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FARMINGTON — One man is in custody after a physical altercation with two Davis County sheriff’s deputies that continued even after one deputy deployed her Taser on him.
Benisimani Pouha, 42, was arrested on suspicion of several drug-related and traffic misdemeanors, and two felonies — assault against a peace officer with a weapon or force, and disarming a police officer.
While patrolling on northbound U.S. 89 before 5 a.m. Wednesday, the arresting deputy came across Pouha’s car stopped halfway in a travel lane, according to an affidavit of probable cause. Approaching the vehicle from the passenger side, the deputy noticed a white residue on the passenger seat and an open box of beer in the back.
Pouha told the deputy his vehicle had broken down, but he had trouble speaking clearly and “repeatedly made exclamations as if to a person who was not there,” the deputy wrote in the affidavit. He had “glassy eyes and a blank stare,” the deputy continued.
When the deputy asked Pouha to exit the vehicle, he looked at her for “approximately 45 seconds” before stepping out of the car, the affidavit says. He walked toward a fence dividing the highway from the frontage road, and the deputy said she and her partner attempted to keep him from going through the fence.
Pouha did go through the fence, though, at which point the deputy’s partner got in front of him and attempted to verbally stop him, the affidavit says. When Pouha pushed her partner out to the way, the deputy says her partner tackled him.
That’s when the first deputy drew her Taser and warned him she would use it, according to the affidavit. When she did, Pouha fell to the ground and the deputies attempted to apply handcuffs.
“He began to fight both of us and pinned both of us to the ground,” the deputy wrote.
She also mentioned that she is only 5-foot-2 and her partner 4-foot-11, while Pouha is 6 feet tall and 250 pounds.
The deputy’s partner freed the officers by striking the man several times in the head with her fist, the affidavit states. A third officer arrived on scene, pursued the man down the road, and ultimately deployed a second Taser against him, at which point he was taken into custody.
Pouha was found to be driving on a learner’s permit and his vehicle’s registration was revoked, according to the affidavit. It also says officers found Gabapentin pills in Pouha’s socks while booking him into jail.
Pouha was on parole for felony assault and sexual assault, the affidavit says.
The deputy also wrote that when reviewing body camera footage, she determined that Pouha had tried to suffocate her partner while wrestling and had attempted to take the deputy’s Taser from her.
