CALLING COPS FOR HELP TURNED OUT TO BE BIG MISTAKE

A DeSoto mom sought help from the police. Instead, they brutalized her family, she and witnesses say

By Miles Moffeit and Elvia Limón

The Dallas Morning News
October 2, 2018

DeSOTO, Texas -- Sammie Anderson says she taught her four sons to trust DeSoto police and to stay out of trouble. They got to know officers based at their schools, and joined the Dallas suburb’s police ride-along program.

One evening in August, her two oldest boys, now in their 20s, got into a heated argument, with one picking up a tool and throwing it in his truck.

Anderson, fearing they might hurt each other, turned to the police.

“It was the worst decision I’ve ever made as a mom,’’ Anderson said.

The dispute was over by the time the DeSoto squad cars swept into their middle-class neighborhood.

But the cops jumped out with weapons drawn, the family and other witnesses told The Dallas Morning News. The police ordered everyone facedown on the ground to be handcuffed, and slammed Anderson to the pavement so hard she sprained her shoulder and ankle. And the officers repeatedly tased her 20-year-old son as he screamed, they said.

That account is now at the center of a brutality complaint that Anderson filed with the DeSoto Police Department against the six officers who responded Aug. 7.

The complaint contends that police falsely arrested two of Anderson’s sons on charges of interfering with officers and a third on suspicion of domestic violence.

The events that night raise questions about why officers stormed into a calm situation despite national police-training guidelines and new Texas mandates that call for cops to defuse tense situations instead of ramping them up.

DeSoto police Chief Joseph Costa said he believes his officers did nothing wrong. His department has declined to release footage recorded at the scene by officers’ dashboard and body cameras, citing ongoing investigations of the family and the incident. DeSoto police Chief Joseph Costa said he believes his officers did nothing wrong. His department has declined to release footage recorded at the scene by officers’ dashboard and body cameras, citing ongoing investigations of the family and the incident.

Dallas-area civil rights leaders want an outside investigation of the department.

“The treatment of this family is deeply troubling,’’ said the Rev. Peter Johnson, founder of the Institute for Non-Violence, who has spoken with the family and neighbors. “We’re talking brutality that goes beyond skin pigmentation. It involves a lack of training to de-escalate a crisis, as well as possible intimidation of a family.’’

Costa told The News that the department's internal affairs office is reviewing Anderson’s complaint. But after examining the camera footage himself, he said he believes his officers followed department policy and training protocols.

The chief acknowledged that dashboard camera footage shows a quiet scene when police pulled up. “There was no physical altercation, no arguing,” he said. “Yes, it was calm.”

Still, he said, his officers needed to “take control’’ because a 911 caller had told the dispatcher that someone at the scene had a sledgehammer. Family members also appeared to resist officers’ orders to be handcuffed, Costa said.

The chief’s message to the family and the public is to “comply now, complain later,’’ he said. “If you comply now, most of the time, we’ll get it resolved without anyone getting hurt.’’

The six officers cited in the complaint — Courie Bryant, Patrick Krekel, Kendall McGill, Ryan Money, Bryan Scott-Lee and Larry Walker — didn’t respond to interview requests.

'Someone better call police'

For more than a decade, Anderson, 49, a single mom and insurance agent, has made DeSoto home for her and her four sons — Matt Bateman, 23; Grant Bible, 21; Sam Bible, 18; and Ty Anderson, 15.

The African-American family lives in a middle-class, mixed-race neighborhood in the largely black suburb of 53,000 people. As the daughter of a Baptist preacher who worked construction, she taught the boys how to make home repairs, and they started their own Handyman for Hire business. Tools often clutter the driveway.

Last month, Anderson had returned home from work to find herself in the middle of an argument between Matt and Grant. It scared her, she said, because she couldn’t remember them ever clashing so heatedly.

As the quarrel spilled into the front yard, Sammie stayed between them while saying, “Someone better call the police.’’

Grant’s girlfriend, Victoria Floyd, called 911. The dispatcher kept asking her if anyone had a weapon. She said “sledgehammer,’’ according to a transcript of the call.

Anderson said that the tool with a long yellow handle wasn’t a sledgehammer, but that Matt picked it up out of frustration and threw it into his truck. Floyd told The News that, in retrospect, she isn’t sure what kind of tool it was. Nevertheless, “he didn’t use it to hurt anybody,’’ she said.

The sons finally cooled off. Grant got inside his car. Matt started walking toward the house, family members said.

Then the DeSoto police cars rolled in. The officers jumped out in shooting stances and drew guns, according to the family and other witnesses.

Anderson said she stood in front of Matt with her hands in the air, screaming, “Don’t shoot my sons!’’

A next-door neighbor, Corbin Washington, watched from a window.

Washington saw officers with guns drawn, she told The News in an email. A “red dot’’ was projected on Anderson’s forehead. Washington assumed it came from an officer’s gun sight. Costa told the newspaper that his officers didn't draw firearms but rather stun guns, which project red target dots.

The officers then ordered the sons and their mother to get down on the ground, Washington said.

Anderson tried to talk to one of the officers. But the officer “picked her up and slammed her onto the ground,’’ Washington said.

The sons then raised their heads up, Washington said, prompting officers to yell at them to “get back down.’’

From her vantage point, Washington said, she couldn’t see whether anyone was tased.

Excessive force

Anderson said the officers slammed her down on the hot pavement as she tried to speak out.

“Suddenly someone was on my back, and my face is being pushed down,’’ she said.

Several officers were surrounding Grant, who was lying next to her. Another son, Sam, had just returned home from work, pulling his car behind the officers’ vehicles.

Sam’s girlfriend, Jayla Armstead, who also was outside, said one officer tased Grant under his buttocks repeatedly while other officers forced his arms upward to handcuff them. Anderson said she saw Grant stunned near his head while he squirmed and screamed.

“All I know was I kept feeling electricity go through my body,’’ Grant told The News. “And I’m like, “Why am I being tased?'’’

Electronic-control weapon guidelines — developed by the Washington, D.C.-based Police Executive Research Forum — state that officers should not intentionally use electronic weapons near sensitive areas such as someone’s head, neck or genitalia.

Police also should only use such weapons against individuals showing active aggression or those resisting in a way that could hurt officers or others, the guidelines state.

Anderson and other witnesses said Grant and the other sons posed no threat to the officers.

Anderson, who has epilepsy, said she asked one officer to let her off the ground because she feared she was going to have a seizure. He refused.

When she told the same officer — one of four black officers at the scene — that police were violating her family’s rights, he suggested she had no basis for filing a complaint.

“We’re black — so what are you going to file?’’ Anderson described him as saying.

The officers took Grant and Sam to jail that night on charges of interfering with police.

Matt was taken into custody on a domestic violence charge, accused of harming his girlfriend. Matt has declined to comment on the case, on the advice of his lawyer. But his girlfriend signed an affidavit for the court saying, "He has not committed this crime and he has never assaulted me.''

A lawyer for the public defender’s office representing Grant and Sam told The News that she planned to subpoena the camera footage.

“From what I saw, I don’t know why the three men were arrested,’’ said Washington, the neighbor.

'Release all recordings'

Johnson and the American Civil Liberties Union are asking DeSoto officials to release all recordings.

“The allegations made about the officers’ conduct raise serious concerns for the public that cannot be fully addressed without the benefit of video footage taken at the scene,’’ Andre Segura, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, said in a written statement. “We strongly advise the department — in the interest of transparency and public confidence — to release any recordings.”

Though the police chief told The News more than two weeks ago that his department would release disciplinary histories of the six officers, it has yet to do so.

Costa said that officers Scott-Lee and Krekel had faced discipline for problems in the last year, but he provided no specifics.

The News found that a third officer who responded that night, Money, was reprimanded in mid-August for a separate incident. Money ignored a supervisor’s orders to stop chasing a suspect, who eventually crashed his car into other vehicles, according to a police memo.

National police training standards instruct officers to maintain calm in their interactions with the public.

If they arrive at a tense situation, their goal should be to resolve the conflict peacefully, the standards say. The DeSoto Police Department has no policy focusing on crisis de-escalation. But Costa said de-escalation is a part of the department’s use-of-force guidelines. Last year, a DeSoto officer was fired after failing to use de-escalation techniques, the chief told The News.

Over the last year, Texas lawmakers have passed legislation requiring more intensive law enforcement training on how to defuse tense situations with members of the public. The courses started last December, and more than 10,000 peace officers in the state have taken them, according to the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement.

As of early September, none of the six DeSoto officers had received that training, according to commission records.

“Seasoned officers will tell you that you can do more with your tongue and your brain to de-escalate a situation than with a weapon,'' said Gretchen Grigsby, director of government relations for the commission.

Costa recently asked Anderson to meet with him to show her dashboard camera footage from that evening. He didn’t show her any of the six officers’ body-cam recordings.

Anderson said the dash-cam footage contained gaps and appeared to have been edited. For example, it didn't show officers getting out of their cars, she said. It also did not provide a clear view of her son being tased.

When Anderson tried to record the footage using her phone, Costa ended the meeting, she said.

Costa told The News that the department did not alter the footage. He said he showed her the dashboard recording because he thought it offered a “good overview’’ of what happened. But he acknowledged that he had not viewed the body-cam videos before the meeting.

Aftermath

The fallout for Anderson and her sons has been devastating, they say.

The three sons, who have pleaded not guilty to the charges, face legal proceedings in coming weeks. Sam and Grant lost their jobs because they were still in jail the day after the incident and couldn’t show up for work. Anderson lost her job, too, after she missed work to seek hospital treatment. Medical records show she suffered shoulder and ankle sprains, along with bruises to a knee and wrist.

The family's bank accounts are nearly depleted by legal expenses and medical bills.

Perhaps worst of all, Sammie Anderson said, immediately after the Aug. 7 incident, the police department asked the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services to investigate whether she had abused Ty, her 15-year-old, Anderson said.

Family welfare officials interviewed friends and family and later notified Anderson that the inquiry found no evidence of abuse, she said. The News confirmed through the welfare agency that the case was closed Sept. 12.

Anderson’s ex-husband, Tyrone Anderson, told The News he was astonished that police would launch such an inquiry, calling her a great mom.

“We never saw the police as bad guys,’’ Sammie Anderson said. “When I saw them I hugged them. That’s what’s so hurtful. Everything I taught my sons they destroyed in one night.”

EDITOR’S NOTE: Even though they were black themselves, I wonder if the DeSoto cops would have handled this incident differently if the family had been white?