GROVES — A Groves police officer is in the midst of arbitration to be reinstated to sergeant after being demoted for excessive use of force.

The incident in question occurred Aug. 6, 2017 when Groves police was called to assist Port Arthur police with a naked man, allegedly high on PCP.

“The Man” as he is referred to in the hearing, first assaulted an employee at Waffle House on 4505 Twin City Highway before running to the Raceway on the 3900 block where he assaulted another person.

Four Groves officers went to the scene: John Rabalais, who is in arbitration; Gary Davis, Steve Lemons and Rudy Guerrero. Of this group, Guerrero was found not at fault while Davis and Lemons were officially reprimanded.

Bettye Lynn who is representing the city in the case called Groves Police Sgt. John Hudson to the stand inside Groves’ municipal court on Tuesday morning.

Hudson, who is one of two sergeants over the criminal investigations division, said he learned of the use of force incident upon reviewing the reporters from over that weekend. He met with fellow sergeant Robert Phillips about the incident then notified City Marshal Norman Reynolds Jr. From there, an internal affairs investigation was launched.

Attorney Greg Cagle with the Texas Municipal Police Association cross-examined Phillips and questioned his method of investigating the case against Rabalais.

Writing with a marker on a large spiral bound paper, Cagle asked Phillips if he interviewed any witnesses in the case. He listed possible witnesses: The Man, the Waffle House employee, the people assaulted at Raceway, four Groves officers and a Port Arthur officer equaling 10.

Hudson said he did not interview any of the people Cagle deemed witnesses and, it was learned, had not been trained to work in internal affairs. He did say he was trained to interview all witnesses as part of a criminal investigation.

Hudson elaborated on the use of force, which takes into account the severity of the crime, the nature of the threat, and the degree in which the subject resists arrest.

The Man exhibited signs he was high on PCP — one of the signs is stripping off clothing because the person feels as if they are burning up, tends to have extraordinary strength and are unpredictable.

The concluding report showed the use of force prior to The Man being handcuffed was justified but not after in which The Man fell forward while handcuffed and struck his head on the concrete.

“If an officer had put a knee or hand on his back or two officers held him down, it would have prevented him from getting up,” Hudson said.

Lynn posed questions about Rabalais’ Taser, an X26 model. In investigating the incident Hudson looked at a Taser log which can show how many times the Taser is activated, how long it is activated along with dates and times. But Rabalais’ Taser had issues and upon examination showed the year to be 2002, not 2017.

A technician from the Taser’s company examined the device and called it a “time drift.” In addition, a small crack was found in the device that can cause data corruption and battery issues, Hudson said.

The technician as able to calculate the number of times the Taser was activated for all of the officers during the incident.

The Man was struck by three different Tasers 11 times in nine minutes and four of the 11 were prior to him being handcuffed,” Lynn said.

Arbitrator and mediator Paul Chapdelaine of Conflict Services LLC. from Pearland is overseeing the hearing which is expected to continue Wednesday.