Rep. Doug McLeod (pictured) of Mississippi was arrested in May 2019 for a misdemeanor domestic violence
Newly released bodycam footage shows the wife of Mississippi Rep. Doug McLeod walking out of their home with a bloody face after he punched her while intoxicated, authorities said.
They say the violent outburst between McLeod, 59, and Michele McLeod, 59, began because she did not undress quickly enough for sex.
Footage obtained by the Sun Herald show a distraught Michele standing with a deputy and explaining that ‘anything can trigger’ McLeod if he’s intoxicated.
She initially told authorities that McLeod ‘just snapped’ and that a friend called 911 after the scary ordeal began.
A deputy said Michele had blood on both her face and her hands.
Locale police officers first responded to the home after Michele’s friend, Magen Merrill, called 911 around 8.51pm on May 18, 2019, from the couple’s upstairs bedroom in Lucedale.
Merrill said: ‘My friend just got punched in the nose by her husband and her nose is bleeding.’
‘Like, he’s drunk right now and we need someone now because he’s got guns in here, too, so please hurry.’
Merrill would later testify that Michele had raced into the upstairs bedroom while covering her bloody face with her hands.
She said Michele claimed that McLeod had been drinking wine for hours and became physically violent because she was not prepared for sex quick enough.
The women then locked the bedroom door and called 911.
‘He’s freaking drunk. He just come running in. Please hurry,’ Merrill said, and is heard telling dispatchers to ‘please hurry’ five times.
She called dispatchers a second time to confirm that they are on their way because she’s afraid they could be shot with a firearm.
Authorities arrived to the Mississippi home of Michele McLeod (left) and Doug McLeod (right) after a family friend called about a domestic violence situation in May
Merrill told authorities that the couple did possess an undisclosed amount of firearms inside the home and was concerned what McLeod would do in his state.
‘He’s downstairs banging around, and I don’t want to get shot through the door,’ she said.
When deputies arrived to the scene, they encountered a drunk McLeod at the Bexely Road residence’s front door with a glass of wine.
Deputy Robert Karg confronts McLeod about the 911 call, to which the lawmaker replies ‘what are you talking about?’ and ‘are you kidding me?’
When McLeod re-enters his home, Karg tells dispatcher that the man is a ‘pretty severe 31’, police code for intoxicated, and can hear him yelling at someone inside the home.
Karg said: ‘He’s in there hollerin’ at somebody but I can’t see him…I can hear him beatin’ on a door or a window or something.’
At the time, deputies said McLeod was so drunk that his speech was slurred and he had trouble balancing.
Deputies say they first encountered an intoxicated McLeod (pictured) outside the couple’s home carrying a wine glass and slurring his speech
A dispatcher then calls Merrill to tell her that deputies are outside the residence and the pair are free to come downstairs. But the woman says McLeod is outside the bedroom door.
‘We can’t he’s at the door,’ Merrill said, sounding frightened.
Michele eventually agrees to come downstairs and out of the house to meet deputies ‘as long as they have [McLeod].’
‘Hold him, handcuff him so we can go downstairs,’ Merrill said.
A judge found McLeod (pictured) not guilty of domestic violence after Michele testified in her husbands defense
Once Michele exited the home, bodycam footage captures her hysterical crying and the evident fear in her voice.
She would later testify that she was also upset because she’s a private person and had to exit her home wearing her pajamas.
The Sun Herald reports that blood was visible around Michele’s nose, mouth and was on her hands. At that time, the bleeding from her nose had stopped.
‘She took a pretty hard hit to the nose. I don’t believe anything is broken, but I want to get her checked out anyway,’ Karg tells a dispatcher.
Michele tells authorities that McLeod was drunk and that he becomes angry when he’s had too much alcohol.
She said: ‘Anything can trigger him to get like that. He lost it. He gets like that when he drinks too much.’
One of the things she mentions is that McLeod believes she spends too much time working.
After deputies escort the women back inside the home, they discover blood stains in the upstairs bedroom where the incident is said to have occurred. Spots were found on the master bed and the floor.
They also saw a wine bottle on the counter in a separate room.
Deputies said they found blood inside the McLeod’s bedroom floor and on the couple’s bed
A wine bottle sitting on the McLeod’s counter can be seen on police bodycam footage captured from that night
McLeod was soon arrested and transported to a local jail.
Karg warns his colleagues that McLeod is on his way ‘in case y’all need to make different arrangements for him cell-wise.’
Following the violent incident, Judge Bullock found McLeod not guilty of domestic violence after Michele testified in her husband’s defense.
Michele said that her husband was in a ‘state of delirium’ because he mixed wine with Ibuprofen.
She testified that she was changing into yoga pants when her husband called her name, prompting her to lose her balance and her face accidentally hitting one of McLeod’s limbs.
‘I was never assaulted. My husband has not hit anyone in the 40 years that I have known him,’ she said in court.
Although Bullock admitted that an instance like that could occur, evidence and 911 calls from that night point towards Michele being in afraid.
‘Mrs. McLeod was in fear of Mr. McLeod. She was in fear of him,’ Bullock said.
Magen Merrill (pictured), a friend of Michele, was inside the home at the time of the incident and called 911 twice
Several lawmakers pushed for McLeod to resign from his leadership position over George and Stone counties – a position he’d held since 2012.
However, McLeod proceeded to compete in the local election in August 2019 and won, allowing him to maintain his position.
House Speaker Philip Gunn, who urged McLeod to step down, has limited his power by only appointing him one of 33 sears in the House Ways and Means Committee.
Gunn did not appoint him to any other committee or delegate him to a leadership role.
‘As you know, I have called on him more than once to resign,’ Gunn told Sun Herald.
‘When this happened, I notified him then that this all was out and you need to consider resigning. You need to go deal with your family.’
Even now, Gunn said that McLeod’s actions cast a bad reflection on Mississippi’s government operations.
The married lawmaker has three kids and runs a car tire company in Lucedale, Mississippi, has represented George and Stone counties since 2012 and is running unopposed for re-election this year
‘This whole episode was a bad reflection on him, his family and on his capacity as a legislator, and that reflects upon the entire state of Mississippi,’ he said. ‘That’s why we take it seriously.’
Because of the outcome of the criminal case, there’s nothing Gunn can do about expelling McLeod from participating in local politics.
Gunn said: ‘Well, he didn’t violate the House rules. There is nothing in the constitution he violated, so that only leaves the third option which is a violation of a statute, which is what he was accused of.
‘The legal staff has pointed out to me the rules as they currently exist just do not provide an avenue upon which to act.
‘I don’t know if it’s ever been contemplated that a situation like this would happen.’
McLeod is currently married with three children and at one time owned McLeod Tire Company.