The Deming Headlight
DEMING — A video shot in front of the John Strand Municipal Building has gone viral on Facebook and is receiving mixed reviews.
The video shows Deming police officers taking down a male juvenile in front of the Deming Municipal Court at 309 S. Gold Street adjacent to the City of Deming offices.
As of Thursday evening, April 6, the video has had close to a million views and over 700 comments.
https://www.facebook.com/kevin.weaver.5876/posts/1397768163645070
The following is a prepared statement provided to the Headlight by police chief Bobby Orosco:
On March 30, 2017 at approximately 3:55 p.m. officers from the Deming Police Department were dispatched to a disturbance at 309 S. Gold, which is Municipal Court. Dispatch advised officers they could hear yelling in the background of the phone call reporting the incident.
This information heightened the officer’s expectation regarding their safety.
Upon arrival officers met with the parties involved in the disturbance. It was learned that there was an argument between court staff and a male subject later identified as Juan Weaver.
As officers were talking with Juan Weaver he placed his hand in his pocket. Officers asked for him to remove his hand for officer safety. Mr. Weaver placed his hand back in his pocket and officers again asked him to remove his hand for officer safety as the officers had no idea what he was carrying in his pocket and same was big enough to house a weapon.
Mr. Weaver refused to take his hand out of his pocket the second time thereby disobeying the lawful order of the officer’s.
At that point, Mr. Weaver was asked for his identification and he refused to provide officers with identification saying he didn’t have to while at the same time the officers were removing Weaver’s hand from his pocket.
Mr. Weaver was then advised he was being placed under arrest.
Mr. Weaver resisted and assaulted the officers and was taken into custody after a brief struggle.
As is standard, every time a juvenile is arrested, a probation officer from CYFD does an assessment to determine whether the juvenile will be continued in detention or released to his parents based upon charges after arrest. In this case the results from the assessment called for the continued detention of the juvenile based upon the severity of the juvenile’s actions in this case.
Charges have not been disclosed at this time.
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©2017 The Deming Headlight (Deming, N.M.)