Sheriff claims deputies didn’t search lacrosse staff’s personal items, body camera reveals in any other case

LIBERTY COUNTY, Ga. (WTOC/Grey News) - An incident that involved players from a college’s lacrosse crew and deputies in Georgia remains beneath investigation.

WTOC studies Delaware State University President Tony Allen released an announcement on Monday responding to the incident that reportedly happened on April 20 in Liberty County.

Allen wrote Georgia law enforcement stopped a bus for a minor visitors violation with the Delaware State Lacrosse group on board. Deputies searched the belongings of the student-athletes, including suitcases with drug-sniffing dogs.

“100% you may’t be in that left lane at all,” mentioned a Liberty County Sheriff’s Deputy.

The staff was returning house from a sport in Florida and traveling by a contracted bus, in line with Allen.

Liberty County Sheriff William Bowman held a information convention concerning the incident but took no questions. He claimed that no private items on the bus had been searched.

Body digicam video obtained by WTOC, nevertheless, clearly confirmed the deputies going by way of the scholars’ luggage and even medicine.

The college president wrote in his statement that videos taken by gamers showed law enforcement trying to intimidate them into confessing to possession of medicine and/or drug paraphernalia.

“They didn’t really ask us,” mentioned Sydney Anderson, a Delaware State Lacrosse Participant. “They knowledgeable us of what they’re gonna do and no one questioned them...we simply allow them to rattle by means of our stuff.”

A participant on the bus asked: “How did we go from being in the improper lane to going by our luggage?”

A deputy responded: “Effectively, he stopped y’all, he didn’t stop y’all for a site visitors violation...he stopped the driving force for a visitors violation.”

Nothing illegal was found within the search, and Allen knowledgeable the general public that he has contacted Delaware’s governor, the Black Caucus and different state officials.

Allen wrote that everyone was incensed over the incident.

Allen also added the following:

“We do not intend to let this or any other incident like it cross idly by. We're prepared to go wherever the evidence leads us. We have video. We've got allies. Perhaps extra significantly, we have the braveness of our convictions.”

Allen concluded his assertion by writing, “We'll never be bullied into believing something other than what we are: Individuals, learners, academics, builders—useful and honorable folks ready to soar.”

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