Woman Stripped Naked, Pepper Sprayed, Left In Jail Cell
A mother of four is planning to press charges against police, alleging that the officers stripped her naked, pepper sprayed her, and forced her to walk in front of other inmates while naked, the New York Daily News reports.
The incident, which took place March 30 in New Albany, Indiana, began when police were called to the home of 31-year-old Tabitha Gentry for a domestic dispute involving her estranged husband. Police arrested Gentry for disorderly conduct and resisting an officer, transporting her to the Floyd Country jail.
After arriving there, surveillance video shows that four officers — two men and two women — proceeded to strip Gentry naked prior to leaving her in a jail cell. Officers allege that Gentry was “drunk and belligerent,” according to a report in the Courier-Journal. Gentry’s lawyer, Laura Landenwich, contends that even though officers stripped the woman naked, they did not perform a cavity search, contending that “this was not a strip search… I think it was outright abuse.”
After being stripped and left in the cell, video shows Gentry approaching the cell door, in what Landenwich says was an effort to get officers to give her clothes to cover herself. After an hour of being left in the cell naked, the video shows officers deploying pepper spray into the cell, which strikes Gentry and forces her back from the door. According to Landenwich, the pepper spray covered Gentry’s body, as well as her genitals, while she was left in the cell.
Approximately 50 minutes after the pepper spray was used on her, which officers told the Courier-Journal was necessary because Gentry was upsetting other inmates, an officer entered the room and gave Gentry a smock that left part of her body exposed. Gentry contends that the male officer led her through a public area while taking her to wash the pepper spray from her eyes, her body partially exposed.
This isn’t the first time that police have made headlines recently for alleged abuses. As The Inquisitr reported, a New York City woman filed suit earlier this month against a cop who she says arrested her falsely before drugging and raping her at a later date.
Surprisingly, Gentry’s case isn’t the only allegation of misconduct being leveled at the Floyd County jail. According to the Courier-Journal, four people, including Gentry, have joined together in a class action suit against the jail, claiming that they were all stripped naked by officers. While Gentry was pepper sprayed, others in the suit claimed they were subjected to a Taser while naked in their cells.
[Images via MailOnline]
