It was just over a year ago that Roderick Reed was driving down the street in Kansas City when he spotted a pair of cops abusing a transgender woman on a sidewalk.
Reed pulled off to the side of the road and began recording with his phone, not saying a word as the Kansas City cops planted their knees on the victim, twisting her arms back as she yelled out in pain, bashing her face into the sidewalk.
“Please help me,” Breona Hill pleads as an elderly white man walks up to the cops, exchanging a few words that cannot be heard before they send him away.
One of the cops has Hill’s arms lifted high behind her back while the other cop has his foot planted on her legs as she continues to moan in pain. More than two minutes go by in the video before the officers notice Reed recording.
“You’re blocking traffic,” a cop tells him, even though there was hardly any traffic.
“I’m recording it,” Reed responds. “All of it.”
The cop accuses him of “interfering” even though Reed was maybe 30 feet from him, sitting in his car.
“I ain’t interfering, I’m recording,” Reed responds.
“Yeah, so am I,” the cop responds, referring to his body camera, a video that has yet to be released. “Move along!”
Reed continues to record despite them threatening to seize his phone as evidence. He ended up convicted for “failure to obey a lawful order” but he is appealing.
His video, meanwhile, led to the indictment last month of Kansas City police officers Matthew G. Brummett, 37, and Charles Prichard, 47, on a charge of fourth-degree assault which is a misdemeanor.
According to KCTV-5:
Police said they issued the citation because he was stopped in a lane of traffic, not because he was shooting the video. Though he pulled over 1-1/2 minutes after being ordered to do so.
“I became a villain from it. And now I’m being punished according to the law for doing the right thing,” Reed said.
Reed has since appealed for a jury trial in Jackson County Court, hoping a jury will see it his way.
“That they will see and understand the reason why I didn’t obey their orders: because a crime was being committed,” Reed said. “I would do it again and again and again if something was occurring in front of me. I don’t feel bad. Not at all.”
The police union is outraged, calling it a “politically motivated prosecution,” claiming the officers were trying to keep Hill from bashing her own face into the sidewalk, pointing out the fact that the department had already investigated itself and found no wrongdoing.
According to KCTV-5:
On Friday, a grand jury indicted the two officers with fourth-degree assault of Breona Hill, a misdemeanor.
The charging documents describe the officers, “slamming her face against the concrete sidewalk, kneeing her in the face, torso and ribs and forcefully bending her arms over her head while her hands were handcuffed.”
The officer told the grand jury he was actually trying to stop her from slamming her own head into the sidewalk.
The Fraternal Order of Police says a department investigation determined Hill, “purposefully struck her head against the concrete and that the officer’s subsequent actions of controlling her head prevented the arrestee from doing further harm to herself.”
Hill was arrested after she had called 911 on May 24, 1019 for help after getting into an argument with the owner of a beauty supply store. But she also began using profanity against the shop owner which prompted the owner to have cops remove her from the store, according to Fox 4.
Court documents say the two officers slammed her face against a concrete sidewalk, kneed her in the face, torso and ribs and forced her arms over her head while she was handcuffed.
Before Hill’s arrest outside Beauty Essence, Barber and Beauty Supply Store on Brush Creek Boulevard, the jury foreman’s statement says Hill was involved in some form of dispute with an unknown third party.
She called 911 for help and also asked the store owner to call 911. When doing so, she began using slurs and insulted the store owner, who asked dispatchers to have her removed from the store.
Officers decided to arrest Hill, but she resisted arrest, court documents say. That’s when she was taken to the ground and allegedly assaulted by the officers.
She was taken to KCPD’s East Patrol station and cited for trespassing, disorderly conduct, resisting arrest and possession of drug paraphernalia.
According to the jury’s affidavit, a witness, who took video of the incident, saw an officer strike the woman with a closed fist.
While Hill is on her stomach, the video allegedly shows Brummett and Prichard kneel on top of her torso, ribs and upper back.
Brummett allegedly slammed Hill’s face two times on the concrete and then dropped his knee and a portion of his body weight on her neck and shoulder. The officers then finished handcuffing her.
Court documents say Prichard can be heard on the video saying, “We tried to be easy,” and “You made it this way.” Hill can be heard asking for help and moaning or crying.
Much to his credit, Reed has no regrets about recording the attack on Hill, who unfortunately was shot to death in October 2019 in an unrelated incident. He is confident he will prevail in his appeal.
“That they will see and understand the reason why I didn’t obey their orders: because a crime was being committed,” Reed said. “I would do it again and again and again if something was occurring in front of me. I don’t feel bad. Not at all.”
The incident prompted a city council member to propose an ordinance that would prohibit cops from ordering people who are recording them away unless they are physically interfering.
Watch the news video below and the raw video of the beating above.
