Burnsville Woman Charged with Assaulting Police Officer

A Burnsville woman has been charged with assaulting a police officer and obstructing the legal process after an incident last week in which authorities say she tried to bite an officer and swore repeatedly at them as she was being arrested.

Chelsea Lee Switzer, 25, is also charged with disorderly conduct in connection with the July 28 incident.

According to the complaint, Burnsville police were called to an apartment on Chicago Avenue South that evening because Switzer’s ex-boyfriend said he needed help getting some of his belongings out of her home.

When police arrived, they found the ex-boyfriend, Switzer and Switzer’s husband arguing beside a U-Haul truck. The officer “observed the defendant screaming at [the ex-boyfriend] and causing a scene,” the complaint says.

Switzer’s husband told police that his wife’s ex-boyfriend had agreed to bring over items from his home which belonged to her husband, in exchange for picking up some of his belongings in the Switzers’ garage.

During the argument, police said, there were “multiple people” in the area, including children at a pool about 20 feet away.

An officer told Switzer “numerous times” to go back into her apartment while the exchange was going on, because her presence was causing problems and she was using profane and obscene language, the complaint says.

Switzer refused to go back inside and continued arguing with the officer and her ex-boyfriend, according to the complaint. An officer told her that if she didn’t stop swearing and causing a scene, she would be arrested for disorderly conduct.

Police told her ex-boyfriend to go home and get the items Switzer was asking for, and he left. Switzer went back into her apartment.

However, Switzer came back outside and began swearing and arguing with her husband about what would happen when her ex-boyfriend returned, the complaint says. The couple eventually went back inside.

Shortly afterward, Switzer’s husband came back out and told police that Switzer had shut the bedroom door and he could hear a pill bottle rattling and the sounds of swallowing. He told police that he thought she had swallowed a bottle of pills in a suicide attempt, and that she had tried to commit suicide in the past.

Officers went inside and used a key to try to open the apartment door, but Switzer stood behind it, blocking them from coming in, according to the complaint. When they forced the door open, Switzer said, “What the [expletive] do you want? Get out of my [expletive] house,” the complaint says.

Switzer then slammed the door and tried to keep it closed, but her husband got it open and let officers inside. When he began walking toward the bedroom, Switzer yelled and charged after him; police tried to get her to speak with them, but she ignored them and followed her husband, the complaint says.

Officers told Switzer that she was under arrest. When one of the officers put his hand on her arm, she pulled away from him and swung in his direction, refusing to put her hands behind her back. When officers put her on the bed and one tried to take her hand to put handcuffs on her, she tried to bite him, according to the complaint.

Once she was in handcuffs, Switzer stood up and became “extremely agitated, becoming red in the face and shaking with anger,” the complaint says. While officers tried to lead her outside to the squad car, she banged her head against the wall.

Paramedics were called and told Switzer that because of her hostility and lack of cooperation, she would be given a sedative. Officers held her down while the sedative was administered, and one of the officers helped paramedics get Switzer to a hospital.