Apr 16, 2009 9:33 pm US/Pacific
Pastor Beaten And Tased By Arizona Border Patrol
Update 4/18: Arizona Department of Public Safety Responds To CBS13
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) ―
A man who grew up in Sacramento is now sharing a traumatic story on the internet. He is a pastor who says he was beaten for exercising his constitutional rights.
"I'm crying out for mercy, they are torturing me with tasers again and again," says Pastor Steven Anderson.
This was a graphic description on YouTube.
Pastor Steven Anderson claims he was tortured during a common border patrol stop in Arizona.
Anderson grew up in Sacramento and was active at the Regency Baptist Church. His father who lives in Roseville is outraged over his son's treatment.
"I was appalled they could do that in the U.S.; beat and torture somebody who didn't resist, but just wouldn't let them search his car," says Anderson.
Anderson, who heads a church in Phoenix, was stopped at a boarder patrol check point 75 miles east of Yuma.
Border patrol says a K-9 alerted agents to the car.
The father of four says he exercised his constitutional right not to be searched without a warrant. He says that's when he claims agents broke out his passenger and driver side windows.
"Both windows shattered in the same instant," says Anderson.
The pastor claims an agents smashed his head into the door and then another threw him on the ground, stepped on his head and tased him once again, causing excruciating pain.
"I felt like his full body weight was just driving my face into more broken glass and asphalt," Anderson explains.
It took 11 stitches to close the cuts on the pastor's face.
His father says a search of Anderson's car turned up nothing illegal but thinks his son was treated like a criminal.
"I hope justice is done. I can't believe that the U.S. could do this to someone," says Anderson's father.
CBS13 is asking the question: Why was the level of force used?
Border patrol says it was officers with the Arizona Department of Public Safety that stepped in and used the tasers. DPS has issued a statement on the incident, reprinted here in its entirety:
The U.S. Border Patrol asked the Arizona Department of Public Safety to assist their Officers with a combative motorist who refused to cooperate at a checkpoint in the westbound lanes of Interstate 8. Steven L. Anderson, the combative motorist, was arrested by a DPS Officer for resisting a lawful order during the incident and booked into the Yuma County Jail.
Mr. Anderson never filed a complaint with DPS concerning his arrest but instead made a You-Tube video that featured his version of the events of that day.
An investigation by the Arizona Department of Public Safety's Professional Standards Bureau is underway. DPS is looking at current agency policies and procedures that officers must comply with when requested by any agency to respond to checkpoints.
In this particular instance DPS will look at our Officer's response and actions. We will offer no further comment on this incident until the investigation has been concluded.
*It should be noted that in 1976, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Federal checkpoints near border areas to enforce laws prohibiting illegal immigration. This U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint along Interstate 8 is in compliance with federal law.*
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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