Allentown Police Officer Iannetta Sued For Kicking Non-Compliant Armed Robbery Suspect

Allentown Police Officer Iannetta Sued For Kicking Non-Compliant Armed Robbery Suspect

Allentown, Pennsylvania – Allentown Police are being sued for excessive force during the traffic stop of four armed robbery suspects.

A video has been circulating the internet the past few days showing Allentown police officers taking down robbery suspects in 2015. The internet is in an uproar over the video showing an officer “professional wrestling-style kick” a man in the face.

I am not going to side with anyone in this incident, but I will lay out some facts and observations from a law enforcement officer’s point of view.

Some points before we get into the video:

• Susan Wild, the city solicitor, stated “The actions of Officer Iannetta have been thoroughly reviewed by command staff and the solicitor’s office and found to be appropriate under the circumstances.”
• Hector Medina-Pena, the man who is kicked, had just told a woman in a strip club “Give me all your money or I’ll shoot you,” and then he took all of the money out of the cash register.
• Right after the robbery, a BOLO was put out on the 4 suspects including their description and their vehicle description.
• A felony traffic stop was made.

Watch the video of the traffic stop below

A few things that you may have not seen:

• As soon as the SUV stops, someone throws the bag of stolen cash out of the back right window.
• Hector Medina-Pena, who committed the robbery and later pleads guilty, is the first to step out, not the driver of the vehicle.
• Only 2 officers are on scene at first with 4 suspects who are believed to be armed.
• Hector Medina-Pena reaches towards his waistband several times. His friends gets on the ground with no problem, but he is slow to act and then stays on all fours. That’s when the kick is delivered.
• After more officers arrive, you can see one officer grab Medina-Pena’s legs like he is resisting the officer holding him down. That’s when Iannetta drops a knee on Medina-Pena.
• Medina-Pena was still doing a lot of moving around and officers had still not patted anyone down for weapons yet. They were still trying to get the scene under control without being shot by suspected robbers.

Do you think that this was excessive force? Let us know in the comments below or on our Facebook page.