'I was telling him to get off me because my back was hurting bad'
The bikini-clad teenage girl who was forcibly restrained by a police officer responding to a disturbance at a pool party in a Dallas suburb over the weekend says she was an invited guest and was obeying his orders to leave when he grabbed her.
"He told me to keep walking," Dajerria Becton, 15, told Fox 4. "And I kept walking and then I'm guessing he thought we were saying rude stuff to him."
Becton was then thrown to the ground by Eric Casebolt, one of 12 McKinney Police Department officers who responded to the disturbance call at a private community pool Friday night.
He grabbed me, twisted my arm on my back and shoved me in the grass and started pulling the back of my braids," Becton said. "I was telling him to get off me because my back was hurting bad."
In a video of the incident taken by a fellow teen and posted to YouTube, Casebolt, who is white, can be seen shouting obscenities and ordering some black teens to lie on the ground while telling others to disperse. He then pulls his gun on a pair of black teenagers who appear to be coming to Becton's aid.
released to her parents.
After the footage surfaced, Casebolt was placed on administrative leave.
"This video has raised concerns that are being investigated," the McKinney Police Department said in a statement Sunday.
"The McKinney Police Department is committed to treating all persons fairly under the law," McKinney Police Chief Greg Conley said at a press conference Sunday afternoon. "We are committed to preserving the peace and safety of our community for all of our citizens."
Conley added: "As the chief of police, I am committed to a complete and thorough investigation into this incident."
"I am disturbed and concerned by the incident and actions depicted in the video," McKinney Mayor Brian Loughmiller said in a separate statement. "Our expectation as a City Council is that our police department and other departments will act professionally and with appropriate restraint relative to the situation they are faced with."
The video quickly sparked outrage on social media, as many drew comparisons to recent high- profile cases of police bias in Ferguson, Mo., and Baltimore.
