Surveillance video from earlier this week shows 24-year-old Daltona Crudup on a scooter on South Beach with officers following him.
Police say he hit one officer with the scooter, sending him to the hospital.
It's what happened inside the Royal Palm hotel lobby — where an officer arrested Crudup — that has the cops in hot water.
The Hurricane season is on. Our meteorologists are ready. Sign up for the NBC 6 Weather newsletter to get the latest forecast in your inbox.
NBC 6 was told Friday by a source with knowledge of the investigation that the hotel lobby video is so disturbing, charges may come rapidly against the officers.
28-year-old Khalid Vaughn started taking video of Crudup’s arrest with his phone, and NBC 6 was told the sergeant at the location is seen kicking Vaughn in the face.
Five officers are on administrative leave, and the Miami Beach Police Chief quickly expressed his concern over what was seen from the lobby’s camera.
Local
On Friday afternoon, Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber, who has seen the videos, couldn’t comment on any potential action by the state attorney but said the process is holding the officers accountable.
“I want this process to go through, but people should understand we ask our cops to do very difficult things every day — put themselves in danger — but the very police force that we saw in the videos is the same police force that scrutinized the video and referred it to the state attorney’s office," Gelber said.
Crudup and Vaughn live outside Florida. NBC 6 was also told that the two men who were arrested have already spoken with both internal affairs detectives from Miami Beach police and investigators from the State Attorney’s Office.
The day after their arrest, Kathy Fernandez Rundle released a statement saying, "Excessive force can never be an acceptable foundation for the policing of any community. I share Miami Beach Police Chief Richard Clements' serious concern about the level of force utilized in the arrests of Khalid Vaughn and Daltona Crudup. Presently, I have senior members of my staff reviewing all of the actions taken during those arrests and will follow all the evidence to its full legal conclusion.”
Both Miami Beach Police and the State Attorney Friday officially told NBC 6 they can’t comment.
To our knowledge, no statements have been taken by any of the officers, as that normally goes through a process set up by the union. But what's in the video appears to be overriding what has been the normal process in the past when it comes to the duration of investigations into law enforcement officers.
