Lisa Marchesoni
Posted: Tuesday, November 17, 2009 10:12 pm

Deonya Henderson accuses the jail staff of beating her while incarcerated.

Former inmate Deonya Henderson broke down with emotion when she accused sheriff’s detention officers of assaulting her Jan. 8 when she was booked into the adult detention center.

“In booking, they beat me,” Henderson said, adding she couldn’t use the bathroom for four days.

Henderson made her accusation before a community-wide meeting of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People attended by about 100 black and white residents Tuesday at Allen Chapel M.B. Church.

Walter Atkinson of the federal Department of Justice’s community relations division in Atlanta asked Henderson and the other people airing complaints to file written complaints about their accusations.

His primary purpose is to try to reach a resolution between parties.

“We do not intervene on behalf of one individual” but intervene for a community, he said.

Nashville attorney Terry R. Clayton talked to several people about their specific complaints.

Sheriff’s Chief Deputy Virgil Gammon said employees are well trained and committed to their jobs.

“If there’s a complaint, we will follow up on it,” Gammon said. “If there’s any type of assault or death, protocol is for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to investigate. We welcome those investigations.”

The sheriff’s office can’t comment on open TBI investigations.

“We’re confident when the facts come out, it’s going to show no misleading situations by any employee in this department.”

Murfreesboro Police spokesman Kyle Evans said he had no comment about the complaints at this time.

Besides Henderson, several other citizens complained about their treatment by sheriff’s detention officers and Murfreesboro Police.

Their complaints include:

• Arvella Minter complained her son, Jason R. McClain, was given someone else’s medication while he is jailed at the Rutherford County Adult Detention Center. She fears her son will die in jail because he sold marijuana. She said Deputy Chief Bob Asbury, who supervises the jail, told her complaint forms were not available.

McClain's arrest record showed he's been arrested for theft, evading arrest, tampering with evidence, selling marijuana and violation of probation.

• Judith Bileyeu of Beech Grove said her daughter was injured May 13 and lapsed into a 10-day coma four hours after she entered the detention center. Bileyeu accused detention officers of beating her daughter. She was told her daughter tried to hang herself. Later, she was told she tried to suffocate herself.

Her daughter sustained marks to her right shoulder and her lip was busted. She survived.

In response, Tommy Vallejos of the Hispanic Organization for Progress and Education of Clarksville, said the sheriff should be “knocked off” his high horse and not be re-elected.

Bileyeu believes someone put a chokehold on her daughter.

The complaints weren’t just about the sheriff’s office. Several people complained about Murfreesboro Police.

• Dorothy Cheers said when a police officer investigated her daughter’s crash about three or four years ago, he made a comment about drinking or using drugs because “that’s what you do in this neighborhood.” She filed a complaint.

• Lakeisha Morgan said she was inside New Reflections barbershop on State Street when barricaded inside by narcotics detectives and plain-clothes police.

One of the officers used the “N” word,” she said.

“I’m scared of those officers,” Morgan said.

She was later arrested and held in booking 3-1/2 hours although her bondsman was there to make her bond, she said. When she asked about getting out to nurse her baby, she said she was told “f--- your baby.”

“You come to Murfreesboro on vacation, you leave on probation,” Morgan said.

• Willie David, a black man who operates the barbershop, complained about the training of Murfreesboro Police officers. He has been arrested several times.

“It’s not the white officers harassing us,” David said. “It’s black officers harassing us.”

Police harassing him are scaring off his customers, David said.

“They are impeding on me to take care of my kids,” David said.

• Rose Collier, an aunt of Lakeisha White, 11, who died after being struck by a vehicle driven by sheriff’s Detective Sgt. Ron Killings, said people are afraid of the system.

Killings’ trial on reckless homicide is set in February before a judge who is the Murfreesboro mayor’s brother, Collier said.

People told her her sons underwent a “lynching because I spoke out against Killings.” Both of her sons were convicted of rape of a Smyrna woman since the crash.

She accused Murfreesboro Police Detective John Singleton of shooting at her son and trying to cover it up.

• Buford Throneberry, 79, accused Murfreesboro Police of “tearing my shoulder out” after the resident tried to bring Valentine’s Day gifts to his wife. The injury required surgery and rehabilitation.