Man Seen Being Beaten By Dallas PD Officers In Video Files Federal Suit Naming City, Officers

Last week, the Dallas Police Department used its Facebook page to show dash-cam footage from January 27 in which Officer Quaitemes Williams is seen kicking and pepper-spraying Rodarick Lyles, who'd been pulled over by another officer for driving with a suspended license. Williams, as you no doubt recall, was fired...

By Robert Wilonsky

March 3, 2011

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Last week, the Dallas Police Department used its Facebook page to show dash-cam footage from January 27 in which Officer Quaitemes Williams is seen kicking and pepper-spraying Rodarick Lyles, who'd been pulled over by another officer for driving with a suspended license. Williams, as you no doubt recall, was fired last week, then promptly arrested on an official oppression charge and taken to Dallas County Jail. Officer Hiram Soler, who'd initially stopped Lyles, was suspended for 10 days for entering inaccurate, false or improper information on a police report.

After the jump, you can read Lyles's account of the events -- as described in a federal lawsuit filed yesterday that names the city of Dallas, Williams and Soler as defendants. When Gary Reaves spoke with Lyles last week, he refused to go into the specifics of the incident; but at the end of the account, Reaves said, "Both he and his mother think race was a factor, and they said it's a problem Dallas police need to face head-on." The complaint alleges the officers did indeed use racial epithets and that one officer said to another after the beating, "You got your stripes tonight."

Rodarick Lyles v City of Dallas

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