The Broward Sheriff’s Office has launched an internal investigation into how a North Miami man was injured during a rough arrest over the summer.
It comes after the public defender’s office saw body camera footage they say shows excessive force and last month requested an investigation.
The video shows an aggressive, belligerent battery suspect mouthing off to deputies, as the arrest report makes clear. But the report doesn't mention what Broward Public Defender Gordon Weekes says he saw in the video: a deputy using handcuffs as brass knuckles to punch the man who was already in handcuffs.
Ka Traughan Dones was having a bad night last July 15.
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His then-girlfriend told police she caught him cheating and left him, seeking refuge in her family home in West Park.
Dones then followed her there.
“I told him I was going in the house and he wouldn’t let me go in the house,” Janesha Nerrete told a deputy. “So that’s when he pushed me.”
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That was enough, deputies thought, to arrest the 19-year-old Dones for domestic battery. Then things got physical for Dones after the deputy asked him to turn around so he could handcuff him.
A melee ensues on bodycam video, and Weekes did not like what he saw.
“You can see he’s handcuffed and there you can see he winds up and punches him,” Weekes said of the deputy who appears to wrap his handcuffs around his knuckles and then punch Dones in the head.
A mugshot taken hours later shows abrasions on Dones‘ head and a black eye.
Two videos released to the NBC 6 Investigators do not show everything that happened that night, as much of the contact occurs off-screen. But Weekes has his theory.
“No one should be punched in the head with handcuffs being used as brass knuckles,” Weekes said. “It’s offensive to law enforcement, to that profession, and it’s offensive to individuals in this community.”
But so is resisting arrest with violence and battery on a law enforcement officer, two of the charges Dones is facing.
While noting law enforcement has the “authority and ability to use force that is appropriate to get the situation under control,” Weekes added, “But handcuffs should never be used as weapons and they clearly shouldn't be used as weapons when someone’s already handcuffed and detained and seems to be under control.”
Weekes last month said as much in a letter to Sheriff Gregory Tony and the State Attorney’s office, requesting an investigation.
“The officer may be engaging in criminal, unlawful conduct in order to hurt or inflict harm on someone that they have in their care custody or control,” he told NBC 6.
The video, Weekes says, shows the officer also may have hurt himself when the handcuffs made contact with Dones’ head.
“He used handcuffs masquerading as brass knuckles and then admitted it by indicating he almost broke his hands,” Weekes said.
Prosecutors dropped the domestic battery charge that Dones was arrested on that night, but he still faces those two charges stemming from his actions with deputies.
He’s also charged with another battery charge for allegedly hitting a nurse after he was taken to the hospital before being booked in jail.
Dones is free on bond. Through the public defender, he declined to comment.
In addition to its active administrative investigation, the Broward’s Sheriff’s Office tells NBC 6 the incident will go before their use of force review board.
