Jazmine Headley Arrest: 2 Officers Put On Leave After Outcry

BOERUM HILL, BROOKLYN — Video showing police ripping Jazmine Headley's 1-year-old baby from her arms as she waited for childcare vouchers is just the latest in a pattern of security officers and police failing to de-escalate difficult situations without resorting to violence, Headley's legal defense said Monday.

Headley, 23, was arrested after the encounter with police Friday at the Fort Greene Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program office, where she had been waiting for four hours after taking off work to fix an issue with her son's childcare.

Security officers called the police on Headley after she sat on the floor because no chairs were available. Two of these NYC Human Resources Administration "peace officers" involved in the incident were put on leave and will be on "modified duty" when they return, Social Services Commissioner Steve Banks said late Monday.

Video taken by onlookers shows that police officers who arrived at the office yanked Headley's son from her arms as she lay on the floor. At one point, an officer waved a taser at Headley and the crowd.

"This is supposed to be the place families come to regain their dignity, not to have it ripped away from them," Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams said at a press conference Monday, asking that the charges against Headley be dropped.

"The mother didn’t endanger the welfare of the child. The actions of the department endangered the welfare of the child."

Lisa Schreibersdorf, executive director of Brooklyn Defender Services which will represent Headley, said the security officers' decision to call the cops was the "worst option," but unfortunately not an unusual one.

Staff at city institutions often call the police instead of peacefully resolving a situation, she said, which can lead to a person being arrested just for seeking help.

"Instead of stopping and calming, they continued and continued and continued to take that baby," Schreibersdorf said at a press conference Monday. "...We find ourselves with a lot of clients that are arrested in places like shelters, other city agencies or schools and it is very unfortunate."

But while Schreibersdorf and Adams condemned the officer's actions, the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association said they were simply doing their best in an "impossible situation."

PBA President Patrick J. Lynch said police did not create the dispute at the office, but were called in, as they often are, to deal with the failings of the city government. The police aimed to enforce the law and protect the mother, her child and others in the office, some of whom were making the situation worse, Lynch said.

"The event would have unfolded much differently if those at the scene had simply complied with the officers' lawful orders," he said. "The immediate rush to condemn these officers leaves their fellow cops wondering: when confronted with a similar impossible scenario, what do you want us to do? Th answer cannot be 'do nothing'"

Banks had a different reaction about how staff at the Fort Greene office handled the incident. He said in addition to the peace officers being placed on leave, the department will reinforce training and offer refresher courses to HRA officers and FJC security staff so that they can defuse situations before NYPD is called.

"HRA centers must be safe havens for New Yorkers needing access to benefits to improve their lives," Banks said. "I am deeply troubled by the incident and a thorough review was launched over the weekend to get to the bottom of what happened."

Schreibersdorf said she and others at Brooklyn Defenders Services are working to have Headley's charges of resisting arrest, obstructing governmental administration, criminal trespass and endangering the welfare of a child dropped.

The mother is being held at Rikers Island for an unrelated case in New Jersey, Schreibersdorf said, but is still facing charges from Friday's incident. A protective order was issued by the court barring her from seeing her son who is being cared for by family members, she said.

The Brooklyn District Attorney's office said Monday it was investigating the "troubling" incident.

Adams said the incident should also prompt an investigation into FJC Security Services, the company that provided security officers at the Fort Greene office. The company has faced 16 lawsuits from shelter residents since 2013, he said.

A spokeswoman for the parent company of FJC, Allied Universal, said the company is working with NYPD to investigate the incident and "understand what occurred and what could have been done differently." She said she could not comment on past litigation.

The security officials should have been trained to deescalate the situation, perhaps by finding a social worker to talk to Headley or offering her a chair, Adams said.

"When you come here to (Human Resources Administration) you're at the end of your rope... This is where you're supposed to go to get the opportunity to just to normalize your life," Adams said. "Instead of her life being normalized, it is traumatized."

Photo by Anna Quinn/Patch