PORTAGE, Ind. (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Battery charges have been filed against a man described as drunk and combative who’s alleged to have coughed on a Portage, Indiana police officer, claiming he has COVID-19.
The man identified by police as 30-year-old Yohinnest Herrod was alleged to have been causing a drunken disturbance at a hotel in Portage, Indiana to the point where police were called.
Police were called late Sunday night to the Country Inn and Suites hotel, located at 1630 Olmsted Dr. in Portage, for a drunken man who would not leave. There police learned that Herrod had been asked to leave a hotel room by another man, because he was being loud and a child was present.
According to a police report, another man refused to give Herrod his car keys, because he was drunk and they got into an argument near the elevators – prompting a hotel staffer to ask Herrod to leave, but he refused.
At the scene, the report said Herrod constantly raised his voice, cursed, and was generally aggressive to officers. Alcohol was detectable on his breath.
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Police apprehended Herrod and placed him in the back of a police vehicle to take him to the Porter County Jail.
Herrod was in the back of a police squad car, handcuffed, according to the police report, when he got out of his seatbelt and tried to get out of the car. The report said he told an officer "I have COVID. You have to release me" and started "dramatically" coughing.
It is alleged Herrod leaned over the front seat and coughed in the officer's face.
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According to the report, the officer swatted him away; and before they got to the jail, Herrod forced himself to throw up all over the floor in the back of the police car.
Once at the jail, Herrod refused a COVID test.
Herrod was accused of battery to law enforcement, resisting law enforcement, and public intoxication.