A Mobile Police officer is on paid administrative leave after being arrested by one of his fellow officers following a domestic incident at home.
According to MPD, officer Newman Brazier Jr. was arrested on domestic violence harassment charges around 7 p.m., June 30. Brazier, who has been an MPD officer since 2007, has been placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of an internal investigation.
In Alabama, the bulk of police reports are not accessible to the public during the course of an investigation, but a one-page summary released to Lagniappe by MPD did give the time of the incident, and noted that alcohol was a factor in the incident that led to Brazier’s arrest.
Records indicate Brazier was booked into Mobile Metro Jail around 11 p.m. that evening on a single charge of third-degree domestic violence. He was released on bond the next day. In Alabama, the charge Brazier is facing is a class A misdemeanor.
The circumstances that lead to a third-degree domestic violence charge can vary widely from things like accusations of physical violence to the use of “abusive or obscene” language. Brazier was previously arrested for menacing and harassment charges before he joined MPD.
It’s unclear if Brazier has any kind of disciplinary history with MPD, but he was named as a defendant in a 2014 lawsuit that accused him and another officer of false imprisonment.
According to the court filings, Brazier was one of two officers who arrested Preston Lee Messer on charges of loitering for drug activity and possession of a controlled substance in 2013. In the complaint, Messer claims he was arrested while speaking to a high school friend who was sitting in a car in the parking lot of an ABC store on Cottage Hill Road in 2013.
After shaking his friend’s hand, Messer said a police SUV pulled up. Brazier and another officer questioned the group and eventually found a pill bottle during a search of the friend’s car. The driver said that it belonged to his sister, but the police believed it had come from Messer.
He was charged and arrested on the scene, but those charges don’t appear to have moved forward in court, or if they did, they’ve since been expunged from public records. The civil lawsuit against Brazier and city, however, continued for more than a year.
Eventually both parties agreed to dismiss the case, though it’s unclear why.
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