Sheriff claims deputies didn’t search lacrosse staff’s private items, body digicam exhibits otherwise

LIBERTY COUNTY, Ga. (WTOC/Gray Information) - An incident that concerned gamers from a university’s lacrosse group and deputies in Georgia stays below investigation.

WTOC reports Delaware State University President Tony Allen released a statement on Monday responding to the incident that reportedly occurred on April 20 in Liberty County.

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

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

The workforce was returning house from a game in Florida and traveling by a contracted bus, in keeping with Allen.

Liberty County Sheriff William Bowman held a information conference concerning the incident but took no questions. He claimed that no personal objects on the bus have been searched.

Physique digicam video obtained by WTOC, nevertheless, clearly showed the deputies going by means of the students’ bags and even treatment.

The university president wrote in his assertion that movies taken by gamers showed legislation enforcement attempting to intimidate them into confessing to possession of medication 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 nobody questioned them...we simply let them rattle via our stuff.”

A player on the bus requested: “How did we go from being within the fallacious lane to going through our luggage?”

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

Nothing unlawful was discovered in 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 additionally added the following:

“We do not intend to let this or any other incident prefer it move idly by. We're ready to go wherever the evidence leads us. We now have video. We've got allies. Maybe extra considerably, we've the braveness of our convictions.”

Allen concluded his statement by writing, “We are going to never be bullied into believing anything apart from what we're: People, learners, lecturers, builders—useful and honorable individuals able to soar.”

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