Man charged after allegedly resisting arrest, providing false information

IDAHO FALLS — A 21-year-old Dubois man was charged after he allegedly resisted arrest and provided false information to an officer.

Eriberto Hernandez-Figueroa was originally charged with a felony for bribery of municipal or county officers and two misdemeanors for resisting or obstructing arrest and providing false information about his identity to officers.

According to court documents, the felony count of bribery was later dismissed by a motion from the prosecutor.

According to the affidavit of probable cause filed by the Idaho Falls Police Department, on Aug. 6 at 8:40 p.m., an officer was dispatched to Canyon Avenue.

Dispatchers were told that the reporting party was approached by a man that they didn’t know, who was later identified as Hernandez-Figueroa. He was complaining about having chest pain and said he was hit with a baseball bat. According to documents, he was going in and out of consciousness.

Emergency responders came to the scene and helped Hernandez-Figueroa, who identified himself as “Eddy.”

“Eddy was complaining of pain on the left side of his torso but was either too intoxicated to tell me how it happened or didn’t care to tell me,” the officer wrote in a police report.

Hernandez-Figueroa was transported to a local hospital for medical care.

One man on the scene told the officer that Eddy didn’t want EMS to be contacted because he had an active warrant. After the officer investigated, he found that Bonneville County had a warrant for Hernandez-Figueroa for failure to appear in court in a robbery case. The officer went to the local hospital to talk to Hernandez-Figueroa.

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At the hospital, Hernandez-Figueroa was speaking with another officer and he had identified himself by a different name. According to documents, Hernandez-Figueroa had given information that did not match any records.

After Hernandez-Figueroa was cleared by hospital staff, a sergeant advised that Hernandez-Figueroa was known to resist arrest and flee. Hernandez-Figueroa was placed in handcuffs.

He was then taken to a patrol vehicle. He told the officer that he left his phone in the hospital room but officers said he never had a phone with him.

“I opened the door to the backseat of my vehicle, and Eriberto suddenly and violently jerked away from me. I had a grip on his right arm with my left hand and utilized the grip to spin Eriberto to the ground,” the officer wrote.

Multiple officers came to assist. They ordered Hernandez-Figueroa several times to get into the vehicle but he would tense up and push away while claiming he was trying to get into the vehicle, documents said. He was then threatened with a taser by an officer and he finally complied and sat in the backseat of the patrol vehicle.

“After a moment, he began to scream and bang his head around the inside of the backseat cage,” the report said.

An officer tried to stop him. Finally, another officer began driving toward the jail with Hernandez-Figueroa in the backseat.

“I had to abruptly stop my vehicle due to Eriberto slamming his head around the inside of the cage trying to break the window,” he wrote.

Hernandez-Figueroa was again threatened with a taser and that’s when he promised he would comply.

According to documents, during the rest of the ride to jail, Hernandez-Figueroa continued to slam his head, slip the handcuffs from behind his back to his front and attempt to kick out the window.

“Eriberto offered me money, saying, ‘I’ll pay you whatever, how much you need me to…’ and I quickly shut his offer down. I do not accept bribery from anyone for any reason,” an officer said in the report.

When the officer arrived at the jail, Hernandez-Figueroa was removed from the backseat and again tried to pull away from the officer. Jail staff then took over.

He was given a $100,000 bond.

RELATED: Man flees from Idaho State Trooper, gets caught later with help from sheriff’s office

This is not Hernandez-Figueroa’s first time in trouble with the law. Back in March, he allegedly fled from an Idaho State Trooper and was later caught with help from a sheriff’s office. He has several other active cases filed against him.