A Vermont dad was seen on camera swinging an excavator erratically close to two state troopers who were detaining his son for breaking and entering.
Brandon Tallman, 24, was wrestled with by troopers Gabe Schrauf and Skylar Velasquez before being thrown to the ground during the arrest outside a residence in Hardwick, Vermont, on June 14.
The 48-year-old mother of Brandon then entered the brawl before becoming one of the arrestees.
As the officers fought to handcuff the mother and son, a large, red excavator could be seen driving at them from the driveway.
The heavy metal shovel of the excavator, whose driver, according to authorities, was Brandon Tallman’s father Wayne Tallman, 52, approaches the crowd.
When the officers saw the machinery, one pulled a revolver and avoided the shovel of the apparatus while the other restrained Amy and Brandon on the ground. The incident caused no injuries, and all the Tallmans were taken into custody.
Wayne was accused with aggravated assault on a protected individual, hindering the course of justice, resisting arrest, and reckless endangerment. Amy received a citation for obstructing an officer, while 24-year-old Brandon Tallman was detained on suspicion of aggravated assault and burglary.
On June 14, officers went to a home in Hardwick, Vermont, to make an arrest for Brandon in relation to an earlier incident.
Captain Matt Daley of the Vermont State Police said that if they had been told, “Sir, turn around, put your hands around your back, you’re under arrest for an assault,” they might have driven off.
Instead, Brandon’s parents made frantic attempts to halt the cops’ detention of their son.
A police SUV was seen parked in the driveway of the property on a video filmed from the dashboard of a state trooper squad car, with an excavator’s red arm looming in the distance.
Then, as Brandon’s mother follows after and grabs hold of the officers as they struggle with him down the driveway, officers Schrauf and Velasquez are visible.
The excavator arm can be seen lurching to life in the backdrop and advancing toward the altercation as the officers wrestle Amy and Brandon to the ground.
Wayne pulls up in the excavator as Schrauf rushes back and pulls a gun from his belt as Wayne raises the machine’s powerful arm and shovel into the air.
Wayne can be heard speaking to Schrauf, who appears to be telling him to drop the shovel or exit the excavator as Velasquez holds Brandon and Amy to the ground.
From the cab of the machine, Wayne can be seen arguing with the officers as he continues to approach them.
Wayne quickly raises and lowers the shovel towards the officers before pitching it against the squad car’s roof. While Schrauf sidesteps and points his gun at Wayne, Velasquez ducks to avoid the hit.
As Wayne swings the shovel back over the squad car, the video is shut off.
Schrauf and Valesquez received praise from Daley for their actions during the arrest.
You were put in a risky scenario, but you managed to influence the arrest, and you two were able to return home that evening. We went there with that objective in mind, he said.
The academy where we train for this scenario doesn’t have one.