The woman, who was working undercover as part of a drug operation in Alexandria, was raped as her law enforcement handlers left her on her own.
A female informant working on an undercover drug operation in Alexandria, La. was raped while her law enforcement handlers left her alone in a house across the street from a dilapidated storefront property. The incident highlights the perils informants face around the country under loosely regulated arrangements.
How did the incident happen?
A woman was equipped with a tiny microphone and hidden camera when she entered the house the in the afternoon last year in January 2021 to find a dealer known on the streets as “Mississippi.” The incident happened when she was left alone unsafe and unprotected. The passive recordings provide horrific sexual violence against women, she was even forced to perform oral sex twice and at a point, he paused doing a separate drug deal.
A local official said in his statement “It was one of the worst depictions of sexual abuse I have ever seen,” “Just the audio from it is enough to turn your stomach,” he added. “It’s a female being sexually brutalized while she’s crying and whimpering.” The office said he was not authorized to discuss more in the ongoing case.
Women cried for help, she was threatened by her assailant to put her “in the hospital” while the deputies stayed down the block unknowing the situation. The incident highlights a serious flaw in the way law enforcement agencies are using new technology to fight crime. In this case, the woman was carrying a device that was supposed to help authorities track her movements. However, the device didn’t have the ability to transmit her real-time actions to law enforcement, so the deputies were unaware of what was happening.
Police in Louisiana gave an informant a hidden camera and sent her to make a drug deal. But they weren’t monitoring her in real time. They say she was raped twice. https://t.co/9sd4JbAW25
— The Associated Press (@AP) September 13, 2022
Who was the culprit:
It wasn’t until the woman left the area and contacted her handlers that deputies searched the single-family home and arrested Antonio D. Jones, 48, on charges of second-degree rape, false imprisonment and distribution of meth after recovering 5 grams of the substance in the sting. The photo provided by the Rapides Parish Sheriff’s Office in September 2022, confirms it was Antonio D. Jones.
Parker who retired this month said, “We’ve always done it this way, She was an addict and we just used her as an informant like we’ve done a million times before. Looking back, it’s easy to say, ‘What if?’”
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More about the victim women:
The woman at the center of the recent Police Sting scandal has a long history of drug possession, according to court records. Just three weeks after her recorded assault, the woman was charged with possession of drug paraphernalia stemming from an arrest that happened about a month before the sting. The woman, who declined interview requests and is not being named because the AP does not typically identify victims of sexual assault, pleaded guilty to possessing drug paraphernalia last year and was placed in behavioral health court in lieu of jail time.
Rapides Parish District Attorney Phillip Terrell defended the deputies, he said “They never thought of that, and had they known that was occurring they would have certainly stopped it, One of their big concerns now is the safety of the confidential informant.”
The Police Department is still investigating the matter, although it’s clear that law enforcement needs to improve on the loosely regulated safety and security of officials in uncovering operations. Share your views on the incident.