Complaint filed with UPD after car theft

A complaint has been filed with the University Police Department about conduct during the investigation of a theft in the Prairie Crossing apartment garage last Thursday, April 19. This comes after a student spoke with The East Texan about her experience with UPD regarding the same incident.

According to a UPD report, three people were seen running from a red Dodge Charger that had a $300 radar detector stolen from it. One of them, a white female wearing a red sweater, fell and dropped something. The officer then observed all three run into the northwest stairwell, including a black male and another person the officer could not identify.

Junior Ashley Derrick had been smoking cigarettes with a friend in one of the hallways of Prairie Crossing when they were approached by a female officer, who asked them a few questions and then left. Derrick then returned to her apartment and went to bed. UPD officers then knocked on her bedroom door at around 4:45 a.m.

"I'm a heavy sleeper, so my roommate opened the front door," Derrick said. "Then, they came and banged on my bedroom door."

An officer ordered Derrick to put on her shoes, and then called on his radio for backup. He then lead her downstairs to the Prairie Crossing laundry room.

"I asked what was going on, and he didn't answer," she said. "He just starts asking me where I had been that night. He asked me what I had been wearing earlier. I told him, and he said 'Nope, try again.'"

The officer then asked to see Derrick's elbows and knees, possibly because the female suspect seen fleeing the scene earlier that morning had fallen down. After this, the officer said that if Derrick didn't own a red jacket, then it would be alright if officers searched her apartment.

"I'm like 'Sure, whatever, go ahead.' Because I didn't do anything, I just want it to be over."

The female officer, who was present during questioning, went upstairs with Derrick.

"She asks me if the guys were intimidating me, was there anything I wanted to say to her that I left out of my story, because now would be the time to tell her. Then she was like 'have you been smoking drugs tonight?' I said no, and she said 'then why are your eyes so hazy?' You just woke me up, I'm really sleepy."

When they reached the room, the female officer asked for consent to enter and search the premises. When it was granted, she began the search, and the male officer who had been questioning Derrick earlier came in.

He asked Derrick why she had not answered her door more quickly when the officers had knocked. She said that she had been asleep and thought she might have possibly been dreaming, and the officer replied that he did not believe her and thought she was evading police on purpose.

The officer asked Derrick if she had been in trouble before. Initially, she said no, but then remembered an incident a few semesters ago when she was caught with some of her friends smoking marijuana. Derrick was not charged and only had to attend a disciplinary meeting with her dean.

"He said 'Well, I don't care if you were charged or not, you're guilty in my eyes,'" Derrick said.

After the search, the officers finally said that one of Derrick's friends had his car broken into.

"The description was a white female in a red jacket and a black male," she said. "My friend had another friend over, who was black, earlier in the evening. I was only there for half-an-hour, and they saw me smoking a cigarette with my friend earlier. So, they decided it was me, apparently."

UPD Lt. Jason Bone said the details of the complaint cannot be released at this time. He did say a female fitting the description of the one seen running away from the scene was questioned by police soon after the incident, along with many others. The investigation is still ongoing, and the complaint is also being looked into.