A police officer in Tallahassee, Florida has been placed on paid administrative leave and may face criminal charges after tasering a 62-year-old woman in the back Tuesday.
The incident was recorded on a cell phone by a nearby witness, and the video was released by Tallahassee Police.
The recording shows Viola Young approach an arrest in progress to inquire after one of the individuals being arrested. An officer tells her to stay back. A second officer, Terry Mahan, grabs her arm. Young pulls herself away from his grip and quickly walks away. Mahanr immediately draws his taser and fires the stun gun into Young's back. Young collapses face-first to the pavement and begins convulsing.
In a probable cause affidavit concerning the incident, posted in its entirety below, Mahan wrote:
Viola Young caused me to take my focus off of one of the arrestees and engage her. Young's actions obstructed Officers while in the course of completing their legal duties. The group of subjects on scene had calmed and the black male obeyed the lawful command and moved away. I addressed Viola Young directly and gave her more verbal commands to back away from our location. Viola Young responded by yelling, "I just want to know what is going on!"
I informed Young that now was not the time for that and to leave the immediate area. Viola Young verbally refused to leave. I informed Viola Young that she was under arrest and reached out and took her left arm. Young yanked away, turned and began to move away from me in an attempt to defeat her lawful arrest. I deployed my Taser and fired one cartridge striking Young in the back. Young was incapacitated and fell to the ground. Young was then taken into custody without any further resistance.
"We will conduct a thorough investigation into this incident," Tallahassee Police Chief Michael DeLeo said. "We want to be transparent with the community by sharing what we can at this point, including the video."
"Based on the video I have enough concerns to call for an internal investigation," said DeLeo. "The investigation will determine not only if the officer's actions were legal, but if those actions are consistent with the expectations that I have for officers and the way we treat members of our community with dignity and respect."
"I know what I've seen on the video," said Robert A. "Gus" Harper III, the attorney representing Young.
"My gut reaction is sort of like everyone else's -- it looks like an instrument that is used to deter violence is being used as a weapon," Harper said. "I think that goes against the spirit of the whole concept behind Tasers."
Tallahassee defense attorney Chuck Hobbs wrote a letter to State Attorney Willie Meggs asking her to "strongly consider" filing charges against Mahan.
"I am asking you to strongly consider filing charges directly if you and your top investigators conclude that this incident was unjustified and there is probable cause and reasonable likelihood of a successful prosecution under one or more Florida laws," he said.
Dale Landry, president of the Tallahassee branch of the NAACP, called the situation "extremely problematic," saying Young "hadn't done anything," and that he'd be "waiting to see the outcome of the situation."
Asked whether the fact that the incident involved a white officer and a black citizen in a black neighborhood was cause for concern, Landry replied: "In the wake of Ferguson, I'm sorry, you can't get around that. We've got to start looking at these things, how they're impacting our community."
Landry added that he hopes "action is taken against the officer, but more importantly, we need to drop the charges against this woman . . . and last but not least, we've got to change this culture."
Viola Young Affidavit