LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A second former Arkansas law enforcement officer who pleaded guilty to violating the civil rights of a man he kicked during a violent arrest in 2022 that was caught on video has been sentenced to one year in prison.
U.S. District Judge Susan O. Hickey on Thursday sentenced former Crawford County sheriff’s deputy Zackary King to prison, with credit for any time served in federal custody, according to court documents. King agreed in April to plead guilty to one count of deprivation of rights under color of law during the Aug. 21, 2022, arrest of Randal Worcester outside a convenience store.
Hickey also ordered King to serve one year of supervised release.
King and another former deputy, Levi White, were charged by federal prosecutors last year for the arrest. A bystander used a cellphone to record the arrest in the small town of Mulberry, about 140 miles (220 kilometers) northwest of Little Rock, near the border with Oklahoma. The video was shared widely online.
“Punching a man in the head, slamming their head repeatedly on the concrete pavement, kicking them in the back and striking them in the midsection — this kind of gratuitous and unjustified violence at the hands of law enforcement runs contrary to the oath that officers take in our country to protect and serve,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division said in a statement. “The defendants swore an oath to uphold the law, then violated that oath and abused their power as law enforcement officers by assaulting a person in their custody.”
An attorney for King did not immediately return a message late Thursday afternoon.
White, who also pleaded guilty in April, on Wednesday was sentenced to over 5 years, with credit for time served, and ordered to be held at a federal prisons medical facility in Missouri. A judge ordered White to receive mental health counseling and treatment while incarcerated.
A third officer caught in the video, Mulberry Police Officer Thell Riddle, was not charged in the federal case. King and White were fired by the Crawford County sheriff. The video depicted King and White striking Worcester as Riddle held him down. White also slammed Worcester’s head onto the pavement.
Police have said Worcester was being questioned for threatening a clerk at a convenience store in the nearby small town of Alma when he tackled one of the deputies and punched him in the head before the arrest. Worcester is set to go to trial in February on charges related to the arrest, including resisting arrest and second-degree battery.
Worcester filed a lawsuit in 2022 against the three officers, the city of Mulberry and Crawford County over the arrest. But that case has been put on hold while the criminal cases related to the arrest are ongoing.
