Arkansas deputy was body-slammed by suspect before bystander video begins showing violent arrest outside store, attorney says

By Steve Almasy and Melissa Alonso, CNN

Two Arkansas deputies — one of whom said he had been body-slammed — followed their training to get a suspect under control during a violent encounter outside a store in the town of Mulberry, an attorney for the law enforcement officers said Tuesday in a statement.

Part of the arrest Sunday was recorded on 34 seconds of bystander video that has led to state and federal investigations into the actions of the deputies from Crawford County and a third officer from the Mulberry Police Department. The recording shows at least two of them punching and kneeing the suspect — identified as Randal Worcester, 27, of Goose Creek, South Carolina — during an arrest.

Attorney Russell A. Wood, who represents deputies Zack King and Levi White, said Worcester matched the description of a man who threatened to cut off a woman’s face with a knife and that he was violent toward the officers.

Crawford County Sheriff Jimmy Damante released a video statement Thursday saying Worcester spit at and threatened a woman who worked at a gas station, telling her he was going to cut her with a knife.

“The amount of force authorized under the law is always relative to the offense the suspect commits,” according to Wood. White’s interactions with Worcester “were cordial up to the point” then the suspect allegedly “viciously attacked him,” Wood said. “Likewise, there was no use of force after the handcuffs were secured.”

CNN reached out Tuesday to Worcester’s attorneys for comment on Wood’s statement.

The bystander video, which was posted on social media, shows the law enforcement officers restraining an individual — identified by state police as Worcester — near a curb outside a business. One officer throws punches at the person’s face and slams his head to the ground, while another knees the individual in the side and back.

A woman who is not seen in the video says, “Don’t beat him! He needs his medicine!” One officer responds, “Back the f**k up!” while another officer orders her to get in her car.

“We do not know what would happen if that person would not have been videoing,” Carrie Jernigan, one of Worcester’s attorneys, said Monday. “The fight was escalating with those officers and you hear that woman on that video yelling, and whoever that is, I think she could’ve saved his life.”

Wood said there is a video recorded by the dashboard camera of the Mulberry officer’s patrol vehicle that shows the entire event. It has not been released to the public. None of the officers was wearing a body camera, officials have said.

Wood said he has requested the police video but had not received a response.

“These Deputies deserve the full truth to come out,” said Wood.

Attorney says deputies used ‘compliance strikes’

The deputies’ attorney said White was checking Worcester’s identity when “the suspect became irate and viciously attacked Deputy White by grabbing him by the legs, lifting him up and body-slamming him, head first, on the concrete parking lot.”

“White was incapacitated momentarily, but remembers getting repeatedly hit in the head and then seeing the suspect fighting with Corporal King and the Mulberry officer,” Wood says in the statement. “Deputy White reengaged and used all force necessary to get the violent suspect under control and detained.”

According to Wood, the use of “compliance strikes administered by the deputies were used exactly as trained.”

Worcester suffered multiple abrasions to his face, scrapes on his knees, scratches, a swollen right ear and had his eye gouged during the altercation with the law enforcement officers, attorney David Powell said Monday. Wood said in his statement the suspect did not need or ask for treatment and he told officers at the jail he had no injuries.

White was treated for a concussion and swelling and bruising over his right eye, Wood said.

Suspect released on bail

Worcester is charged with second-degree battery, resisting arrest, possessing an instrument of crime, criminal trespass, criminal mischief, terroristic threatening and first- and second-degree assault, according to Arkansas State Police.

Worcester allegedly threatened a gas station clerk in a neighboring town, Crawford County Sheriff Jimmy Damante told CNN affiliate KHBS.

Worcester was released on a $15,000 bond, Powell said. He had his bicycle with him as attorneys escorted him out of the detention center, and he gave no audible response to a reporter’s question.

The suspect told officers he had a weapon, but the sheriff believes Worcester handed it over before the fight ensued, he told reporters Monday. Damante also said the encounter was recorded by a camera in the Mulberry officer’s vehicle.

A Crawford County Sheriff’s Department Facebook post identified the Mulberry Police Officer as Thell Riddle.

The deputies are not rookies and have been in law enforcement “for some time,” while the Mulberry officer has been in policing for “many years” and previously worked for the sheriff’s department, Damante told reporters Monday. They are suspended with pay, he said.

The Mulberry police officer is on administrative leave pending the investigation’s outcome, his department said.

“The City of Mulberry and the Mulberry Police Department takes these investigations very seriously and holds all their officers accountable for their actions,” a Mulberry police statement said.

The US Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Arkansas confirmed it had opened a federal civil rights investigation. The FBI Little Rock field office and the US Justice Department’s civil rights division are also investigating, according to a statement from the US Attorney’s Office.

Damante said Monday the actions he saw on the video are “not indicative of the Crawford County Sheriff’s Department or any law enforcement agency in this area.”

The deputies “will be punished for what they did, if they’re found to be in violation of any rights,” the sheriff said.

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CNN’s Eliott C. McLaughlin, Andy Rose, Hannah Sarisohn, Elizabeth Wolfe, Nadia Romero and Kevin Conlon contributed to this report.