An Akron police officer is facing an internal investigation after video surfaced of an altercation between him and a woman inside of a car.
The video was posted on YouTube, but has since been removed from the site.
newsnet5.com is not naming the officer because he hasn't been charged, but the police department confirms he is a 25-year veteran of the force who works undercover in the narcotics unit.
The quality of the cell phone video is dark and poor. Investigators said it was recorded by the officer's girlfriend last summer.
On the video, you can hearing music playing loudly and a man and a woman verbally arguing.
You can also hear other noises followed by the woman crying and accusing the officer of hitting her.
"You hit me in the face with the charger," she said.
He responded, "You learned, right?"
Akron Deputy Chief Prosecutor Craig Morgan said a special unit that investigates domestic violence cases—in which officers are either victims or suspects—looked into the situation for five to six weeks.
In October, Morgan consulted with the investigators and viewed the video. He felt there was enough evidence to file charges, but the victim decided not to prosecute so the case was dropped.
"Initially, she did file a report. She certainly put the wheels in motion. It just came down to, by the time it was all over, she didn't want to go forward," Morgan said.
Morgan said prosecutors can seek convictions without a victim's cooperation, but in this case, he didn't feel there was enough evidence, in part, because the of the poor video quality.
"You hear things, but you don't know what they are because you can't see them," Morgan explained.
Morgan said it's not uncommon for a case to be dropped for a lack of evidence and added the case involving the officer and his girlfriend was investigated thoroughly.
"We take any incident, whether it involves a police officer or anybody, we take all incidences of domestic violence very seriously because there is always that potential that you can have that one domestic that goes tragically wrong."
Internal affairs officers are also conducting an investigation to determine if the officer violated any policies, rules or regulations.
Lt. Rick Edwards said if any violations are found the officer could face disciplinary actions ranging from a reprimand to termination.
newsnet5.com requested any police reports connected to the incident. Edwards said portions of the reports needed to be redacted and would be made available through the law department on Friday.
Police Chief James Nice said the internal affair probe should be wrapped up by next week and stressed the officer didn't receive special treatment because of his position.
"The truth is we hold officers to a higher standard," Nice said. "He actually got more scrutiny than the public would have gotten."
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