After alleged beating, CBS asks if police are now 'targeting women' CBS legal analyst: 'Preposterous' that fall caused woman's horrific injuries
An incident involving a Louisiana woman who was allegedly beaten by a police officer after her arrest on suspicion of drunk driving has led CBS News to take a look at the broader question of whether police officers are specifically targeting women.
The alleged victim, Angela Garbarino, has claimed that Officer Wiley Willis beat her after turning off a police video camera. The Caddo Parish district attorney and the U.S. Justice Department are both planning to investigate the case.
Willis asserts that Garbarino slipped and fell when he tried to prevent her leaving the room. The Shreveport Police Union has come to Willis's defense, saying that they believe his version of the story and charging that his dismissal following the incident did not follow protocol and violated his rights.
Legal analyst Lisa Bloom told CBS "it's absolutely preposterous" that Garbarino's horrific injuries -- which included two black eyes, a broken nose, a fractured cheekbone, and two lost teeth -- could have been sustained in a fall.
"When the incident started to escalate, he should have called in another police officer," Bloom said of Willis. "He could have cuffed her to the chair. He could have used less restrictive means to control the woman if, indeed, she was getting physically abusive. He's a younger, much stronger male."
CBS News has found that Willis had two lawsuits filed against him in 2006, one by a woman who claims Willis held a gun to her son's head and threatened to shoot him and another by a woman who says she was arrested because she filed a complaint against Willis.
Bloom further sees the incident as part of a larger pattern. "Wives of police officers have long claimed there's a problem with police officers abusing women," she stated.
The Louisiana case is the latest in a series of videotaped incidents of possible police brutality against women, the most recent of which was that of an Ohio woman forcibly strip-searched by police officers of both sexes. In November 2006, another Ohio woman was tasered while handcuffed.
"This has been a long ongoing problem," Bloom concluded. "What we have now is the introduction of the videotape, and women don't have to just make a claim. They have some proof."
The full CBS story can be read here.
This video is from CBS's The Early Show, broadcast February 21, 2008.
 
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