NFL Player pulled over while Mom in law Dies.
 

Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle stood in front of a dozen news cameras this afternoon at police headquarters to apologize for the behavior of an officer who stopped a family outside a hospital emergency room.

Kunkle said Officer Robert Powell has been placed on paid administrative leave in connection with an incident last week in which he stopped a family rushing to visit a dying mother, detaining them for 13 minutes to write a traffic ticket.

“His behavior in my opinion, did not exhibit the common sense, discretion, the compassion that we expect our officers to exhibit,” the chief told a packed audience of media outlets that included Inside Edition.

During the traffic stop, caught on the officer’s in-car camera, Powell berated the driver, 26-year-old NFL running back Ryan Moats, and threatened him with arrest for running a traffic light.

“I can screw you over,” said Powell, 25. “I’d rather not do that.”

At one point during today’s news conference, Kunkle seemed to restrain himself from being even more candid with his views on the incident.

“When we in the command staff reviewed the tapes,” he said, “we were embarrassed, disappointed — it’s hard to find the right words and still be professional in my role as a police chief.”

The chief also praised Moats and his family for how they handled the officer’s behavior.

“They exercised extraordinary patience, restraint, dealing with the behavior of our officer,” Kunkle said. “At no time did Mr. Moats identify himself as an NFL football player or expect any kind of special consideration. He handled himself very, very well.”

Moats rolled through a red light as he and his wife were en route to Baylor Regional Medical Center at Plano. A Dallas police squad car pulled their SUV over near the hospital's emergency entrance.

Moats and his wife implored the officer to let them hurry on to the bedside of her ill mother.

“You really want to go through this right now?” Moats pleaded. “My mother-in-law is dying. Right now!”

His wife, Tamishia Moats, said Powell "was pointing a gun at me as soon as I got out of the car. It was the weirdest feeling because I’ve never had a gun pointed at me before under those circumstances.”

Powell then spent long minutes writing Moats a ticket and threatening him with arrest.





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Pullling over is one thing...drawing a gun....well....that's a bit much.

*SMH* It HAD to be Dallas...

That cop was being an ass just to be one. One of my line brothers is a cop and he says that they're allowed to use their judgment in situations like this. I don't know how I would have reacted if I was in the same position.

ETA for the lawyers: Would the family have any standing to collect any damages?

did you watch the unedited video from the police camera?

This made me so mad!! Even after the nurse comes out and says that the lady is about to die and asks if the men can go up to see her, the cop says that he's almost done, then takes minutes more and continues to lecture the guy!!

I hope he gets fired!!!

Here's the article that has the video

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcont...p.3e9c080.html

I wonder what the possibility of her living would have been if the officer had just let him go....


One of them was needed to sign a rescusitation order...

Poor discretion on his part.

And they are laughing about it at the end of the video!!!

No kind of remorse...gotta love audio and video!!!

The language for the story running on MSN is significantly different. Interesting....

Forget the story....the video is damning all by itself.

and MSN is in bed with Fix News...so of course the language will be 'different'.

Just read it here (AP posted it) and they left out what else transpired (the mom dying after Moats made it in and etc) and other things....wow.

I don't even need to watch the video (can't right now anyway), I am sure that the cop was being an a**. I had just read the story on MSN before I saw this post and the 'clean up' was so obvious.

I heard about it yesterday, but because I couldn't understand WTH the news was talking about, I ignored it. Then, I saw it again on CNN, and was like, HUH?

What DWB? A loved one was DYING! I am sure the driver was not in his right mind to follow every single traffic law. It does not give him a reason to violate the laws, but you can be served by law enforcement in a more professional manner than saying "I could make your life Hell right now, but I don't want to..."

How about saying, "EFF YOU TOO!!!" I though Dallas cops were better than that... Well, let's say Irving, 'cuz I am unsure, but it looked like Irving to me. But if she was in Parkland... :rolleyes: Zale Lipshy or St. Paul, yeah!

For as many people who have driven under "the suspicion", I still like this video.

Just watched the video and I'm pissed off. You have other officer's, security guards, and a nurse telling him that Ryan wasn't lying. How cruel do you have to be to not let someone see their loved one one last time?

This is so ridiculous. I saw it on the local news.

A nurse and security guard went out and TOLD the police officer the woman was hanging on by a thread and wouldn't be alive much longer and he still did nothing.

At some point in the dashcam video (I think it was towards the beginning) the police officer said "I could make this a really bad say for you"

What a jerk.

the pig's still getting a paycheck too...

Because even a "pig" is entitled to due process -- a fair hearing before his pay is cut or he is fired. Which I hope he is.

If there was a legal remedy that would lie because the defendant acted like an enormous douchebag, Moats could retire from the NFL right now.

Disgusting, just disgusting. He had no compassion whatsoever.

He was right in the beginning, stop a car who ran a red light. Afterward, it was a total power trip. What an a-hole.