Fired Colorado cop says he was 'unfairly painted as a racist' when he left a black woman hogtied upside down in the back of his patrol car while she pleaded for help
A Colorado police officer who was fired for not helping a restrained black woman who begged for help after she became lodged upside down in the back of his patrol car is appealing his termination, saying officials unfairly painted him as a racist.
Levi Huffine, who is white, filed a lawsuit last week in state court in an attempt to get his job as a police officer in the city of Aurora back, The Denver Post reported.
Chief Vanessa Wilson fired Huffine in February, overriding an advisory panel's recommendation that he only be suspended.
Last month, the city's civil service commission upheld Wilson's decision after disturbing video of Shataeah Kelly crying for help in August 2019 was released to the public for the first time.
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Levi Huffine, who is white, filed a lawsuit last week in state court in an attempt to get his job as a police officer in the city of Aurora back. He is seen at a video hearing in September
Horrifying footage has shown a black woman begging for her life and saying 'I can't breathe' as she lies hogtied and upside down for 21 minutes in the back of an Aurora PD cruiser
The video shows that while Kelly initially berated Huffine after he restrained both her ankles and wrists, she later called him 'master' as she tried to get his attention, unable to free herself because of the hobble.
'How many times to I have to beg you master? Master, I'll be good,' she says at one point.
The incident took place on August 27 2019 when Huffine arrested Kelly for allegedly refusing to stop fighting with another woman in a park, but the video was only released this September.
In the lawsuit, Huffine does not dispute the facts of the case, but he argues that officials unfairly inferred that racial bias played a role in what happened.
He said they did so both in their testimony at his civil service appeal and by releasing a summary of the case in response to an open records request by the Post. Wilson said that release was accidental because disciplinary records should not be released until any appeal is complete.
'Despite the fact that there was no evidence of racially motivated bias in this case, or any racial component aside from the fact that the individuals were of different races, Plaintiff was impermissibly painted as a racist with no way to counter, biasing Plaintiff in the eyes of the Commission,' the lawsuit says.
The lawsuit claims that his reputation has been tarnished as a result, preventing him from getting another job in law enforcement.
The footage was released Tuesday as part of a civil service commission appeal hearing for Huffine, who is fighting Aurora Police Chief Vanessa Wilson's decision to fire him
In a statement, the city of Aurora said it is reviewing the lawsuit. 'The termination of Huffine by Wilson was lawful and appropriate, and was upheld by the city´s Civil Service Commission, and we believe the District Court will agree with the actions taken in this case,' it said.
Fired Officer Huffine's bodycam video shows the handcuffed Kelly moving around in the back of the police cruiser and pushing on the door with her feet, apparently trying to escape, after removing her seat belt.
Huffine tells her he is going to hobble her - linking together handcuffs around her wrists and ankles - for trying to get out of the car.
The cop is seen hogtying her and putting her back in the car.
While hogtied and lying in the back of the cruiser, Kelly, who says she was intoxicated at the time, screams and berates Huffine but then pleads with him not to let her ride that way.
She then slips off the back seat headfirst during the ride, ending up with her head down on the floor behind Huffine's seat with her legs up in the air.
Kelly is heard repeatedly begging the cop to lift her back up on to the seat for more than 20 minutes of the journey.
The bodycam video released Tuesday shows Shataeah Kelly head down in the foot well of the vehicle pleading with Aurora police officer Levi Huffine to lift her back up on the seat. Pictured the moment she is hogtied
The incident took place on August 27 2019 when Huffine arrested Kelly for allegedly refusing to stop fighting with another woman in a park. Kelly pictured on the seat before she fell head down on the floor
Kelly slips off the seat and is left there for 21 minutes as she begs for help, says 'I can't breathe' and desperately calls the cop 'master'
She is heard saying 'I can't breathe' several times - the very same words uttered by George Floyd, a black father who died in Minneapolis police custody after a white cop knelt on his neck for almost eight minutes back in May.
'Officer please, I can't breathe,' says Kelly between screams and sobs. 'I don't want to die like this. I'm about to break my neck.'
She continues: 'My neck is killing me dude. Help me, I can't breathe.'
Police Chief Wilson branded the incident 'sick' and 'beyond human decency'
Despite her repeated cries for help and reports of her suffering, Huffine does not appear to respond to her or acknowledge her concerns.
At one point, Kelly is heard calling him her 'master' as she begs him to help her and tells him she is sorry.
'How many times to I have to beg you master? Master, I'll be good,' she says.
The woman also says she has 'never felt so much racism in my life' and voices distress that she is 'suffering like this for being black.'
An internal affairs investigation found that Kelly was left in that position for 21 minutes until the officer pulled up at the jail, where a female detention officer opens the car door.
The detention officer is heard questioning Kelly's treatment at the time, asking her: 'Honey, why are you head down like that?'
Police Chief Wilson slammed Huffine (pictured right) saying he 'tortured' Kelly and that it was lucky the black woman didn't die from asphyxiation in the back of his car
She then looks at Huffine and tells him 'that didn't look pleasant.'
Huffine tells the prison officer Kelly was in the seat and decided to roll.
In February, the officer was fired for his treatment of the black woman.
At a disciplinary review hearing, Dr. Paul Taylor, an assistant professor and law enforcement instructor at the University of Colorado Denver School of Public Affair who is an expert witness for Huffine, testified that Huffine would not have been able to turn around and see Kelly on the floor from the driver's seat because of the partition behind him and because of his duty belt and bulletproof vest.
He said most police departments do not allow hobbled people to be transported without a seatbelt as Aurora did before Wilson changed that policy.
He said Aurora's previously policy put prisoners at 'extreme risk' but it was unfair to single out one officer for punishment rather than focusing on its overall approach and training.
Elijah McClain died last August after being put in a chokehold by Aurora cops
He noted that Kelly said she could not breathe before the cruiser left but none of the officers there were concerned enough to call for an ambulance.
Following the death of Floyd in Minneapolis in May and protests over racial injustice and police brutality, the Aurora Police Department also came under renewed scrutiny over the 2019 death of Elijah McClain, a black man confronted by police after someone reported him as suspicious.
McClain who was killed last year when Aurora cops put him in a chokehold and sedated him with ketamine as he was walking home from a convenience store.
No officers have been fired over their involvement with McClain, although Wilson fired three officers this year over photos mocking a stranglehold he was placed in.
The Aurora Police Department, near Denver, is also facing mounting scrutiny after footage emerged earlier this month of another black woman being hogtied by officers back in 2017, allegedly causing her a shoulder injury.