatment you deny that yes i never heard him ask for anything
other than the occasional threat about how how long before you left for the transport did you
pepper spray well right after he was spray i believe it was pretty immediate okay so before the
transport you opened one of the doors sprayed them in the eyes and then and then shut the door yeah
and you did that to gain compliance you said yes because he was kicking the inside of the cruiser
kicking the door and attempting to break it open i mean he posed no safety threat to you did he
from kicking the door yes right just because somebody's handcuffed doesn't mean they're not
dangerous they can still pose a threat okay he couldn't get out that door
right if he would have kicked it open he could have so that's why
you pepper sprayed him the danger of him potentially kicking out of the door
kicking the door and causing who knows what did you pepper spray him to cause him pain
to gain compliance that's what it's meant for so you pepper sprayed him
to cause him pain not necessarily in your own self-defense defense from the public from the area
where i was at who had more of an opportunity to go through the other door i was in a safer
location and at that time how many police officers were present there was three certified three
police officers were present and one uncertified police officer yes she was still armed right
yes she was still pretty frank and melvin sargent on the other hand was handcuffed
right he was just you had already shut him in the back of the police cruiser
yes so that was part two and the final bit of deposition for this particular officer
basically what happens after this point after i stop questioning him is his lawyer then gets
to ask him questions and sort of try to clean up testimony a lot of times that's basically pretty
leading questions where the where the the lawyer is sort of picking every problem area and sort
of asking a leading question in part three we'll get into some of the other officers
and they're asked some of the same questions and you'll see whether or not they answer the
same now remember these are depositions this is not trial so there's a difference in questioning
for deposition which is more of a fact-finding sort of thing and you don't necessarily follow
the rules of evidence and there's a big difference for cross-examination at trial