‘Knocked me off my feet’: Man recovering from OPD Tasing during open container arrest

By Justin Schecker

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    ORANGE COUNTY, Florida (WESH) — An Orange County man says he spent nearly a week in the hospital after an Orlando Police officer tased him downtown on S. Orange Avenue.

“The feeling it just knocked me off my feet, and it was excruciating,” Gabriel Lasalle said. “I feel like electricity run through my whole entire body.”

Police said Lasalle, 30, started to run away when they tried detaining him for having an open container of alcohol.

“Like if I can rewind the time, I would be okay with just doing 30 days in the county jail instead of getting tased,” Lasalle said during an exclusive interview with WESH 2 Investigates.

Lasalle is back home in Winter Park after his family posted his bond last weekend while he was still in custody at Orlando Regional Medical Center.

“They did a CAT scan on me to see how bad the swelling or the blood was with my skull,” Lasalle said. “So, I had a fracture in my skull and fracture in my neck.”

Just after midnight on Tuesday, March 25, Orlando Police said they observed Lasalle trying to hide an open container of alcohol at Pine Street and S. Orange Avenue.

It was a Beatbox Lemonade Hard Tea drink that Lasalle said he had just opened.

“I threw it away,” he said. “I was just thinking they were gonna let us go or a slap on a wrist.”

Lasalle shared with WESH 2 Investigates cell phone video of his interaction police prior to the tasing. In the video, he asks “what’s your badge number?” before the officer replied, “you’re being detained.”

Lasalle can be heard saying, “I’m not being detained,” prior to the video cutting off. Lasalle said another officer in the background of the video wearing shorts with a flashlight is the one who Tased him.

According to police reports, Lasalle started sprinting south on Orange Avenue. After a first attempt wasn’t effective, the arresting officer said he deployed his Taser a second time from about 20 feet away, aiming at Lasalle’s leg and lower back. The reports said Lasalle ended up in a “supine position,” meaning he fell backward.

“So, when I turned around, I was only like, five steps away, and that’s when they Tased me, and that pain was unbearable,” Lasalle said. “I never got Tased before, and that that hurt really bad. And so I was screaming, and I couldn’t breathe because the police were on top of me.”

Orlando Police previously provided WESH 2 Investigates with this statement about the Tasing incident.

“Based on the Department’s Use of Force Policy a Taser is authorized for that type of resistance. A Use of Force Investigation will be conducted in accordance with department policy.”

Lasalle explained he lost his job as a car wash manager because of the days he missed at work while still in the hospital.

“I’m very grateful to be alive right now because everything happened so abruptly,” he said. “And you know now I have to deal with health conditions, and I lost my job, and it’s hard for me to pay my bills now because everything just happened so quick.”

Orlando Police on Thursday denied WESH 2 Investigates public records request for the arresting officer’s body camera video of the Tasing and the arrest. The reason provided was “this case is still open.”

Lasalle is scheduled to face a judge for his arraignment on a resisting without violence charge and violating the city’s open container ordinance on May 1.

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