In a two-page complaint filed in San Diego federal court last May, Border Patrol officials accused a 23-year-old woman they detained at a checkpoint along State Route 94 of pushing an agent as he moved her into a holding cell, and then throwing “a closed fist punch at him.”
The agent blocked the woman’s punch, then another agent fired a Taser at her and she fell to the ground, according to the complaint. The day after the incident, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Diego charged her with assaulting a federal officer, a crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison and a fine up to $250,000. The charge didn’t stick.
Months after the federal complaint was filed, the woman and her attorney obtained body-worn camera video footage from the agents involved, and a more nuanced – and concerning – picture of the incident emerged…