Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Another Video shows more problems at Hillsborough Jail


By: Mike Deeson

Tampa, Florida - This is a crime caught on tape that's what this is. That's how Marcella Pourmoghani describes an incident caught on tape as she was being booked in the Hillsborough Jail in November of 2006.

The incident is coming to light as the result of a federal lawsuit following the Brian Sterner's booking where he was dumped form a wheelchair last month. On the tape you see a deputy pulling the woman out of a chair by her hair, throwing her to the ground where she is hit several times.

Pourmoghani says and you know they have guns and they have badges and they can do what they want because they darn sure did it.

Meantime Sheriff David Gee says the deputy did everything right because of her explanation The report says, "The deputy attempted to escort Pourmoghani to the holding cell; she pulled away from the deputy's grasp, so tried to grab the inmates arm and she grabbed the railing of the chair."

The deputy says it was necessary to redirect her to the floor, where she grabbed the deputy's leg and refused to let go. That's when the deputy says she delivered several defensive strikes to get her to release her hold.

Pourmoghani's attorney Virlyn Moore says the most outrageous thing is when they brought this to light the sheriff''s department investigated and exonerated all the officers involved.

Moore says this incident proves the sheriff wasn't being honest when he said the Sterner wheelchair dumping was not the way the jail works.

On Friday the sheriff said of the wheelchair incident, there's no way you could explain how something like this would happen it's just so out of the norm of what they do everyday.

However, Moore says this is not in Mr. Sterner's case where one correctional officer had a mental meltdown. Moore says this is the way things are encouraged and tolerated by the sheriff's office.

Pourmoghani says there is nothing they can say that condones what they did.

And while the sheriff's office points that Pourmoghani has been arrested 8 times since 1992, she says that has nothing to do with the fact her head was repeatedly slammed into the concrete floor at the jail.

She says this can happen to you to your child this can happen to anybody it didn't just happen to her this can happen to any of us.

Meantime, Pourmoghani knows what she wants to happen to those involved.

She'd like to see them all in prison, that's what she says she is looking for.

And Pourmoghani and her attorney want someone other than the Sheriff and his staff to investigate this case of the deputies who they call criminals.

1 comment:

Vox Populi said...

This is excellent coveraqe.
I am currently being stalked and intimidated by whatever passes for law enforcement in Tampa FL. Also the firefighters.
It's nice that all of this is cropping up.
Suits my case very well.