10 Deputies on Leave After Videotaped Beating

San Bernardino County is down 10 sheriff's deputies today, all of them placed on paid leave after a TV news helicopter filmed them beating a prone suspect offering no resistance, reports the Los Angeles Times. Sheriff John McMahon did not release their names, citing threats to the department after NBC4 aired its footage. In a follow-up, the station does the rough math: "In the two minutes after the man was stunned with a Taser, it appeared deputies kicked him 17 times, punched him 37 times, and struck him with batons four times. Thirteen blows appeared to be to the head."

Suspect Francis Pusok fled deputies who arrived at his house to serve a search warrant in an identity theft investigation, then led police on a long chase that ended with him falling off a horse and being beaten. His attorneys say he is bruised and in pain behind bars, reports AP. "He remembers being beat, and he remembers that he wasn't resisting, that he laid still, he complied immediately," says one. "He says that he didn't even move a muscle because he didn't want to be continuously beat, yet it still happened." Another adds that when the beating stopped, a deputy whispered in his ear, "This isn't over." (More police brutality stories.)