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| Witness gives account of police Taser incident |
The scene of the incident, 307 Rives Road, Martinsville. |
Sunday, January 11, 2009
By DEBBIE HALL - Bulletin Staff Writer
After Justin Gregory saw a Taser used on his friend, he thought the incident would be good for a laugh.
“I thought Derrick was getting Tased and we’d laugh about it tomorrow,” Gregory said.
He never expected Derrick Jones to die.
But Jones did die, after becoming unresponsive when the Taser was deployed by a Martinsville police officer seeking to subdue the 17-year-old.
Gregory, 15, and Jones had been friends for about three years, Gregory said. They were together Thursday night at Jones’ home at 307 Rives Road in Martinsville when police were summoned by passersby about some disturbance outside in the road. While the police have not officially identified the teen, Gregory and neighbors have said the victim was Jones.
Jones and Gregory, along with three more teens — two females and a male — spent most of the afternoon together, hanging out at Jones’ new home, according to Gregory.
The five teens “had been wrestling all day in the house,” Gregory said.
At one point, Gregory said the two females locked Gregory and another male out of the house, but they forced their way back inside, Gregory said.
“The door did get kicked in, but it was all in good fun,” he said.
It also is likely there was blood on the wall, he said.
“I got scratches on my neck” from the tussling, but that also was in “fun,” Gregory said, adding that alcohol had been consumed by some people there since about 5 p.m. Thursday.
Jones had became angry that “a friend left,” Gregory said, but he was unclear why Jones was as angry as he was. Had he not been drinking, Gregory said, whatever it was that angered Jones likely would not have bothered him.
As it was, Jones “was out in the middle of the road acting stupid,” Gregory said. “He was laying down in the road and wouldn’t get out of the road.”
As friends called to him to get out of the road, Gregory said he kept trying to get Jones to move. Later, Gregory said he learned police had received reports that a fight was occurring in the road.
That was not the case, Gregory said.
“I didn’t want him (Jones) to get hit by a car,” Gregory said, and he refused to leave Jones in the road by himself.
Finally, Gregory said he was able to maneuver Jones into the duplex at 307 Rives Road.
Minutes after getting Jones back into the apartment, Gregory said he had started up the stairs of the duplex when he saw a police cruiser arrive.
He went back down to the foot of the stairs and yelled to alert Jones, who was in the kitchen, that the police were there, Gregory said. Then, Gregory said he turned around and ran back up the stairs.
While he was standing at the top of the stairs, Gregory said he saw the policeman “standing in the door, leaning halfway into the living room” with his Taser drawn.
Gregory said the officer told him to come back downstairs and he complied.
Arriving on the first floor, Gregory said both he and the officer heard noises coming from the kitchen, which is just off the living room.
Jones “was mad. He was hitting the refrigerator,” Gregory said, and the officer ordered Jones into the living room.
Gregory said he kept telling the officer “not to Tase Derrick ... he’s just drunk,” Gregory said.
Jones then walked around the corner from the kitchen into the living room. “When he was half-way into the living room” the Taser was deployed, Gregory said. “They’re trying to say he (Jones) advanced toward the officer quickly,” Gregory said, but that is not how he recalled the incident.
Gregory said he has seen a Taser used many times on the “Cops” TV show, and usually those who have it used on them are “screaming and yelling,” he said.
Jones did neither.
“He just melted,” Gregory’s mother, Jennifer Crigger, said she was told by her son. Gregory told her that when the Taser was deployed, Jones “fell to the ground. It was the last time they saw him move. He (Jones) didn’t say anything,” Crigger said.
Then, “the cop came over and put his knee on Derrick’s back and cuffed him,” Gregory said.
At that point, Gregory said he became angry, and another officer arriving at the scene handcuffed him and put him into a police cruiser. E.W. Dillard was the second officer to respond, according to a city release.
In hindsight, and given the calls police had received, Gregory said, “I’m not saying the officer did anything wrong.”
The front door of the apartment had been damaged and blood was visible on the wall, Gregory said.
“From the officer’s perspective” the situation likely appeared much different than it was, Gregory said, but he said he believes “too much force” was used under the circumstances and considering what he estimated as Jones’ 130 pound, 5-foot, 7-inch frame.
Because a Taser is an alternate, non-lethal tool employed by some law enforcement officers, Crigger said “I know in my heart” Jones’ death was not intentional, but she also continues to have mixed feelings about it.
“When I think about this as a mother, I get angry,” Crigger said. When she thinks about it from the police officer’s perspective, “I feel sorry for him and my heart goes out to Derrick’s family. I can’t imagine how they feel,” Crigger said.
Jones, who had lived in the Villa Heights area, had attended Bassett High School before his recent move to Martinsville, Gregory said, but he added that Jones planned to withdraw from that school and enroll in a GED program. He just hadn’t gotten around to doing it yet, Gregory said.
He hopes Jones’ death will prompt police to reconsider the use of Tasers.
“This is not the first time” someone has died after a Taser was used, Gregory said he had learned on the Internet since Thursday’s incident. “If it can kill somebody, if it affects some people different” then Gregory said the use of Tasers should be banned.
Local authorities have turned the investigation over to the state police and it could take up to two weeks to complete, according to Martinsville Police Chief Mike Rogers. |
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