A former Colorado cop was captured on camera maltreating an elderly woman with dementia while arresting her. Later on, he allegedly joked about the incident with his co-workers.
On Wednesday, Austin Hopp pleaded guilty to assaulting a 73-year-old woman named Karen Garner, who suffers from dementia. In 2020, Garner left a store in Loveland, Colorado, without paying for $14 worth of items. Garner was walking through a field picking wildflowers at the time of her arrest. Garner can be seen turning away from him and Hopp grabbing her arm and pushing her to the ground in the bodycam footage. Garner was still holding on to the wildflowers, NBC News reports.
While pushing her against his car, she turned around and explained that she was trying to go home. He then pushed her back against the car and bent her arm toward her head. “Are you finished? Are you finished? We don’t play this game,” he can be heard saying.
The entire ordeal ended with Hopp getting sued for allegedly dislocating Garner’s shoulder. The city settled the federal lawsuit for $3 million.
Hopp is now looking at up to eight years in prison after being sentenced in May over the second-degree assault.
