LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Representatives from the ACLU and NAACP addressed the recently released bodycam footage showing a CCSD officer slamming a student to the ground.
In a press conference on Friday morning, the Executive Director of the ACLU of Southern Nevada, Athar Haseebullah, Esq. commented on the footage and the legal effort to secure public access to footage from the incident, which occurred in February 2023.
He said he has not seen any evidence of a firearm near the scene that day, which is what CCSD has alleged lead to the interaction.
"Never happened," Hasseebullah told reporters. "And if you had the basis to stop anybody in the state of Nevada for a firearm possession within a certain radius, everybody in the state would be under arrest."
The footage was taken from the body camera of Clark County School District Police Lieutenant Jason Elfberg, who can be seen slamming a high school student to the ground and pinning him underneath his knee. The footage also shows officers shaking bottles and threatening to use pepper spray, warning the students, "Back up if you don't want to get sprayed. Back up. Back up."
This would later spark an investigation from CCSD into the conduct of the officers on the scene, which would conclude in June 2023 and determine that Lt. Elfberg would remain employed.
According to a report from CCSDPD, the students were detained in a "firearm-related incident," something both agencies pushed back against during the conference.
Haseebullah described the use of the police department's budget to fight against the release of the bodycam footage as "egregious."
"There have been attempts to prevent the release of these records every single step of the way," he said. "And for any family out there attempting to obtain public records on your own... one thing to remember is that they won't make it easy for you."
Christopher Peterson, the Legal Director of the ACLU, said that he was concerned about First Amendment violations that occurred during the incident. Additionally, he highlighted the violation of the students' right to film and criticize police officers, as well as officers' demands that the students "keep moving" when they had the right to remain on the public sidewalk.
"Questioning police is not an escalation. Demanding answers is not an escalation," he said. "That is an obligation that every member of our public has when they observe police actions that are inappropriate. When the police use violence, we should be asking why they are using violence."
Another concern Peterson highlighted was the student's fourth amendment rights, which protects them against unreasonable search and seizure. He also highlighted Lt. Elfberg's use of pepper spray in the video, which qualifies as a use of force, and claimed during the conference that any danger present during the incident was "manufactured by Elfberg."
"There was no basis to detain our clients, that's obvious from the video...we are concerned about broader, cultural problems at the Clark County School District Police Department," Peterson said.
The ACLU says it plans to file a new lawsuit at some point, though officials are still studying the footage that was recently released.
Channel 13 reached out to the CCSD to find out if the officer, Jason Elfberg, is still employed as a cop for the district. As of Friday evening, there had not been a response.
Quentin Savwoir, the President of the NAACP Las Vegas branch, presented several demands during the conference. These included asking the CCSD Board of Trustees to revise the use-of-force policy, requesting that District Attorney Steve Wolfson open an investigation into the incident, and calling for stronger continuing education for law enforcement officers in Clark County schools.
"We have to be more mature than the young people we are cultivating to be leaders in our own communities," he said.
Clark County School District provided Channel 13 with the following statement after the conference:
As communicated to the ACLU in March 2023, we offered to release redacted copies of the video to them, provided they obtained permission from their clients. However, they refused and instead filed a lawsuit demanding the video footage.
Under Nevada law, we are required to protect the identity and safety of minors and the rights of police officers. Those laws were upheld, and the release of the court-ordered video shows that the rights of citizens were honored and laws were followed despite the challenges of that day’s events near Durango High School.
