Source: Reddit screenshot / Reddit screenshot
A woman identified as the girlfriend of a Black man who was handcuffed and ruthlessly tased by an Alabama police officer as shown in video footage that’s gone viral is disputing the claim that the incident was the result of a traffic stop.
On Dec. 2, Officer Dana Elmore of the Pickens County Sheriff’s Office arrested 24-year-old Micah Washington in the Tuscaloosa suburb of Reform. This much is agreed upon.
But Elmore did not pull over Washington to conduct a traffic stop, Jalexis Rice said on social media.
In response to a Facebook post asking why “all these major networks are reporting that the incident taken place with Micah Washington was a traffic stop,” Rice said Washington had been in the process of changing his tire when he was confronted by Elmore.
That alleged context matters as a police-driven narrative instead emphasized how Washington was charged with obstructing governmental operations, resisting arrest, marijuana possession, drug trafficking and possessing a firearm as an ex-felon.
We haven’t even gotten to the part where Elmore employed what appeared to be excessive force when she tased a handcuffed Washington while he was complying with the officer’s commands.
While the two of them were exchanging words as she walked Washington, already in handcuffs, to the front of a police cruiser, Elmore can be heard saying “Oh yeah?” before pressing the taser to his back while he was face-down on the hood of her car. After tasing him, she taunted him by asking, “You want it again?”
“She tased him in the back and she was holding it. She was just holding it there until he started crying,” Rice said Monday, during a protest gathering of family and community members near Reform’s city hall.
“When I seen it, I couldn’t do nothing but cry,” Rice added. “I couldn’t do nothing but cry.”
The incident in Reform was the second high-profile police tasing in Alabama in five months.
Back in July, lawyers claim an unarmed Black man was tased “until he died.”
In that case, the police narrative informed media reports that claimed Jawan Dallas, 36, died while attempting to burglarize a motor home in the city of Mobile.
However, citing a witness, attorneys representing Dallas’ family say not only was he denied the medical attention he repeatedly requested after being tased, but he also wasn’t even remotely involved in the alleged burglary.
When Dallas’ family—just two weeks ago—was finally allowed to see the bodycam video footage from the incident, their lawyer called it “one of the worst videos of a police killing that I have ever witnessed” and compared it to the video of George Floyd’s police murder.
SEE ALSO:
Ex-Louisiana Cop Gets Light Sentence For Tasing, Beating And Pistol-Whipping ‘Nonviolent’ Black Man
62-Year-Old Black Man Dies In Custody After Telling Atlanta Officer Who Tased Him, ‘I Can’t Breathe’
