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A newly released police body cam video shows cops in California wrestle a pregnant woman to the ground and arrest her after she refuses to show them identification — something the ACLU says she had every right to do.
“Even if an officer is conducting an investigation, in California, unlike some other states, he can’t just require a person to provide ID for no reason,” Adrienna Wong, a staff attorney for the ACLU Foundation of Southern California, said in a press release.
The video, recorded on Jan. 26, shows an officer with the Barstow Police Department respond to Crestline Elementary School to investigate a complaint made by a school employee.
When the officer wearing the body cam arrives, the unidentified school employee can be heard complaining about the way a woman had been driving in the parking lot. ACLU SoCal identified the woman as Charlena Michelle Cooks.
The complainant told police Cooks not only sped through the parking lot, but also cut her off and then confronted her.
“She gets out of her car, punches my window … [and] starts screaming at me,” the woman can be heard telling police, adding that Cooks “scared the hell” out of her.
The officer told the female complainant he saw no evidence of a “crime that has been committed,” but told her he would speak with Cooks.
