Tarrant sheriff’s employee involved in ‘aggressive’ pool confrontation, report says
Fort Worth police are investigating a confrontation in May where an off-duty Tarrant County sheriff’s deputy allegedly tried to use his position to avoid culpability after being approached by an apartment manager while drinking at a pool, according to a police report.
Chief Henry Reyes was found at the pool of Parkside So7 Apartments on May 17 with another older man and five young women, according to the police report. Reyes’ age wasn’t listed in the report.
Reyes couldn’t be reached for comment Wednesday, and the manager of the apartment complex didn’t return a message left for her.
The confrontation began around 5 p.m. when a resident of the complex and a manager were walking to the pool. When they noticed the group, the manager asked the group to leave so the space could be safely shared due to capacity limits that were in place because of COVID-19, the police report said.
The report says the group became loud, aggressive and unruly.
“They had already been drinking and there were broken alcohol bottles in the pool area,” according to the report.
The report says, “They became extremely aggressive to the point of threatening the female manager.”
Then, the resident told police, a man got out of the pool and was “highly intoxicated and started calling him and the manager a racist and using other offensive language toward them both,” according to the report.
That man identified himself by a specific rank and said he was a law enforcement officer and yelled, “I’m a sheriff here, I’m a (expletive) cop, I can do whatever I want, you can’t touch me,” according to the report.
He made a fist and raised his arm at the resident, who later told police that he felt threatened by the man, who was identified as Henry Reyes of the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office, according to police.
In the written report, Reyes was identified as “Officer Ruiz,” but Fort Worth police said the manager of the apartment complex later clarified that she found out his name was Henry Reyes.
Police said in the days and weeks following the incident, they tried multiple times to contact the resident, who is listed in the report as a victim. However, the person has not responded to phone calls and letters asking for more information, so the case is still listed as pending.
The name of the person listed as a suspect is redacted in the report provided to the Star-Telegram.
Sheriff’s Lt. Jennifer Gabbert said police told her that Reyes was not listed as the suspect, but the unredacted narrative of the event doesn’t mention anyone else.
“Fort Worth advised me their report does not list Chief Reyes as a suspect in the incident and that they have not confirmed much of what you have mentioned in your email,” Gabbert said in an emailed response to questions from the Star-Telegram. “Their case is still open, so any statement regarding the details would have to come from them.”
Gabbert said there is no open internal affairs case involving Reyes.
This story was originally published July 23, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
