Authorities in Ohio are investigating why a police dog was allowed to attack a semi-truck driver during a traffic stop.
In the body cam footage, the truck driver, 23-year-old Jadarrius Rose, can be seen complying with orders from police officers to get on his knees and keep his hands in the air.
According to police, Rose had led law enforcement on a highway chase.
The incident occurred July 4 in the grassy center median of the U.S. Route 23 near Circleville, Ohio, about 28 miles south of Columbus.
In the body cam video, one patrolman can be heard ordering repeatedly, “Do not release the dog with his hands up.”
After the dog’s handler, who in the video shouts at Rose, “Get on the ground or you’re going to get bit,” the dog is released and the handler himself shouted at by several patrolmen, “Get the dog off of him!”
What sounds like Rose screaming can next be heard as several officers, including the dog’s handler, can be seen rushing to Rose as he’s being attacked, and they pull the animal off of him.
According to a statement from Ohio State Highway Patrol, “As troopers were attempting to gain compliance by providing verbal commands to the suspect, the Circleville Police Department deployed their canine, which resulted in the suspect being bitten by the canine.”
The statement stressed that “the canine involved in the incident is from the Circleville Police Department and not the Ohio State Highway Patrol.”
The statement adds that Rose was taken into custody and troopers immediately performed first aid on him as they waited for paramedics to arrive.
After receiving hospital treatment, Rose was released into the custody of Highway Police. He was booked in county jail on charges of failure to comply, a fourth-degree felony.
In her own statement, NAACP Columbus Branch President Nana Watson said, “This type of barbaric behavior brought back horrible memories and images of the unleashing of dogs on civil [rights] activists that occurred in the South during the 1960’s.”
The Circleville Police Department said the city’s Use of Force Review Board is conducting an investigation, but is “unable to provide any further details at this time.”
