Officer Ronald Kerzaya is under investigation after holding a black man at gunpoint while searching for a white suspect.
Kerzaya arrived at Hawthorne Suites after the hotel manager reported a white man wearing a black shirt pointed a gun at an employee.
Upon his arrival, bodycam footage shows Kerzaya stopped Trevon Cumpian, a black hotel employee wearing a white-grey shirt.
Kerzaya even lies about Cumpian fitting the description of the armed suspect.
“I am responding to a man with a firearm who matches your description,” Kerzaya says, justifying his behavior.
On video, you can hear Cumpian say over and over again that he is a worker, but that did not stop Kerzaya from holding him at gunpoint until he confirmed his employment at the hotel.
“Are you going to shoot me? Am I … another person on the news?” Cumpian says.
“Shut the f— up with that s—, get on your knees.”
There were no weapons found, and since then, Kerzaya, has been placed in an administrative role.
The Tempe Police Department released in a statement, “Our initial review indicates that this incident was not handled in accordance with the professionalism and respectful behavior that we, and the public, have for our officers.”
The Tempe Officers Association empathizes with Cumpian, but they are adamant this incident had nothing to do with race. Kerzaya was strategically doing his job.
“The officer involved was responding to a call involving an armed suspect who already had committed an assault,” the association said. “In real-time, the officer was receiving information from the property manager. That information indicated the next person to come through the door would be the suspect.”
According to Fox 10, this is not Kerzaya’s first time under investigation. In 2019, he tased an unarmed man holding a baby.
