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Louisiana passed a new police accountability law after allegations of civil rights violations against a sheriff’s aide who was caught up in a video of a black woman dragging her into her hair and slamming her head to the ground.
Chantelle Arnold, a woman, sued the deputy and the sheriff, accusing the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office of Conspiring to Cover up the 2021 attack. The sheriff’s office agreed to pay Arnold $300,000 after a three-day trial in March, but Arnold’s lawyer said before the ju apprentice deliberations began.
After the incident, Propublica worked with WRKF, WWNO and The Times-Picayune to publish an investigation detailing the long history of excessive existence complaints against Sheriff Jefferson Parish Julio Alvarado. Alvarado, a 20-year veteran of the Sheriff’s Office, was employed by the department as of March.
Arnold’s lawyer, Sen. Gary Carter, D-New Orleans, said that Alvarado introduced the law after it was revealed that he had not written a report on his encounter with Arnold, despite being documented whenever officers use force. Jefferson Parish Sheriff Joseph Ropinto said in his testimony at a March trial regarding Arnold’s case that Alvarado’s commander had directed him to write such a report after a video of his actions spread on social media.
Filmed in the 14-second video, Arnold’s swarming with Alvarado, left the woman with bruises and wounded lips and repeated headaches, according to subsequent explanations to police investigators.
“If there were no bystanders who captured the way this officer defeated Chantelle Arnold, there would be no reports. There would be no evidence of that. There would be no indication that it had happened.”
The new law passed unanimously by state lawmakers and signed by Gov. Jeff Landry in June requires all law enforcement agencies to report whenever officers use of force leads to serious injuries. We direct the Council on Standards and Training for Peace Officers to prove police officers to adopt a policy on mandatory use reporting by January 1st. Details about how the process works are not spelled out, and there are no penalties for failing to comply.
The bill was introduced as “Chantelle Arnold’s Law,” but Carter said “Sheriff Lopinto was so mad about it that it almost killed the bill, so his name was removed.
Neither Jefferson’s Parish Sheriff’s Office nor Alvarado’s attorneys responded to requests for comments or interviews.
Alvarado met Arnold in September 2021. At that time, officers answered a 911 call about a fight between 25 people in Jefferson Parish. As the aide rose to his police car, Alvarado looked at Arnold, covered in dirt and walked down the street. Arnold told his aides he was attacked by a group of boys who frequently bullied her. When Alvarado ordered her to stop, Arnold said she just wanted to go home and continued walking. Several witnesses say that when the aide jumped out of his car and grabbed Arnold and slammed him onto the sidewalk.
In a video shot by a bystander, Alvarado drags Arnold along the pavement, hugging her with her braids and repeatedly smacks her on the pavement. Arnold was not charged with a crime and was later taken to hospital. The Sheriff’s Office was not using body cameras at the time, but later began using them.
The Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office denied any misconduct. An internal investigation by the Sheriff’s Office in 2022 determined that Alvarado’s actions against Arnold were “rational and acceptable.” Alvarado was suspended for “about” 40 hours after failing to submit a written report, Lopinto said in March.
In a 2022 lawsuit, Arnold alleged that the sheriff’s office knew that Alvarado had a tendency to violence against black people and other minority groups, but continued to patrol such communities and put the public at risk.
According to a 2022x interview with Picaune, Lopinto attributes the history of Alvarado’s complaints to his work. “He’s not complaining every month,” Ropinto said. In the same interview, Ropinto rejected Arnold’s account and accused him of “looking for a salary.”
Alvarado’s allegedly false misconception fits a wider pattern at the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office, as a year-old investigation by Propublica was discovered. Between 2013 and 2021, deputies disproportionately drained guns against black people. During that time, of the 40 people shot and killed by Jefferson Parish deputies, 73% were black, more than double the proportion of the population. During that time, 12 of the 16 people who died after being shot or taken into custody by deputies were black.
Alvarado has been named in at least 10 federal civil rights lawsuits since 2007, all involving the use of excessive force. The eight plaintiffs were members of a minority group.
The Sheriff’s Office has settled three of these cases. Arnold’s $300,000 payment is the third and largest settlement involving Alvarado. Five other cases were closed in favour of the sheriff’s office, one was dismissed for legal expertise, and one was delayed indefinitely.
In a filing in response to eight cases that were not dismissed or delayed, the sheriff’s office said the officer’s actions were “rational under circumstances” and characterized the claim as “frivolous.”
Before the 2021 incident involving Arnold, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office had settled a 2016 lawsuit accusing Alvarado of grabbing a 14-year-old Hispanic boy by his neck and slamming his head into concrete while the child screamed. A woman called the police and complained that the boy and his friend were wrestling in the parking lot. Alvarado later threatened to have the boy and his family deported, according to the lawsuit. The sheriff’s office, which paid $15,000 to the juvenile’s family, said in its court declaration that Alvarado’s actions were “reasonable under the circumstances.”
The Louisiana Sheriff’s Department will resolve two use cases, including those who died of an autistic teenager
In another lawsuit, Alvarado and three deputies defeated Honduras native Atodonor Casco, stealing more than $2,000 from him during a traffic stop the previous year and conspiring to deport him. Casco suffocates him until he agrees to stay silent about being taken, claiming that Alvarado was beaten. The sheriff’s office denied any fraud, but in 2020 it resolved the case for $50,000.
Both cases were cited in Arnold’s case as evidence that Alvarado had demonstrated a pattern of behavior that was unfit for his job throughout his career. Arnold’s lawyer, Carter, filed yet another case at a trial in March when sheriff’s detectives witnessed Alvarado’s beloved massage parlors being investigated for alleged prostitution. Alvarado denied that he had been there to “do sexually commit him,” and he was demoted from the sergeant to “disrespectfully introduce the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office” and “sponsoring non-giatial businesses on duty and disregarding your responsibility to detectives under your command,” Carter said, citing an internal police report.
In an interview, Carter said Lopinto’s continued defense and Alvarado’s employment represented a tolerance towards suspicious behavior.
“He stood up,” Carter said, “There was no pain or regret.”
