Bodycam of Jasper incident of a viral traffic stop where a man was hit and dragged out of a vehicle
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2:42 - Body cam 1
15:18 - Body cam 2
23:23 - Body cam 3
35:10 - Body cam 4
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Jasper Police Chief Billy Mason held a news conference Thursday where he played the officer body camera videos of a viral traffic stop where a man was hit and dragged out of a vehicle.
Thursday, we learned that the man is now facing charges.
Chief Mason says the driver ran a stop sign, and that an officer spotted what he thought was a long gun in the back seat.
Chief Mason says the officer, Justin Graham, spotted that gun in the back seat, and that was why the officer asked the man to step out of the car.
It was later revealed that officer Graham realized the object in question was a BB gun.
The incident happened the night of August 5th.
The body camera video shows an officer making a traffic stop, after he says the driver, a woman, "almost T-boned" him when running through a stop sign.
A passenger in the vehicle was asked to show ID.
Chief Mason says he gave 4 false names before he was identified as Samuel "Sal" Hrynecwicz.
He was then asked to step out of the vehicle.
Sal admitted he had been drinking, and the video shows him struggling to follow the officer's commands.
"Either you can step out, or I'm going to get you out," Officer Graham says.
'Please don't do that," Sal responds.
'Then step out for me, sir," Graham says.
'I'm trying real hard," Sal says.
Sal repeatedly asked the officer what he had done wrong.
Officer Graham repeatedly asked him to step out of the vehicle, and the officer hits him in the face at one point.
Officer Graham says in an arrest report that he was "struck" by the man, "exposed to pepper spray," and has to get medical treatment following the altercation.
"When he decided to lie about who he was and not get out of the vehicle, my officer gave him the utmost respect, and he just didn't get it in return," says Chief Mason.
Body camera video shows other officers stepping in.
Eventually, the officer uses his Taser on the man, who is dragged out of the vehicle.
Video shows the man being dragged to the ground and handcuffed.
When officer's start searching the vehicle, that's when officer Graham realizes that the weapon is a BB gun.
"There was an AR style rifle across that back seat, yes sir. After I checked it, luckily it was a BB gun, at the time, I had no idea what it was, That was why I was asking you to get out of that car, You kept refusing me, not telling me who you were, I knew you were intoxicated. Now I thought you were intoxicated with what I thought was a live firearm, which is a serious threat to me," officer Graham says in the video.
Mark Raines, the attorney for the city of Jasper, says it is a part of police procedure for an officer to use his palm to hit someone in the neck, stunning them into compliance.
It's a technique called a brachial stun procedure.
"The obvious question is about the strike from office Graham to the defendant. That's a cherry-picked part of this video that whoever put it out on social media chose to display, but that is a procedure that is taught by the Tennessee law," says Raines.
The attorney says that was what officer Graham was doing, but when Sal moved, he was hit in the face instead.
"Instead of making contact with the neck, as you know, is taught in the procedure, he ended up making contact with the side of the defendant's head. But that, quite frankly reaching across the defendant like that in the dark, you know, it's easy to see why," says Raines.
Police says Sal is charged with 2 counts of assault on a police officer and resisting arrest.
He was taken to the Marion County jail but has since bonded out.
The charges against the driver are still pending.