A Royse City police officer has been placed on administrative leave after cellphone video showed the officer grabbing a woman by her hair, pulling her to the ground and restraining her during a chaotic arrest at a neighborhood pool. The confrontation unfolded on Monday at the Creekside neighborhood pool, where officers were dispatched around 6:30 p.m. to a reported disturbance, and it ended with two women, Janiaca Wheeler and Amaiyah Allen-Smith, in handcuffs.
Video of the arrest, which began circulating online days later, shows an officer pushing women away with his hand against their faces and striking one of them twice in the head, according to footage released by the Next Generation Action Network. As reported by The Dallas Morning News, up to five officers responded to the scene once the confrontation escalated. Wheeler said three of her children, ages 4, 6 and 10, witnessed the confrontation, and she told the paper she thought her daughter would get really hurt, which is why she intervened.
Wheeler said six of her dreadlocks were ripped from her head during the struggle, and Allen-Smith, who was also restrained on the ground, said the exchange became heated after an older couple confronted her, her sisters and friends after staring at them. Another woman present, Zoey Manning, said the encounter was mentally straining and traumatic, and told the paper she experienced neck and jaw soreness afterward.
What Sparked the Call to Police Remains Unclear
What actually happened before officers arrived is still murky. Witness accounts indicate the dispute began when an older couple confronted Wheeler's family while they were listening to music, prompting the couple to alert a pool attendant and call police, according to CBS News. That initial exchange was not captured on the viral video compilation, and the available footage does not show either the original dispute or the moment officers arrived at the pool.
The Royse City Police Department has not disclosed what led from the disturbance call to the arrests, nor has it released the initial charges against Wheeler and Allen-Smith. Those charges were dropped on Tuesday, the department said, pending a thorough examination of all charges filed against the two women. Police administrators learned that video of the encounter was circulating online that same day and opened an internal investigation.
Chief Cites Ongoing Review, Officer Not Named
Royse City Police Chief Kirk Aldridge announced the investigation in a statement, confirming the officer involved has been placed on administrative leave while the use-of-force review continues, per Blue Ribbon News. The department has not disclosed the name of the officer under investigation and says it will not comment further while the review is underway, though it has committed to releasing its findings and any resulting action once that review is completed. A police captain has said the internal review could take a couple of weeks.
Notably, the department's statement did not address the allegation that race played a role in the encounter. Wheeler and Allen-Smith have since filed a formal complaint accusing the officer of excessive force. Dominique Alexander, president and founder of the Next Generation Action Network, said police officials cooperated with the family as the two women filed that complaint, even as he called the video despicable and demanded the officer be fired.
Activists Invoke 2015 McKinney Pool Party
Alexander has also called the encounter an example of racial profiling, and the case has drawn immediate comparisons to the 2015 McKinney pool party confrontation, in which an officer forced Black teenager Dajerria Becton to the ground and pointed his handgun toward other teenagers. That officer resigned days after the 2015 incident, and the City of McKinney later paid a $184,850 federal civil rights settlement in 2018 to resolve excessive force claims brought on behalf of Becton and six other teens, according to the Associated Press. Alexander's organization, founded in Dallas in 2014, led major regional demonstrations following that McKinney case and has since spearheaded multiple police accountability campaigns across North Texas, including a July push for transparency in a Dallas County evidence-tampering case that Hoodline previously covered in a bridge-jump cover-up.
The Next Generation Action Network is now calling on the city to release body-camera footage from the pool encounter publicly and plans to submit an open-records request for the recordings. Under Texas public records law, however, police body-camera footage is not automatically subject to immediate release and can be withheld by agencies while internal or criminal investigations remain active, according to guidance published by the Teague Police Department. That legal framework, updated under a 2025 revision to the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, sets up a likely standoff between the department and activists demanding faster disclosure.
A Fast-Growing Suburb Grapples With the Fallout
The incident lands in a Royse City that looks very different than it did just a few years ago. The city's population has more than doubled since 2020 to an estimated 28,000 to 31,000 residents in 2026, making it one of the fastest-growing suburban communities along the Interstate 30 corridor, according to World Population Review. Census Bureau estimates put the city's population at roughly 59.1% White, 27.0% Hispanic and 9.7% Black, a demographic backdrop that has fed the allegations of racial profiling now surrounding the case. The Creekside subdivision where the pool sits is one of 17 master-planned developments managed by homeowners associations across the city.
For now, the internal review remains the central unresolved piece of the story. Charges against Wheeler and Allen-Smith have been dropped, but the officer's status, the department's eventual findings, and the fate of any public records request over body-camera video are all still pending. Royse City police has said it will disclose any resulting action only once that review is finished.
