Williams, Arizona (VN) – On Thursday, August 11, 2016, Ken Walton was traveling east on Interstate-40 toward the Grand Canyon with his daughter safely buckled in a car seat beside him in the rental vehicle they had taken from San Francisco. He had noticed an Arizona Highway Patrol car driving behind him for a mile or so when the officer flashed on his lights. Walton pulled over, rolled down his window and waited for Highway Patrol Trooper Oton Villegas to approach the vehicle.
To his surprise, Officer Villegas inched toward the vehicle on the passenger side with his gun drawn. When Walton had noticed the officer approach the side of his car, he saw that the officer had his gun pointed at him with his daughter in the line-of-fire. The officer ordered Walton to lower the passenger window. Being in an unfamiliar vehicle, Walton was struggling to find the button for the passenger window while keeping his hands visible to an officer who is threatening their lives.
Walton’s 7-year-old daughter rolled down the window. “I explained that we were in a rental car, that we had no weapons, and I was having trouble figuring out how to roll down the front passenger window from my driver’s side door,” Walton recounts.
As his daughter struggled to lower the window further, the officer pointed his gun directly at her and ordered her not to move. The officer then ordered Walton to exit the vehicle. He exited promptly with his hands raised in the air. The officer stepped to the driver’s side of the vehicle ordering Walton to face away from him. Officer Villegas shouted at Walton, who was still facing away from the officer with his hands in the air, “Get your hands away from your waist or I’ll blow two holes through your back right now!”
Read the full story: http://www.voluntarynow.com/father-daughter-held-gunpoint-driving-rental-car-dps-claims-officer-justified/
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