Iowa officer admits failing to record arrest of pepper-sprayed reporter at BLM protest

An Iowa police officer who pepper-sprayed and arrested a journalist covering a Black Lives Matter protest acknowledged on Tuesday that he failed to record the interaction on his body camera and did not notify a supervisor as required.

Case of reporter facing trial over BLM coverage seen as attack on press rights

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Luke Wilson said his body camera was on when he arrested Des Moines Register reporter Andrea Sahouri on 31 May 2020, and that he believed he had activated its record function.

His testimony came on the second day of a trial in which Sahouri and Spenser Robnett, her former boyfriend, are charged with failure to disperse and interference with official acts. The prosecution has drawn widespread criticism from media and human rights advocates, who say Sahouri was doing her job and committed no crimes. The pair face fines and even jail time.

The newspaper assigned Sahouri to cover the protest for racial justice at Merle Hay mall in Des Moines, days after the death of George Floyd, a Black Minneapolis man who was killed when a white officer put his knee on his neck for nine minutes. Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the mall. Sahouri reported details live on Twitter.

Wilson, an 18-year veteran of the Des Moines police department, said he found a “riotous mob” breaking store windows, throwing rocks and water bottles at officers, and running in different directions. He said his unit was told to clear a parking lot, and he used a device known as a fogger to blanket the area with clouds of pepper spray.

He said the chemical irritants worked in forcing most of the crowd to scatter, including Robnett, but he decided Sahouri should be arrested when she did not leave. Wilson said he was unaware that Sahouri, whose eyes were watering and nose was running from the spray, was a journalist.

Wilson said he grabbed her with his left hand while his fogger was in his right hand. Wilson said Robnett returned and tried to pull Sahouri out of his grasp, and Wilson deployed more pepper spray that “incapacitated” Robnett.

Under cross-examination by defense attorney Nicholas Klinefeldt, Wilson said he charged Sahouri with interference because she briefly pulled her left arm away while he was arresting her. He acknowledged, however, that he didn’t mention that claim in his report on the arrest.

Wilson said he only rarely used his body camera during his normal job at the city airport, wrongly believed it had recorded Sahouri’s arrest and was unfamiliar with body-camera policy.

Prosecutors say Sahouri and Robnett ignored orders to leave the area long before their arrests, while the defense argues any such orders weren’t clear.

Wilson said he did not initially charge Robnett with failing to disperse because he left when he was hit with pepper spray.