It’s hard to imagine a situation where perfectly professional police officers responding to a reported car accident end up tasing one Black man and arresting another. That situation looks even more suspect when witnesses say the tased man was trying to flag the cops down to alert them to the accident, and the man arrested was trying to explain to the cops that the man they tased was “not in his right mind.” Well, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is investigating the very incident described, which took place Monday in Lennox, Calif.
Part of the altercation between sheriff’s deputies and the two unidentified men was recorded by the person involved in the car accident and posted to Twitter.
“Got into a bad car accident today and this man in the video tried to flag the police down to help us instead they hopped out and tased bro no cap,” the witness captioned his video.
Fox 11 reports that the deputies responding to the call reported that the man they tased “ran onto the roadway, blocking the path of the deputies’ vehicle.” The officers said that they exited the vehicle to speak with the man and that he refused to follow their orders.
“Deputies exited their patrol vehicle and contacted the individual,” the department said in a statement, according to BuzzFeed. “Despite their de-escalation efforts, the individual became hostile and a use of force occurred.”
In the video, a man is seen surrounded by officers and then falling to the ground after being tased. Shortly after he falls to the ground, another man can be heard shouting, “Hey, he’s not in his right mind! He’s not in his right fucking mind!” Seconds later, that man was tackled to the ground and struggling with officers after one deputy tried to pull him back and the man appeared to push the officer’s arm away shouting, “Get off me!”
Sheriff’s officials said the second man “ignored requests for him to back up” and “struggled with the deputies and was taken into custody,” BuzzFeed reports. Officials also reported that the two men were related to each other.
Throughout the video, witnesses can be heard gasping in shock and shouting at the police. According to Fox 11, the witness who recorded the video said officers acted “aggressively” from the moment they got out of their car to confront the man who was reportedly trying to flag them down for help.
BuzzFeed reports that both men were taken to a nearby hospital after the incident. The tased man was still recovering in the hospital Tuesday while the second man was released and charged with battery on a peace officer and obstruction. The incident is still being investigated.