According to the guilty plea, Benton instructed the
juvenile, who was locked in his cell, to be quiet. Benton then had the
juvenile’s cell door opened and ordered the juvenile to come out of his cell
with his mattress. The juvenile picked
up his mattress as instructed. As the juvenile turned to face the cell door,
holding the mattress in both arms, Benton pepper sprayed the juvenile in the
face from a distance of a few inches. Benton continued spraying the juvenile as
he tried to turn his head away from the spray. Benton then took the juvenile to
the ground. Benton covered up the assault when he falsified an incident report,
saying that the juvenile had attempted to lunge at him with his fists clenched,
when in fact the juvenile had posed no physical threat.
Benton is the third former officer to plead guilty to
charges stemming from assaults on juvenile detainees at the White River
Juvenile Detention Center. On April 26, 2017, former White River supervisors
Captain Peggy Kendrick, 44, and Lieutenant Dennis Fuller, 40, pleaded guilty to
conspiring to assault juvenile detainees. Kendrick also pleaded guilty to
assaulting a sixteen-year-old girl using pepper spray and for obstructing
justice. Kendrick and Fuller await sentencing. Two other former White River
Juvenile Detention Center officers, Will Ray, 26, and Thomas Farris, 48, are
scheduled to begin trial on Aug. 28, before Senior United States District Judge
Billy Roy Wilson in Little Rock on related charges of conspiring to assault and
assaulting juveniles.
“Federal law protects all individuals – including those who
are incarcerated – from the use of excessive force by those acting under color
of law,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General John Gore of the Civil Rights
Division. “We will vigorously
investigate and prosecute officers who break the public trust in this way.”
“When law enforcement officers violate the law and the
public trust, they will be prosecuted and held accountable,” said U.S. Attorney
for the Eastern District of Arkansas Cody Hiland. “There will be no exception.
This officer broke his oath to uphold the Constitution, injured a juvenile in
the process, and then tried to cover it up. That is a crime, and those who
commit crimes will be punished accordingly.”
Benton faces a statutory maximum sentence of 30 years in
prison.
This case is being investigated by the FBI’s Little Rock
Division. It is being prosecuted by
Assistant U.S. Attorney Julie Peters of the Eastern District of Arkansas and
Trial Attorney Samantha Trepel of the Civil Rights Division.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment