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Ex-St. Louis Police Officer Gets Two Weekends in Jail, Probation for Covering Up Beating
Former St. Louis police officer Bailey Colletta, who lied to cover up the beating of an undercover detective, was sentenced today to time behind bars — two weekends. She was also sentenced to three years of probation.
On Sept. 17, 2017, Colletta, 28, was assigned to the department's Civil Disobedience Team, or "riot police," tasked with quelling protests following the acquittal of a white ex-police officer in the killing of a Black drug suspect. That night, as protests slowed, she was part of a group that ran into Detective Luther Hall, who was working undercover.
Mistaking Hall for a protester, officers beat him savagely, even as he complied with Colletta's commands to get on the ground, prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney's Office said.
Colletta didn't take part in the beating, but she lied to investigators and a grand jury, claiming Hall's arrest had been textbook and that he was taken to the ground "very gently." One of the officers she was protecting was her boyfriend, Randy Hays. He was sentenced earlier this week to 52 months in prison after admitting he clubbed Hall with a baton during the attack.
Another former officer, Dustin Boone, was found guilty last month for his role in the beating. It was the second trial for Boone and co-defendant Christopher Myers after an earlier trial resulted in a hung jury. In the second trial, jurors once again couldn't decide whether Myers had smashed Hall's phone, as prosecutors had alleged.
Prosecutors had said Colletta was "least culpable" of the officers involved in assaulting Hall. She pleaded guilty in 2019.
More than 120 people were arrested the same night as Hall, leading to dozens of similar complaints of police abuse. No charges have been filed in response to any of those complaints.
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