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INVESTIGATIVE UNIT: New documents say EBR deputies filmed alleged assault of handcuffed inmate
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BATON ROUGE - New documents obtained by the WBRZ Investigative Unit show that three correctional deputies who were arrested for assaulting an inmate filmed the encounter inside the parish prison.
According to a search warrant, former East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's deputies Elijah Christopher, Julius Conner and Noah Jenkins filmed their alleged assault of a parish prison detainee.
The incident likely would not have been discovered if investigators hadn't already been looking into Christopher for a separate allegation.
When they searched through his phone, they found a video, which led to the malfeasance and assault charges for him and the two other deputies.
The video shows Christopher, Conner and Jenkins spraying a handcuffed detainee with pepper spray while in and out of his cell. The men are laughing and Christopher is jumping up and down with excitement as it happens. Christopher also hits the inmate in the face twice.
The inmate did not resist or attempt to fight back.
"There is no circumstance where people should be attacked and particularly when they are helpless," said Rev. Alexis Anderson, who runs East Baton Rouge Parish Prison Reform Coalition.
The warrants says the incident was never submitted in a report, which deputies are required to complete daily.
Once the video was discovered, all three men were arrested and fired from the sheriff's office.
"The fact that they were fired is the surprising part. Not the part that there's been ongoing violence, not the part that there's been ongoing malfeasance," said Anderson, who says in her experience, incidents like these are not uncommon at the jail.
"None of that is surprising."
The parish prison is technically a jail and functions as a pre-trial facility. Only a handful of inmates housed there have been convicted.
The jail is notoriously over-filled and understaffed.
"You run into people who think that they have to be tough and that they can't let anybody be disrespectful to them — whatever that means — and then that behavior takes on a life of its own."
Anderson is skeptical that the deputies will see the full extent of the law.
"We have watched, time and time and time again, some of the most horrendous things being done to citizens by law enforcement, and yet when it's all said and done there's very little accountability. The Ronald Greene case is a prime example."
Both Jenkins' and Conner's bonds were set at $15,000, while Christopher's was set at $46,000. He is facing three counts of assault and two counts of malfeasance in office.
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