A Montgomery County police officer accused of police brutality first tried to calmly speak to a teenager before getting into a physical struggle with him, his fellow officers said in Montgomery County Circuit Court Tuesday.
Officer Kevin Moris, 32, was charged with second-degree assault and misconduct in office following the arrest of 19-year-old Arnaldo Pesoa, in which Moris was seen kneeing Pesoa in the back of the head outside of a McDonald’s in Aspen Hill. Pesoa had been arrested for allegedly selling psilocybin mushrooms.
Officers testified on Tuesday about the specific tactics used during the July 3 arrest, telling attorneys from both sides that Moris first gave several commands to Pesoa to leave the booth he was sitting in and put his hands behind his back. Officers said Pesoa resisted Moris’s commands despite a conversation that went on for around 2 minutes.
Officers who testified Tuesday also said the sight of blood on Pesoa’s face was an immediate concern because of the possibility of infectious disease in the blood.
Scott Smith, an undercover officer who helped arrest Pesoa, said during his testimony that the altercation started inside the McDonald’s. Moris, he said, told Pesoa multiple times to get out of the booth he was sitting in, stand up and put his hands behind his back. Pesoa resisted.
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“It had gotten pretty tense in that situation,” Smith said.
“He [Pesoa] kept saying ‘what’s all this about?’”
At one point, Smith said he was ready to use physical force to try to remove Pesoa from the booth but Moris asked officers to “hold off” for a minute. Moris, he said, was “extremely patient.”
When Pesoa continued resisting, Smith said he “delivered a knee strike” to Pesoa’s torso. Officers eventually handcuffed Pesoa and brought him outside, where they placed him on the sidewalk, he said.
Officer Gregory Lazor said in his testimony that he “observed blood in the area of his [Pesoa’s] mouth. Moris, he said, then told Pesoa to roll onto his stomach, and he resisted.
Lazor said Moris later got on top of Pesoa’s torso as he continued to resist.
“He [Pesoa] was twisting his body around a lot,” Lazor said.
Lazor said at one point during the altercation Moris told Pesoa to “stop spitting” and Pesoa replied by saying “something to the effect of ‘yeah I spit on you, what are you gonna do about it?’”
Lazor said that Moris placed a shirt over Pesoa’s face so that he would stop spitting.
Officer Jeffrey Stromberg said in his testimony that one officer had asked for a spit hood — a device intended to prevent a suspect from spitting — but no one had one.
Another officer, David Rice, said during his testimony Tuesday that he was in a police cruiser patrolling the shopping center and eventually went to help in the arrest when backup was called. He said he became concerned when he saw blood on Pesoa.
“Just seeing the blood, I didn’t want it on my hands without some kind of protection,” he said.
Moris’s defense attorney Morgan Leigh on Monday said the officer was justified in using force because it was necessary to avoid contact with Pesoa’s bloody saliva – a potential hazard officers are trained to avoid due to the possibility of infectious disease.
After the prosecution rested its case around noon on Tuesday, Leigh asked Judge Nelson Rupp to dismiss the charges on the grounds that no witnesses so far had disputed the claim that Moris’s actions were justified.
“There was no one to opine on whether that force was reasonable,” she said.
Rupp denied Leigh’s motion.
Rupp said the defense will finish calling witnesses Wednesday, and it is possible closing arguments and jury deliberations could happen then. The case will finish no later than Thursday, he said.
Dan Schere can be reached at Daniel.schere@moco360.media
