Incident reports detail Wesley Wells' detention by Tupelo police

Caleb Bedillion, Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, Tupelo
·3 min read

Mar. 19—TUPELO — When three police officers detained a local Black business leader on Tuesday night, one of them was not wearing a body camera — a violation of Tupelo Police Department policy.

Mayor Jason Shelton's administration on Thursday released incident reports filed by officers at the scene detailing the temporary detention of Wesley Wells at the Mall at Barnes Crossing after law enforcement suspected he might be a shoplifter. The records were released to the Daily Journal on Thursday following a public records request.

The incident reports reveal that officer Dan Porch was not wearing a body camera at the scene. He said he left it on the charging dock at police headquarters.

The mayor also said he is willing to release the police body camera footage from the other officers at the scene — Roy Noe and Blake Hudson — if Wells will give his permission.

Shelton is not required to seek Wells' consent before releasing the footage.

Three City Council members saw at least some of the body camera footage during a Wednesday meeting involving at least Mayor Jason Shelton, Chief Operations Officer Don Lewis, Police Chief Bart Aguirre, Deputy Chief Anthony Hill, Deputy Chief Jackie Clayton, Ward 1 Councilman Markel Whittington, Ward 4 Councilwoman Nettie Davis and Ward 7 Councilman Willie Jennings.

Davis and Jennings are the only two Black members of the city council.

Jennings said he was "disturbed" by the video and said that he made the initial request for a pair of police officers to be suspended without pay while an investigation remains ongoing

However, Jennings declined to answer questions from the Daily Journal about the specific content of the video. He cited the ongoing internal investigation.

Incident reports filed by the three officers largely present the same account of events: Wells was approached by an officer as he was walking somewhere in the vicinity of Dick's Sporting Goods because his clothing matched a shoplifting suspect who had allegedly fled from Belk.

Wells reportedly declined at first to identify himself, asking instead why police were questioning him.

He eventually offered his first name but was not in physical possession of identification at the time.

Once a second officer arrived at the scene, police searched Wells, and he was "placed in two sets of handcuffs, double locked, and checked for tightness, until [he was] able to identify himself."

Examination of Belk security footage eventually revealed that Wells was not the suspect police were seeking, and he was released, the police reports reveal.

Davis and Whittington both questioned the decision by police officers to handcuff Wells.

"I didn't like some of their language, and I didn't really see the need for Wesley to be handcuffed," Davis said. "He didn't do anything; he didn't try to run away. It's like you're taking an innocent person and you're punishing them before you have the facts."

While noting that "one of the officers was very nice," Whittington had similar concerns about police tactics.

"Wesley just didn't seem to be a threat to anything, and I don't know why it escalated to handcuffs, but it did. So hopefully, we can get to the bottom of it and move on," said Whittington.

Based only on the video, Davis said she was not sure if police targeted Wells because of his race or not, and she said police initially seemed to believe he was white.

However, she spoke from firsthand experience about the prevalence of racial profiling.

"There is a lot of racial profiling," Davis said. "I know that from being Black. If you're Black, you catch hell."

An internal investigation remains ongoing into the conduct of officers during the incident. Shelton announced that two of the three officers have been suspended without pay as this investigation continues, the third has been verbally counseled and all will receive sensitivity and de-escalation training.

caleb.bedillion@djournal.com

Recommended Stories

  • Adam Schiff: will the Democratic star of Trump's impeachment trial be California's next top cop?

    Congressman is a top contender for the role, but immigrant groups and criminal justice advocates say his record should disqualify him Adam Schiff, a representative from southern California, looks increasingly well positioned to be appointed as the state’s next attorney general. Photograph: J Scott Applewhite/AP As the lead prosecutor in Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial, Adam Schiff, the representative from southern California, became a household name, an icon of the anti-Trump resistance, and a rising star in the Democratic party. A year on, the congressman looks increasingly well positioned to be appointed as California’s next attorney general. But in Schiff’s home district, criminal justice and immigrant rights advocates say that his record as state senator and congressman, authoring legislation to increase the criminalization and incarceration of Black and brown Californians, should disqualify him from holding the position. “There’s this real disconnect,” said Jody Armour, a University of Southern California law professor who studies the intersection of race and legal decision making. “The country knows Schiff as sort of an icon. Here in California, we know him as someone who was, in many ways, one of the chief architects of mass incarceration.” Schiff has reportedly been lobbying Governor Gavin Newsom for the attorney general spot that will open up if the US Senate confirms Xavier Becerra as the health and human services secretary later this week. The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, has given her blessings, and reportedly even a personal endorsement. Schiff, 60, began his career at a US district court in California, first as a law clerk and eventually as an assistant US attorney, rising to prominence for prosecuting the case against a former FBI agent convicted of spying for the Soviet Union. He was elected to the California state senate in 1996, and four years later moved to the US House of Representatives. There, he served as the chair of the powerful intelligence committee, becoming one of Pelosi’s closest confidants. As the lead impeachment manager pursuing Trump for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, Schiff’s fiery speeches gained him lavish praise from liberals, begrudging recognition from conservatives and $41m in campaign funds last election cycle. Schiff’s star power, his powerful allies in the Democratic party and fundraising prowess have set him up as a top contender for attorney general. ‘Tough on crime’ record California voters elect their top prosecutor every four years, but Becerra will be leaving his seat with a year of his term left – leaving it to Newsom to find a replacement until the next election. From there, Schiff could be in a better position than he currently is to run for US Senate, or even governor in the future. In recent years, and especially under Donald Trump, the California attorney general has become a national figure. Becerra launched more than 100 lawsuits against the previous administration, successfully sueing to block policies that would strong-arm local law enforcement to cooperate with immigration authorities, insert a question about immigration status into the US census, or end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (Daca) program, which gives temporary protection to undocumented immigrants who arrived in the US as children. California’s attorney general, Xavier Becerra, right, will be leaving his post with a year of his term left, which Governor Gavin Newsom will have to fill. Photograph: Rich Pedroncelli/AP Critics say Schiff’s appointment would run counter to the political progress on police reform and criminal justice made last year amid nationwide protests following the killing of George Floyd. Armour, along with a number of academics, activists and advocates in California, have asked Newsom to appoint someone else. “One person alone is not responsible for California’s incarceration crisis. But Schiff stands out for his extreme punitiveness,” they wrote in a public letter. They pointed at Schiff’s legislative proposals and votes in the California senate in the late 1990s, which were in line with the “tough on crime” attitude of politicians in that era. Schiff authored several bills to toughen up the criminal justice system and immigration enforcement, including a proposal that would have expanded the three strikes law, one that would have allowed 14-year-olds to be tried as adults, and a bill to create juvenile “boot camps” for children who commit crimes while at school. On immigration, he authored a bill that would have made the hiring of an undocumented immigrant a crime punishable with jail time. Many of the most punitive criminal justice bills Schiff introduced never became law. They failed to get enough support in the legislature or were vetoed by both Republican and Democratic governors. More recently, as a US representative, Schiff sided with Republicans in 2017 to support the Thin Blue Line Act, which would have altered the federal criminal code to add the targeting or killing of a law enforcement officer to the list of offenses that could be sentenced with the federal death penalty. The law was criticized by civil rights organizations, including the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and it ran counter to policies espoused by Newsom, who issued an executive order to halt executions in California in 2019. The discrepancy between Schiff’s record and California’s priorities are noteworthy, at a moment when the state attorney general will serve as a key player in debates around police accountability, criminal justice reform and immigration. Under new California law, the state’s attorney general will take on the role of investigating all deadly police shootings of unarmed civilians. And the state is continuing to challenge Trump-era policies that restricted immigrant rights. In June, Schiff did disavow Jackie Lacey, the former Los Angeles district attorney who faced fierce backlash from the Black Lives Matter movement for her failure to prosecute police violence. “This is a rare time in our nation’s history. We have a responsibility to make profound changes to end systemic racism and reform criminal justice,” Schiff said. Schiff’s office did not respond to the Guardian’s request for response to the concerns detailed in advocates’ letter to the governor. The congressman has repeatedly brushed off questions about his attorney general ambitions in national news interviews. But Armour said he wished Schiff would explicitly reckon with his record, much like Biden and Kamala Harris – herself a former California attorney general – did in the lead-up to the 2020 elections. Newsom meanwhile has remained secretive about who his final pick will be. Other top contenders include Rob Bonta, an assembly member representing Oakland who has been endorsed by the Black Lives Matter co-founder Alicia Garza, and Diane Becton, the Contra Costa county district attorney.

  • Biden says US to hit 100 million virus goal on Friday

    With the U.S. closing in on President Joe Biden's goal of injecting 100 million coronavirus vaccinations weeks ahead of his target date, the White House said the nation is now in position to help supply neighbors Canada and Mexico with millions of lifesaving shots. The Biden administration on Thursday revealed the outlines of a plan to “loan” a limited number of vaccines to Canada and Mexico as the president announced the U.S. is on the cusp of meeting his 100-day injection goal “way ahead of schedule.”

  • Ousted Myanmar lawmakers eye ICC probe, more deaths reported after protests

    Military and police have used increasingly violent tactics to suppress demonstrations by supporters of detained elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi but that has not put off the protests, with crowds out again in several towns on Friday. The total number killed in weeks of unrest has risen to at least 224, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners activist group said, noting another death in the commercial hub of Yangon and two in the cities of Monywa and Bago on Thursday.

  • A city outside Seattle just passed a 'no sit, no lie' ordinance for a 10-block swath of sidewalks aimed at homeless communities

    Councilmember Liz Vogeli voted no: "I don't think sitting and lying down is a crime, nor do I think that it is a good idea to create it as a crime."

  • North Korea cuts ties with Malaysia over US extradition

    North Korea on Friday announced the termination of diplomatic ties with Malaysia over its decision to allow the extradition of a North Korean criminal suspect to the United States. The ministry said that it was announcing “total severance of the diplomatic relations with Malaysia, which committed super-large hostile act against (North Korea) in subservience to the U.S. pressure.”

  • Private investigator admits to illegally spying on Meghan Markle on behalf of British tabloid

    A private investigator is revealing that a British tabloid paid him large sums of money to spy on Meghan Markle at the onset of her relationship with Prince Harry. Daniel Portley-Hanks, who is now a retired private investigator out of Los Angeles, was hired by The Sun to obtain private information about Markle, now the Duchess of Sussex, The New York Times reported on Thursday.

  • With striking of Black juror, Floyd activists see racism

    A prospective juror who once lived in the neighborhood where George Floyd was arrested told the attorney for an ex-officer charged in Floyd's death that he had a personal reason for wanting to serve on the jury. “Because me, as a Black man, you see a lot of Black people get killed and no one’s held accountable for it, and you wonder why or what was the decisions,” Juror No. 76 said under questioning during jury selection in Derek Chauvin's murder trial. “We have a Black man who was probably in the best position to judge the case being excluded,” said Nekima Levy Armstrong, a civil rights attorney and head of a community activism organization called Wayfinder Foundation.

  • A private investigator says The Sun paid him to dig up private information on Meghan Markle and her family

    The Sun hired a famous private investigator to get information on Meghan Markle. He says he accessed her phone and Social Security numbers.

  • SLS: Successful test for world's most powerful rocket

    Engineers have carried out a major engine test of Nasa's Space Launch System.

  • Armie Hammer accused of 'violently' raping a woman for more than 4 hours and committing 'other acts of violence' against her

    A woman, identified as Effie, said in a press conference Thursday that she thought the "Social Network" actor "was going to kill me."

  • 'He lied through his teeth': Morning Joe slams Bill Barr after report reveals China did not try to subvert US election

    Joe Scarborough says former attorney general should be held accountable

  • The US hasn't authorized AstraZeneca's vaccine for 2 main reasons. That could change in April.

    If the vaccine is found to be safe and effective in US trials, the FDA could authorize it for emergency use next month.

  • Liberals Grow Impatient With Biden's Foreign Policy Decisions

    WASHINGTON — Earlier this week, Biden administration officials passed around with bemusement some words of praise from an unexpected source: Jared Kushner. In an opinion essay for The Wall Street Journal, Kushner, former President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and adviser on Middle East issues, said that President Joe Biden “did the right thing” and had “called Iran’s bluff” by refusing to make new concessions to lure Iran into talks about restoring a nuclear deal abandoned by the Trump administration. Kushner may have meant well, but his seal of approval compounded a problem for Biden by inflaming liberal allies already disappointed that his nuclear diplomacy with Iran had not made swifter progress. Sign up for The Morning newsletter from the New York Times “I would take this in the Biden White House as a giant, blinking red light that maybe what I’m doing is not right because Jared Kushner is finding ways to praise it,” said Benjamin Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser under former President Barack Obama who worked closely on the 2015 nuclear agreement, speaking Wednesday on the “Pod Save the World” podcast. Iran is just one of several foreign policy issues frustrating Biden’s base two months into his presidency. Although Biden delighted them with several swift actions — among them rejoining the Paris climate accord and withdrawing support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen — he triggered frustration by ordering an airstrike in Syria and declining to punish the crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, over the brutal murder of a dissident journalist and U.S. resident, Jamal Khashoggi. On Wednesday, Biden fueled the discontent when he conceded in an interview with ABC News that it would be “tough” to meet a May 1 deadline, set under the Trump administration, to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, a high priority for liberals impatient to end what they call “endless” American wars. And more conflict may lie ahead on military spending, with Biden expected to propose few if any cuts to a Pentagon budget that swelled under Trump. Fifty House Democrats sent Biden a letter this week calling for a “significant” reduction. After seeing Biden deliver a transformational $1.9 trillion stimulus bill, progressives are asking why his foreign policy feels so conventional. They worry that Biden and his largely centrist team of national security officials will disappoint the liberal wing’s desires for a new U.S. foreign policy that relies far less on military power, de-escalates tensions with rivals like Iran and China, and places greater pressure — under threat of cooler relations — on allies like Saudi Arabia and Israel. Biden administration officials dispute the criticism as unfair and premature. One senior administration official said the Trump era created an unrealistic appetite for finger-snap action on complex issues and that the longer arc of Biden’s policies would satisfy many frustrated liberals. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss unofficial political considerations. The official also pointed to several early actions by Biden welcomed by the left, including his returning to the climate deal, the World Health Organization and the United Nations Human Rights Council. Biden also reversed visa restrictions widely known as Trump’s “Muslim Ban,” announced an end to U.S. support for the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen and has placed temporary new limits on drone strikes outside combat zones. Some prominent liberals call those moves welcome, but also low-hanging fruit, and say that on matters requiring harder trade-offs and political courage, Biden is too risk-averse. They worry that a 78-year-old president may recall too keenly the days when Republicans routinely enjoyed a political advantage on national security issues and Democrats gravitated to more conservative, militaristic policies to defend their right flank. “I think that there is a lack of belief that the politics around some of these issues have actually shifted,” said Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the Israel-focused, liberal advocacy group J Street. “There is a lot more political space open to this administration to pursue progressive policy than they think.” The Middle East, which Biden officials hope to de-emphasize as they turn America’s attention to China, is the source of many complaints. Topping the list is Biden’s decision not to unilaterally rejoin the Iran nuclear deal by reversing harsh sanctions imposed on Iran by Trump after he abandoned the agreement in 2018. Iran says it will not talk, much less scale back its advancing nuclear program and comply with the deal’s limits, until Biden acts. Supporters of the original deal, including Obama administration officials who helped to design it, say the passage of time only allows for political opposition to build at home and for events in the dangerous region to trigger an escalation. They also complain that Biden is maintaining the sanctions Trump applied on Iran when he exited the nuclear deal, even though Iran had been in compliance at the time. Kushner referred to this approvingly as a “strong hand” that Biden had inherited. “The Biden administration has bought the Trump analysis that these sanctions give America leverage, even though the sanctions didn’t give Trump any leverage on Iran,” said Joseph Cirincione, a longtime arms control expert who consulted closely with Obama administration officials over the nuclear deal. Further complicating the prospects for nuclear talks was Biden’s Feb. 25 airstrike targeting Iranian-backed militia fighters in Syria, a retaliation for militia rocket attacks on U.S. forces in neighboring Iraq. Although the strike was limited, it derailed nascent nuclear diplomacy and risked escalation, Cirincione said. The strike also angered liberals determined to end what they call America’s “endless” or “forever” wars — its military and counterterrorism campaigns across the Middle East and parts of Africa that began after the Sept. 11 attacks. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said the strike “puts our country on the path of continuing the Forever War instead of ending it,” and he questioned its legal justification. (The White House says it supports congressional action to repeal and replace Bush-era laws that provide presidents with broad authority to use force.) Compounding the frustration is a sense among liberals that Biden’s national security team is stocked with centrists who have supported past U.S. military interventions, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and the president’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan. Critics of Biden’s early Middle East policy have focused their attention on Brett McGurk, the National Security Council’s coordinator for the region. McGurk entered government as an aide in former President George W. Bush’s White House but stayed on through the Obama and Trump presidencies. He has strong relationships with leaders in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — oil-rich states labeled repressive by human rights activists and that liberals see as exerting an unwelcome influence over U.S. policy. McGurk helped shape Biden’s decision, decried on the left, not to directly punish Crown Prince Mohammed even after the White House declassified an intelligence report that found that he, the de facto Saudi leader, approved the operation that led to the murder of Khashoggi in 2018. Many liberals said the moral imperative of barring Crown Prince Mohammed from future visits to the United States, at a minimum, should outweigh the familiar realpolitik of preserving relations with the Saudi kingdom. Some were encouraged by the prospect that Sanders’ foreign policy adviser, Matthew Duss, another Middle East specialist, would join the administration. But after job discussions with the State Department, Duss recently decided to remain on Sanders’ staff, telling the publication Jewish Currents that it was “the best place to keep working to support a progressive agenda.” Even before that disclosure, many liberals complained that “the Biden foreign policy team includes no one who has been a clear and consistent opponent of our disastrous interventions across the world,” as Katrina vanden Heuvel, former editor of the leftist Nation magazine, wrote in a Washington Post opinion column. And as Blinken and Sullivan meet Thursday and Friday with senior Chinese diplomats, some liberals also chafe at the Biden team’s hawkish stance toward Beijing, again warning that it has Trump-inflected confrontational tones and noting that Chinese cooperation is essential to fighting climate change. Among other things, Biden has not rolled back the stiff tariffs Trump placed on Chinese imports. “I’ve been incredibly disappointed, though not shocked, that the Biden administration has leaned into the confrontational posture advocated by the foreign policy establishment,” said Kate Kizer, policy director for an anti-interventionist group, Win Without War. “More militarization and demonization is not the answer. Making deep investments in diplomacy and in building resiliency here at home is.” Some Democrats are pressing the case for a huge diplomatic infusion. On Tuesday, a group of Democratic Senate and House members called for a $12 billion increase to the U.S. international affairs budget to fund diplomacy. And even more congressional Democrats are simultaneously calling for deep cuts to a Pentagon budget that grew by 20% under Trump, to $740 billion. “We have so many domestic needs here at home,” said Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif. Lee is also among those weary of extended deadlines for withdrawals from Afghanistan like the one Biden hinted at Wednesday. “We’ve got to bring our troops home,” she said, “and we’ve got to do that quickly.” This article originally appeared in The New York Times. © 2021 The New York Times Company

  • COVID vaccine survey might be a scam, watchdog warns. What to know before clicking

    The BBB has reported a rise in scams related to the COVID vaccines.

  • Lebanon Hezbollah chief will support new cabinet if announced Monday

    Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Thursday he would support a new Lebanese cabinet if one is announced on Monday, but said that a government formed solely of specialists would not last. President Michel Aoun is scheduled to meet with Prime Minister-designate Saad al-Hariri next week. The two politicians have been wrangling for months as the country sinks deeper into financial crisis.

  • 72 Democrats sign motion to expel Marjorie Taylor Greene from Congress

    The Congresswoman says war has been declared on ‘strong Republican women’

  • David Davis hits out at Scottish prosecutors as they consider launching probe into Salmond leak

    Scottish prosecutors have indicated they could investigate how David Davis obtained leaked messages which he said pointed towards a criminal plot against Alex Salmond. The Crown Office declared on Thursday that it was "considering if any further investigation is required" after the senior Tory used parliamentary privilege to read out texts between senior SNP figures including Nicola Sturgeon’s husband, which were disclosed to Mr Salmond ahead of his criminal trial. The former Brexit Secretary swiftly took exception to the announcement, as he told officials to "go back and read their law books". Meanwhile, Ms Sturgeon attacked Mr Davis and Mr Salmond as “the very epitome of the old boys’ club” and demanded an apology from the former Brexit Secretary, who she described as her predecessor's "old pal".

  • Teen Vogue editor steps down after anti-Asian posts resurfaced: ‘Past tweets overshadowed work’

    Alexi McCammond, the newly hired Teen Vogue editor-in-chief, has resigned following backlash over her decade-old racist tweets that recently resurfaced. McCammond, 27, who was set to begin her new job on 24 March, announced the decision in a statement shared to Twitter, where she said her “past tweets have overshadowed the work I’ve done”. “My past tweets have overshadowed the work I’ve done to highlight the people and issues that I care about - issues that Teen Vogue has worked tirelessly to share with the world - and so Condé Nast and I have decided to part ways,” McCammond wrote.

  • Rock Hill teen charged in Jan. 6 Capitol riot no longer part of Republicans at Citadel

    Charged with illegal entry into the U.S. Capitol, the cadet was kicked out of the Republican Club, but remains enrolled at the school.

  • Paris goes into lockdown as COVID-19 variant rampages

    France imposed a month-long lockdown on Paris and parts of the north after a faltering vaccine rollout and spread of highly contagious coronavirus variants forced President Emmanuel Macron to shift course. Since late January, when he defied the calls of scientists and some in his government to lock the country down, Macron has said he would do whatever it took to keep the euro zone's second largest economy as open as possible. However, this week he ran out of options just as France and other European countries briefly suspended use of the AstraZenca vaccine.