Ex-Coast deputy has been convicted of domestic violence twice. Why won’t he have a record?
When former Hancock County sheriff’s deputy Colin Freeman was found guilty of misdemeanor domestic violence in December, it was the second time he had gone before a judge for assaulting a woman.
Freeman’s first conviction occurred in 2015 — three years after he joined the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department in 2012, first working as an animal control officer before rising in the ranks to patrol deputy, then narcotics officer and K-9 handler, according to employment information obtained through a public records request.
Sheriff Ricky Adam said he did not know about the first domestic violence arrest and conviction when he hired Freeman, but internal records from the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department include notations about that arrest along with other alleged misdemeanor violations.
The sheriff, instead, said he had no way of knowing about the domestic violence conviction in Waveland because there was no official record of the previous conviction.
That’s because Waveland Judge P.J. Mauffray sentenced Freeman in the 2015 domestic assault case to non-adjudicated probation, with additional orders to pay a fine and attend anger management classes, according to court records obtained through a records request.
When a person receives a non-adjudicated sentence, there is no record of the crime once they complete the term of the sentence.
As a result, Adam said, Freeman’s former brethren at the Hancock County Sheriff’s Department had no way of knowing about the prior domestic assault when they wrestled him to the ground in August to arrest him in an unrelated domestic violence assault.
Two domestic assaults, but no record
In December, a second Coast judge, this time Hancock County Justice Court Judge Brian Necaise, sentenced 38-year-old Freeman to a second non-adjudicated sentence for domestic assault.
The judge followed the recommendation of Hancock County prosecuting attorney, Olen Anderson, placing him on probation for six months, with additional orders to pay a fine and attend a round of anger management classes.
Once Freeman completes the terms of the second sentence, he will once again walk away without a criminal record, paving the way for him to pursue any future career in law enforcement. However, his attorney, William “Bill” Covington, said in December that Freeman had no plans to do so.
Under federal law, anyone convicted of certain misdemeanor offenses, including domestic violence, and felony crimes, can no longer buy or possess a firearm.
But Mississippi does not have a state law to uphold the federal restriction, paving the way for most domestic violence offenders in misdemeanor cases to own and carry firearms after their convictions.
Freeman’s case is just one case involving misdemeanor domestic violence charges that resulted in two non-adjudicated sentences.
It’s unclear how many other domestic violence offenders receive non-adjudicated sentences for a misdemeanor or felony domestic violence charges because Mississippi does not track that information.
Anderson said he did not know about Freeman’s previous conviction because there was no record of it.
For some, it’s hard to believe no one knew about the previous arrest in Waveland because it’s one of only three cities in Hancock County and when something happens, the news usually travels fast between the residents and among law enforcement agencies.
Freeman’s arrest and subsequent conviction for domestic violence in Hancock County have raised questions among readers and even the prosecutor about why Hancock County authorities didn’t tack on additional charges against Freeman since deputies had to fight to take him into custody, among other things.
After his December conviction, Freeman reached out to the Sun Herald to complain about coverage of his domestic violence case, but never responded to repeated requests for comment about his previous domestic assault arrest and conviction in Waveland.
Assaulting a woman in Waveland
Waveland police first arrested Freeman on a misdemeanor domestic violence charge there on Feb. 18, 2015, after responding to a domestic violence call at a home in the city, according to court records.
When police officers got to the home around 3 p.m., the records say, the victim told authorities she and Freeman had gotten into an argument on their way home from picking up a license plate for his new pickup truck.
By the time Freeman pulled up in the driveway, the records say, the argument had intensified.
The assault happened when the woman went to remove a child in the truck with the couple at the time.
When she went to grab the child, the records say, Freeman, reached into the truck and “grabbed her and threw her to the ground.”
On the scene, Freeman admitted to police officers what he had done, but justified his actions by saying he threw the woman to the ground because she was ‘kicking my truck,” court records say.
By June 2015, Freeman had completed the terms of his sentence in that domestic violence case and was left with a clear record.
The Sun Herald obtained records in the first case after asking for a court abstract on the case since no criminal files remained on Freeman’s record. The city provided the court abstract of the charges and subsequent rulings.
That was the first case that resulted in orders for Freeman to attend anger management classes.
A second arrest for domestic violence
Freeman faced his second domestic violence arrest on Aug. 8 after Hancock County sheriff’s deputies responded to a 911 call about an assault at his home involving his then-girlfriend, who was an employee of the Sheriff’s Department at the time.
The sheriff placed Freeman on administrative leave after the arrest but he resigned after the Sun Herald started asking questions about the case. The arrest had gone unreported, likely because of a notation on the arrest report that read: “not for public release.”
According to the report, Freeman was drunk and angry when he assaulted the woman because he thought she had been cheating on him.
The report says Freeman saw text messages the woman had sent to a man, saying she loved him. She told deputies she had sent the texts to a friend and not a boyfriend, but said Freeman felt like he had just found proof of her cheating on him.
The woman said the assault happened when Freeman kicked in a bathroom door at the home, where she was bathing her two children, then ages 3 and 4.
During the assault, Freeman batted a phone out of the victim’s hand as she attempted to dial 911 for help and later “shoved her backward, forcing her to hit a corner of a countertop,” resulting in injuries, according to the report.
A short time after deputies arrived, Freeman resisted efforts by authorities who were trying to take him into custody.
A deputy pulled out a Taser at one point, but it was not used to detain Freeman. In the end, it would take three sheriff’s deputies to get him into custody.
After Freeman’s conviction, the Sun Herald asked for additional records about that assault, including a request for police body camera and dashcam footage from the scene.
In response, the Sun Herald learned there was no camera footage of deputies responding to the assault and their subsequent interaction with Freeman.
Adam said those who responded were mostly supervisors who do not carry body cameras, and they had no dash cams in their vehicles activated at the time.
Prosecutor recommends sentence
When it came time for Freeman’s plea in his second domestic violence case, prosecuting attorney Anderson recommended the non-adjudicated sentence.
The Sun Herald reached out to Anderson to find out why he would recommend a sentence that would result in no record of the crime on Freeman.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t know about the Waveland arrest,” Anderson said.
Mississippi has no central database that tracks domestic violence convictions in the state, though Anderson said he usually reaches out to domestic violence organizations such as Gulf Coast Women’s Center for Nonviolence to see if they have any conviction records on a domestic violence offender before sentencing them in a case.
The center tries to keep track of those convicted of domestic violence, Anderson said.
However, Anderson initially seemed to downplay the assault, describing it as ‘more of shoving incident,’ and said Freeman “didn’t show any aggression with the children.”
Anderson stood by his recommendation by saying he also follows the wishes of victims and said the victim in the Hancock County assault agreed to a non-adjudicated sentence.
“She didn’t want to be exposed and she was very concerned about that,” he said. “Unfortunately, like a lot of victims of domestic violence, she just wanted to move on. She didn’t want anything to do with him. Getting witnesses to testify puts a lot of pressure on them.”
“It put a lot of pressure on the victim, and she just wanted to move forward,” he said.
The Sun Herald spoke to the victim about Freeman’s sentence.
As for the non-adjudicated sentence, she said, “they told me it would be easier to do non-adjudication, but after that (the sentencing), they said we should’ve gone forward.”
This story was originally published February 1, 2022 at 2:22 PM.
