Two Niota officers arrested for fight last summer

Niota police officers Donald McCarter, 45, left, and Officer Jonathan Scott, 22, are charged with one count of official oppression and one count of conspiracy to commit official oppression.

Photo by Contributed Photo.

Two Niota Police Department officers have been arrested, accused of injuring a man during an arrest last summer, the TBI says.

Officer Donald McCarter, 45, and Officer Jonathan Scott, 22, were each charged with one count of official oppression and one count of conspiracy to commit official oppression, according to TBI spokeswoman Kristin Helm.

“Official oppression” is a charge applied to a public servant who “intentionally subjects another to mistreatment or to arrest, detention, stop, frisk, halt, search, seizure, dispossession, assessment or lien when the public servant knows the conduct is unlawful,” according to Tennessee state law.

Charges for official oppression can only be brought by a grand jury.

Both McCarter and Scott were indicted by the McMinn County grand jury earlier this week, she said.

On June 13, 2011, Scott conducted at traffic stop and pulled over 53-year-old Wesley Stewart for riding a motorized bicycle without a tag or registration, Helm said.

Scott stopped Stewart near Stewart’s residence and requested his license and registration. Stewart refused to produce the documents and, when Scott returned to his patrol vehicle, Stewart walked home.

McCarter arrived on the scene and he and Scott entered Stewart’s residence to arrest him, she said, but a fight occurred and Stewart was injured.

Stewart was charged in the incident, but the charges were later dismissed in General Sessions Court, said Helm. TBI opened the investigation at the request of the District Attorney General Steve Bebb in the 10th Judicial District.

McCarter and Scott were booked into the McMinn County Jail today, Helm said.