Video shows former Las Vegas police officer shoving woman into car hood
Las Vegas police have released body camera footage after a former officer pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor in an excessive force case Thursday.
The profanity-laden video appears to show then-Metropolitan Police Department officer Richard Scavone assaulting a woman near Tropicana Avenue and Interstate 15 in the early morning of Jan. 6, 2015. He was fired from Metro in September of that year.
On Friday evening, Metro released the previously unseen footage of Scavone’s encounter with a woman he suspected was a prostitute. The footage was released because Scavone’s criminal case had been closed, Metro said.
Scavone, 50, faces up to a year behind bars and a $100,000 fine on one count of deprivation of rights under color of law in connection with the encounter.
The 3-minute, 23-second video begins with Scavone in his patrol car, getting out and calling to a woman. Within seconds of getting her attention, Scavone said, “I got the Taser out” and attempts to handcuff her.
He’s heard threatening to “dump” her on the ground as she talked back to him.
“The hell you think you’re talking to?” he asks her in the video.
The footage shows him push the woman, whose face is blurred, against the hood of his patrol car before apparently forcing her to the ground for several seconds. The camera then only shows her legs in the street, but she can be heard yelling for Scavone to get his knee off her neck.
Scavone and another unidentified person pull her off the ground and put her back against the hood of the car, the video shows. After a brief radio transmission, he’s observed asking her, “What else do you want me to do, tough guy?”
“Go ahead and take me to jail. That’s all I want you to do,” she replies.
“You got it,” he says, reaching for her bra.
She pulls away and he uses his left hand to shove her head into the hood. The video shows her screaming as Scavone tells her not to pull away from him.
Still holding her against the hood, he reaches into her bra and pulls out a few items. Again he shoves her head into the hood, this time twisting her hair around his hand and prompting her to scream again.
He then pushes her against the patrol car door before putting her in the back of the car. The video ends as he positions her inside.
Scavone is scheduled to be sentenced in January. Under a deal with prosecutors, he no longer can work as a police officer.
Scavone initially was charged with violating the civil rights of the woman when he used excessive force while arresting her in January 2015 and falsifying his report of the encounter to obstruct an FBI investigation, according to the Justice Department.
The woman suffered “bodily injury,” according to an indictment.
Scavone also falsified a use-of-force report about his confrontation with the woman, the indictment stated.
The woman was charged with littering and loitering, but those charges were dismissed, police said.
Contact Mike Shoro at mshoro@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5290. Follow @mike_shoro on Twitter.
