Two Fired New Mexico Cops Could Face Charges In Jail Cell Beating Of Handcuffed Man

Two for­mer cops in New Mexico could soon be the ones behind bars after video of the December 2014 beat­ing of a hand­cuffed arrestee was released and cap­tured the bru­tal, unwar­rant­ed assault. The local dis­trict attor­ney and the state Attorney General plan to present their case against Las Cruces police Richard Garcia and Danny Salcido to a grand jury in June. Both offi­cers, on admin­is­tra­tive duty since March, were fired ear­li­er this month after the depart­ment fin­ished an inter­nal inves­ti­ga­tion into the Dec. 23, 2014 beat­ing of 47-year-old Ross Flynn. Flynn is suing the depart­ment for $12.5 mil­lion. “The alle­ga­tions against both offi­cers were reviewed and it was found that these offi­cers vio­lat­ed inter­nal poli­cies and pro­ce­dures which war­rant­ed their dis­charge from employ­ment with the Las Cruces Police Department,” LCPD Chief Jaime Montoya said in a May 19 state­ment announc­ing the termination.

Flynn was being arrest­ed two days before Christmas on charges stem­ming from a dis­pute with his neigh­bor when, he says, he asked offi­cers to adjust his hand­cuffs, which were dig­ging into his wrists. That’s when he light­ly kicked a cell door, get­ting the atten­tion of the two offi­cers, who walked in and imme­di­ate­ly start­ed attack­ing Flynn, who was cuffed to waist chains. The near­ly two minute clip shows the offi­cers slam him against the wall, while one grabs him by the head, as they throw him onto a met­al bench and one begins to apply knee strikes to the cuffed man’s body. They fling him around and face first into the wall before toss­ing him on the cell floor, video shows. The offi­cers then drag him over to the bench and prop him against the wall and again pick him up and move him to a sec­ond por­tion of the bench before leaving.

Flynn was lat­er hos­pi­tal­ized with a frac­tured skull, bleed­ing on the brain, a cracked cheek­bone and cracked rib, accord­ing to KVIA-TV.

The offi­cers in their reports on the inci­dent claimed Flynn was strug­gling and resist­ing offi­cers dur­ing the confrontation.

“We then start­ed strug­gling with Mr. Flynn in try­ing to force him to have a seat but he then began to resist and start­ed mov­ing and push­ing us around,” Salcido wrote in his report, obtained by the ABC affil­i­ate. “We con­tin­ued to make every effort pos­si­ble to try to get Mr. Flynn to have a seat but then he con­tin­ued to move us around and push us around and con­tin­ued to move his hands as in a way attempt­ing to grab ahold of us or our equipment.”

But Flynn’s attor­ney says the secu­ri­ty cam­era tells a dif­fer­ent story.

“You can see from the video that Mr. Flynn was help­less, defense­less, he had hand­cuffs on and he’s being thrown around that cell like a rag­doll,” attor­ney Jeff Lahann told KVIA. Flynn was booked on charges of aggra­vat­ed assault with a dead­ly weapon, assault on a police offi­cer and resist­ing or obstruct­ing a police offi­cer. It’s unclear what the out­come of the case was, but Flynn said he’s been in fear of police ever since his bru­tal encounter with the two cops. “The whole thing has been real­ly painful,” Flynn told KVIA. “I used to have a lot of respect for local police no mat­ter where I was. In this case I feel I was ambushed. All my rights were vio­lat­ed. I was beat­en while in restraints. The gen­er­al atti­tude in the com­mu­ni­ty are that the LCPD are a lit­tle bit vicious. I’d like to see more training”.

Two fired New Mexico cops could face charges in jail cell beat­ing of hand­cuffed man (VIDEO)