Use of Force Probed in Videotaped Arrest

Law enforcement authorities have launched an investigation into whether police used excessive force when arresting a 16-year-old boy at an Inglewood gasoline station. The incident was captured on videotape.

The footage, taped about 5 p.m. Saturday, shows the African American teenager being picked up by a white Inglewood officer and slammed onto the trunk of a police squad car.

Surrounded by about five Inglewood officers and Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies, the teen-ager then appeared to be punched in the head by the same officer.

“The guy was out of it. It’s pretty clear he’s totally subdued,” said Mitchell Crooks, an amateur photographer who videotaped the incident from a nearby hotel.

“He [the police officer] picked him up like a rag doll and then slammed him to the car ... then he clocked him.”

Filming the incident, Crooks said, made him feel like he was watching “the next Rodney King,” a reference to the 1991 videotaped police beating that was broadcast across the nation and sparked public outrage.

The teenager, whose identity was not released, was taken to a hospital and treated for injuries before being taken into police custody, authorities said.

Police booked the youth on suspicion of assaulting a police officer, and he was later released. The nature of the teenager’s injuries was unclear.

Both Inglewood police and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said they would investigate the incident.

“A thorough investigation into the use of force by sheriff’s deputies will be conducted, which is routine any time force is used by department personnel,” said Sgt. Rick Myers, a Sheriff’s Department spokesman.

The incident occurred Saturday when sheriff’s deputies pulled over a car whose driver was wanted for driving with a suspended license.

The driver was at a gas station on West Century Boulevard just inside Inglewood. Several Inglewood police then arrived at the scene, and an altercation ensued with the 16-year-old boy, who was a passenger in the vehicle.

Crooks said he was sitting in his hotel room across the street when he heard a woman screaming that police were beating a man.

Grabbing his video camera, Crooks said, he rushed to the hotel balcony and started filming. The footage appears to show the officer lifting the boy by the collar and pants and throwing him face first onto the trunk of a police car.

Pinned against the vehicle, the teenager turn his head toward the officer, who then appears to strike him in the head with a closed fist. The same officer appears to grasp him around the neck before other officers intervene. At that point the boy is escorted to a police car.

In the video, the teenager and the officer appeared to have suffered injuries. Blood appeared to be dripping down the boy’s face, and the officer appeared to have a wound above his left ear.

It is not clear what happened in the moments before the footage was taken.