Django star charged with lewd behaviour

Published Oct 23, 2014

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Here's a situation where speaking out on social media may have garnered a little too much attention. A month after actress Daniele Watts and boyfriend Brian Lucas went on Facebook and publicly accused the Los Angeles Police Department of targeting them on the basis of race while “showing affection” in public, both have been charged with a misdemeanour count of lewd behaviour.

At the time, their posts went viral. The LAPD launched an internal complaint investigation and the story took on a life of its own. It had started, though, on Septyember 11, when police were called for a report of the couple engaging in some ambiguous PDA in a car outside CBS television studios. Lucas said later they were just making out; witnesses claimed there was much more going on. Watts (an actress known for a small role in ‘Weeds’ and a tinier one in ‘Django Unchained’) refused to show police her ID, and they were both briefly detained. Officers released them after determining that no crime was committed, the LAPD later said in a statement.

It was Watts and Lucas who spread the word of the incident. Both wrote long, emotional posts on Facebook, with photos of Watts crying in handcuffs. Lucas maintained that officers “saw a tatted RAWKer white boy and a hot bootie shorted black girl” and rushed to the assumption that Watts was a prostitute and he was a client.

“As I was sitting in the back of the police car, I remembered the countless times my father came home frustrated or humiliated by the cops when he had done nothing wrong,” Watts wrote. “I felt his shame, his anger, and my own feelings of frustration for existing in a world where I have allowed myself to believe that “authority figures” could control my BEING ... my ability to BE!!!!!!!”

The social media outcry worked — multiple outlets picked up the story that weekend. The press war continued as Watts told CNN that the police “accosted me and forced me into handcuffs.” The arresting officer, Sgt. Jim Parker, told the Hollywood Reporter that Watts escalated things when she didn't show ID. “People having sex in the car, no biggie. No one wants to arrest anybody,” he said. Parker later gave audio of the arrest to TMZ in which Watts is heard saying, “Do you know how many times I've been called — the cops have been called just because I'm black and he's white?” Parker responds, “Who brought up the race card? Why?”

Now, as the story rages on, the Los Angeles city attorney's office has officially filed charges against Watts and Lucas. A spokesperson confirmed that both of them are charged with a misdemeanour count of lewd conduct. “Once we looked at the police report, we felt criminal charges were warranted,” the spokesman said.

Even though the LAPD initially determined that there was no crime when Watts and Lucas were detained, a report was submitted to the attorney's office by law enforcement, the spokesman said. That generated a follow-up investigation, and once the attorney's office reviewed the case and talked to witnesses, they felt they had sufficient evidence to file charges.

TMZ takes credit for that one. “Prosecutors listened to the LAPD audio — obtained by TMZ — and realized what was up,” the site boasted, adding that prosecutors had TMZ photos of Watts and Lucas in the car.

Now, Parker is under internal investigation at the LAPD for speaking to the media and leaking the audio (he told TheWrap he's in “the penalty box” at work), while Watts and Lucas are due in court next month for an arraignment. Overall, it's a no-win situation that wasn't helped at all by the massive amount of publicity it received from both sides. - Washington Post/Bloomberg

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