Louisiana State Police reinstate trooper accused of withholding video in Black man’s deadly arrest

The Louisiana State Police have reinstated a veteran trooper who had been accused of withholding graphic body-camera video showing another officer dragging Black motorist Ronald Greene by his ankle shackles during his deadly 2019 arrest.

Lt. John Clary, the ranking trooper at the scene of Greene’s arrest, will return to active duty this week, state police spokesman Capt. Nick Manale said in an email to The Associated Press on Monday.

The development comes weeks after state prosecutors dismissed an obstruction of justice charge against Clary after he agreed to testify in the negligent homicide trial of Kory York, a trooper accused of forcing Greene to lie facedown and handcuffed on a northeast Louisiana roadside for more than nine minutes. Use-of-force experts have said that tactic likely restricted Greene’s breathing.

Clary, 59, had been among five officers indicted a year ago in the May 10, 2019, death that authorities initially blamed on a car crash. An AP investigation revealed long suppressed body-camera video showing white officers beating, stunning and dragging Greene as he pleaded for mercy and wailed, “I’m your brother! I’m scared!”

The prosecution has suffered several setbacks in recent months and only two of the five officers still face charges. The dismissals have prompted new calls for the U.S. Justice Department to bring its own indictment against the troopers following a yearslong civil rights investigation that examined whether state police bosses obstructed justice to protect the troopers in Greene’s arrest.

Greene’s mother, Mona Hardin, told the AP she was surprised and disgusted that Clary was restored to duty.

“It’s really like he never took the uniform off,” Hardin said. “These guys have been protected from the beginning. They know the brass have their back.”

Clary and his attorney did not respond to requests for comment.

York is expected to stand trial next year. He asked an appellate court to throw out his indictment after prosecutors acknowledged a mistake in allowing a use-of-force expert to review protected statements York made during an internal affairs inquiry. Such compelled interviews may be used to discipline officers administratively but are specifically prohibited from being used in criminal cases.

Clary’s video is the only clip of the arrest that shows the moment a handcuffed, bloody Greene moans under the weight of two troopers, twitches and then goes still. The footage was withheld from prosecutors, detectives and even medical examiners for months amid a cloak of secrecy that surrounded Greene’s death.

Clary, who had been suspended without pay, is the first of the officers to return to the job. He faced no internal discipline after Col. Lamar Davis said the agency “could not say for sure whether” the lieutenant “purposefully withheld” the footage in question.

Davis said Monday there were no grounds for Clary’s termination after he was cleared in the state case.

“We can’t just terminate someone like other organizations. We have to operate by the law and our state police rules,” Davis told AP. “As a superintendent, I have to put my personal feelings aside. Our job is to operate under the color of the law.”

Former Detective Albert Paxton wrote in an internal report that, on the morning of Greene’s death, “Clary told me he did not have body camera video of the incident.” Clary also greatly exaggerated Greene’s resistance, saying he was “still trying to get away and was not cooperating.” Those statements were contradicted by Clary’s body camera footage and were apparently intended to justify force against Greene while he was prone. He had already been hit in the head with a flashlight, punched and repeatedly stunned.

“The video evidence in this case does not show Greene screaming, resisting or trying to get away,” Paxton wrote. “Lt. Clary’s video clearly shows Greene to be suffering.”

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Jim Mustian, The Associated Press