Three arrests after a now infamous cuffing that followed his apparent beating by a Springfield police officer during a traffic stop on Rifle Street in 2009, Jones has even lost his entourage of civil-rights stalwarts who once appeared faithfully at every court appearance.
Melvin Jones IIIIn just under two years, Melvin Jones III has gone from cause celebre to chronic inmate.
If a virtuous victim there ever was, Jones concedes he isn’t it.
“I’m definitely not your ideal, but I’m definitely not the worst guy either,” says Jones.
Three arrests after a now infamous cuffing that followed his apparent beating by a Springfield police officer during a traffic stop on Rifle Street in 2009, Jones has even lost his entourage of civil-rights stalwarts who once appeared faithfully at every court appearance.
“I know it would be easier to support me if I had never done anything wrong in my life. Of course I know that,” said Jones during a recent interview at the county jail in Ludlow, where he had been held since his bail was revoked nearly three months ago. “I don’t expect some people to agree with me, but I don’t think my criminal history has anything to do with this case.”
Jones, 30, was out on bail after being hospitalized with injuries and charged with drug possession in the arrest two years ago. During the arrest, he was beaten by a patrolman wielding a flashlight while a bystander videotaped the incident.
In the first three months of this year, he racked up two arrests for unrelated alleged crimes – including shoplifting and domestic assault – and on June 28 was indicted for cocaine trafficking in Hampden Superior Court. He’s denied all the charges leveled against him, including the drug trafficking count which led to his 18th adult appearance before a judge in a criminal matter, according to court records.
On the other side of his most infamous case, the arrest caught on videotape, is retired patrolman Jeffrey M. Asher, one of several officers who pulled over a car in which Jones was riding and ordered Jones from the vehicle. The arrest quickly went wrong, according to the amateur videotape that was made public by The Republican and MassLive.com. It shows Jones, who is black, versus a clutch of white officers.
Police reports were that Jones attempting to wheel away from the officers, who forced him back onto the hood of the car.
Asher then brought his flashlight down on Jones’ head with more than a dozen sickening thuds heard on the film. Jones said he passed out after the first blow, but Asher and his lawyer have said Jones made a grab for an officer’s gun and continued to struggle.
During the jailhouse interview that took place before the most recent indictment was brought, Jones said he tried to run that night after a police officer grabbed him roughly by the back of his pants. He denies making any attempt to grab a gun.
“I was just trying to get away,” he said.
Charged with drug possession and resisting arrest, Jones was later hospitalized and treated for massive injuries to his face. Defense lawyer Shawn Allyn said Jones has been left partially blind in one eye.
Jones said he didn’t know a videotape existed until several days after the incident. He watched it several times and says now he is glad someone memorialized the event, for better or for worse.
“I didn’t know if anyone would believe me,” he said.
The videotape, captured by a woman who has never publicly been identified, lasts just under 20 minutes, including about 90 seconds of Jones attempting to run from police and the subsequent beating. Although untold numbers of people have watched the video online, Jones said his mother has yet to see it.
“It’s kind of excruciating to watch,” Jones said.
His father, on the other hand, has watched it several times and was among Jones’ family members who encouraged the videographer to release it to one of Jones’ lawyers.
The film won Jones quick notoriety and a following of civil rights protesters who appeared at his many court dates and eventually those of Asher, who was charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon. Three other officers involved in the arrest were cleared of criminal charges.
Former Hampden district attorney William M. Bennett declined to pursue criminal charges against any of the police, including Asher; but Asher was charged after Jones sought criminal complaints through a clerk magistrate.
“I don’t know any of the protesters personally, but I appreciate their support,” Jones said. “I’ve read some of their signs. A lot of them say things about justice.”
But in Jones’ case, justice seems a tricky thing in the court of public opinion.
Each article about the Jones-Asher incident in The Republican sparks dozens and sometimes more than 100 opinions on MassLive.com. Many commenters weigh in about Jones’ criminal past, which includes a few drug and gun arrests, but many more related to trespassing, driving with a suspended license and passing bad checks. Others rail against an abuse of power and bad cops and contend that everyone’s civil rights should be protected, no matter their histories with the courts.
“Every bone in his face was broken,” Allyn says of his client. “Every single bone.”
A transcript of the videotape also indicates one of the officers (it is unclear who) called Jones the n-word during the struggle.
“Do I think it’s a race thing? To an extent,” Jones said. “There were four white cops and one black guy, but I’m not sure it’s a black-white thing as much as a power thing.”
A defense lawyer for Asher, scheduled for trial in Chicopee District Court starting Nov. 28, has said repeatedly that Asher used the flashlight only as long as Jones kept up a struggle.
“When the resistance stopped, the force stopped,” Asher’s defense lawyer, Joseph Monahan III, has said.
Asher has his own complicated history with which to contend.
In 1997, he was suspended after another amateur videotape captured him kicking a black suspect who was handcuffed and on the ground after a foot chase. The suspect, Roy Parker, also had a criminal history and the incident also prompted widespread public debate.
Another black man, a school principal, sued police, including Asher, for allegedly beating him during a 2008 arrest. In that case, Douglas G. Greer said police mistook a diabetic attack for a violent outburst as he was pulled over at a gas station. The city paid $180,000 to settle a federal lawsuit to Greer, who later died of a diabetic attack.
Asher took a stress-related disability retirement last year; one day later, Police Commissioner William J. Fitchet fired him and suspended three others. He’s been able to keep his retirement thus far.
Recently, Asher drove away from a court appearance sporting a thick beard and chewing on a cigar as he honked and waved enthusiastically at the protesters who stood in support of Jones outside the Chicopee District Court.
For Jones’ part, he said he had an unremarkable childhood with stable, working parents and little trouble with the law until he was an adult.
“I just started running with the wrong crowd when I got older,” he said.
Among his most unbearable embarrassments, he said, was an arrest for shoplifting in January after he was caught on videotape stuffing dozens of pairs of jeans into a bag at a JC Penney store and sprinting for the door.
“That was just a foolish thing on my part,” he said, offering little else in the way of explanation.
Allyn attributes the behavior to drug use, but still intends to take that case to trial. The current district attorney, Mark G. Mastroianni, dismissed the November 2009 drug charges against Jones, but Jones’ bail was revoked after a domestic dispute with his girlfriend this spring. Then, that charge, too, was dismissed the same day Jones was arraigned on the recent drug charges.
The new indictment links Jones to alleged sales of crack cocaine to an FBI informant in December. He remains jailed in lieu of $50,000 bail.
Jones concedes he has had a fair amount of celebrity in jail as a result of the videotape of his arrest. It is unwelcome celebrity, but celebrity nonetheless, he said.
“Everyone wants to talk about how they got beat up by the police. I do not want to be known as the guy who got beat up by a bunch of police,” Jones said, adding that the endless comparisons to the infamous Rodney King beating in Los Angeles also have become tedious.
“I think mine was worse though,” he said.
Jones has sued police in federal court, and, prior to his latest charges, was slightly more hopeful about his future. He can’t afford any more trouble, he said.
He had been hoping to get out of jail, stay out and, perhaps, open his own business – possibly a skating rink, he said, to give kids something to do other than run the streets.
Though Jones’ public following seems to have fallen off some with each new arrest, civil-rights advocates still say his alleged criminal behavior should be treated separately from the incident involving his alleged beating at the hands of police.
“We need to be concerned about justice no matter the character is of a particular individual,” said Henry M. Thomas III, president of the Urban League of Springfield. “Rodney King was no world-class individual either. As Martin Luther King said, ‘Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere.’”
Police Sgt. John M. Delaney would not comment on Asher’s case, but said the public should take care not to canonize Jones.
“He’s so quick to blame everyone but himself: society, the police,” Delaney said of Jones. “But the night of the arrest, he was of unlawful design. He was out, dealing drugs and running from the police. If he was home like a good citizen, he wouldn’t be in this position right now.”
Jones believes all the officers involved in his arrest should be facing criminal charges.
“If me and three of my buddies beat somebody up, we’d all be in jail,” he said.