Police reports reveal new details after Taunton crossing guard arrested twice in one day

TAUNTON — Police reports reveal new details about both incidents after a former Taunton Public Schools crossing guard was arrested twice in one day for allegedly assaulting people.

Former Taunton school crossing guard Louis Freitas Chaves was first charged with assaulting occupants of a vehicle outside Taunton High School on the morning of Monday, June 3 while he was on duty.

Then he was was arrested a second time after allegedly losing his cool with TV news crews after he was arraigned in Taunton District Court in connection with the first incident.

Chaves is due back in court for a pretrial hearing on Aug. 8.

What we learned about the first incident

Chaves, 68, was fired from his part-time job by the Taunton Public School District after an early morning incident Monday involving a city woman driving with her children in her van.

The 35-year-old city woman was allegedly assaulted by Chaves – after she sneezed and stopped her vehicle in the middle of an intersection on the school grounds of the combined campus of Taunton High School and John F. Parker Middle School at 50 Williams St.

Taunton police School Resource Officer Joshua DeOliveira, in his report, states that when he arrived on scene shortly after 7:30 a.m. he found the woman sitting in her van “visibly shaking” and “hysterically crying.”

According to DeOliveira, she was yelling: “He (expletive) beat me with the stop sign stick!”

The woman reportedly stated she had stopped her van after sneezing because she needed a tissue to “blow her nose real quick.”

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At that point, Chaves allegedly walked up to the front, passenger side window and yelled at her to keep driving. The woman, in turn, allegedly yelled back that he (Chaves) was out of line for yelling at her “in front of my kids.”

Chaves allegedly tried to strike the woman with his stop sign stick by sticking it through the open, passenger side window, while also allegedly using expletives and telling her she needed to get out of there.

Instead of making contact with the woman, the stick portion of the stop sign allegedly struck the arm of her front-passenger-seat daughter. The girl later reportedly told DeOliveira she wasn’t injured and managed to grab the sign and push it out of the window.

The altercation quickly accelerated when the woman said she exited her vehicle to confront Chaves, who she says then “attacked” her with the stop sign stick.

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The woman told DeOliveira she ended up on the ground in the middle of the intersection and that Chaves “dragged” and “repeatedly” kicked her after she landed on the pavement.

DeOliveira, in his report, said the woman, who was taken by ambulance to Morton Hospital for examination, had “multiple abrasions and lacerations on her arms.”

Police said she called her boyfriend who arrived on scene to drive the children home in the van.

Chaves was arrested and charged with three counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, two for using the stop sign stick as a weapon and one for using what is referred to in legal terms as a shod foot.

He was arraigned in court and released after posting a bail of $250.

Second arrest of the day

What followed next outside the courthouse, in terms of Chaves’ alleged assault on the two TV news media members, was phase two of his troubles with the law that day.

Chaves was arrested for a second time in one day after being caught on camera Monday afternoon outside the courthouse delivering a light kick and a couple of slaps to two cameramen from competing news outlets.

The victims, who police said were not injured, were accompanying reporters from one Providence and three Boston TV newsrooms hoping to get an on-air comment from the former crossing guard.

In addition to his slapping and kicking outburst, an agitated Chaves at one point can also be seen on video picking up a small tree branch and tossing it in the general direction of the news crews.

A woman, identified by police as his wife, grabs Chaves by the shirt and in one video clip can be heard saying, “Louie, stop!”

Police decided to arrest Chaves at his home that night after they said they watched “various news stations videos” at police headquarters showing an enraged Chaves “lunging” at a Boston 25 News cameraman.

Police said the videos also showed Chaves slapping a shoulder-mounted camera being held by a member of the WPRI-TV news crew from Providence. The camera, police said, was not damaged.

Chaves was arrested at his home Monday night at around 9:45 p.m.

He was taken to the police station where he was booked and charged with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon (a shod foot); assault with a dangerous weapon (stick/branch); and simple assault and battery.

It’s not clear if he was kept overnight or was bailed out before appearing in court the following morning.

During his arraignment Tuesday morning, Judge Paul McCallum denied the request of the commonwealth to revoke Chaves’ previous bail of $250.

Chaves reportedly did not cause a disturbance either during or after his second arraignment.

Chaves, according to trial court records, was cited in 2012 and 2017 for the civil offense of failure to stop or yield at either a stop sign or red light. In both cases the charges were disposed of and he was found “not responsible.”

He also was included in a 2023 Taunton Daily Gazette story highlighting persistent traffic congestion around the high school and middle school campus site.

Chaves, in the story, noted that it’s not uncommon for weekday traffic to stretch all the way from Dean Street/Route 44 past the school property after classes let out.

“It would be nice if (city officials) would do a traffic survey about this area,” he was quoted as saying.

This article originally appeared on The Enterprise: Police reports reveal details about Taunton crossing guard incidents