During the public comment period that opens City Council meetings Tuesday, Paula Bell, a tall, imposing woman in her 40s, said she was naked behind the door at a little past 5 p.m. on Aug. 22, 2006 when four or five well-armed El Paso police officers pushed their way into the family’s Northeast El Paso home looking for her 19-year-old son who was wanted on an aggravated robbery charge.

At the same time, said her husband, an Army sergeant, officers had him on the ground in the back yard. Just back from Iraq, he said, he was nursing a combat injury and the resulting back surgery, and was still in uniform.

What the officers didn’t know and had not bothered to check was that Paula and Ricky Bell had turned their son over police on Aug. 19, three days earlier, and he was behind bars in the county detention center when the police came looking for him in the Bells’ house at 4621 Loma del Rey Circle.

Neither of the Bells was injured and the police left the residence after confirming that the son, Ricky Paul Bennett Bell, was already in custody.

But Paula Bell said she was so traumatized by the events that she left El Paso a month later, leaving her husband behind. He retired in December 2007 and the couple now lives in Austin.

They have hired El Paso attorneys Angelina Lugo and Sam Snoddy, who said they will a civil rights lawsuit against the Police Department and the city, probably in May.

Shaking and talking through her tears, Paula Bell told her story to City Council and an audience of more than 100 people in the allotted five minutes for public comment and was followed by her husband, who gave his account.

“I heard banging on the door and thought it was my husband who had locked himself outside,” Paula Bell began. “I looked in the peep hole, and I saw El Paso police department officers yelling, ‘Open this damn door now!’

“They never said anything about a warrant. I told them to please wait; I did not have any clothes on. I then saw that they were ready to hit down the door with a battering ram, so I opened the door a little so they could see that I was undressed.

“An officer immediately barged into my house carrying a shot gun and all officers ran in, too, behind. They never showed me any paperwork. I was undressed. I wasn’t even allowed to put on my robe. I could only cover my private parts.”

She said the officers repeatedly yelled at her, “Where is Ricky?” and told her the house had been under surveillance for four days.

She said she told the officers several times that her son was in jail.

“Sgt. (Victor) Bulos continued yelling at me and calling me a liar. I kept telling him, ‘Please call your jail. We took our son there ourselves.’

“He kept yelling at me to shut up. After about 10 minutes, one officer eventually said he confirmed that our son had been in jail for four days and had turned himself in. I looked over at the front door and saw neighbors and kids looking into my house while I stood there naked. I felt humiliated and degraded.

“I took a step towards the restroom and realized that I had urinated on myself. Another officer then brought me a small towel but it was too small to cover myself. Sgt. Bulos then told me you can change and put clothes on now. As I proceeded to go to the bathroom, four El Paso police officers stood there and watched me walk in my own house to put clothes on.”

Though the event lasted only about 15 minutes, she said it has had a lasting effect on her.

“As a result of this horrible day, I am now on depression pills, and I can’t sleep,” she said. “Until now, only now, am I able to stand up and tell others about what happened to me.

“I have been hurt by this situation. Before this happened, I volunteered in El Paso churches, I helped feed the homeless. I never deserved this. I did not do anything to create this issue. I pleaded numerous times to explain what was going on and all I was told was ‘Shut up.’

“I have never even as much as got a driver’s ticket. I do not understand how and why this is allowed to go on. As I landed today, I wanted to turn and get back on the plane and go back, but it’s time for me now to say, it’s not right, it’s not right.”

Ricky Bell, whose 24-year Army career ended at Fort Bliss, concluded his statement to the council saying Aug. 22, 2006 “was just a very dog day for the community of El Paso and a bad reflection on my life, my service in the United States Army serving this country, and nobody, no soldier, no person that follows orders and does the right thing for their country, and their community deserves this -- then, now and never. Thank you.”

Based on the Bells’ accounts, 2006, Sambrano said, the Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division and the chief’s office have opened an investigation.

What is known, he said, is that officers from the department’s tactical squad arrived in four cars with an arrest warrant for Ricky Paul Bennett Bell for allegedly taking part in the July 29, 2006 robbery at knife-point of Mr. Goldteeth at 4501 Hercules.

A grand jury indicted the younger Bell for aggravated robbery on Sept. 6, 2006 and he was released on bond a week later.

Now 21, he was given deferred adjudication and is now on probation in El Paso because he had no prior offenses and because of the peripheral role he played in the robbery, Lugo, the Bells’ lawyer, said.

“When he turned himself in, it was just as Mr. and Mrs. Bell said, on the 19th … at the Central Station,” Sambrano said. “What’s happening now is we’re trying to see what occurred. We’re pulling up the communications that took place on that particular call. We’re also going to be talking to the officers that were there, trying to see exactly what occurred.

“The only thing that seemed strange was they waited two years before making a complaint, because there wasn’t a complaint filed. It’s very important for the community to keep in mind that if there’s a question about contact with an officer, that information needs to come to our attention right away.”

Sambrano said the investigation is focusing on two issues: what occurred when the officers entered the Bell home and why they failed to check on whether the younger Bell was in custody.

“Definitely, all the information (the Bells) provided so far seems accurate)," Sambrano said.

Asked about police procedures for entering a home in light of the Bells’ account, Sambrano said arresting a suspect charged with a crime involving a deadly weapon is risky business and officers act accordingly.

“Anytime you execute a warrant involving a violent crime and a weapon, the officers executing it are going to be taking a lot of precautions,” he said. “They are going to be putting people down on the ground. They are going to be handcuffing individuals and, of course, ensuring that there’s not any person out there that can hurt anybody else. They’re going to have to ensure that everything’s is safe and controlled.

“It’s definitely going to be a situation where the officers are have got to be more forceful than they would for the execution of other types of warrants. We do strive to be professional, but there’s definitely situations or cases where certain ways of speaking may not work as well when addressing a violent felon.”

Asked why officers might have found it necessary to confront Paula Bell aggressively when she was unarmed and undressed, Sambrano said, “That’s what we’re looking into right now.”

Snoddy said there were several reasons why the Bells did not come forward with their complaints before now and why they went to City Council first.

“Here’s the problem, a lot of these things that occur, people never file a complaint because they’re intimidated by the police. They go unreported,” he said. “Mrs. Bell has not been able to muster up enough strength to come back and face these people until now.”

Snoddy, who has brought a number of lawsuits against the police department, said he wanted Paula Bell to go before City Council partly as a test of her own courage in preparation for the legal action to come.

“And, I wanted City Council to see how the police have treated live human beings,” he said. “Once the gauntlet has been thrown down and the suit is filed, the city attorney’s office will be filtering everything that goes to the council.”

West Central Rep. Susie Byrd said Paula Bell’s account got her attention.

“That was awful. That was really awful,” Byrd said. “From Mrs. Bell’s story about what happened to her, by anybody’s account, is really horrifying.

“The only thing that gave me any pause was the Sam Snoddy element and why they didn’t file a complaint about it immediately.

“That’s unacceptable conduct by police officers. … If it actually happened as she described, then some very strong action should have been taken, something should have happened to those officers to make sure it didn’t happen again.”

David Crowder can be reached at dcrowder@epmediagroup.com and (915) 351-0605