Denver police officer trips pregnant woman, allegedly attempts to delete video evidence

theGRIO REPORT - Denver police officers have been accused of tripping a pregnant woman and using excessive force against her boyfriend, then confiscating a bystander's tablet in order to delete a video taken of the incident...

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Denver police officers have been accused of tripping a pregnant woman and using excessive force against her boyfriend, then confiscating a bystander’s tablet in order to delete a video taken of the incident.

Despite the video being erased from the device, a copy of the footage was uploaded to the cloud and later released to a local news station. The footage shows Officer Charles Jones apparently punching David Flores in the head multiple times during the August incident.

Flores was suspected of possessing heroin by plain clothes officers.

The altercation began when two unidentified officers in plain clothes approached the couple’s vehicle, where Flores was accompanied by Mayra Lazos-Guerrero, who was seven and a half months pregnant, and a child. Flores allegedly placed a white sock in his mouth, according to both witnesses and officers, and then was “assisted” out of the car, according to Fox 31 Denver. The officers and Flores then wound up on the ground.

Charles Jones and partner Christopher Evans came to back-up the two officers in the narcotics arrest. In the video, Jones tells Flores to “spit the drugs out,” before he begins punching the suspect in the head, causing Flores’ head to hit against the ground. In his report on the incident, Jones indicated that the reason for punching Flores was to keep the suspect from choking.

While Jones was hitting Flores, Lazos-Guerrero came over screaming at officers, and witness Levi Frasier described as her being “concerned for [Flores].” Jones, however, believed that the pregnant woman was going to kick him, and instead tripped her, also sending her to the ground.

Frasier, who took the video, also said of the officer’s use of force that “I used to cage fight and I’ve never seen punches harder than that.”

And of the officers deleting the video, Frazier explained, “The first officer that comes up to ask me about my witness statement brings me to the police car and says we could do this the easy way or we could do this the hard way.”

Former detective Mark Carlson agreed that the use of force was excessive but said of tripping the pregnant woman that, “I’m sure I would react similarly. Whether it’s pushing her, jumping up to confront her, grabbing her, whatever it is, because you’re not sure what the threat is.”

Flores and Lazos-Guerrero both faced multiple charges after the incident but reportedly did not arrive for their last scheduled court appearance.

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