Woman claims state troopers assaulted her during stop

A 62-year-old woman says a traffic stop ended with officers slamming her to the ground, leaving her severely injured.

 Sheila Joyner Pritchard told Channel 2s Tom Jones she can't even look at the pictures that show her injuries. "Too painful," she said. "People would ask me had I been hit by a car or if I was in a car accident," she said of her injuries to her eye, her face, arms and legs. 

Pritchard claims Georgia State Patrol troopers caused the injuries while she was giving some foreign exchange students a tour of Atlantic Station. She said officers conducting a road block on 17th Street stopped her because one of the students in the car didn't have on a seatbelt.

An officer got the student out of the car and was talking to him about the citation, according to an incident report. Pritchard said she got out to see why he was being questioned over a seatbelt violation.

"She was acting out of concern. She didn't yell she didn't curse. She didn't scream," her attorney, Mawuli Mel Davis said.  Pritchard said when she kept inquiring, officers slammed her to the ground and other officers joined in. "My face was being scraped from side to side on the ground on the pavement," she said explaining that she screamed out in agony as the exchange students looked on in fear. Pritchard said the officers refused to get her medical treatment.

            The incident report obtained by Jones tells a much different story. It explains that Pritchard refused to get back in the car as the officer repeatedly instructed.  The report says she was confrontational, combative and jerked from an officer who was trying to get her to calm down. The report indicates that as Pritchard continued to resist arrest she was taken to the ground.  Other officers then came over to assist.

            State Sen. Vincent Fort is supporting Pritchard in her fight to hold the troopers accountable.  He told Jones  he wonders how a simple traffic stop could end with a woman injured so severely.  "Why do you need four officers, three or four officers, to take down a 62-year-old woman," he said. Fort said the beating was a terrible example to send too exchange students, some from China, about Georgia justice. Davis thinks the race of the student played a role.  The student is African American. 

"This is another example of over-policing. Give him a citation. Let him go about his business or just give him a warning," Davis said.

            The officers noted in the incident report the 17-year-old student switched seats after the officer went to his patrol unit to print his citation. The officer also noted that another officer wanted to use a stun gun on Pritchard because she was so disruptive, but he said that was needed. Pritchard said she was not combative and was very respectful to the officers.  She wants justice. 

"I just want to make sure that my beating is not in vain," she said.

 A GSP spokesman said Pritchard hasn't filed a complaint so the incident is not being investigated. The agency pointed out that Pritchard was treated at Grady Hospital.