Dibor Robert’s Nightmare

It’s about 10:45 p.m. on July 29, 2007. You’re driving home alone from work on a dark, lonely, rural road between Sedona and Cottonwood – a road without a single streetlight.

You come up behind a car that is driving erratically and pass it, then you see flashing lights and think, if it’s a cop, he’s not after me, he must be stopping the erratic driver.

You stop at a stop sign and turn onto the road leading to Cornville, and the flashing lights follow. Although it looks like a sheriff’s SUV, you can’t imagine why a legitimate cop would want to stop you, since you haven’t done anything wrong. You’re not a speeder, you’ve never had a ticket and your ’93 Nissan sedan isn’t exactly a hotrod.

You yell and gesture that you’re going down the road to Cornville, where there are at least two places that will be lighted at this time of night. You know this because you and your husband have discussed exactly where you’ll find the safety of lights if someone tries to stop you on a dark road. He worries about police impersonators. So do you. Recently, a gang in Phoenix posed as officers and raped their victims. It was on all the TV stations. The Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office is concerned, too, and for years has promoted a clear policy: Motorists in doubt should call 911, drive to a lighted area before pulling over and ask for an officer’s identification.

Now, I have to ask readers the crucial question: What would you do in this situation?

I’ll tell you what I’d do and what most women I know would do: I sure as hell wouldn’t stop. I’d hightail it to those lights first.

And so did Dibor Roberts, a short, 120-pound, 48-year-old nursing assistant who had just become an American citizen after emigrating from Africa. She tells me she was afraid, and that everything happened so fast there was no time to react.

A mere half mile down the Cornville road – remember this distance – the SUV pulled in front of Roberts’ car, forcing her to stop. The man in uniform jumped from his car with such haste he didn’t even close his driver’s door, and he ran at her with a drawn gun.

Here’s my second crucial question: How long would it take you to dial “911-send” on your cell phone? Dibor Roberts didn’t have that much time before she says the screaming officer used his billy club to break out her rear driver’s window, grab her cell phone and throw it on the ground.

“He didn’t let me do anything,” she recalls, sitting at her kitchen table in her Cottonwood apartment in June. “He didn’t allow me to dial 911; he didn’t let me put the car out of gear. This all happened just like that (she snaps her fingers). I’m saying, ‘Why are you doing this? I just wanted to get to a lighted area.’ I said that several times.” (And there’s a witness attesting she did. More on that later.)

Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office Sergeant Jeff Newnum’s version makes it sound like the chase went a lot farther and the confrontation took a whole lot longer. He would testify at the Yavapai County Superior Court in Prescott in May that she had “six minutes” to call 911 before he even stopped her, but she says it was only a half mile that she was even aware he was targeting her car.

“At gunpoint I ordered the driver of the Nissan to exit the vehicle,” Newnum’s police report read. “The Nissan’s headlights were shining in my direction, fully illuminating my Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office uniform. I continued to order the driver of the vehicle to open the door and exit the vehicle, however the female driver refused, and continued to yell something inaudible.”

The beefy sergeant said he gave “numerous commands” to open the door and when she didn’t comply, he holstered his weapon and took out his expandable baton, breaking out the back window. He claims that Roberts then “accelerated” twice, trying to flee, although she says as he pulled her out, her foot slipped off the brake and the car inched forward. Inching is actually all it did – even Newnum’s police report notes it touched the back of his car but did no damage.

By then, passerby Colin Bass of Rimrock drove up, noted the open SUV door and thought the officer might need help. The police report from that night says this: “Bass said he drove by the police SUV and saw glass on the street. Bass said he then saw a police officer attempting to pull a female out of a vehicle…. Bass said Roberts was resisting and being combative.”

That was about all the original police report said about Bass, although his story would get more elaborate and suspicious: Bass, who claims to be a stranger to the officer, says that since Newnum had both hands busy pulling Roberts from the car, he took the flashlight from the officer’s belt, next to his gun, to signal any oncoming car. Even Newnum says a passerby “used my flashlight to assist in traffic control.”

OK, I’m not a police officer, but I know enough officers to know none of them would ever allow anyone to get near their weapon. (A veteran officer I know said this scenario is “absurd.”)

Eventually, Bass would embroider his story to back up the officer’s claim that this was a woman intentionally fleeing from a cop. Significantly, he would claim to hear her on her cell phone asking her husband how to get away – the same thing Sergeant Newnum testified he heard.

But the evidence shows this isn’t true.

First, Bass didn’t even arrive on the scene until the window was already smashed and the cell phone was in the gravel. Second, if Newnum couldn’t hear her “inaudible” screams through the closed window, how could he hear her cell phone conversation? But most significantly, cell phone records from that night show Dibor Roberts made no calls during the time of the altercation. Her husband’s cell phone records show he received no calls, either. Even Yavapai County Sheriff Steve Waugh admitted records show there was “no attempt to call her husband or call 9-1-1.” (Regrettably, Roberts’ attorney didn’t even bring up the cell phone records during the trial. Duh.)

But curiously, Bass did testify to something everybody else wanted to deny. Both Newnum and his sheriff insisted there was no reason to believe Roberts didn’t know there was a legitimate cop trailing her – that she was just avoiding arrest. But Bass said he heard Dibor Roberts, again and again, telling the officer she “was trying to get to the lights.” He heard her repeatedly ask the officer, “Why are you doing this? I did what I was supposed to do.”

This makes Bass a most curious witness: He clearly lied to help the officer but also said the one thing the Yavapai County Attorney’s Office didn’t want anyone to believe – that this woman was only trying to get to a lighted area for her own safety.

Now is when you expect me to tell you that the truth was revealed and everyone left this poor woman alone. Or that they saved face by charging her with a minor crime and everyone went home. But that’s not what happened.

The Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office and its county attorney went after this woman with a vengeance. To me, they appear as out of control as the officer was that night.

Yavapai County Sheriff Waugh even called a strange news conference before the trial to tell the “Paul Harvey” side of the story, trying to bolster his sergeant’s version, but he ended up giving several wrong impressions. He insinuated Roberts might have been “impaired” that night (although he knew she wasn’t) and claimed Roberts never once acknowledged his officer as he drove alongside her (although even Newnum admitted she was gesturing and yelling at him through her closed window, but he didn’t understand what she was saying.) The sheriff tried to make it seem like the sergeant was so calm and collected as he approached Roberts that “he asked for ID and proof of insurance.” Yeah, right!

Dibor Roberts went to court this spring. Her attorney did a lousy job defending her and was clearly outclassed. Even so, it’s hard to believe a jury convicted her of two felonies: fleeing an officer and resisting arrest. The judge reduced one to a misdemeanor but let the other felony stand. He didn’t impose any jail time since she had already spent six days in jail (until she could raise her $20,000 bail).

Perhaps the most haunting part of it all was the prosecutor’s last words to the jury: “She didn’t stop, and the law says you must stop.”

Oh yeah? Then why would the same sheriff’s office tell other “motorists in doubt” to get to a lighted area? (The sheriff’s office did not respond to my request to discuss the case.) A videotape of the sheriff’s news conference shows even he said if you’re in doubt, it’s a “good course of action” to get to a lighted area.

You don’t have to be a legal expert to see what happened here. Newnum might be a very nice man and a good peace officer, but he made a lousy call that night, lost control and then needed to cover his behind. Even Sheriff Waugh said at a news conference this was a situation that “snowballed into something unfortunate to all parties.”

Yet, the sheriff tried to convince the public that Newnum “went by the book.” Remember, Newnum said he went after Roberts because she was speeding. He never proved it, but even if she had been speeding, since when do you draw a gun and smash out a window for a routine traffic stop?

“A lot of ordinary people have looked at this and said, ‘this is outrageous,’” says Barbara Latrell, a Sedona community leader who is advocating to appeal Roberts’ convictions. “Many people are saying ‘this could be me,’ and they see it as an over-exaggerated use of police force.”

Supporters have launched a statewide campaign called “A Woman’s Right to Light” and want Arizona law changed to assure this doesn’t happen to another frightened woman, whether on a lonely rural road or a dark urban street. Supporters also are trying to raise money for an appeal – if the felony conviction stands, Roberts’ life is ruined.

“I became a citizen in 2006, and the first thing I did was register to vote,” Roberts says. “Now I can’t vote again.”

The felony also means she likely can’t use the nursing degree she’s pursuing at Yavapai College.

Roberts could have avoided all this if she’d taken the two plea deals. If she’d just pled guilty – letting the sheriff’s office save face – the felonies would have gone away.

“But I did not want to plead guilty because I did nothing wrong,” she says.