An Arkansas police officer was placed on leave after putting a ninth grade student in a chokehold.
Video obtained by an NBC affiliate shows Officer Jake Perry, a law enforcement officer in Camden, Arkansas, repeatedly lifting Camden Fairview High School student Dekyrion Ellis by the neck. At one point, Perry allegedly lifts Ellis off the ground while the student grasps the officer’s arm.
“I feared for my life,” Ellis said to local media. “I didn’t know what was going to happen. I blacked out. I really didn’t see anything until he took me back to the office.”
“He could’ve taken me to the office. He didn’t have to restrain me,” Ellis said about the officer’s actions. Ellis said that Perry, a school resource officer, interrupted an argument between him and another student. The argument then allegedly escalated into a fight involving multiple students.
“The police officer pushed the kids off of me, and he grabbed me and started choking me against the glass,” Ellis recalled. “It wasn’t like I was trying to get away from him. I wasn’t resisting arrest.” Ellis’s family took the ninth grader to a hospital for X-rays on his neck following the incident.
“My son couldn’t even breathe,” Ellis’s mother Alonna Parker said. ”It was just really uncalled-for.”
Police Chief Boyd Woody said Perry would be placed on leave pending an investigation of the incident. “As the police chief, I will not tolerate misconduct from my officers, and this matter will be dealt with accordingly, and I will be transparent in doing so,” he said.
