GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – A Green Bay man is scheduled to enter a plea Monday to charges he punched a teenage girl during a drunken rage.
44-year-old Jerald A. Cook is charged with child abuse/intentionally causing harm, false imprisonment, disorderly conduct and obstructing an officer. All counts have repeater enhancers.
According to the criminal complaint, Green Bay police were called to an apartment building in the 1600 block of Christiana Street on April 18 for a disturbance.
Dispatch notified officers that callers could overhear a female screaming, “Let me go!”
Officers entered the hallways and several residents said they heard a girl crying and screaming. A knock at the door was met with hard strike of the door and a man yelling obscenities.
The cops announced their wish that the man open the door, but he yelled obscenities again. Backup was requested and weapons were drawn because of the tense, yet unknown situation inside the apartment.
“I need you to open the door,” yelled one of the officers. “We are not going away, we need to make sure everyone inside is okay.”
Moments later, the door swung open but no one was in the doorway. The man was ordered to come out with his hands up, warning that he risked being bit by a K-9. After some rummaging heard inside the apartment, the man said something to the effect of, “I’m coming out.”
A man walked into the hallway with his hands at his side, only holding a cigarette. Officers yelled at the man to put his hands in the air, but he turned to glare at one of the cops, dropped his cigarette and said, “I’m not afraid of you.”
Once again the man was ordered to place his hands in the air, but the man said, “@#$% it,” and refused. He just continued to stare hard in the direction of that officer.
Given the situation, believing the man had assaulted someone based on numerous people telling him they heard, “Blood curdling screams yelling for someone to get off of them and crying,” he deployed a Taser to the man from about 8 feet away.
That allowed officers to place handcuffs on the man, and enter the apartment to verify no one else was inside.
Officer then attempted to locate the girl people heard screaming, and someone mentioned that she may have gone upstairs. Authorities went to an upstairs apartment where a female voice was heard whimpering in one of the apartments.
They knocked on the door, and inside was a little girl crying, her face red and very scared. She confirmed to officers that she was involved in the altercation downstairs.
An elderly woman occupied that apartment, and said the girl pounded on her door so she let her in. The woman indicated she didn’t know what happened, but told the victim she could stay there until her mom got home.
The girl told police that she wasn’t feeling well that morning and decided not to go to school. She says that the man they tased, identified as Jerald A. Cook, was intoxicated after having been drinking non-stop for the past 4 days.
Later in the day, the girl heard Cook verbally abuse her mom, reportedly slapping her once and calling her names.
Around 4 p.m., the girl’s mom left for work and she was sitting on the couch when Cook walked into the living room falling on top of her legs. She pushed Cook off of her and squirmed away from him.
As she began walking towards her bedroom, Cook quickly followed. The girl tried to get the radio in the bedroom to turn on music in hopes it would calm Cook down.
Cook appeared upset and overheard last evening that two of her mom’s friends tell him that if he continued to assault them (meaning the girl and her mom), “They would handle the problem.”
The girl tried to get to the phone to call her mom, when Cook took the phone away and punched her several times in the face and right arm. She tried to get out of the apartment, but Cook prevented that by blocking the door and pulling her hair.
Per the complaint, the girl was able to yell, cry and grab the door hard enough to pull it open to sneak out and run upstairs.
Officers took Cook to the hospital for his alcohol intoxication after he blew a 0.31 on a preliminary breath test and due to him getting tased.
Jerald A. Cook previously was convicted of disorderly conduct-domestic abuse in January 2014 and possession of THC-repeater this past January.
Cook is due in Brown County Circuit Court on Monday for his arraignment. If convicted of all charges, Cook faces about 20 years in prison.