By Jon Vanderlaan
Odessa American
ECTOR COUNTY, Texas — After the Ector County Sheriff’s Office arrested five people in connection with a drug raid, a video depicting those people’s interaction with deputies started gaining popularity on Facebook.
Ector County Sheriff Mark Donaldson said the Drug Enforcement Agency was conducting an operation at about 5 p.m. Monday near Melody Lane when DEA agents asked the sheriff’s office to follow a car leaving from a house they were watching.
Donaldson said when deputies stopped the car, several of the people were combative.
First, 19-year-old Jamin Davis, who was the driver and was already in the sheriff’s truck when the video was taken, was arrested on a charge of possession of marijuana, Donaldson said. At that point, 22-year-old Teravious Holbert was being detained but had not been arrested, Donaldson said, when a minor began taking a video of what happened next.
Several people in the video are seen and heard yelling at the deputies, Sgt. Abel Sanchez and Deputy Josh Pool. At one point, Donaldson said 25-year-old Channa Shea Smith’s cell phone was confiscated because deputies were afraid she’d warn the people at the suspected drug house.
The deputy gave her phone back, Donaldson said, but he said Smith then began to confront the deputy when he previously told her to back away.
In the video, she is seen approaching the deputy and yelling at her, at which point the deputy tried to take her phone again and put her hands behind her back, at which point she was handcuffed.
Then 17-year-old Dayshia Marie Williams and 19-year-old Dauryashia Williams attempted to grab Smith’s cell phone from the bed of the deputy’s truck and one of them opened the truck’s door to get another cell phone, which was all captured on the video.
Holbert ran from the truck as Sanchez chased after him, leaving Pool to fend off both of the Williams women.
Donaldson said one of them bit Pool and all three — Pool and the women — were hitting and punching each other.
Eventually, the video shows that Pool took out his stun gun and had all of them get on the ground as Sanchez returned with Holbert.
Holbert was charged with escape and resisting arrest, Smith was charged with interference with duties, Dayshia Williams was charged with assault on a peace officer and resisting arrest, and Dauryashia Williams was charged with assault on a peace officer and resisting arrest.
The entire time, the minor filming the fight stayed off to the side, but when the fight ended, Sanchez is seen walking up and taking her phone from her.
Donaldson said the entire situation is still under investigation, but his deputies are instructed to be OK with someone taking a video of a situation.
“We don’t take phones from people for videoing,” Donaldson said. “If someone is videoing, we have our own video, so why do we care if they’re taking video? Unless they try to get up too close.”
Because of the phone being taken at the end, Donaldson said they are still trying to figure out if any sheriff’s office policies were violated.
Some comments on Facebook decry the arrests, but Donaldson said that’s what happens when people disobey law enforcement orders.
Bryson Williams, who posted the video on Facebook, said on his profile that the girls are his cousins and that Smith was arrested “for no reason,” and called the Odessa Police Department “crooked,” although it was sheriff’s office deputies who made the arrests.
The Williams women remain in custody at the Ector County Detention on bonds totaling $12,000 each.
Williams also said the cell phones were confiscated, though Donaldson said cell phones had been returned since then.
“She’s getting up there close and he’s already told her several times to get back and leave,” Donaldson said. “If people would have followed the orders that they were given then it wouldn’t have ended up the way it did. If you think something’s wrong, if you think an officer’s wrong in what he’s doing, there’s a process to take care of that. The process is not right there at the scene.”
Copyright 2014 the Odessa American