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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nA white Jacksonville police officer has been stripped of his duties after a video surfaced showing him punching a 22-year-old Black man during a February traffic stop in Florida.
The footage, captured on William McNeil Jr.\u2019s dashboard-mounted phone and widely circulated on social media, shows him calmly seated in his vehicle, requesting a sergeant after being stopped for allegedly driving without headlights during daylight. McNeil explains, \u201cIt\u2019s daytime, it\u2019s not raining,\u201d to which the officer replies, \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter, you\u2019re still required to have headlights on.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
McNeil, wearing a seatbelt, continues to seek legal clarification and supervision. Moments later, another officer is seen smashing the driver’s side window and punching McNeil in the face while yelling for him to exit the vehicle and show his hands. Additional footage shows McNeil being dragged out, struck again, and forced to the ground, sustaining a chin injury. \u201cWhat the f\u2013\u2014 is wrong with you?\u201d one officer is heard saying before announcing the arrest. Five officers were involved in the detention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At a press briefing Monday, Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters confirmed the officer who punched McNeil- identified as Officer D. Bowers- has been \u201cstripped of his law enforcement duties, effective immediately.\u201d Waters said Bowers voluntarily waived his privacy rights to allow the release of police body camera footage, though the punch itself was not captured on any of the three bodycams reviewed by investigators, according to NBC News.
The stop took place on February 19. McNeil was charged with driving on a suspended license, resisting an officer without violence, and possession of a small amount of cannabis. He later pleaded guilty to the first two charges, according to the sheriff.
Sheriff Waters defended the legality of the stop and the obligation to comply with police orders, stating, \u201cThe law requires that a person comply with a police officer\u2019s command during a traffic stop. There are not options. Even if that person disagrees with that officer\u2019s reason for the stop.\u201d However, he declined to defend Bowers\u2019 actions, noting, \u201cI will not commend nor defend Officer Bowers’ response.\u201d
Despite the incident being recorded on McNeil\u2019s phone, Waters said the state attorney cleared all three officers involved, in part because none had seen the punch firsthand.
Civil rights attorney Harry Daniels, representing McNeil, condemned the response: \u201cWilliam felt like his rights were being trampled upon by being stopped during the day for not having headlights on. That\u2019s a new one. The officers could have easily dispatched a sergeant to the scene to de-escalate.\u201d
Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s office has launched an internal investigation amid footage going viral and widespread backlash.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Civil rights advocates condemned the sheriff’s department in Jacksonville, Florida, after a video of officers punching a Black man and throwing him to the ground during a February traffic stop went viral online. William McNeil Jr, 22, recorded the video as he sat in the driver’s seat of his car after deputies pulled him over. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":12017,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1924,1906,2980],"class_list":["post-12014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","tag-florida","tag-he","tag-video"],"yoast_head":"\n