Georgia Police Tried To Arrest a Paralyzed Man for Kicking Down a Woman’s Door and Assaulting Her
Last month, police officers in College Park, Georgia detained Charles Read for felony assault charges, alleging that he kicked down his ex-girlfriend’s door and attempted to strangle her. The only problem? Read is paraplegic—and has been for more than 20 years. Despite the obvious discrepancy, police officers still handcuffed Read and tried to take him to jail, even as the same officers seemed unsure if it was physically possible for him to have committed the crime in the first place.
“If she made a false report, that’s going to be on her . . . It’s a warrant now. I have to go ahead and take you in. So now that’s gonna be up to you and the courts and your lawyers and her to establish your innocence,” Officer Mark Belotte told Read in body camera footage obtained by Reason. “So at this point, she says you kicked down her door. It don’t look like you could kick anything, no offense, at this point in time.”
In June 2024, a woman named Katherine Jensen called police and reported that Read, whom she claimed she had broken up with a few days prior, had come to her house, kicked down her door, choked her, and attempted to steal her car keys. Afterward, he left on foot. In body camera footage obtained by Reason, Jensen told police that she didn’t want to press charges. Still, officers obtained an arrest warrant for Read.
It’s unclear why it took police so long to detain Read, who said he had been in contact with police for more than a month before coming to the station.Â
When Read arrived at the police station on March 20, Officer Mark Belotte—the same one who originally responded to Jensen’s call in June—read Read his Miranda rights and began questioning him. Belotte asked if Read knew anyone named “Kather
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