Stockton Police Officer Joseph Silva told VICE News that the teenager had been walking in a bus lane and did not respond to an officer’s request to get out of the street.
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It is thought the footage was shot in Stockton, California.
The officer retrieves from the ground what appears to be a body camera knocked off during the scuffle.
And this time, the incident was captured on video recorded by a witness, so we get to judge for ourselves how it went down.
The Stockton Police Department is reviewing the incident, but preliminary investigation suggests the officer was probably acting within policy, Silva said.
In a Facebook post he said the officer tried to stop the teenager for jaywalking and ordered him to sit but the teen kept walking to his bus.
The teen was cited for trespassing, for blocking the bus lane, and for resisting arrest, Silva said.
In a video published to YouTube, one officer hits the boy with his baton twice before calling for backup.
A US teenager was stuck in the face with a baton and forced to the ground by five police officers after he was detained for jaywalking. Leave him alone, he didn’t do anything wrong!’
The footage shows the cops pushing the teen up against a brick wall and pinning his legs down with a baton. Eight more police arrive, lifting the teen and then slamming him onto the sidewalk and pinning him down, while several cops attempt to cut off Avendaño’s camera angle. They tackle him to the ground, handcuff him and take him away while he cries.
“He barely stepped out of the bus he was 2 feet away from the sidewalk when the cop stopped him for jaywalking,”Avendaño wrote”.
“The cop kept grabbing his arm & the kid took off the cop’s hand off his arm so the cop took out his baton & that’s when I started recording because everything happened too quick”. But, instead of using the word “resisting” to describe his defiant behavior let’s consider that maybe this kid was afraid, confused, and in physical pain from whatever the officer was doing with that baton. “And as you can see his body cam is on the floor”, he said.
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The 16-year-old was later released to his mother at the police station and given a citation.
