A New Haven police officer who once trained fellow cops on the proper use of force has been charged with assaulting a woman he handcuffed outside a downtown bar a year ago. Officer Evan Kelly, 47, turned himself in to Connecticut State Police on Thursday on a warrant accusing him of third-degree assault, stemming from an Oct. 18, 2025 arrest outside Elm City Social.
According to courant.com, Kelly punched a 33-year-old handcuffed woman in the head twice during the arrest, which occurred at around 1:14 a.m. outside the restaurant, as detailed by newhavenindependent.org. Kelly told investigators he believed the woman was reaching for pepper spray on his duty belt as he moved to place her in his cruiser, and he said he struck her in the head twice before getting her inside the vehicle, per the warrant affidavit cited by courant.com.
Per Daily Voice, Kelly had responded to Elm City Social after the woman reportedly refused to leave, with police describing her as intoxicated and belligerent. A struggle followed as Kelly walked her toward his cruiser, the outlet reports, and that struggle is when the punches occurred. The woman was taken to Yale New Haven Hospital afterward, according to nbcconnecticut.com.
Supervisors Flag the Force as Excessive
Two New Haven police supervisors who are themselves excessive-force instructors reviewed Kelly's body-camera footage and incident reports and concluded that his use of force was excessive, the same courant.com report states. Those findings eventually led the department to send its case to both the Connecticut State's Attorney and the Connecticut State Police, per Daily Voice. Department policy, approved in 2021, limits officers to force that is reasonable, necessary, and proportionate to the threat they face, the station notes.
The woman, for her part, did not walk away unscathed legally. She was arrested and charged with second-degree breach of peace, second-degree criminal mischief, third-degree assault, first-degree criminal trespass and interfering with an officer, courant.com reports.
A Decade on the Force, Then Administrative Leave
Kelly had been a New Haven police officer for 10 years and was serving as a use-of-force instructor at the time of the arrest, according to newhavenindependent.org's reporting. New Haven Police Chief David Zannelli placed him on paid administrative leave in January, months before Thursday's arrest, the outlet notes. The department's internal affairs investigation into Kelly's conduct was paused while state investigators did their own review, and it is expected to resume now that the criminal case has moved forward, per the same account.
Department leaders have said they plan to take appropriate disciplinary action once the internal investigation wraps up, Daily Voice reports, though officials have not specified what that punishment might look like. Kelly was released on a written promise to appear and is scheduled to appear in New Haven Superior Court on Nov. 3 at 9 a.m., according to newhavenindependent.org.
Use-of-Force Numbers Have Dropped Citywide
The case lands amid a broader shift in how often New Haven officers report using force at all. New Haven police logged 164 use-of-force incidents in the first eight months of 2026, down from 342 during the same stretch of 2025 — roughly half the prior year's total and what the department described as a five-year low, per newhavenindependent.org's separate reporting. Controlled strikes with hands or feet made up the bulk of those incidents, totaling 107 so far this year, while officers reported displaying a firearm 34 times without any reported firearm discharge, the outlet notes.
The department points to de-escalation training it began rolling out in 2021, including ICAT tactics, alongside its policy requiring force to be used only when necessary rather than whenever it might be legally justifiable. Kelly's case now stands as a test of how that same department handles an instructor accused of violating the standard he was once tasked with teaching.
