Barbara Pinkney, a 70-year-old resident of the Manatee County city of Bardenton, was startled by officers at around 7:30 a.m. local time on December 26, one day after Christmas.
“We heard a knock at the door,” she told local Florida news station WFLA. “Actually, there wasn’t a knock. I think they kicked the door. Bam! Bam! At the door.”
According to the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office, deputies showed up at Pinkney’s residence with an arrest warrant for Tevin Turney, her grandson who had recently violated probation for having a concealed weapon on his person.
“When he was on probation he gave this as his address, but he wasn’t living here,” she asserted to the outlet, adding that she asked officers to produce a search warrant in order to enter her home.
The deputies asserted an arrest warrant allowed them to enter the Florida residence, and the incident escalated after Pinkney attempted to shut the door to her home.
Video shot by Elizabeth Francisco, Pinkney’s granddaughter-in-law, and observed by the outlet shows a deputy pulling her arm back after grabbing her wrist. “She is then tased and taken to the ground hard,” WFLA reported, noting that “visible injuries” from the altercation remain on her body.
“I was just hollering. I was scared. I didn’t know what else to do. I was just hollering,” the grandmother recounted.
The probable cause affidavit filed alleged the elderly woman, who was celebrating her 70th birthday, was hit with a stun gun in her “left arm,” “back” and “upper back.” A deputy’s knee is said to have been placed on her back to keep her on the ground as she was cuffed and arrested.
“It’s not something that you see every day or something you expect to happen,” Francisco said. “Even if she wasn’t my grandmother. Dang, this is a 70-year-old woman."
Turney, on the other hand, was not found to be within the home, but the sheriff’s office contended that he may have escaped through the home’s back door during the arrest of Pinkney.
“Whenever I see police I just try to not look at them,” the 70-year-old told WFLA following the incident, explaining that she is traumatized by the experience and cannot sleep at night. Pinkney added that this is the first time she has been in trouble with law enforcement in her entire life.
Pinkney, who was charged with felony battery on a law enforcement officer and obstruction, is scheduled to appear in a Florida court on January 17.
