Sgt. Arrests Video-Taker; IA Probe Begins

The police chief Monday ordered an internal investigation opened into a sergeant who allegedly had a woman arrested and a cell phone camera snatched from her bra after she recorded him beating a handcuffed suspect.

Chief Dean Esserman (pictured at center in above photo at an unrelated press conference Monday afternoon) said he acted as soon as he learned of the allegations.

The allegations against Sgt. Chris Rubino came from two women who observed a tussle between cops and an unruly man in the Temple Street plaza behind Pulse nightclub shortly before 2 a.m. Saturday.

If the allegations prove true, they would dramatically violate, in exquisite detail, police General Order 311. The order protects the rights of citizens to photograph or video-record cops in public; police cannot use the excuse of arresting someone for using a camera with a blanket ​“interfering” charge. (Read about that here.) Former Chief Frank Limon announced the policy last year (click here to read about that) after several controversial incidents of cops unconstitutionally harassing citizen photographers. In one case an internal investigation prompted by this Independent article concluded that an assistant chief violated department policy when he ordered one such photographer arrested then took his camera and erased his files; that assistant chief resigned. (Read about that here.)

The alleged actions would also violate the Constitution, in the view of the U.S. Justice Department, and could potentially open the department to a lawsuit.

Esserman said he will reserve comment on the incident until the investigation ends.

“Stop Filming Right Now!”

The arrested woman is Jennifer Gondola (pictured), a real-estate agent and administrative assistant from Ansonia. She and friends went to Pulse for a drink. They left around 1:45 a.m. out the back entrance onto the plaza in the rain.

They came upon a commotion. Police were arresting a 24-year-old Bridgeport man; police said they had ordered the man and his friends to disperse, at which point the man refused and then started physically attacking officers as they handcuffed him.

People throughout the plaza whipped out their camera phones. Gondola was standing ​“6 feet away,” she told the Independent Monday. ​“I wasn’t in their way at all.” She started video-recording the action on her iPhone 4.

Five cops had the arrested man pinned to the ground, she said.

“The kid was anklecuffed and handcuffed. He was talking shit to them. He was on the ground. Blood was coming out of his mouth,” Gondola said. ​“They were hitting him.”

“They were roughhousing him. Stepping on his face. Kneeing in his back,” said Gondola’s friend, Tamara Harris, who was alongside her and taking still photos. Sgt. Rubino was doing the bulk of the beating, Harris said, ​“stepping on the guy’s head, doing all this extra stuff when he was already handcuffed.”

Harris said she saw Rubino look up from the beating and notice Gondola with the camera. He immediately left the arrestee and approached Gondola, Harris said. ​“He went to snatch her phone. ​‘I want your phone.’ She’s like, ​‘No!’ He got mad.”

Here’s what happened next, according to Gondola:

“Stop filming right now!” Rubino ordered her.

“No this is my civil right,” she recalled saying. Gondola said she’s ​“always on all these news sites” reading about recent cases in which cops got in trouble for snatching cameras from citizens.

“Well, I have to right to review it,” Rubino allegedly told her.

Gondola claimed she remained ​“very quiet and calm” and ​“pressed play” to show him the video. ​“But I didn’t let him touch my phone.”

Rubino’s response, according to Gondola: ​“It’s evidence of a crime. You need to give it to me right now.”

Her response to his response: ​“I’m not giving you the phone.”

His next response: ​“If you don’t give me the phone, you’re getting arrested.”

So Gondola slipped the phone into her bra. Rubino ​“twisted my hand hard behind me and put the cuffs on me. Really tight. My wrists are black and blue,” she said.

Rubino next ordered a female officer to pat her down and commanded, ​“I want that phone out of her bra.” The woman removed the phone. Rubino ​“put it in his pocket,” Gondola said. An officer walked her to a prisoner transport vehicle. It was full with men already arrested during the mayhem in the plaza. She was next escorted to the back of a police car and driven to police headquarters at 1 Union Ave. to be booked.

Except for Rubino, all the cops treated her courteously, Gondola said. She eventually left the police station with a ticket for ​“interfering” with police.

Before leaving she encountered Rubino again. She asked for her phone back.

“No,” he allegedly replied. ​“That’s evidence.”

At this point only a judge can order her phone returned. Gondola will get to ask the judge for her phone next week.

Meanwhile, the police department’s internal affairs division is looking into whether Rubino violated General Order 311.

“The video recording of police activity in and of itself does not constitute a crime, offense, or violation,” the order states. ​“If a person video recording police activity is arrested, the officer must articulate clearly the factual basis for any arrest in his or her case and arrest reports.”

Rubino’s supervisor, Lt. Jeff Hoffman, declined comment on the specifics of the case pending the outcome of the investigation.

“The department has a general order regarding citizens’ right to video the police, which is very clear that people can video the police without repercussions. As far as this case goes, this will be investigated,” Hoffman said.

Rubino was involved in a separate incident the following night, when he chased a 16-year-old driver up State Street until the driver missed a turn and smashed into the front of Christopher Martin’s restaurant and pub. Hoffman said it does not appear Rubino broke any rules in that case; he said it will be reviewed like all other pursuits. (Read about it here.)

Police Union President Arpad Tolnay Monday defended Rubino in the Temple Plaza camera incident.

“Sgt. Rubino is a veteran officer. If he felt that he needed to take those actions at that time, I’m certain he followed what he thought was the best at the moment. I’m sure he had a reason for it,” Tolnay said. Rubino joined the force in the early 90s.

“At that particular point of time he thought what was being videotaped might be of evidentiary value. … We’ll let IA [Internal Affairs] do its investigation.”

The question of whether cameras can be seized on the grounds of containing evidence has arisen in previous discussions of the order and of incidents in other cities. The suggestion to cops has been to seek a warrant for a camera if they feel it contains crucial evidence. The fear among police critics is that that argument becomes a pretext for seizing or destroying any evidence of police misconduct, not suspects’ misconduct.

Gondola said Rubino made that argument to her.

Her response?

“This is not the guy committing the crime,” she said. ​“This is the police doing the crime.”