By Steve Neavling
The FBI launched an investigation into allegations in recently filed lawsuits that claim Baton Rouge police in Louisiana assaulted suspects they detained in a warehouse known as the “Brave Cave.”
One woman, Ternell L. Brown, described the warehouse as an unmarked “torture chamber,” where she was “forcibly” taken and then stripped and cavity searched, according to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana, The New York Times reports.
Brown, who was accused of mixing two different prescription pulls in the same container, alleges she was held in the warehouse for more than two hours and was released without being charged.
The Street Crimes Unit of the Baton Rouge Police Department ran the warehouse, which was closed in recent weeks amid similar allegations.
The FBI launched a civil rights investigation on Friday, saying the probe was based on “allegations that members of the department may have abused their authority.”
“The Baton Rouge Police Department is committed to addressing these troubling accusations and has initiated administrative and criminal investigations,” the department said, noting that the Street Crimes Unit was “disbanded and reassigned.”
Another lawsuit alleges three officers brutally beat a 21-year-old man, who was treated at a hospital for broken bones and other injuries after he had been transported to the “Brave Cave.”
In both cases, officers switched off their body cameras, the lawsuits allege.
