Officers kept backs turned

Two Marysville Police Department reserve officers testified Wednesday they kept their backs turned because they felt uncomfortable with an alleged body cavity search of a woman suspected of having drugs.

Robert Hess and Donald Jacobsen testified in the jury trial of Officer Joshua Hendrickson, charged with the illegal search of Stacy Michelle May on the afternoon of Jan. 26 near 10th and Chestnut streets.

As backup officers, keeping their backs turned while a parolee like May was being searched was not consistent with safety, both men said.

"It's just not normal practice, turning your back on somebody," Jacobsen said.

Officer Amy Alfred is also charged in the case. After seeing Alfred put on a pair of rubber gloves, "I thought something was going on that shouldn't have been," said Jacobsen.

Alfred started putting on a heavy pair of gloves that officers normally use to search subjects, but then Hendrickson told her, "You're not going to need those gloves," Jacobsen said.

Alfred then retrieved the rubber gloves and searched May. Hendrickson had his back turned during the search, Hess and Jacobsen testified.

Alfred was accompanied on the call by Community Service Officer Lucy Merrill, who testified that Hendrickson said to Alfred, "No, not those gloves."

Alfred then said, "Aw, man," shrugged and acted hesitant, said Merrill.

After the search, Alfred said "she had to go up in (May) and didn't find anything" except a napkin that May was using during her menstrual period, Merrill testified. During the search, Hendrickson looked at Merrill and the two reserve officers and "made a gagging face as if he were vomiting," said Merrill.

"It looked feigned," Merrill said about the expression.

Hendrickson's supervisor, Sgt. Christian Sachs, said a roadside cavity search is never correct, even when done by a female officer. Hendrickson and Alfred both should have known that, he said.

Hendrickson was a field training officer at the time, in charge of training new officers.

Another reserve officer, Ashley Guizar, testified that when Hendrickson was her field training officer in 2006, he told her to perform a similar search when they stopped a woman for a traffic offense.

Hendrickson saw the woman put something down her pants. After the woman admitted it was a glass methamphetamine pipe, Hendrickson told Guizar to put on rubber gloves and said, "You're going to have to go down there and get it," Guizar said.

Guizar said she did not report the search to her superiors, even though "I was kind of disgusted at the time," because Hendrickson talked openly and made crude jokes about the search at the Police Department. Also, she said, she was intimidated by Hendrickson.

Under cross-examination, Guizar said Hendrickson never told her to perform a cavity search on the woman, who had consented to be searched.

Guizar admitted that she did not get along with Hendrickson, who had consistently given her poor performance evaluations.

Sachs said that, after the search of May, he ordered Hendrickson to cite and release her, even though she was on parole and driving with a suspended license, because she was being used as an informant by the Police Department.

Contact Appeal-Democrat reporter Rob Young at 749-4710 or at ryoung@appealdemocrat.com