Officer Lawrence Etsitty Jr Faces Sexual Assault Charges

GALLUP

Crownpoint-based Navajo Police Officer Lawrence Etsitty Jr. may face federal charges after he allegedly sexually assaulted a 26-year-old Gallup woman while transporting her to jail.

The FBI has launched a preliminary civil rights ‘color of law’ inquiry into Etsitty, according to New Mexico FBI spokesman Todd Hulsey.

“Color of law is when any government official is acting with some authority,” Hulsey said.

Additionally, Navajo Police Department has launched its own internal affairs investigation.

Etsitty is accused of stopping en route to Crownpoint jail, pulling the handcuffed woman from the cruiser and fondling her. After about 20 minutes, he turned around and brought her to Gallup, according to the victim, whose name was withheld to protect her identity.

The victim said she and her fiancé went out for dinner and drinks with more than 10 out-of-town relatives, including a designated driver, the evening of Jan. 24. When the bar closed at 1:15 a.m., the caravan continued toward Fire Rock Casino. They arrived around 2 a.m., and everyone went inside. The victim walked in about 30 seconds behind the rest, having lingered at the car to organize her purse.

As she approached the entrance she saw her fiancé and other family members seated near the buffet, but security stopped her at the door and told her she was too drunk to enter. Two security guards escorted the victim to her fiancé and family and everyone agreed to leave, so they walked back toward the exit.

“As we were walking out I noticed a cop at the door,” she said. “The cop stopped us and said ‘I need to arrest her.’”

“For what?”

“Assault.”

She said the officer accused the 5-feet-3-inch, 120 pound victim of assaulting her 6-feet-3-inch, 220 pound fiancé during their walk from the buffet to the exit.

The rest of the family thought she was being charged with public intoxication and pleaded with the officer to let them take her home because they had a designated driver, according to a relative present at the time, whose name is withheld to protect the identity of the victim.

“Usually they just let you take them home if you have a driver,” the relative said. “My first thought was: ‘At least she is safe with a cop.’ You’re supposed to be able to trust them.”

After she was cuffed and placed in the cruiser and headed toward Crownpoint, the victim said Etsitty began mumbling to himself.

“... she could hear the officer talking to himself, saying ‘should I do it, should I do it, or shouldn’t I,” according to a Gallup Police report filed a few hours later.

The victim said that 20 to 30 minutes into the drive, Etsitty stopped near “the dunes.” He pulled to the side of the road and turned off all of the vehicle’s lights. He forcibly pulled the still-handcuffed victim from the back seat of the cruiser and told her to stand against the door. She said Etsitty repeatedly asked about her boyfriend and said he liked her as he kissed her on the mouth and inappropriately touched her. Throughout the ordeal the victim wept and pleaded with Etsitty to stop.

“The whole time I was like don’t do this ... this is wrong. Don’t do this,” she said. “To me it felt like forever ... standing out there, it could have been 15 minutes.”

Afterward Etsitty agreed to bring the victim home. But when they got back into Gallup, she didn’t want him to know where she lived. So she asked him to stop and let her use the bathroom. Etsitty parked beside a Dumpster at an apartment complex and let her out.

The victim said Etsitty wanted to help her get her pants down. She asked him not to help with her pants, but to remove the handcuffs, and Etsitty did. The victim went behind the Dumpster and out of sight, quietly removed her boots and started running. When she got home she called Gallup Police.

She said that same day she was visited by an FBI agent and an Internal Affairs Investigator from Navajo Police Department.

“Internal Affairs said he may get off with a short suspension because he didn’t actually rape me,” she said.