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CNN Live Today

Case of Alleged Brutality Headed From City Hall to Courtroom

Aired July 10, 2002 - 10:01   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: A case of alleged brutality is headed from the noisy steps of City Hall to the higher stakes of a courtroom. The videotape that captured a police officer's rough handling of a teenage suspect will be Exhibit A, as the teen's attorneys plan to file a lawsuit today. Our Thelma Gutierrez has the story from Los Angeles.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

THELMA GUTIERREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): At City Hall in Inglewood, California, dozens of protesters stood together. They held signs and screamed for justice.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are outraged. We are mad and we are outraged at the behavior of this department.

GUTIERREZ: Their anger, the result of this, a videotape showing 16-year-old Donovan Chavis, a special education student in handcuffs, being slammed on a car and hit on the face by an Inglewood police officer, identified as Jeremy Morse, a three-year veteran of the force.

MAYOR ROOSEVELT DORN, INGLEWOOD, CALIFORNIA: I have had an opportunity to review the tape. I have studied it over and over. There isn't any question in my mind what occurred.

GUTIERREZ: Inglewood City Mayor Roosevelt Dorn told protesters the officer, now on paid administrative leave, committed a crime and should be fired, regardless of how the altercation began.

DORN: As far as I am concerned, there is nothing that could have occurred prior to the videotape being turned on that would justify the conduct that I observed. I will be urging, recommending, that this officer be suspended without pay.

GUTIERREZ: Four Inglewood police officers and two Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies were present when the beating occurred. The Inglewood Police Department has launched an internal affairs investigation into the incident, and so has the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, and now, the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights division has asked the FBI to begin its investigation as well.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's their responsibility to enforce those laws to insure that people's civil rights are not violated. GUTIERREZ: Donovan Chavis and his father Coby say they did nothing to provoke the officers; that they had stopped at a gas station to fuel up.

COBY CHAVIS: Also, at nighttime, he scared to go sleep by himself at night. He'll wake up like screaming. He's scared of police now. He's scared to go outside by himself.

GUTIERREZ: A security surveillance camera on the property may have caught the actions that led up to this controversial video. It is now being reviewed by sheriff's officials, who will only say that what is on the tape is germane to the investigation. Thelma Gutierrez CNN, Inglewood, California.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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