Affidavit: Texas trooper used force in arrest of Sandra Bland, who later died in cell

Sandra Bland, who was found dead in a jail cell July 13, had kicked a Texas trooper who used force to subdue then arrest her three days earlier, according to the officer’s affidavit released Tuesday.

The death of Bland, whose body was found in a Waller County jail cell here, is being investigated as a homicide, officials said Tuesday. A preliminary autopsy classified her death as a suicide, but her family and supporters have challenged the official finding and will have an expert perform a second autopsy.

The case has become the latest in a string of deadly encounters between African Americans and police. Numerous civil rights leaders have called for an independent investigation of the case by the U.S. Justice Department.

Family and their supporters have rejected the idea that Sandra Bland could have killed herself. They also condemn the initial arrest on July 10 as unwarranted.

A video taken by the camera on the dashboard of the police cruiser is scheduled to be released on Tuesday. Waller County Dist. Atty. Elton Mathis, who said he has seen the dash cam video, told reporters Tuesday that Bland was not “compliant” with the officer’s directions. “Sandra Bland was very combative. It was not a model traffic stop. It was not a model person that was stopped,” Mathis said.

The records released on Tuesday document the arrest in the trooper’s words.

According to an affidavit filed by Trooper Brian T. Encinia, the arresting officer, he was on a routine patrol in Waller County at 4:27 p.m. when he saw that a silver Hyundai Azera failed to signal during a lane change. That car was being driven by Bland, 28, of Naperville, Ill.

“I had Bland exit the vehicle to further conduct a safe traffic investigation,” the trooper writes. “Bland became combative and uncooperative. Numerous commands were given to Bland ordering her to exit the vehicle,” Encinia stated.

As Bland “was removed” from the car, the trooper wrote, she became more combative and was placed in handcuffs “for her own safety.”

“Bland began swinging her elbows at me and then kicked my right leg in the shin,” Encinia wrote. “‘I had a pain in my right leg and suffered small cuts on my right hand.”

“Force was used to subdue Bland to the ground to which Bland continued to fight back.”

Bland was then arrested for assault on public servant, a third-degree felony, and taken to the Waller County Jail, where she was held through the weekend in lieu of a $5,000 bond, according to the magistrate’s documents also released on Tuesday.

Bland was visiting the area 60 miles northwest of Houston.

Encinia, 30, started with the Texas Department of Public Safety in January 2014, according to department spokesman Tom Vinger. Following Bland’s death, he was placed on desk duty after officials found “violations of the department’s procedures regarding traffic stops” and the department’s “courtesy policy,” according to a statement.

Vinger said the trooper’s disciplinary record was only available through a public records request, which The Times filed and was awaiting a response Tuesday. Encinia could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

A second officer responded to Bland’s traffic stop from Prairie View police, but her dash camera video memory was full and no footage was available, Mathis said.

Also on Tuesday, Texas state Sen. Royce West (D-Dallas) was expected to hold a briefing about the Bland case at 2 p.m. CDT Tuesday after a closed-door meeting at nearby Prairie View A&M University.

West had demanded that investigators release the trooper’s dash camera video, writing a letter to Department of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw last week calling Bland’s death, “tragic” and “suspicious.”

In the letter, West said he had “unconfirmed information” that before the traffic stop, the trooper followed Bland, “for some distance.”

“This detainment, arrest and the events that transpired have raised a number of questions for numerous persons, none more than myself,” West wrote. “It comes months and weeks into what seems to be an unabated season of unfortunate police-citizen encounters.”

Bland’s death is the latest in a series of cases involving authorities and deadly confrontations with African Americans, including Eric Garner in New York City in July 2014, Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., in August, and Walter Scott in North Carolina and Freddie Gray in Baltimore, both in April.

Bland’s family and local activists have demanded an independent federal investigation, insisting that the 28-year-old woman from the Chicago area who was preparing to take a new job as a college outreach worker at Prairie View A&M, her alma mater, would not have ended her own life.

An initial autopsy report appeared to support sheriff’s officials’ account of what happened, but the family’s attorney has said they intend to have an expert perform a second autopsy.
Family attorney Cannon Lambert said relatives believe the woman known among her four sisters as “Sandy B” was killed.

Lambert said video footage from the jail released by Waller County officials offers no insight into Bland’s death, and the dash cam footage from the trooper’s car that he viewed “doesn’t give us any more understanding of what actually happened to her.”

Lambert said dash camera footage shows the Naperville, Ill., woman arguing and the trooper pulling out his Taser.

A department spokesman said last week that Bland was going to be issued a warning for a minor traffic violation, but was charged with assault on a public servant after she kicked the officer.

The footage shows the trooper approaching Bland’s vehicle and getting her license and registration before returning to the cruiser, Lambert said. The officer returns to the driver side of the car and asks Bland to put out her cigarette, and Bland refuses, he said.

The officer then asks Bland to get out of the car and opens her door, he said.

Bland protests and reaches for her cellphone, Lambert said.

“He steps back and pulls his Taser,” according to Lambert.

“She then complies with him by getting out of the car on her own,” he said. “He tells her to put down the cellphone.”

The trooper tells Bland she is going to jail, and Bland questions why, Lambert said.

The two then move behind Bland’s vehicle to the passenger side of the car, and are out of view for the rest of the footage, according to Bland.

Bland can be heard protesting her arrest, Lambert said.

“The frustrating part of it is it revealed that her being asked to get out of the car in the first place wasn’t really necessary,” Lambert said.

Lambert said the jail video and dash cam footage don’t “give us any more understanding of what actually happened to her.”

molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com

Twitter: @mollyhf

Hennessy-Fiske reported from Hempstead, Texas, and Muskal reported from Los Angeles