Broward Sheriff Gregory Tony said Friday he would launch a “thorough investigation” into deputies who are shown on video pepper-spraying, tackling and punching teens near J.P. Taravella High.
“It may take some time but we will be transparent, and if folks need to be held accountable, it shall be done,” he said in a video statement released Friday afternoon.
The statement came after some Broward County leaders demanded that the Sheriff’s Office take disciplinary action against deputies.
The footage, which has been shared through social media, shows at least two deputies take a boy down, bang his forehead into the pavement and repeatedly punch him in the head Thursday afternoon. The incident took place in Tamarac outside a McDonald’s at 8375 N. Pine Island Road in Tamarac, about a half-mile from the high school in Coral Springs.
School Board member Rosalind Osgood took to Twitter on Friday morning to contact the Sheriff’s Office “to demand removal of these officers.”
Broward County Mayor Mark Bogen also said action was needed. “These are deputies who are hotheads, who don’t know how control their tempers,” Bogen said.” It was outrageous that a deputy would do this to an unarmed student who was not fighting back, who was giving no resistance.”
Bogen said the deputy who threw the student to the ground should be suspended at the very minimum and the deputy who punched the student and pushed his head into the ground should be removed.
The Sheriff’s Office is aware of the video, spokeswoman Veda Coleman-Wright, said Thursday evening. “They’re investigating the incident to determine exactly what happened, how it started, how it escalated and they’re looking at the outcome of it.”
The Sheriff’s Office hasn’t released the names of the deputies involved, but the lawyer for one of the teens identified the deputies as Sgt. Greg Lacerra and Deputy Christopher Krickovich. Records show Lacerra has been with the Sheriff’s Office for 17 years, while Krickovich has served the agency six years.
Video excerpts of the encounter have been posted on social media. It’s unclear whether the deputies wore body cameras, which may provide a fuller picture. The cellphone footage that’s come out so far has sparked a public outcry.
“This is unacceptable,” Osgood tweeted. “The young man clearly had his hand by his side when he was attacked by these officers.”
Two teens were arrested from Thursday’s encounter, with one of them appearing in court Friday.
One boy, 15, had been held on charges that included aggravated assault against a law enforcement officer and resisting arrest without violence. The boy’s attorney, Richard Della Fera, argued there was no evidence to support an aggravated assault charge, so the judge reduced the charge to simple assault. The boy, who has no criminal history, was released to his mom, Della Fera said.
“They were saying he should be held in secure detention, but even their allegations didn’t rise to the level of aggravated assault,” said Della Fera, who argued that the video demonstrates his client did not pose a threat to the deputies.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel isn’t naming the 15-year-old boy because he’s a minor facing misdemeanor offenses.
School Board member Lori Alhadeff, whose district includes Taravella, said she too was alarmed by the deputies’ actions.
“I’m disappointed, saddened and shocked by the most recent actions taken by BSO,” she said. “The aggressive and excessive force shown was unnecessary and excessive. Sensitivity training and culture awareness for police is key.”
The commotion erupted about 3 p.m. Thursday when deputies were called to the Tamarac McDonald’s, a popular after-school hangout. The initial call to 911 came at 2:55 p.m. reporting that several students had gathered in the restaurant’s parking lot, Coleman-Wright said.
A follow-up call at 3:08 p.m. reported that kids were fighting, she said.
“Some students were detained and questioned,” Coleman-Wright said.
The 10th-grader who recorded the video with his cellphone said the boy who was tackled face-down on the pavement was in handcuffs and “bleeding a lot” when he was taken away in an ambulance.
“It was just crazy,” the boy who shot the video, and whose mother did not want his name to be published, said. “It was very overboard. Punching him and slamming his head on the ground wasn’t necessary.”
Thursday was the last day of the school week before the Good Friday holiday, Coleman-Wright said.
Staff writers Larry Barszewski, Rafael Olmeda and Juan Ortega contributed to this report.
tealanez@sun-sentinel.com, 954-356-4542 or Twitter @talanez