Cop Kicks Pregnant Woman In Stomach, Dept. Says He Was Within Policy
By Maurice Garland
2:02 PM May 10th, 2012
Officer says he didn't know the woman was pregnant.
Just when you thought the police ran out of ways to disgust you.
Dekalb County police officer Jerad Wheeler was called to a home to settle a domestic dispute involving a pregnant woman named Raven Dozier, her brother and his child and baby's mother.
As things escalated Wheeler pulled out his taser and used it on Dozier's brother. She says that's when she started crying and asking the officer why he used a taser on her brother.
Wheeler must not have been in a talking mood because after he used the taser on him, he then kicked Dozier in the stomach.
"I think he really just didn't want me asking him any questions, questioning him, and when I did question him is when he kicked me," she tells Atlanta's Channel 2 Action News. "I was upset because I couldn't believe an officer would kick me, with my child in my stomach."
Dozier was almost nine months pregnant and wound up giving birth via an emergency C-section two weeks after the kick left a bruise. The now 4-month old baby was born and is healthy.
"What kind of a human being kicks a pregnant woman?" says Dozier's attorney Mark Bullman. "I mean, forget whether or not it is a police officer that is supposedly protecting people."
Officer Wheeler says that he couldn't tell that Dozier was pregnant and that he only kicked her because she came at him aggressively. He also described the kick as "a front push kick to the abdomen, as he was taught to do at the academy," in his police report.
On top of getting kicked in the stomach, Dozier was also charged with obstruction, a charge that was later dropped. She also filed a complaint with the Dekalb County Police Department, but the matter was never investigated and they said that Officer Wheeler's actions were within department policy.
This isn't the first time Wheeler has acted questionably. In 2011, he was accused of manhandling a 53-year old woman, twisting her arm behind her back and shoving her face down into a patrol car. She says she was only trying to check on her grandchildren who had just got in a car wreck with their mother. This past January, Wheeler was accused of showing up to the wrong address when called, and then shooting that family's dog.
Wheeler is currently under criminal investigation.