WESTON, FLA. (WSVN) - - A young man who was captured on cellphone video being slammed to the ground by a Broward Sheriff’s Office deputy who was taking him into custody in Weston said the deputy crossed the line, and now officials with the department said they’re looking into the arrest.
The startling footage, posted to TikTok, captured the moment the BSO deputy placed 22-year-old Khalil Pace in a chokehold before slamming him to the ground, Dec. 22.
“I’m thinking, ‘He’s trying to kill me,'” he said.
Speaking with 7News on Thursday, Pace said he and his friends paid to use the weight room at the Bonaventure Town Center Club.
It’s where staff at the business accused the group of smoking marijuana in the bathroom.
“They come in while we were working out, in the middle of working out, and they come into the gym with two officers, and they basically [said], ‘You guys have to leave, you guys were smoking in the restaurant.’ We weren’t going to go back and forth about it; we just started leaving the building,” said Pace.
It’s an accusation Pace denies.
“No, we didn’t,” he said. “[The staff] called the cops.”
Pace admits that when BSO deputies arrived, he cursed at the manager and told him to shut up as he walked out.
“The manager just kept on talking, ‘Yeah, you guys shouldn’t have been smoking, don’t come back here,’ and he just kept on talking,” said Pace, “and I was juts like, ‘Shut the [expletive] up.'”
It was at that moment when, Pace said, he was initially roughed up by the responding deputy.
“Why are you touching him? Don’t touch him,” a friend of Pace is heard saying in the video.
Moments later, the deputy grabbed Pace by his sweatshirt.
“You feel helpless, you feel humiliated, you feel, like, powerless,'” said Pace. “You really feel like there’s nothing you could say or do to change the outcome of this situation.”
Figuring he’d be arrested, Pace said, he tried handing his phone to one of his friends to notify his family.
“Take my phone,” Pace is heard saying to a friend.
That was when the deputy is seen wrapping his arm around Pace’s neck from behind and slamming him to the ground.
“I just feel like it’s based on the person, it’s not based on the skin color, and I feel like, based on who he was, he just seemed like a very aggressive person, like he didn’t have self control,” said Pace.
When asked whether the deputy’s handling of the situation was appropriate, Pace replied, “Of course not.”
When asked whether or not he feels his civil rights were violated, Pace said, “For sure.”
7News reached out to BSO for comment. In a statement, a spokesperson wrote, “Per BSO policy, District Command and the Training Division are already reviewing the arrest to determine if the force used was consistent with agency training and policy.”
Pace has been charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. His case is pending.
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