Stacy Bonds was arrested for no apparent reason, then taken to jail—where officers roughed her up, searched her, cut off her bra and shirt, and left her to languish in a cell half-naked for hours. Luckily, there’s video.
“Luckily,” because it possibly saved Bonds from going to jail even longer than she did. But whether the video will help her seek justice against the officers seems uncertain-to-unlikely. Some commentators expect little will be done.
A slight, brown-skinned, 27-year-old makeup artist from Ottawa, Canada with no criminal record (natch), Bonds was arrested for public intoxication and taken to an Ottawa jail. A group of officers—four male, one female—subjected her to various forms of humiliation, then charged Bonds with assaulting them. The Ottawa Citizen, which procured a copy of video showing what went on inside the jail between the officers and Bonds, points out that Bonds appears to have “mule-kicked” one of the officers—after he stuck his hand down her pants. But then she stops resisting, which nevertheless leads to this particularly horrifying part:
Her bare back visible, Bonds is eventually lifted by the four male officers, her arm across her chest holding what remained of her tattered clothing in an attempt to prevent herself from being completely exposed.
Another camera angle, which is covered by the publication ban, shows Bonds being led down a hallway to a holding cell with nothing but her arm and the small piece of fabric covering her chest. The side of her breast is briefly exposed at one point.
Morris, the female officer, can be seen tearing away what’s left of Bonds’ shirt and bra before putting her in a cell with the help of the male officers.
Bonds, who had soiled herself, is then left half-naked and in dirty pants for at least three hours and 15 minutes before eventually being provided a pair of coveralls—an outcome [Judge Richard] Lajoie attributed to the vengeance and malice of the officers.
Bonds’ arrest happened in 2008, but her story’s now making headlines across Canada because her charge of assaulting a police officer just recently came up for trial. Judge Lajoie, who presided over the case, threw out the charge, calling Bonds’ treatment in jail an “indignity.” (The same judge also threw out her intoxication charge; the cops claimed Bonds had an open bottle when they arrested her, but no bottle was ever confiscated.)