LF: Trump aide charged with misdemeanor battery vs. ex-Breitbart reporter

Title: Trump aide charged with misdemeanor battery vs. ex-Breitbart reporter
Source: Palm Beach Post
URL Source: http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/n ... demeanor-battery-on-ex-/nqtkY/
Published: Mar 29, 2016
Author: Lulu Ramadan
Post Date: 2016-03-29 12:29:25 by cranky
Keywords: None
Views: 3139
Comments: 25

Following a March 8 conference at Trump National Golf Club, Michelle Fields, a 28-year-old reporter formerly with the online Breitbart News Network, said she was grabbed on the arm by Lewandowski, 41, after she asked Trump a question about affirmative action.

Trump cancels rally while campaign manager faces accusation photo

Washington Post reporter Ben Terris wrote that he witnessed the battery.

Jupiter police later said they were looking into the incident after Fields filed a report, although investigators had not named Lewandowski.

Lewandowski turned himself in to Jupiter police just after 8 a.m., accoriding to a police report.

Surveillance footage captured at Trump National, off Donald Ross Road, corroborates Feilds’ claim, the arrest report says.

Fields, who Tweeted photos of bruises on her arm she said resulted from the battery, resigned Breitbart less than a week after the incident. She cited Breitbart’s refusal to stand behind her amid the allegations as her reason for leaving.

Lewandowski replied to Fields’ Tweet, writing: “You are totally delusional. I never touched you. As a matter of fact, I have never even met you.”

Ben Shapiro, former Breitbart editor-at-large, also resigned, claiming in a prepared statement that the conservative news outlet, seen largely as supportive of Trump’s presidential bid, “abandoned” Fields “in order to protect Trump’s bully campaign manager.”

Several other employees followed suit in the following weeks and resigned, according to multiple reports.

From that angle, it looks as though he grabbed or hooked her arm and kept her from moving forward when she got too close to Trump. Looking at her feet, she was stopped, but not pulled backwards.

At the time, her statement was, "Someone had grabbed me tightly by the arm and yanked me down. I almost fell to the ground, but was able to maintain my balance. Nonetheless, I was shaken.”

An anonymous witness to the incident told the Daily Beast that Fields was grabbed from behind and was yanked “down toward the ground like a ragdoll.”

But it appears Lewandowski lied when he claimed in a tweet 'I never touched you'.

And she lied when she said, "Someone had grabbed me tightly by the arm and yanked me down. I almost fell to the ground, but was able to maintain my balance. Nonetheless, I was shaken.”

The question is, does this rise to the level of misdemeanor battery? Put me on the jury and I would crucify her for wasting my time on this petty bullshit and the judge for even hearing the case.

But this was a case where there was a crowd and she was imposing herself on the candidate. She was halted in her tracks and the crowd moved on.

I think the smoking gun, such as it is, is that the video makes it seem that Lewandowski lied to the police about the incident.

Without the WaPo reporter's testimony, the case amounts to nothing. The woman says she never saw who shoved her.

The Washington Post reporter, Ben Terris, wrote, "... As security parted the masses to give him passage out of the chandelier-lit ballroom, Michelle Fields, a young reporter for Trump-friendly Breitbart News, pressed forward to ask the GOP front-runner a question. I watched as a man with short-cropped hair and a suit grabbed her arm and yanked her out of the way. He was Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s 41-year-old campaign manager."

That appears to be true, but all Lewandowski did was halt her progress while everyone else moved on.

What's telling was her reaction on the video. Nothing. Like this happens to reporters all the time. And it probably does.