They do this because they can
by digby
I suppose if you think that the misdemeanor charge being drunk and mouthing off are crimes that deserve humiliation and abuse at the hands of the police then you'll think this sort of thing is a-ok:
On March 30, Indiana State Police troopers were called after the New Albany woman got into a domestic fight with her estranged husband.
The officers brought the mother of four to the jail on charges of disorderly conduct and resisting an officer.
Tabitha Storms Gentry was pepper-sprayed after she shouted and begged for clothes, her lawyer said.
Tabitha Storms Gentry was pepper-sprayed after she shouted and begged for clothes, her lawyer said.
Inside the jail, Gentry was questioned by four officers. Video showed she was compliant but upset, her lawyer said.
Suddenly, the officers grabbed her, restrained her and forced her out of the room, into a padded cell.
The video doesn't have audio, but Landenwich said her client must have said something that made the officers upset.
Then, the officers removed all of her clothing, leaving her completely naked. Both male and female officers removed her pants, shirt and undergarments.
Gentry was given a smock to gover up with, but her lawyer said it was more like a mat than an article of clothing.
Landenwich said the officers did not perform a cavity search — a common reason an arrestee might be stripped of clothing.
"This was not a strip search," Landenwich told the newspaper. "I think it was outright abuse."
The video showed Gentry banging on the cell door. She was apparently yelling, asking officers for something to wear.
Gentry was forced to walk through open areas of the jail while naked, her lawyer claimed.
Landenwich said police threatened to pepper-spray Gentry if she didn't quiet down.
When she kept shouting, a hand reached into the cell from a slot and sprayed the room, video showed.
Almost 50 minutes later, officers let Gentry out of the cell so she could wash the spray off her body and out of her eyes.
But her smock slipped off when officers handcuffed her, so she walked through the common area of the jail totally exposed, her lawyer said.
The video showed returning to the cell a few minutes later, still naked.
"They leave her in that room — still with no clothes, with a mat that is now soaking wet from the water — for five more hours before they finally give her a jumpsuit and let her make a phone call," her lawyer said.
Officers said Gentry was drunk and violent throughout the arrest.
According to a report, Gentry was warned that "since she had resisted, threatened and attempted to kick an officer, she was being placed in a smock and the females (officers) were going to remove her clothes."
In another report, police said they pepper-sprayed Gentry to subdue her for "the safety of this facility" because her shouting "agitated other inmates."
Because stripping a suspect naked for "threatening to kick an officer" and for "the safety" of the facility is perfectly fine.
I wonder where they got that idea anyway?
.
